Angels

The Surf Shop

"Help me set up the sim yeah?" Josh said, unlocking the sim hut, I looked back at the girls waiting to start the class. This class didn't have parents watching them the whole way through. "Sure, do you want help at the shop afterwards?" The whole beach was almost dedicated to our surf club. The shop was yet another hut, selling wetsuits and surf boards, sometimes I helped out there too. One day I hoped I would be high up and possibly own part of the surf club, I was pretty sure that I was a shoe in for that job. "Urm yeah if you want... For no extra pay though. But you'll have to work alongside Jed, if that's okay?" Jed was Josh's younger brother, he was nice enough, but didn't surf himself so didn't know much and relied on other people alot. He was much much younger than Josh, 10 years actually, so that made him 11. And whiny, there was always something, too hot, too cold, thirsty, hungry, tired, the worst thing was when he was excited, he wouldn't stop talking. And lucky for me, it was nearly his birthday so he'd be all full of that. "Okay, he can work out back while I work with customers, it's better that way." Josh smiled and pulled the cover off of the maiin body of the sim. "I agree, customers don't trust and 11-year-old non-surfer." I pulled the cover off of the screen then I pulled open the fuse box and switched on the lights and sound system. "It's all set to go." I smiled at Josh. We walked out, it was almost a shock to the system after being in the sim, because it was so dark in there then when you walk out into broad sunlight. Josh suddenly stopped, almost tripping me behind him, turned around and pointed to fingers at me. "What are you doing tomorrow night, I meant to ask you?" All the girls were looking very impatient, half an hour of their lesson had been in their view wasted on getting ready and they were paying for the whole hour and a half and didn't want to spend anymore time waiting around, so I carried on walking. "Nothing I don't think. Why?" Josh followed by walking beside me. "It's the annual surf club barbercue and I needed more people, you're invited obviously, but I need more! Invite who you can, friends family. Strangers, hand out flyers. At the moment there's only 100+ last year we had 300+, so while I'm showing half the class the sim will you tell the others, it would be a real help." He picked up the small A5 printed flyers as we walked past the surf shop, it seemed like at the moment I was spending my entire life at the beach. I didn't mind it much though, as it was summer, it was hot and other people were out. I took the flyers from his hand, it said "South beach surf club beach barbecue. Sunday 15th July." Josh looked down at them proudly, he had obviously made them, the way he admired them said it all. "You broke up on Friday right?" He said, then looked at me "right?" He said again, after I didn't answer, I was reading the flyer, trying to make sense of his incorrect grammar, it read 'come see our amazing anually barbecue on the beach. There'll be awrds ceremony.Food and surfing shows and demonstratiob. It's on July 25th, this Sunday! Come along and see us there!' (Any spelling errors you see were actually printed on the flyer. I copied it word for word.) "Huh? O-oh yeah, we broke up Friday. We had a half day." I laid my surfboard down next to Ellie's, she smiled at me and stepped onto her board. "You ever surfed before?" I asked, she shook her head, her hair was now slightly tamed into a big puff sticking out the back of her head. "Nope, this is my first time." I smiled and pointed to Josh. "Well this is the best place in the region to learn, Josh is an amazing teacher." She nodded, she didn't care, I could tell, she just stared at me and smiled. "Sounds great." She said and started twiddling a little stray bit of hair around her finger. I nodded and started chewing my lip, one of those things you know you shouldn't do because it's going to hurt later on. Josh stood in front of us all and took a deep breath in. "Who knows what the sim is?" He said, the girls started mumbling to eachother and shrugging. They clearly didn't know what the sim was, but wanted to make a fuss. If there's one thing I knew about girls is that most of them are very fussy fusspots. "Alright, quiet!!" Josh shouted, he hadn't taught many classes with girls this age before, he wasn't prepared for the amount of talking and giggling. I knew because of school. "That's the sim." He pointed to the dark hut standing alone. "It is a simulator. Now, you'll all get a go in it, but first I'll take a group of you into it, and the others will stay with Beau here. Now, can I have the girls with surnames A-M come with me first." Just over half of the girls went with Josh the other half stayed with me. Ellie went with Josh, but Georgia was with me since her last name was Taylor. "So, Josh has asked me to hand out some invites to you, it's a barbecue tomorrow night, and you all get one since you are sort of part of the surf club." One girl looked at me through dagger eyes, snatched the flyer out of my hand and took her gum out to chew. "What do you mean sort of? I've been at this club for 7 years, I only was forced to stop cause your dumb friend decided to stop our age group cause not enough people were paying." I reeled backk, I was slightly scared of this girl. "Urm, yeah, what's your name?" She put her gum back in, chewed it for a couple of seconds then carried on talking after taking it out again. "What's it to ya?" I was losing my patience with this girl. "I just asked a simple question and I was trying to be polite and you have to-" Georgia pushed me away. "Matilda- Her name is Matilda Gray." I sighed, stared her in the eyes and said reluctantly. "Well I hope we'll be seeing you tomorrow night, Matilda." She smirked at me, then scrunched up the flyer and through it away. "Hey," I said sternly. "Pick that up." She looked around to her equally disgusting friends and shook her head. "Just pick that up with no trouble." She walked over to where she through it, picked it up and started lolloping over to the bin. I worked my way along the line of girls and got to Georgia. "You coming then?" I raised my eyebrows. She stared at the flyer for a while. "Well I'll have to see, are you gonna be there?" The whole class  dissolved into whispers and hushed giggles. "Quiet down please. Shh!" I called out. Then looked at Georgia. "I'll be doing kids cocktails." I grinned and tugged at the top of my wetsuit. "Wearing a tux." She giggled. Then suddenly went so serious. "Well then, I will consider the invitation. If I can get the words in the right order by tomorrow." I laughed, I agreed, Josh wasn't the english grammar whiz around here, Georgia was the last on the row, I looked over to the sim. Josh was ushering the last person in, he was almost done. "So." I said, trying to start a conversation. "Who's gonna go first in the sim then? It's pretty wild in there." I said with a smile on my face. Four experienced girls put their hands up. "Anyone who hasn't been in it before?" I looked at Georgia, putting slight pressure on her. "Georgia?" She sighed, and put her hand up, acting reluctant, but she was really, she was smiling! "Georgia, yes you can go in first!" She laughed as the other group came back. Josh slapped me gently on the arm in a friendly kind of way. "You take these guys to the sim, tell them all the safety and everything yeah?" I nodded and slapped him back, we all walked over to the sim.