"Yeah."
We built the rate from twenty-two to twenty-six. The boat responded—faster, but not better. Like pushing a car that was out of gas. More effort, same emptiness.
From the coaching launch thirty meters to our port side, I could hear the low idle of the engine. Hale was driving. Eldridge beside him. Neither had said anything through the megaphone in the last fifteen minutes, and from Hale that silence was worse than any correction he could give.
Remy was in the launch today. I caught a glimpse of him when we turned at the bridge—sitting behind the coaches, watching. His face unreadable from this distance, but I knew what he was seeing. The same thing the footage would show later: two rowers going through the motions, making the right shapes, producing nothing.
Later, we did a race-pace piece. Five hundred meters. My lungs burned and my quads screamed and at the finish I was gasping—head between my knees, oar handles resting on my thighs. Our split was five seconds off what we'd posted a week ago.
Five seconds. In a five-hundred-meter piece. That wasn't a bad day. That was a broken boat.
Liam didn't say anything. Just sat there. Breathing. Staring at the water off the stern.
We paddled back to the dock in silence.
Racking the oars. Wiping down the shell. The post-practice routine I could do with my eyes closed. Liam was on the other side of the hull, toweling the rigger bolts. We moved around each other with the careful precision of two people who knew exactly where the other was and were determined not to get closer.
The boathouse was emptying out. Tyler and a few of the Riverside guys headed for the showers. Derek was talking toMason by the erg room. The usual post-practice noise—voices, lockers, the clang of oar handles being sorted into racks.
I hung my oars and turned toward the hallway that led to the upper level. Eldridge was there. Leaning against the doorframe. Arms crossed. He'd changed out of his launch jacket into the charcoal quarter-zip he wore to meetings—the one that meant he was about to be Coach Eldridge, not river Eldridge.
"Harrington. A moment."
Not a question.
I followed him down the hall. He didn't go to his office—stopped in the corridor between the trophy cases, which was somehow worse. His office was formal. The hallway was casual. Casual meant this wasn't a meeting. It was a correction delivered as a favor.
"I won't keep you," he said. Hands in his pockets. The river visible through the window behind him, flat and grey. "That piece today was concerning."
"Yes, sir."
"I've watched you row for years. I know what you're capable of. What I saw out there wasn't capability. It was compliance."
The word landed precisely where he intended.
"There's a difference between rowing and going through the motions," Eldridge continued. "Your blade work was technically sound. Your drives were adequate. Your connection to Moore was nonexistent." He paused. "A double with no connection isn't a crew. It's two people in a boat."
I didn't respond. There was nothing to say that wouldn't make it worse.
"The Charles is nine days out. Scouts. Media. This program's reputation." He looked at me. The look that carried thirty years of coaching and a lifetime of friendship with my father. "I don't know what's happening between you and Moore. I don't want to know. But the water doesn't lie, Alex. Whatever it is—resolve it."
"Yes, sir."
"One more thing." He uncrossed his arms. "I had a call this morning from a journalist at New England Rowing Magazine. They'd like to profile the double. The joint program. It's excellent visibility—for the program, for both schools. Interview and photo shoot, probably Thursday at the boathouse."
My stomach dropped.
"I've already spoken with Hale. He's on board. I'll send you the details."
"Okay."
He studied me for a moment. Whatever he saw, he kept to himself.
"Get some rest, Alex. You look tired."
He walked toward his office. The door closed behind him.
It was the kindest thing Eldridge ever said to me. I stood in the hallway between the trophy cases. The afternoon light catching the glass, the engraved silver, the decades of Kingswell excellence displayed in rows. Somewhere in there was my father's name. Somewhere in there was the weight I'd been carrying since I was old enough to hold an oar.
