"No, no, I'll do it. I'll just be witheringly judgmental if you make me dive nude or something."

"Oh, that's nowhere near anything I'd considered, but also I don't actually have a good forfeit in mind that I'd be willing to actually ask for so maybe that'd do." Deep breath. "Yeah okay give me like thirty seconds and I'm good."

"Thirty seconds regretting giving you ideas, got it."

"Yup." And he counts to thirty because even though he's feeling mostly fine by fifteen he wants to give himself some more proper breathing and he also wants to draw Edmund's suffering out, but then: "Alright, ready. Who's going to be the referee and why is it going to be Lucy?"

"Susan!" Edmund calls in lieu of response.

"What's happening?" she asks once she draws near.

"Racing! Five laps! Forfeit for the loser! Judge us?"

"Constantly, and especially right now. Forfeits?"

"It was his idea!"

"It was absolutely my idea," he says shamelessly. Then he lowers and adjusts his swimming goggles again, turns his back to the edge of the pool with his right foot resting against the wall and both hands behind him holding the edge and says, "Ready."

"Oh, fine." Susan hops to sit on the edge.

"Lucy's scorn would be worse," Edmund explains as he takes his position.

"Stop gossiping, three two one and go."

The pool is semiolympic so if Pete's going absolutely no holds barred, full speed, for all five laps—which he is, five laps with no breaks is pushing his explosive endurance but not by that much—then he can do one lap in about forty-fiveish seconds, on average, the first one closer to forty and the last one closer to fifty.

Edmund is a good swimmer. His form is a bit better than Pete's, since he's had the same body for - well, not his whole life, but at least a few years, and he was in it the whole time it was changing. He paces himself well, too; his laps are clustered tighter around the mark. However, the mark in his case is closer to fifty seconds for each lap; he's fit, but he doesn't have a Hollow Leg.

Thus, he pulls up next to Pete after about twenty seconds, not quite gasping but certainly panting.

"Christ," he comments.

"Victory to Pete," Susan says drily. "Really neck-and-neck, there."

Pete had in fact been gasping when he finished his own laps twenty seconds ago, but now he is just panting. Still not, however, fit to speak full sentences. "Really needed," breathe, "that," breathe, "referee there," breathe. He's lowered his goggles down to his neck again.

"I'm bad on sprints!" That was several words it's panting time again.

"Yes, I know. You also know that."

"What you're," pant, "saying," breathe, "is that he," pant pant, "wanted to lose?"

"Well, not out loud I wasn't. But yes, he could at least have negotiated a contest that would have put him on a better footing."

Wordless V-salute.

Pete thinks about saying something but then he decides that actually what he is going to do is pull himself off the pool so that he can then lie down on the floor along the edge of the pool and rest there without having to use any of his breathing to stay afloat.

Ed does the same, weighing his options and eventually, irritably, putting his head in Susan's lap.

She smooths his hair. "There, there. Was your big sister mean to you."