Worth it

Swim

There was one reason Ronaldo hated going to the pool.

Well, actually two reasons, one of them being an embarrassing moment in childhood where he had his trunks pulled down when some kid snuck up behind him from underwater while he was wading in the shallow end.

The second reason was he couldn't actually swim. He preferred to stay in the shallow end of pools, or even more preferred, out of the water completely.

At the beginning of the summer, while the Big Donut was under renovation, Lars had been looking for a new job (at his parents' insistence), and since he was still banned from the video game store (in what Lars would only call 'The Pretzel Incident'), and the other stores, including Ronaldo's own business, were covered, he was willing to apply for anything within reason. When the pool mentioned they needed a lifeguard, Lars applied, and was then told he would have to take a test, to see how fast he could swim, and to prove he had CPR training.

All during that first week of summer, Ronaldo was dragged by Lars, with a stopwatch, to help the teen practice for his test at the end of the week. Ronaldo had a feeling Lars was just doing this to show off, especially since he knew better than anyone that Lars was a great swimmer, having gone to the pool most every day as a child in the summertime, and would still sporadically go nowadays. Not to mention his decency at surfing when the waves were big enough at the beach. Regardless, Lars insisted he needed to practice his swimming for sake of job security, and in his words 'to work out and keep my buff figure'.

By the second day of practice, Ronaldo was more than certain Lars was doing this to show off, because after every ten laps or so in the athletic pool, Lars would peek to see if any attractive women were around, hop out of the pool with a towel, and attempt to flirt by bragging about how he was training to be a lifeguard and totally save lives. The girls would usually show only partial interest, then leave, and Lars would continue the cycle, hoping he'd woo somebody.

Ronaldo kept track of his friend's swimming time, watching as he raced through the water, slapping his hand on the edge once he reached it, then using his foot to flip around and go back the other way. If Ronaldo remembered correctly by watching that one swimming anime 'Unchained!', the sort of swimming style Lars was using to propel himself off the pool walls was based off of otters. When Lars had gotten out of the pool for a break, Ronaldo had actually told him that, and Lars responded by telling him that he swam like a fat doomed baby seal. Ronaldo nearly whacked him with a pool noodle.

By the third day, Ronaldo didn't see much point in timing Lars anymore, he was getting faster as far as he could tell. At one point that afternoon, when Lars complained that Ronaldo wasn't using his stopwatch, Ronaldo decided to mess with him, and make up time records, some being faster and some being slower. When Lars caught on, he threatened to pull Ronaldo's shorts down, and was promptly pushed into the pool.

Day four, Ronaldo gave up timing Lars, and being tired of seeing his friend show off his swimming and brag to girls, decided to take an inflatable chair into the lazy river, and doze for the next three hours. He got horribly sunburned, and Lars teased him all while he sprayed him with aloe mist.

On the fifth day, Ronaldo had refused to go to the pool, and Lars begged, insisting he needed emotional support for his test later that afternoon, and at least wanted a swim buddy for the morning. Ronaldo was about to accept until Lars then called him 'Lobster Fries', and he promptly slammed the door. It took thirty four minutes of incessant whining outside his door for him to change his mind, but he insisted he was not getting anywhere near the water, and would be under a towel on a pool chair the entire time.

True, settling on that activity for the whole day wasn't proving to be very fun, but at least he was mostly safe from the sun, and completely dry. Even as Lars coaxed for him to come into the water to swim with him, he insisted he was fine steam-roasting on the chair. He decided he would then pretend not to hear anything when Lars called him a chicken. If his friend wanted to continue showing off his swimming, he was welcome to it, but there was no way he was getting in the water.