The water made everything better. He was not a good swimmer, but the thrashing helped, and he spent longer and longer with each lap just gliding underwater. It washed over him, calmed him, brought him back to where he had been in the car, coming to the residency. Perhaps it was the oxygen depletion. Perhaps his rangy body had finally gotten the exercise it needed, especially in light of his enforced celibacy. Perhaps, only, he had exhausted himself to the point where his anxieties had fallen away. [False. He should have known a gift when he saw one.] But when he came to the end of the pool,
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