Caitlin (2 page)

“He’s nice.” She opened her locker.

“Just don’t come crying to me when he hurts you.”

“You don’t mean that.”

No, I didn’t. I was there for her. I always would be. It’s what best friends did.

“I just don’t get why you like him so much.”

“I know, but you don’t have to.”

It was as though his being older was rubbing off on her or something. She used to be really shy, kind of quiet. Now she was confident about everything.

Although maybe it wasn’t him at all. Maybe it was the fact that she’d saved a kid who’d almost drowned.

That was supposed to be my job — as a lifeguard. So far, all I’d done this summer was blow my whistle when kids ran around the pool or didn’t follow the rules that were posted.

“Are we okay?” Robyn asked.

“Yeah, totally.” I adjusted my red Paradise Falls visor. Another part of our uniform. I slipped off my sparkly flip-flops, popped them in my locker, slammed it closed, and reset the lock. “Gotta go.”

“Don’t forget what Mr. T says.”

Mr. T was the park’s general manager. Supposedly his name was unpronounceable so he just went by “Mr. T.” Robyn and I pointed our fingers at each other, the way
Mr. T did whenever he saw a park employee. “Be watchful out there!” we both said dramatically.

Then we laughed. It always felt good to laugh with Robyn. The problem was that these days she was mostly laughing with Sean. And I was laughing alone.

I was sitting in the lifeguard tower at the five-foot mark. Tsunami was twelve feet deep at the end of the pool farthest away from the Tsunami lounging deck. A huge wall was at the back end. Behind it were all the machines that created the awesome eight-foot waves. The alarm sounded to warn swimmers that the calm pool was about to transform and pretty soon the rippling waves would be heading toward shore. Tsunami was the cornerstone of the park. It was the largest pool, had the largest lounging deck, and the biggest pavilion. Around the outskirts, it had private cabanas
for rent if people didn’t want to mingle with the masses.

I didn’t understand why anyone would come here for privacy.

I heard a girl release a high-pitched scream. It would take the waves a while to hit their maximum height, so right now they were just undulating around people. It could be scary if you were a kid and had never experienced it before.

But she wasn’t a kid. She was probably my age. Blond. She was wearing a black string bikini and sitting on a guy’s shoulders. He was so darkly tanned that I knew he loved being in the sun. I could relate. But I also had a job to do and since he was in my watch zone, I blew my whistle.

He turned around, looking all innocent. He was a true cutie. His wet black hair fell into his eyes. He flicked it back with a jerk of his head, his hands holding the girl’s legs so she didn’t go tumbling off.

“No carrying people on your shoulders!” I yelled.

“What?”

I didn’t know if he hadn’t heard me or he was just giving me a hard time. Lots of times people pretended not to hear us when we yelled at them, so I went into hand-signal mode. I made a motion to indicate the waves were starting up, made a motion of lifting something off my shoulders. “Put her down.”

Even with her sitting on his broad shoulders, he managed to shrug. “Why?”

I pointed to the huge sign behind me where large letters proclaimed
NO STANDING ON SHOULDERS
.

Although she wasn’t technically standing, it was still too dangerous. I was sure they’d done studies. Or someone had gotten hurt and sued the park. Rules were put in place for a reason.

“Give me a break,” the guy yelled. “I’m strong.”

Did he think I was blind and couldn’t see that he was in shape? But it didn’t matter how strong he was. Or how cute.

“It’s the rules,” I called out.

“Rules are made to be broken!”

“Do it or you’re outta there.”

He grinned at me. It was a challenging grin. I tried not to notice that it made him look even cuter. I wasn’t being paid to notice cuteness factors, but it was a little hard not to notice.

“Do it!” I repeated with authority.

He sank below the water.

The girl screamed, “Romeo!”

Was that the guy’s name? Who named their kid Romeo? Or was it what he told people his name was because he thought he was such hot stuff?

The girl shrieked again before she started swimming into the waves. He broke through to the surface and followed her.

I tried not to watch how powerfully he swam. I wasn’t going to get sucked into crushing mode by good looks or an athletic build. I wasn’t going to fall for a guy just because on a scale of one to ten, he was a twelve.

Romeo. Such a stupid name.

Of course, lately I thought all guys were lame, so it might not have mattered what his name was.

When I first started working here, I’d crushed on one of the other Tsunami lifeguards — Tanner. He was blond and in shape. He’d come over to talk to me every now and then so I’d mistakenly thought he was crushing back. We’d hung out some, watched fireworks together, gone to a party, held hands, so I’d believed that he liked me as much as I liked him.

Then I’d caught him kissing a girl who worked in one of the souvenir shops. I didn’t know her name, but I’d seen her when I walked through the shops area of the park. And I’d definitely seen her when he was kissing her.

When I’d confronted him, with her standing right there, he’d acted as innocent as Romeo had a few minutes earlier.
What? Me being bad?

Guys could be such jerks.

Standing at the shallow edge of the pool now, where the waves rolled around his ankles, Tanner held his rescue tube against his side. He was definitely cute. He had blond hair that hung straight down past his ears. He looked like someone who did a lot of surfing — or would if we had a real beach nearby. He had more freckles on his shoulders now than he had at the beginning of summer. He was also more tanned, but then we all were. He was tall. During the school year, he played football.

During the summer, he apparently played with girls’ hearts.

I hadn’t seen him with Souvenir Chick since that fateful night when I’d caught them in a lip-lock, but the damage was done. I couldn’t trust him, so I’d started ignoring him. Robyn had warned me early on that I shouldn’t be interested in someone I worked with — that it would be hard to see him every day if things didn’t work out. At the time, I’d been unable to imagine things not working out. But they hadn’t, and she was
right. It was hard to see him and be reminded again that I’d been a total fool. I’d never had a boyfriend. Had never even been kissed. I’d believed Tanner was the
one
, the one who would give me my first kiss. But it hadn’t worked out that way.

It still stung — a couple of weeks after his betrayal.

I looked past him to the sand-covered Tsunami deck where the lounge chairs and occasional umbrella-covered tables were filled with guests. Behind that was the pavilion with picnic tables. It, too, was crowded with people. Summer was in full swing. Everyone was here for a good time.

I let my gaze wander over the guests frolicking in the pool. The waves ran for twelve minutes. Then they’d settle into calmness to give people a chance to catch their breath and the lifeguards a chance to make sure everyone was all right.

I stood up, holding my own red rescue tube against my stomach. I’d never really considered how boring it was to watch other
people having fun. I’d much rather be rushing up Thrill Hill where the larger, more exciting slides were, or floating in an inner tube along the Sometimes Raging Rapids where I had the option of taking a detour that carried me over a series of waterfalls. But I also really liked getting a weekly paycheck because I had an addiction to buying clothes. As far as I was concerned, a girl could never have enough outfits.

The waves began to diminish. The buildup was slow, the letdown a little faster. I really wanted to just dive into the pool. It was nearing the end of June and was hot.

“Hey!”

I glanced down. Romeo was looking up at me, water dripping from his hair. His hair touched his shoulders. I wondered if it curled when it was dry. The water was lapping at his chest, and since I sat at the five-foot marker, I figured he was tall. Jock tall. I no longer liked jocks.

“Can I put her on my shoulders now?” he asked, like someone who smells chocolate
chip cookies baking and is asking for permission to snitch one. In other words, he knew the answer was no but he asked anyway.

“No.” Okay, I have to admit that having power gave me a rush. Not that I ever abused it.

“Why not?”

“Too dangerous.”

What was he doing hanging around here anyway? Why wasn’t he playing at Surf’s Up where he could do some actual surfing on a man-made surfing machine? I wanted to think it was because he didn’t have the skills, but the truth was he looked as though he had skills in a lot of areas. Obviously I was influenced by a nice tan much more than I should have been.

“What’s your name?” he called up.

I shook my head. We weren’t supposed to flirt with guests. We were supposed to be seriously watching the swimmers. Not that I hadn’t done my share of flirting with
Tanner. Or it had felt like flirting at the time. I was pretty new at it so maybe I hadn’t been as clever and flirtatious as I thought. Maybe I’d just been stupid. I hadn’t been able to hold on to him.

“Hey, come on,” Romeo said. “What’s the big deal?”

I once again pointed to the sign. “Number ten.”

NO TALKING TO THE LIFEGUARDS
.

I’d been offended when I’d first read the sign. It reminded me of signs that they posted at the zoo warning people not to feed the animals.

For some reason Romeo laughed, and I wondered if he was thinking the same thing about the sign that I was. He had a terrific laugh. Deep, infectious. It made me want to laugh with him. It almost made me want to give him my name.

Trying to appear bored, I looked across the pool but I still could see him out of the corner of my eye.

Then he swam away.

I didn’t want to admit that I was a little disappointed that he gave up so easily. On the other hand, now that he was swimming in the pool, he became someone who I was
supposed
to watch.

Sometimes work was no fun at all.

A couple of hours later, I was stretched out on a lounge chair on the Tsunami deck, eyes closed, soaking up the sun, waiting for Robyn and Whitney to catch up with me for lunch. Since this was my work area, I was always the first one to arrive. I suppose it would have been fairer to switch around where we ate, but the truth was that my area had the best views of guys.

Originally I’d been thrilled about that aspect, but after my experience with Tanner, I was no longer sure that I wanted a summer romance. As a matter of fact, I was pretty sure I didn’t. I just wanted to work, shop,
hang out with friends. Maybe later, I’d take a more serious interest in guys again, maybe when school started —

“Hey, if it isn’t the rules girl stretched out on my lounge chair.”

I heard another lounge chair scrape over the ground as someone sat on it. Droplets of water slapped my bare arm. I’d taken off my sunglasses because I didn’t want big white ovals of non-tanned skin around my eyes, so I had to squint to see who had disturbed me. Although I thought I’d recognized the voice. It just sounded a little different close up, when it wasn’t being yelled across water.

Romeo.

His wet hair fell across his brow again, and he did a little flick of his head to get it out of the way. More droplets slapped my arm. It appeared that keeping his hair out of his eyes was a constant battle, because almost immediately the heavy locks fell back over his forehead. His sunglasses prevented me from telling the exact color of his eyes.
When he was in the pool and not wearing shades, I could tell that they were a light color. Blue maybe. Like the sky at noon. Not that I really cared about his rebellious hair or the color of his eyes. I just wanted him to go away.

“I don’t think it’s yours. No towel, no bag, no item showing that you claimed this spot,” I told him with authority. After all, I still had my whistle, which meant I was the girl in charge.

“Right there. My Birks.”

I leaned over and looked beneath the chair, where he was pointing. No way those were there when I sat down.

I grabbed my sunglasses from where they rested beside my hip and put them on. It’s easier to be intimidating when you’re not squinting. “Sorry, but it doesn’t count when you slip them under there
after
someone has sat down.”

“Why would I do that?”

“To irritate me, because I wouldn’t let you swim with Juliet on your shoulders.”

“Juliet?” Then, as though a lightbulb had gone off, he grinned broadly. “That’s good. Clever even. So you caught that my name is Romeo, huh?”

“Hard to miss when your girlfriend is screaming it at the top of her lungs.”

“She’s not my girlfriend.”

Okay, this was too much like my experience with Tanner earlier in the summer. No-commitment Tanner, as I’d started to think of him. Too-many-girls-too-little-time Tanner. I thought of a new name for him almost every day. I knew I needed to get over what had happened, but what can I say? I was crushed.

“Does she know that?” I asked.

“I hope so. She seemed pretty smart.”

I just bet.
“Could you go away, because I’m trying to take a break here?”

“So what’s your name?” he asked as though I hadn’t spoken, as though I wasn’t trying to get him to run off and play with some other girl.

“Good-bye.”

“Bummer! You’ve got cruel parents. What were they thinking to name you that?”

I had to fight really hard not to smile at his teasing. And talk about cruel parents.
Romeo?
But I wasn’t mean enough to point that out. No reason to make him feel badly about his name just because I wanted him to leave.

Why was he even over here? I wasn’t going to tease back. I wasn’t going to indicate that I had any interest at all. I had a new rule: only one heartbreak per summer. I’d reached my limit.

“I bet it gets really hard when you’re at a party and everyone starts leaving,” he said as though he wasn’t at all bothered by my ignoring him. “I mean, you have to wonder — are they really saying good-bye or do they want to talk to
you
?”

Groaning, I shook my head and closed my eyes. I wasn’t going to be influenced by his cuteness or the fact that he seemed as though he might be a lot of fun. Been there, done that.

I felt a disturbance near my hip-pack — where I’d clipped my park ID earlier. My eyes sprung open in time to see him holding my ID and reading my name.

“Caitlin. I like it,” he said.

“Like I care what you like,” I said, shooing his hand — as though it was a pesky mosquito — away from my badge.

“So why are you giving me such a hard time?” he asked.

“You’re a player. Obviously.”

“Why? Because people call me Romeo?”

“You’re here with another girl. Shouldn’t you pay attention to her?”

“Actually, I’m
not
here with another girl. I just met her this morning. We were hanging out in the pool for a while. She’s off doing something else now.”

Why was he telling me all this? Didn’t my attitude say “I don’t care”? And where were Robyn and Whitney? I sat up, looked around, and spotted them at a nearby table. Robyn wiggled her fingers at me. Great. We
were supposed to be lifeguards, rescuing people. Why couldn’t she and Whitney see that
I
needed rescuing?

“Gotta go,” I said. “My lunch partners are here.”

I picked up my soft-sided cooler.

“Later,” he said.

I didn’t want to be totally rude so I gave him a halfhearted wave. I crossed over the sand that made this part of the park look like an island. I dropped into the chair at the table. “Thanks, y’all, for coming to my rescue.”

“I didn’t realize you wanted rescuing,” Robyn said.

“Well, I did.”

“Who’s the cutie?” Whitney asked.

“Romeo,” I stated flatly.

Robyn laughed. “No way!”

“Yeah. That’s what I thought. I’ve already had one Romeo this summer, thanks so very much.”

“I hate when people make judgments
about someone without really knowing the person or make a decision based on someone else,” Whitney said.

“What are you talking about?” I asked, opening my cooler and taking out my sandwich.

“Just because Tanner turned out to be a jerk doesn’t mean this guy is.”

“For most of the morning he was in the pool with another girl, then he comes over and starts talking to me.
Hello?!
That tells me all I need to know.”

“You’re harsh.”

This from Miss I’m-So-Adorable-No-One-Ever-Says-No-to-Me. Don’t get me wrong. I liked Whitney but somehow she always, and I mean
always
, got what she wanted. Worked where she wanted, when she wanted, with as much or as little effort as she wanted. And if she wanted the park owners to throw a party for the employees? They did. The employee get-together where Tanner had decided he wanted to kiss someone else had been Whitney’s idea.
She liked parties. So did I. But it was as though she had some secret password or something. And she wouldn’t share it.

Robyn had been my best friend forever. I knew everything about her. Well, almost everything. It had been a shock to learn that she liked my brother.

But we’d only known Whitney for a few weeks. We were still trying to figure her out. No matter how much time we spent together, no matter how much she talked, she never really told us anything important. It was as if she didn’t really want us to know anything about her except for surface stuff. She never shared deep, dark secrets.

“So … you don’t have a boyfriend,” I said. “Go say hi to Romeo if you think he’s not going to break your heart.”

“Maybe I will.”

I issued another challenge with a look over the top of my sunglasses.

“Fine. Okay. I will.” She got up and walked away.

I glanced over my shoulder. Romeo was
stretched out on the lounge chair that I’d been sitting on. Had his Birks been under the chair when I got there and I just missed them? And what was so special about that chair anyway? A lot of empty ones were available.

Whitney sat down on the lounge chair beside Romeo and started talking to him. He sat up and grinned at her. Of course, here was another girl to flirt with. I knew I shouldn’t be disappointed by how quickly he took an interest in her. But I was. Sometimes I felt like such a mess.

“That girl takes bold to a whole new level,” I said.

“I know what you mean. Sometimes, I don’t think she’s afraid of anything.”

“Except for media coverage.”

When Robyn had saved the kid from drowning, Whitney had been with her, but afterward she’d disappeared into the background like Spider-Man or something — - not wanting any credit, not wanting to be interviewed. Robyn had been on the news
that night, talking about what she’d done. She’d been great at it. She’d always been shy, but she’d sort of come into her own with the whole rescue incident.

Or at least that’s how my mom described it when she watched the news coverage.

I was trying really hard not to pay any attention to the exchange between Romeo and Whitney. He said something. She laughed. He grinned. Even from here, his grin had power, made my stomach flutter. He gave off vibes as though he was all about having fun, maybe being a little bad.

But this was girl number three — that I knew about — and the park had only been open a little more than three hours. He was a major flirt.

“Whitney really seems to like him,” Robyn said.

“Fine, she can have him.” I turned my attention back to my sandwich, not to eat it, but just to wrap it up so it was ready to go into the trash. Thinking about how
disastrous my summer had been so far had ruined my appetite.

I shifted my gaze to the edge of the pool where the waves rolled onto the sandy shore. Tanner was still standing there, in red swim trunks and visor, holding his rescue tube, watching the swimmers. I remembered a time when he’d watched
me
, when he would come over and talk to me during his break.

“Surprises me, though,” I confessed. “I thought she liked Jake.”

Jake was another summer employee. He worked the ice-cream cart, which was a total waste as far as I was concerned. His uniform was red shorts and a white polo shirt with the Paradise Falls logo on it. He was really in shape. He would have made a great lifeguard.

“She’s sorta right, you know,” Robyn said. “Just because Tanner was a jerk, doesn’t mean this guy is or that all other guys are.”

I glanced back over at Romeo. He and Whitney were having a marathon conversation. “Does he look athletic to you?”

“Definitely.”

“So he’s probably a jock.”

“Maybe.”

“And with a nickname like Romeo, he obviously has girlfriends.”

“Do you think it’s a nickname?” she asked.

“Would you name your kid Romeo?”

She shrugged. “I’ve heard worse.”

“I guess. But the thing is — I’m not interested in cute jocks. I want a geek. Someone other girls don’t want.”

“Caitlin —”

“It hurts, Robyn, it just really hurts when you like a guy and he kisses someone else. It would have been different if Tanner hadn’t let me think that he liked me. But I thought he did and then he didn’t. And I don’t know what I did wrong.”

“You didn’t do anything wrong.”

I shook my head. I knew she was trying to lift my spirits, but it wasn’t working. “You don’t understand because you’ve only ever liked Sean and he hasn’t hurt you yet. Of
course, if he does, I’ll make his life miserable.” I was digressing. “Anyway, I just don’t want to get hurt again. And Romeo has broken hearts tattooed all over him.”

“Really?” She snapped her head around to get a better look at him.

“Well, not literally,” I said. “You know what I mean. You can just look at him and tell he breaks hearts.”

And I wasn’t going to do anything that might get my heart broken … ever again.