Almost Impossible

  The guy didn’t pause to think about it. He simply stepped out of line with a nod and a “No problem.” He was already moving to the slide station Janet had gestured at before she had a chance to exhale her temporary relief.

  “Janet!” I called to her before she hustled off.

  She jerked to a stop, glancing back. “Everything going okay here?” she asked, sounding doubtful, like she was waiting for me to walk out on her.

  “Yeah. Great,” I said. “That guy who you were talking to. The lifeguard.” I nodded in his general direction. “Who is he?”

  Janet almost smiled. I wasn’t sure if it was relief I wasn’t quitting or if it had something to do with the guy. “That’s Quentin.”

  When she tried leaving again, I continued, “Does he work here, you know, all the time? Or is he just here helping for the day?” I didn’t realize I’d crossed my fingers until I reached out to take the money from the next kid in line.

  “He works here,” she said with a little laugh, like that should have been obvious. “He’s the head lifeguard.”

  My fingers uncrossed as I slumped forward on the counter. Of course he was.

  Janet hustled away. Before I had a minute to fully appreciate just how much luck was messing with me, the door burst open and in flew a ball of dark hair and accessories.

  “Sorry I’m late. Thirty-year-old cars and scorching-hot weather don’t play well together.” The girl hung her colorful tote on the side of the chip rack, raking at her disheveled hair before wrestling it into a high bun.

  I must have been staring because she paused in the middle of her bun-making. “I’m Zoey, one of your fellow purgatory residents.” Her eyes scanned the inside of the stand.

  “Hey. I’m Jade.”

  “You could be a serial killer and I’d still be happy to meet you, Jade.”

  “Thanks?”

  She spit her gum into the garbage can. “We were desperate for another concession employee.”

  “Glad it all worked out.”

  She paused, giving me a solid once-over. “You’re not really a serial killer, though, are you?”

  I fought a smile as I motioned to the next person in line. “Um, no.”

  Zoey was digging through her tote, looking more frustrated with every shovel of her hand. “Great. Awesome. I forgot my phone at home again. That’s twice this week.” Her collection of bracelets was jingling as she searched another second before giving up.

  When I noticed the chipped black nail polish, matched with the forgetfulness and upfront approach, I couldn’t help smiling. Add another fifteen years to her and a more edgy look and I’d have a Meg Abbott clone as a coworker.

  “You can use mine if you need to make any calls. I don’t mind.” I freed my phone from my back pocket, setting it on the back counter.

  “Really?”

  “Of course.”

  “Nice, too?” Zoey appraised me with warm eyes as she adjusted a clutter of necklaces that had gotten tangled. “We’re going to be good friends, Jade. I can already tell.”

  She was wearing a pair of scuffed-up motorcycle boots. In the dead of summer. She wouldn’t have been the only one—Mom lived in boots in the summer. “I can, too,” I said.

  The hours that followed passed exactly like the hours before. Scooping buckets of ice cream, shaking out wrist cramps, exchanging money, and biting my tongue when the only part of the English vocabulary these pool piranhas didn’t know was please and thank you. Having Zoey there made a huge difference, though. She whipped around that stand at warp speed, jingling and jangling as she went.

  There was only one way the past few hours were different—him. I couldn’t not notice him. The harder I tried, the worse it became, until I eventually gave up and didn’t berate myself for glancing in his direction every couple of minutes. He seemed entirely different from the person I’d exchanged “words” with yesterday. Serious, focused, and not a hint of amusement settling into his expression. He was more adult than boy out there on the pool deck, more parental than the parents relaxing in the loungers around him.

  He took his job seriously, which I supposed was a good thing since, you know, people’s lives were at stake. Compared to the other lifeguards, who were your typical teenage guys counting down the minutes until their shifts were over, he had something else going on. And he barely seemed to notice the flock of girls who magically congregated in his general vicinity. I didn’t miss the way some of the moms were checking him out, either.

  Right as I was about to take an order, I heard another whistle blow, but this one wasn’t like the others I’d been hearing all day. This one was loud and sharp, getting every last person’s attention in the pool area, from the young mom with Beats tucked over her ears to Janet, who was on a call in the office.

  My eyes jumped to where I’d heard the sound, right in time to notice Quentin dive into the water like his life was on the line. Or someone’s life was on the line.

  The other guards at their posts started waving the rest of the swimmers out of the pool as Janet came bursting from the office. Zoey flew up beside me at the counter, shoving her red sunglasses on top of her head.

  Everything got really quiet right then. I craned my neck to see what was going on, and that was when Quentin emerged on the surface with another head in front of him. It looked like a little boy, but it was hard to tell from here. Suddenly, a shriek pierced the silence as a mom went streaking toward the end of the pool.

  One of the other guards grabbed the kid to pull him from the water once Quentin made it to the edge. Quentin leaped out a half second after, kneeling to check on the boy, who was coughing a little but standing and breathing.

  My heart was thumping out of control. I couldn’t imagine how Quentin must have felt or the poor kid’s mother. The boy looked like he’d had the poop scared out of him, but he was okay. No CPR or ambulances or—God, I hadn’t really considered this yet—coroners needed.

  Quentin was talking to the boy, checking him over as the mother inspected her son with anxious eyes like she was half-expecting to find a limb missing.

  Leaning in, Quentin said something to the kid before raising his hand in the air. The boy answered with a high five before being guided away by his mom, who was talking with Janet. The lifeguard beside Quentin then pulled him over, pointing to his sunglasses now sunk at the bottom of the pool.

  I couldn’t help but stare as Quentin dove back into the water to retrieve them.

  “And I thought I was hot before watching that.” Zoey fanned her face with her hand, not blinking as she stared at Quentin.

  “That was…,” I started.

  “Insanely sexy?”

  “Heroic. That’s more what I was going for.”

  “Yeah, but insanely sexy works, too, right?” Zoey nudged me, giving me a knowing smile before getting back to opening a giant can of cheese sauce.

  I was still staring at the spot where Quentin had disappeared into the water. The next kid in line started waving his cash at me, but I kept watching the pool.

  When Quentin’s head broke above the surface this time, he was looking in this direction. Well, actually, he was looking in my direction. It didn’t matter that I had sunglasses on; he knew I was staring at him. And he made it clear that he was staring at me.

  A slow smile lifted into place, one side higher than the other, and then he winked.

  He winked.

  What in the world was I supposed to do with that after yesterday?

  A wink.

  I wasn’t sure if that was his way of making peace or declaring war, but I knew that either way, this boy would be a battle every step of the way.

  He was hanging around after his shift and I wasn’t sure why. He’d left his post on the deck at four, and when I guessed he was ready to peel out of the parking lot as fast as he could, he c
ame meandering back, moving down a long line of empty loungers until he settled on what must have been exactly the right one.

  I tried not to give much thought to why that happened to be the one directly across from the concession stand. Or why it felt like he’d lift his head every once in a while and glance at me through the cover of his sunglasses while I returned the look through the cover of mine.

  And I definitely tried not to notice the way he stretched out on that lounger, too, with his long legs dangling off the end of the too-small chair, his skin seeming to tan before my eyes, and how his stupid shorts that clearly needed to have the elastic replaced wouldn’t stop inching down lower whenever he moved.

  For all I knew, he had no other plans than working on his tan and relaxing after a long shift, but as the time kept ticking by, I guessed his intentions had something to do with screwing with my head as well.

  Mission accomplished.

  Around five, there were only a few stragglers left in the pool, and the concession line had finally come to an end. Zoey had taken off a few minutes earlier, so I used that time to start cleaning up, but it didn’t take long before that was done and I wasn’t sure what to do. So I stood there, leaning into the counter, trying to ignore a boy who would not be forgotten.

  When he finally did get up from the lounger a little while before closing, I could feel my lungs deflate with relief. Talk about awkward tension. One day down, and surely we wouldn’t be working all the same shifts this summer.

  Trouble, trouble, trouble, I started to sing to myself again. T-R-O-U-B-L-E.

  Trouble, trouble. “Trouble.” I didn’t know I’d said it out loud until I noticed the look on his face change.

  My hand shot over my mouth, like I was trying to take it back.

  “Just one of my many nicknames,” he said, already recovered. “But Quentin was the name I was given at birth, you know, before I went and created all of those nicknames for myself.” That tipped smile went back into place, but he wasn’t wearing sunglasses anymore. Nope. This time he was looking at me. Through me.

  I kept my own glasses firmly in place.

  “Let me guess, another one is Self-Absorbed? Delusional? Narcissistic?” Maybe I should have clamped my hand over my mouth again, but I’d never been big on censorship—of myself especially.

  “You can add Crabby When Sleep-Deprived, Prone to Idiocy When Woken Up by a Pretty Girl, and Not Above Apologizing When I Was an Asshole.”

  His speech struck me silent. At least for a few seconds. “You accused me of gawking at you.”

  “How would you respond if you woke up to find some guy staring…looking at you inside your car?”

  I reached for a towel to wipe the counter, needing a distraction. “I wouldn’t have reacted like that. I wouldn’t have accused someone of gawking at me. I’m not that in love with myself.”

  His smile held as he leaned into the counter. I slid down to the other end of it to clean. “What would you have done, then?”

  My shoulder lifted. “I probably would have called him a creeper or something, before whipping out my can of pepper spray.”

  That made him laugh. “That is so much better than what I went with.”

  I had to bite my lip to keep from smiling, because he had a point. There wasn’t really any best way to react to waking up to find a stranger peeking in your car window.

  “Of course, the natural response to that was to accuse her of checking you out, because what red-blooded girl wouldn’t want to check you out while you were snoring, drooling, and sweating inside your truck?” I said, playing along.

  “Glad we got that cleared up.” He folded his arms as he leaned farther across the counter. I wished he’d put a shirt on, already.

  “I’m not sure if we cleared up anything or made it more confusing, but sure.” I glanced at the clock on the wall. Fifteen minutes to go. I’d have to find something else to clean because if I kept wiping at this same patch of counter, I was going to rub a dent in it. “But since we kind of work together, maybe we should forget about it and move on?”

  “I like the way you think. Let’s have a do-over.” Gliding down the counter, he stuck his hand toward me. “Hi, I’m Quentin. I lifeguard here and frequently spend my breaks inside of my truck, sleeping.”

  I hesitated a moment too long to shake his hand. His smile shifted into a smirk. “Hey. I’m—”

  “Jade.” He lifted his chin. “I asked Janet.”

  “Oh.”

  My hand dropped back at my side. “Are you going to let me finish my end of the introduction?” I waited. He drew a zipper across his lips. “Hi, I’m Jade,” I started again. “I just started working here as a concession employee, and if I actually got a break today, I could tell you what I prefer to do on mine.”

  “You didn’t get a break today?”

  “Unless you count that two minutes I chugged a bottle of water, then no, I didn’t get a break.”

  “Yeah, the concession positions are the worst. Never enough people to work them. Can’t keep anyone longer than a few weeks. If you’d asked me first, I would have told you to run away. Fast.”

  “I was too busy running away from you.”

  He made an O shape with his mouth, giving a mini wince. His expression cleared a half second later. “Hey, next time give me a shout and we’ll coordinate our breaks. I’ll cover concessions on one of my fifteens so you can at least get a few minutes to eat or whatever.”

  “Or catch up on my sleep?”

  He nodded once, his eyes flashing. “Or that.” The thought of food made my stomach grumble. Loud enough he could hear it. His brows lifted, like another of his points was being proven. “Really, I mean it. I know my way around the concession stand.”

  I wasn’t sure what to think of him offering to use one of his breaks to give me one of my own. I wasn’t sure what to think of this whole interaction. Yesterday I couldn’t get away from him fast enough, but today I was being drawn in by more than his nice-to-look-at exterior.

  Which kind of made me wish yesterday back, because I wasn’t looking to get mixed up in anything of a romantic nature this summer. Especially with a boy like this one—I’d always been into the brooding artist types, never the hot jock types. Not to mention, if there was one thing Mom had pounded into me, it was not getting serious with a guy until I reached senior citizen status. Still had a few more years to go.

  He hit me with another of those smiles. Everything south of my neck felt like it was melting as I reconsidered my position on those hot jock types.

  “So, now that I think I’ve properly apologized and we’ve had a better second first meeting, can I give you my order? I’m starving.” He rolled his fingers across the counter, scooting in front of the cash register.

  While he pulled some money from his shorts, I worked on issuing myself a reality check. This boy wasn’t here to flirt—he was here to get some food.

  It was official: I was an idiot.

  “Oh. Yeah. Of course,” I said, like that was the natural reason he’d be here talking to me right now. “What would you like?”

  Quentin’s eyes narrowed, like he had to give this some serious consideration. “I’ll have a hot dog with everything on it. Make that two hot dogs with everything. An order of nachos with extra cheese. A bag of Doritos, a large Mountain Dew.” His head bobbed side to side as he studied the menu. “And a triple scoop in a bowl. Yeah, that should be good. I don’t want to ruin my dinner.”

  “Is that all?” I blinked at him, sure he was messing with me.

  “Now that you mention it, throw in a licorice rope, too.” Dead. Serious.

  I shook my head as I started to make the hot dogs. “What flavors of ice cream?”

  “Can I get two scoops of rocky road in one dish, and a to-go dish with a scoop of strawberry?” He waited, like he wasn’t sur
e if I was going to agree. If he thought his request was outrageous, he had no idea what type of day I’d had.

  “No problem. Your dessert after dinner?” I guessed as I moved on to loading up the nachos with a pool of cheese.

  “Nah. I’m saving it for someone who’s under the impression strawberry ice cream is the best thing ever.”

  I nodded, assuming he was referring to a girlfriend. Taken. Another cautionary word to beat into my brain before I started gawking at his lickable abs again.

  “I probably should not be telling you this, since, you know, playing it cool is so much more the ‘thing to do,’ but I’ve never been very good at following the crowd.” He rolled his neck, like he was pumping himself up for something. “I’ve kind of been hanging around all afternoon waiting for you to come say hey and make the next move.”

  The bag of Doritos I’d grabbed from the chip rack tumbled from my hand. “The next move?”

  “You know, since I made the first. I thought it was your turn.” He had no problem staring straight at me as he admitted all of this, which would be kind of endearing and refreshing if it wasn’t so bewildering. “Instead, I made the first move, and now the second. Totally playing it cool over here.”

  When I was kneeling down to retrieve the Doritos, I felt safe enough to reply. Since I was able to think now that I wasn’t looking at him. “What was the first move?”

  He tapped the top of his head where a pair of sunglasses were settled. Then he pointed at the ones on the top of mine.

  My stomach lurched. “You left these? You wrote the note?”

  He gave me a funny look. “Of course I did. Who did you think it was?”

  “I don’t know. Someone else?”

  “Someone else here who owed you an apology? How many cars did you stare into yesterday?” His gaze swept across the almost-empty pool area.

  “One!” I laughed. “Well, thank you. That was…” I struggled for the right word, sure the one I’d arrived at couldn’t be right.