I glare at him as I pass, and it only makes him laugh harder.
I don’t realize Maddy isn’t alone until I hear the pool door click closed behind me. Her friend Holly is sitting in one of the lounge chairs, a book propped up on her thigh with one hand, the other knuckle deep in a bag of Doritos. She looks up at the sound of the door, staring at me for a few seconds before her lips give way to a lopsided smirk.
“Hey, Maddy,” she says, pulling a chip from the bag. She points it at me, then glances to her friend who has just stopped on the opposite wall to catch her breath. “You’ve got company.”
There’s a long exchange between the two of them, and I’m starting to feel like I was the subject of some high-school-style bet.
“I can come out later to get my work in. I didn’t know you were here,” I lie. I hover at the edge of the deck by the chairs, not really wanting to leave, when I feel her friend kick me with her toe, against my leg.
“You’re welcome out here, Will. I’m the one she wants to leave,” her friend says, shooting Maddy a glare.
“It’s because you keep calling me a pussy!” Maddy shouts.
My lip tugs up, and I laugh quietly, looking down at my feet before moving my eyes to Holly. She shrugs.
“She’s right. I do,” she says, looking back to her friend and cupping her mouth to make her voice come out even louder…as if that’s possible. “Because you’re acting like one!”
I can’t hear Maddy sigh, but I can tell by her shoulders and the way they rise and fall while she holds on to the pool’s edge that she is.
“You know she doesn’t like it when people underestimate her,” I say to her friend, laying my towel on a nearby table and kicking off my slide shoes.
“Just trying to bring out her best,” Holly says, holding her half-eaten bag of chips out for me. I shake my head no and rub my sore abs.
“Trying to bring out my best,” I laugh.
Her mouth curls as she shrugs, and her eyes narrow, her expression shifting to flirtatious. “Yeah, well…it’s working for ya,” she says, eyebrows waggling.
I thought I was too old to blush, but Maddy’s friend may just be the female equivalent of the stereotypical construction worker, and I feel pretty damn objectified.
“All righty,” I say, eyes wide as I stretch my goggles in my hands and turn my attention to the pool. Maddy’s soon approaching my side of the pool and is about to touch the wall, so I step quicker, kneeling by the edge to force her to look at me on her touch. She slows when she notices me, her eyes masked by her tinted goggles, hair tucked under her cap. My brother used to say that all swimmers look the same when you gear us up, but Maddy doesn’t look like anyone else at all—even masked and ready to compete. Her cheekbones are always a little higher, her lips a little pinker, and I’d recognize her form even under the deepest waters. She’s perfection.
“I thought maybe we could sprint together. I know it’s always easier for me when there’s someone in the lane next to me,” I say. I could not possibly be more transparent, and I hear her friend breathe out a laugh behind me. The more seconds that tick by without Maddy’s response, the more see-through I become.
And by sprints being easy, I mean I just want to be near you because I literally cannot get your taste out of my mouth.
I start to stand, but before I make up an excuse to leave, Maddy gives me a slight nod.
“Cool,” I nod back.
She swims a few slow laps while I stretch and warm up, and when I twist to the side, I notice her friend Holly is now chewing on her pen cap, her legs folded in the chair while she stares at me. I wonder if Maddy told her about yesterday?
I do my best to ignore her, but every time I glance her direction, I’m met with her eyes, and a wry grin that she flashes, like I’ve been caught.
“You, Evan and Maddy…you guys were close?” she finally says after locking eyes a dozen more times.
“We were,” I answer quickly, turning the opposite way and stretching an arm that is already limber and loose just to avoid looking at her more.
“Was it always Evan and Maddy, or did you and her…ya know…like, date or anything?”
My head cocks and my mouth hangs open, my stomach tightening as I think of the best way to deflect this, when Maddy steps in before I have to.
“Will is two years older than me, Holly. It would have been weird,” she says.
Weird. I nod to agree with her, but as I get in the pool, I stay under water for a few extra seconds just to mouth the word to myself. Weird. I guess she didn’t say gross, so weird is better, but I never really thought of the idea of a me and her as weird. Two years when I was a senior and she was a sophomore would have been difficult, yeah, but…no…a me and her has always been far from weird.
When I resurface, I hear the middle of her friend’s response.