by Mei Silk
Money was the least of her concerns. She had a considerable amount of savings, and she had tenure. She raised her chin defiantly. “I wasn’t thinking about the pay!”
“I’m sorry,” Mateo apologized. “Would you rather volunteer?”
Sara opened her mouth but didn’t know what to say. A yes would be agreeing to his suggestion and a no would contradict what she was saying.
“Or you won’t volunteer?” With a charming smile, Mateo pressed her for an answer.
Sara was annoyed by that question. “I’ll consider it.”
“Class is next Tuesday at four. I expect to see you there.”
“What?” Mateo’s arrogant assumption left Sara speechless until he walked back to his car. With a jolt, she remembered that her summer class started on Tuesday. “Wait!”
She was cut short by the roaring of his car engine.
“Wait, I can’t!” she shouted as he drove slowly by her.
“Yes, you can, butterfly!”
“Butterfly?” Sara’s cheeks turned crimson as the BMW rolled out of the parking lot.
Chapter 2
The summer quarter started on a typical sunny Southern California day. Sara got to West Coast College early in the morning. The campus was magnificent with its mulberry trees lining the red brick buildings. Back in high school, Sara used to take summer classes here at WCC, so it felt like she was coming home again. The hem of her cotton dress brushed against her calves in the light breeze. At first, she had put on shirt and trousers in order to look more professional, but when she’d stepped outside, the sun shone so mercilessly that she changed her mind. She got to the classroom fifteen minutes early, and had to wait in the hallway for the last class to finish.
While she was waiting, a teenager came to her and took off one of his earphones. “Excuse me, are you here for the STAT class?”
“You mean probability theory? Yes.” Sara nodded. Students often got confused with the two.
“Is this your home school or are you just coming for the summer?”
Sara smiled. She was used to being mistaken as a student and she decided to play along.
“It’s my home school.”
“Same here. I took this class in spring and failed. I’m hoping it’ll be easier now.”
“I’m not sure about that.” Sara shook her head slowly.
“Do you know the professor? Have you had him before?” he asked.
“Yes, I know her well.” Sara mustered a serious expression on her face. “She can be tough.”
“Damn.” The kid shook his head.
As the door opened, Sara waited for the students to go in first. When she walked directly towards the podium, she heard the kid say, “Man, I thought you were a student!”
“I was, many years ago!” Sara answered humorously.
The kid hit his forehead with the heel of his palm.
As Sara scanned the rows of students, she became aware of the butterflies in her stomach. She’d been teaching for over eight years, starting as a teaching assistant, but she still felt as nervous as she had on her first day.
It’s only two hours, she thought to herself and started to imagine the rest of the day. It usually helped to ease the before-class-anxiety, but not today. The swim lesson in the afternoon increased her anxiety, but she was also a tad excited about it. Her heart raced as Mateo’s face popped into her head. His handsome face had possessed her mind the whole weekend.
“Excuse me, are you adding?” A student called out, interrupting her thoughts.
“I have two spots available,” Sara said quickly and pulled out a piece of paper. “Please print your name, student ID, and your academic status here.”
After all the administrative matters were taken care of, Sara stood up in front of the class and started her lecture.
“Now, some math history. Many students here don’t know why you have to study math, and think that you’ll never use it. But actually, math is a very practical subject. For example, geometry is the oldest topic in math next to counting, and the Egyptians used it for a variety of purposes, such as computing the area of a land in order to collect taxes from the owner, or finding the volume of a granary to see how much grain it was holding and the amount to be taxed. So, mathematical science actually originated for economic reasons. Similarly, the study of probability also started as a means for maximizing profits. And believe it or not, it was for making money on gambling. It was invented to figure out how much a person should bet on a game so that he wouldn’t lose money.”
The eager expression on the faces of the students showed Sara that she had gotten their interest on the subject. It was a good time for some thinking. She continued, “That’s why you’ll see lots of problems involving gambling in the class. You can already do some easy ones. For example, rolling a fair die. What’s the probability that you’ll get a four?”
After a quick answer from a student named Hugo, she nodded, “Exactly, one-sixth, because there are six total possible outcomes, and four is one of them. Later on in the course we’ll roll the die again, and sometimes a pair of dice, and calculate more complicated probability problems.”
“Let me ask you another question. What’s the probability that it’ll rain tomorrow in Pasadena?”
Hugo pressed some buttons on his cell phone and said, “Zero. Yahoo weather says it’s going to be sunny.”
His comment made the class laugh. Sara smiled and said, “Okay, what are the chances of raining a month from now? I bet your Yahoo won’t tell you that.”
“Still zero,” Hugo said after a moment’s hesitation.
“Why?”
“Because . . . because it just doesn’t rain much here in July.”
“Exactly!” Sara said, “You know that from experience. Now experiences, or experiments, are very important in the study of probability. Mathematicians run countless experiments in order to find patterns of occurrences of events in life, in order to be able to estimate the chances of an event. You’re going to learn many useful probability models in this book, formulated from experiments . . .”
After the last student had left the classroom, Sara erased the board, and looking at the empty classroom, she let out a sigh of relief. The first lecture had gone well, however nervous she had been in the beginning, but as soon as she’d gotten back into the flow of teaching, she forgot all her fears and concerns.
* * *
Driving down Colorado Street, Sara felt happy. She had always loved Pasadena. The campus of WCC, with its elegant and beautiful green lawns and red brick buildings in the middle of a busy commercial street, was quite a sight. Sara’s stomach grumbled from the smell of BBQ and roasted garlic from the surrounding restaurants. When she saw the logo of El Pollo Local ahead, her mouth watered. Perhaps she should simply get some fast food instead of going home for the egg salad in her fridge?
She groaned as she scanned the street for a parking space. It was impossible to get a space here. Her eyes narrowed on the last remaining parking space and she quickly pulled to the side. She turned her head, wanting to make sure she hadn’t offended the driver behind her, when the car passing her caught her attention. Her breathing hitched and quickened, and her heart pounded in ears. She clenched her suddenly clammy hands. It couldn’t be Bill, it simply wasn’t possible. A lot of people drove Chrysler 300s. And black was a very common color.
It had been a year since he’d last stalked her in Portland. Sara remembered the last time Bill followed her from the college to her new apartment. And after that, she had to move again. For the longest time, she’d been too paranoid to drive. Could Bill have followed her all the way to California? No! Firstly, he didn’t know that she was in California. Secondly, he had a phobia about the freeways and couldn’t possibly drive 800 miles on the interstate. She knew that because he had never driven down here, even though his family had a farm house in Fresno. Thirdly, supposed he had flown down here, then he wouldn’t be driving his own Chrysler. Therefore, the probability of B
ill stalking her here was zero . . . at least close to zero.
A sense of ease washed over her as she made her conclusion. Besides, it could have been a Rolls Royce. She shook the concern out of her mind and took a few deep breaths to calm her racing heart, stepped out of her car and walked towards El Pollo Loco.
Chapter 3
On her way to the Y, Sara was sure she had to be crazy. She was supposed to be preparing for tomorrow’s lecture, or turning the geisha print fabric into a curtain, or planting flowers in her little garden. Instead, she was driving to the Y, like a robot under a coded command. Why was she allowing herself to be tricked into an unpaid job like that? She didn’t have to do it. She hadn’t said yes to the pompous CEO lifeguard. She hesitated as she pulled into the parking lot of the Y, sighing as she turned off the engine. She had missed coaching and working with kids.
Before Sara stepped into the locker room, she heard the giggles and chatting, and smelled the sweet scent of children. The locker room was crowded with cute little girls in pretty swimsuits and colorful flip-flops. Sara’s mood lit up at once. Oh, how she wished to have a house with a sight like that. Stacks of backpacks, clothes and small shoes littered the benches and the tables. There was hardly any room to stand, but Sara didn’t mind it. She would give anything just to clean up the mess all day. If these were the kids she’d be teaching, then she was delighted she had come.
Once she’d changed into her swimsuit, Sara noticed a teenager squatting in the middle of the room, helping a child to put on her swim cap.
“Hi! I’m Sara. I’m supposed to be an instructor for the girls. Is there anything I can help you with?”
The teenager looked up. “Oh, I’m Lisa. Nice to meet you. I’m a day-camp counselor. It’s not really your job, but if you don’t mind, could you help Dora with her swimsuit?”
“I’m more than happy to.” Sara turned to Dora, an adorable girl with blonde curls and blue eyes.
“Hi sweetheart, I’m Sara.”
“I’m Dora and I’m a minnow. Last year I was a guppy,” the little girl said proudly.
Lisa chuckled and explained that those were the levels of swimming classes: the guppies could float, kick and slide in water, the minnows could crawl for one lap, and the sharks could do a combination of strokes for ten laps.
“Oh! Congratulations!” Sara said and took hold of the straps of Dora’s swimsuit. “Let me see, what have we got here?”
“You need to tie a knot in the back.” Dora said and turned her back to Sara.
The swimsuit was a two-piece halter tankini with ruffled neckline. Multicolor hearts adorned the blurry purple tie-dye patterns. “What a pretty swimsuit!”
“Thank you. It’s called Hippie Hearts. My mommy got it from online.”
“Wow, how nice! Your mom’s got good taste.”
“Nuh-uh! Mommy wanted to get me a yucky one that was easy to put on. But I really, really wanted this one.”
“Good choice, Dora, here you go!” Sara finished the knot and let go of the girl.
“Now everyone, line up and get to the shower room,” Lisa gave the order as all the girls were ready to go.
After a moment’s chaos, the girls formed a line and headed towards the pool.
There were twenty-five girls, and just when Sara started wondering how she’d possibly manage to instruct all of them, Lisa told her there would be another instructor joining her.
The pool was divided into two halves. Girls on one side and boys on another. A tall, skinny teenager was leading the boys in their land exercises.
Sara’s eyes scanned the area for Mateo, but he didn’t seem to be anywhere in the vicinity.
After grouping the girls according to their levels, Lisa beckoned to Sara. “I’ll be in charge of the guppies, you and Elena will be taking care of the minnows and sharks. She’s going to be here in a minute.”
There were ten guppies, ten minnows, and five sharks.
While waiting for Elena to come, Lisa and Sara had the girls do a few simple stretching exercises before going down to the pool.
She could see the parking lot through the window. The door of a silver BMW opened and Mateo got out of the car. Sara’s heart leapt at once, but sank the next second as the passenger door opened and a tall girl with curly black hair came out. Sara’s mind went blank as she watched the beautiful pair standing side by side, gathering their gym bags from the trunk and leaving the parking lot together.
Ugh, I’m such a damn fool, Sara cursed herself.
* * *
Mateo quickly changed into his swim shorts. He didn’t like being late. He’d spent twenty minutes waiting for Elena. It was the third time this month Elena had called him, begging him to give her a ride because her car wouldn’t start. Mateo knew she was lying to him, but he allowed it because she was a good swimmer and a good teacher. She could be impatient sometimes, and had a bad temper, but she had a way of making the kids do what she told them to.
Hopefully, Sara would compensate for Elena’s shortcomings. His pulse quickened as Sara filled his mind. He had thought of nothing but her over the weekend. He was impressed by what he had seen that day in the parking lot. She was confident and sure of herself, although her voice was soft. And there was a strong presence of woman in her. A presence that wrapped around his whole being the moment he stood in front of her. A presence that made him quite forget himself. Would she be here today? He had spotted a white Toyota in the parking lot, but wasn’t sure whether or not it was hers. With that thought, he jumped into the shower and rinsed off with lightning-fast speed. He was desperate to see if she’d decided to volunteer.
* * *
Sara was directing the girls to their proper lanes when Mateo came in. She tried hard not to gasp at the sight of his body resembling the bronze statue of Adonis. Glowing with a natural tan and sparkling with water beads, the muscles of his arms and trunk were firm but not bulging. He didn’t have the six-pack, but his stomach was flat and taut.
As Mateo walked directly in front of her, Sara was sure her heart had stopped beating. Suddenly, everything around her went blurry and he was the only thing that clearly existed within her vision.
“I’m glad you came!” He smiled.
“Me too.” It was all Sara could utter.
“You know what to do with them, right?”
“Not really. I was hoping that you would tell me.”
“Right. You’ll be helping the Sharks. They can already swim all the styles. Your job is to correct their mistakes, and make sure they’re doing it right. You’ll also have to keep an eye on the Minnows, some of them might be qualified to move up to Shark level. Elena will be working with you.”
As he looked up, Sara followed his eyes and saw a tall woman in an orange-and-black striped swimsuit coming through the door, still securing the knot of her hair while walking.
“Elena!” Mateo shook his head. “Hurry up for God’s sake, you’re not in a beauty contest.”
“What’s the hurry? The kids got all the time in the world,” Elena mumbled.
“Sara, meet Elena, the most revered swim instructor of the Y,” Mateo said to Sara as Elena came closer. Sara recognized her as the woman she’d seen with him in the parking lot.
“Elena, meet Sara, an excellent swimmer and a new member of the Y.”
Elena shook hands with Sara and looked her up and down. “Welcome to the Y.”
“Thank you!”
“Elena, why don’t you focus on the Minnows and let Sara watch the Sharks?”
“Why does the newcomer get the easier job?” Elena protested.
“Because the Minnows need to practice on their endurance and they won’t dare to cheat on laps when you shout at them.”
“Sara can’t shout?”
Sara didn’t know what to say, but she wasn’t one to shout at young kids.
“Okay,” Elena said, after seeing Sara’s hesitation. Then she turned to Mateo. “But you owe me one.”
“No problem. I’ll gi
ve you a ride after the lesson,” Mateo said as he walked away. “Hurry up, the kids are waiting.”
“Wait a minute,” Elena shouted. “That doesn’t count! I want dinner!”
Either Mateo didn’t hear her or pretended not to hear her. He jumped into the pool on the boy’s side.
“Elena, why don’t we just take turns? You’ll work with the Minnows first, then we switch. That way, I can see how you work with them.”
“Sounds good,” Elena said and turned to the kids. “Now girls, get in the water! Hurry up!”
* * *
While watching the boys swim, Mateo also kept an eye on the girls in the other side of the pool.
“Girls, slow down your pace and make sure you complete each stroke.” Elena shouted to the Minnows.
“We are slow!” a couple of girls responded.
“No, you’re not. You looked like fish running away from a shark.”
The girls giggled and started another lap, slower this time.
“Lydia, you are not doing your kicks right. Move your hips,” Sara said to a girl practicing with the kickboard.
“I can’t,” the girl grumbled.
“Yes, you can, sweetheart. Straighten your knees.” Sara held the girl’s legs as she kicked along.
Elena and Sara made a good match. Elena was strict and good at giving orders to a group. Sara was patient and good at working one on one. Mateo’s gaze fixed on Sara. He hadn’t asked her whether she had taught swimming before, but somehow, he’d had the feeling that she would be a good instructor. He was glad that she was here. A patient instructor was hard to find. Most of the instructors they had at the Y were young and tended to be impatient. Mateo wished he were the kid whose legs Sara was holding. What would her hands feel like on his skin? He could still remember the feel of Yingying’s smooth hands and could still hear her voice echoing through his head. “Mat, raise your elbow higher, like a fin. Imagine yourself as a fish. A free fish. Good job!”
God knows how many times he had heard those words in the past years, long after she had left the Y. Even now, recalling those words made swimming more enjoyable. It made him feel like she was right next to him, watching him and guiding him.