Life starts now - A Bondi Rescue story

Emotions

A/N: Hello everyone. I am so sorry for the delay but life has just been absolute bedlam recently. Uni has started again last week and this weekend I had the second part of the course I took, so I can now train kids and teens...
Also, my brother had to go to hospital twice this weekend and after he had to be taken there by ambulance on Sunday, he was admitted and could only go home today.

So yeah, I'm sorry I didn't post anything sooner. I hope you like the chapter, though.

April turned into May, autumn quickly becoming winter. The beaches emptied, but the lifeguards kept busy. General maintenance and minor repairs, catching up on administrative work and training filled their days.

Decision day for the trainees was nearing and thus, Hoppo and the team leaders wanted to test the two women's skills and progress. First aid scenarios, dummy rescues and more elaborate staged incidents kept them on their toes.

They hadn't been idle in improving their soft skills either. Alicia was working on her tact and patience, Melanie had grown more self-assured and confident.

All together, the guys were quite proud of their rookies, who had both come a long way from where they had first started out.

While everything went well at work, things weren't looking as rosy on the home front. The differences in opinion between Dr Finnegan and her daughters caused friction and especially Melanie often found herself in a disagreement with her mother.

On one such occasion, they once more argued about the teen's future. Susan insisted that lifeguarding wasn't a suitable job for her daughter, who really just ought to apply herself more and she could go on to study anything she wanted.

Melanie, on the other hand, knew with absolute certainty that she wasn't destined for an academic career. Sure, she didn't have a bad memory and she wasn't stupid, but she simply knew that she'd never make it at university when reading and writing caused her so much difficulty.

***

"What is so bad about being a lifeguard?!", the young girl challenged, heated exasperation fuelling her tone. "You're acting like I just chose to become a sewage inspector!"

"It's not good enough!", her mother snapped.

Melanie ignored the sting of hurt those words left and fired back: "Yeah, I've heard that before, but why not? What makes it less of a job than what you're doing?"

Susan gave a little laugh, one that expressed how ridiculous she found that question. "Honey, my job is extremely important. My research has the potential to save lives."

The teen snorted humourlessly. "Right", she commented, sarcasm dripping off the word. "It's not like a lifeguard doesn't save lives."

She shook her head, frowning in disappointment as she called her mother out on her faulty logic. "That's a load of crap and you know it. You just think my job's not prestigious enough." Glaring at her, she added: "You're ashamed because I didn't do as well in school as the twins and now, you think I'm an embarrassment because I dropped out of school."

The silence that followed was somehow louder than the biggest shouting match. Nodding jerkily, more to herself than anybody else, Melanie muttered: "Yeah...that's what I thought."

Susan averted her eyes.

The twins, who had been silent witnesses up to that point, were shocked by the fact that their mother didn't even make an attempt to deny it. "Mother!", they exclaimed, completely aghast.