Match Your Weakness With A Name

Get Out, Nineteen!

AUTHOR'S NOTE: Double update because why not?

*****

Things are back to normal the next day at work.

It's surreal. After what I said to Awsten, I expect the world to somehow be different, yet it's the same. He's still watching Otto swim, Jenna's still sorting papers, Derek's still scrubbing floors, and I'm still watching kids break rules.

A particularly enthusiastic kid is putting his own swim trunks into the filter gates when Derek comes in. He stands by the door to the office for a good twenty minutes, looking like he's waiting for someone. And the someone is Ryan, who enters the pool deck in skinny jeans and leads Derek into the office.

Okay, I'm a little curious.

Hesitantly, in case the kid's swim trunks clog the drain and cause an explosion of hair and dead insects, I step out of the lifeguard chair and meander towards the office.

Jenna is inside, talking to someone on the phone. Derek and Ryan must be in the staff locker room. I brush past Jenna like I'm looking for something, and maintain a position in the back of the office by the locker room entrance.

"...you wouldn't come here," says Derek. "I'm gonna get caught, and I don't wanna lose this job."

"Lil D, you invited me here," says Ryan. "You said you wanted to talk. So let's talk."

"Fine," says Derek. "But you know I hate sneaking around like this."

"It's not sneaking around," says Ryan. "We're just being safe."

"I know," says Derek, "but I wish we could go places together without pretending we're not together."

They're together.

I thought they hated each other.

"I get you, but we live in Texas," says Ryan. "We'd get shot."

"Or worse."

"Hey, don't worry about that right now," says Ryan. "Nobody knows we're here, so theoretically, we can do whatever we want."

"In a locker room?"

"Yeah."

"Oh my-Ryan, you don't-"

"My parents are home. Your parents are home. The locker room floor is as clean as it's ever gonna get. How about it?" asks Ryan.

"What if Jenna can hear us?"

"Just don't be too loud. It's like seven minutes in heaven, but we've got as much time as we want."

"Yeah, we've got until I get fired for blowing a dude on the job."

"No one knows we're here."

"Okay. Fine. I love your ass."

I can't hear any more; evidently Derek has a dick in his mouth and Ryan's trying to keep quiet.

Well, shit.

Biting my lip, I amble out of the office, past Jenna, and back to my lifeguard chair. No one has drowned since I've been eavesdropping on my apparently gay friend and his former nemesis getting hard off each other in a locker room. All is well.

La la la, fuck this job.

It isn't until I get home that afternoon that I start letting my mind wander. My aunt and uncle won't get home until four, I've got time.

Before I realize it, it's four o'clock and I've been telling myself I had time to think all afternoon. They burst through the door, Rebecca close behind for some reason, arms full of groceries and shit. "Hello, honey!" shouts my aunt, setting her groceries on the kitchen counter.