A 90's Friday Night Lights meets Fifty Shades, only the town is the sadomasochist and the two young lovers their pawns.
July Elizabeth Edwards is stuck in the existence her pretentious, rural East Texas town has allotted her. A shift in social statu...
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I smiled as the pool manager handed me my guard shirt and first week's schedule. It was a crowded room. There were more of us this year than last, and a lot of faces I didn't recognize.
I felt a few eyes on me earlier when Cleta introduced her veteran guards to the rookies and three incredibly tall college guys I had never seen before. Cleta was a tough boss, but we liked that about her. She ran the pool with an iron fist; the stricter she was, the more fun we had in our off time.
She had a wild streak and never shorted us on well-earned play. Cleta worked for the Prairie City dispatch and thus had easy access to her guards in our free time, should we be up to any unsavory shenanigans. She owned us during the summer, but again, the perks made up for it.
I knew Lane was there. When I pulled up, his car was already in the parking lot. In my state, I honestly don't know if I saw him or even bothered to glance at him before we ended up standing side by side for the introductions. Sitting there in such a thick haze was so strange. Just hours before, the anticipation of this meeting alone had me bouncing off the walls and ready to arrive an hour early. I was glad my mood had altered. Sitting through the meeting like a sane person, calm and almost mellow, felt good. Those were two looks I had never successfully sported.
I felt Lane's stare as if he was trying to get my attention when we all separated into groups to sign up for the first month of pool parties. I was in such a fog that I noticed too late and walked right past him. It was odd. I felt a little like the comradery he and I had relied on in the lion's den was no longer necessary or the pecking order had somehow switched. He was an outsider high school guy trying to maintain his second-year lifeguard status among the big dogs, and I was... dare I say, one of them?
I was fresh bait with status and the college guys were curious about who I was. Is that all it took to have the upper hand? Look great, keep your mouth shut, and people start noticing. Ridiculous. It was Pure Pines made over, and I couldn't care less that doing nothing could potentially make me one of the ones who mattered.
A clipboard was shoved in my face, and Cleta's niece, Stacy snapped me out of my daze. "Blue or red this year?"
I looked down at the checklist of an order formtitled Women's Guard Suits.
