First Times： Nine Tales of Innocence Lost(20)

I imagined it was for me. I imagined it was his hand, not mine, sliding up my stomach to tease along the outer curve of my breast and I imagined his warm lips on my neck, kissing over my shoulder as his finger slipped inside me and his palm ground against my clit.

Minutes later, I was a quivering mess, whimpering and sighing as I dragged myself to a frantic, hazy orgasm that made my head thump against the wall as my back arched. Or so I thought. It was someone’s fist on the bathroom door.

“Kelly?” my father called. “You’ve been in there half an hour.”

I reached over and shut off the water.

“I’m fine,” I yelped.





I woke up an hour early the next day. Normally I wouldn’t bother doing much before I went to work. After all, I’d be sweating all day and diving into a pool, maybe. Today I didn’t pull my hair back. I left it down, and brushed it out until it shone, letting my loose curls hang all around my shoulders. I touched some gloss on my lips and put on just a little eye shadow. Not enough to be obvious.

I wasn’t sure why I was doing it, but then again I knew exactly why.

I slipped off my flip flops in the car and left them there, and did a wincing walk across the parking lot to the back gate. Jim’s car was already there, tucked in the corner. I pushed through the back gate and locked it behind me. Today I knew I’d be starting on the gate. It was my turn. At least there was shade.

It was a hot one. Jim was swimming. I sat down at the table by the gate and watched him breach the surface and dive back under. He was a good swimmer, fast and agile. When he finally emerged and climbed out, the water pulled his trunks down just enough to expose a sliver of pale, untanned skin above his waistline. As he stood up I saw the way the muscles of his ass bunched.

I’d skipped the shorts today. I was just in my bathing suit. It wasn’t the most revealing thing in the world, but I had my legs stretched out under the table. He looked over and waved, and I saw a cryptic look on his face as he saw my legs jutting out from under the table, my heels resting on the concrete.

“Careful you don’t trip somebody,” he said, his mouth twisting a little at the corners, in amusement.

“It’s about that time,” he called out, as he started climbing his chair.

I got up, unlocked the gate, sat down, yawned. The first kid didn’t show up for half an hour. I had a book, pretended to read, but I was mostly looking at him. The water on his skin made him glow. Again, a kid startled me.

The morning rush started, when the moms were dropping off their kids into our charge. I was distracted almost until it was time to switch. I caught his attention and motioned, and he started climbing down.

We passed by each other as I walked to the lifeguard station. He was looking at me, I could feel it. He turned to smile at me as I passed him and I didn’t look back, but he looked at my ass, I knew it. My bathing suit was tight there, and the sides had ridden up, exposing pale skin. I plucked at it, making myself a little more decent as I climbed up.

I saw him look away, over at the table, when I turned to sit. He was watching. I knew it, because he was trying to hide it.

Fidgeting, I made myself pay attention to the goings on in the pool, but he was always in the corner of my eye, dragging my gaze away from my charges. I was relieved by the time it was time to change places and head back under the shade. I curled my finger in my hair as I walked past him, and flashed him a smile. He smiled back, but he looked past me, away from me.

My chest clenched a little. There was something wrong with that. Sullenly, I sat behind the table and leaned on my hand, sighing.





It happened on the Fourth of July. I got to work a weekend, since all the lifeguards were called in for the big party. It was blistering hot, so bad I had to wear my flip flops even around the pool, where the concrete was usually bearable, if not cool. I spent part of the party in the lifeguard stand, part of it at the front gate, taking IDs.

The pool complex wasn’t huge, just the one pool with a fence around it, the bathhouse, and the little parking lot behind. Part of the cramped space was taken up by the hastily erected concession stand. Jim was working it, selling hot dogs and sodas from a cooler. He motioned me over.

“I could use some help here,” he said.

I talked one of the other girls into taking over for me, and started helping. The stand was just a tent and some extra plastic tables from the storage shed, and a grill someone loaned us. Jim worked the food, sweating profusely even in the shade. I stared at his back as he worked, watching the muscles flow and flex under his skin.

I had to put my hair up. He watched as I lifted my arms up over my head to pull my hair into a scrunchi before I went back to hanging out sodas and working the cash box. We were going to run out soon, I realized.