The Lifeguard

Chapter 5: November 9th part 1

I walked in for my shift at Waterpark. As soon as I stepped onto pool deck, I saw an unbelievable number of customers in the centre. It was ridiculous. It was an uncountable number that would reach over 1000 people easy. How on earth was this suppose to work?

For the first time since I had started lifeguarding I cried on the inside. There was just too many customers. Hundreds of kids running around and to top it all off. Loretta Mchonda was working. I walked over to the staff room with my mouth open.

 I had to push my way forward, zigzagging my way around people. It felt as though I was stuck in a labyrinth filled with people. I was dreading what the slide must be like today. As I turn to look, I see the line leading outside the venue. It was an hour wait or more for the people at the end of the line.

 It was also very hot and humid in the centre. As I was about to enter the staff room someone taped me on the back. It was Harry.

"Welcome to summer, Roo-kie" Harry had a grin on his face as he went to slide duty. 

I don't know anyone in their right mind happy to go to the slide on a day like this. That man just went there blissfully as more people continued to enter the centre.

There was over 20 guards on pool deck at one stage. Sarah who I have worked a few shifts with stayed at the first aid station for a good hour. I saw that she responded to over a dozen incidents, one that just kept popping up after another. 

A few incidents happened on my watch which included a person who slipped and broke his tooth. Blood poured all over the floor and I sent them to Sarah. Another Kid slipped and started to scream in pain as I sent them all over to Sarah. It got to the point where I was just sending customers after customers to Sarah.

It was absolute chaos. It was so bad that the Opa! Man was screaming Opa! And no one was replying. I couldn't even hear him. All I could see was a man moving his lips from the water. I mean this guy has dedicated followers that scream Opa daily. What has the world come to when an Opa! Man has lost his ability to be heard. 

Brian Anton Jacobs Zignar Jr came in and got told off for distracting the guards. That's all I saw of him which was good. It was a busy day I didn't want to have to deal with him. Surprisingly Len Davis didn't come today. Which was extremely strange. 

The whole time I was guarding, I saw Harry gazing at me smiling. He looked very happy moving rafts from side to side on slide duty. Loretta looked frustrated and angry. Like a raging bull running from one side of the pool responding to the next incident. 

I continued to do my job well and scanned the pool. At that moment me and Tom where guarding the 50 meter pool when a small boy smashed his face on the floor. He had been running and slipped. Blood was coming out of his nose. 

The boy got up and looked fine but when he noticed the blood he started to cry uncontrollably. I got Tom to cover me and I took the boy over to first aid. Sarah was busy with another incident so it was time for me to get into the action and commence first aid.

"It's going to be all right mate" I said to the boy who just continued to cry.

I was trying to ask him where his Mum was but he just continued to cry. I put him down on the first aid chair. It was very noisy I couldn't really hear that well. I noticed that the boy was also bleeding from the leg. He seemed to have grazed it when he fell on his face. 

I took everything in. I first tilted his head forward and got some tissues to cover his nose. There was a lot of blood coming out. Gloves, shit!. I quickly went to get gloves and continued. By that time his Mum comes over.

"What happened? Honey are you all right, you are going to be all right" the mum said. Just what I wanted, a drama queen. 

"His all right, just a scratch. I'll be putting antiseptic on that bruise" As I said that the boy started crying and pushed the antiseptic away.

 I needed to disinfect the bruise. Then Loretta Mchonda come over. 

"What are you doing Levi? Move aside" Loretta said as she shoved me to the side. 

She then grabbed the antiseptic off me and poured it over the bruise. This time the kid started screaming so loud people started to stop and stare at us.

 "Levi what are you doing huh? Start getting the incident report filled out" Loretta said. 

I started to panic I didn't know where the forms where kept and took a few minutes of opening and closing draws. 

"Stop it Levi, just go back over to the 50 meter pool and do something useful" Loretta grunted

"But-"I said to which I was brutally cut of.

"LEVI. DON'T QUESTION IT!! JUST DON'T QUESTION IT" Loretta said very quickly as she went to go get the incident report which was not at the first aid station.

 The boy had calmed down now. 

"See mate it's all good now. Have a good day guys" I said as I went back over to the 50 meter pool. 

The next two hours went so slow. It was like time had stopped at Waterpark and accidents kept happening. 

While I was on the splash park a family nearly ended in a punch on with another family over their kid spraying water into the other family's son's eyes. Yep over that! 

It ended with Loretta getting shoved and then the cops came, to sort out the dispute. 

The family's where both banned from the centre.