by Peter Harmon
CHAPTER 13
EARLY THAT MORNING, before the pool opened and just after the sun had rubbed his sleepy eyes and decided that he guessed he’d better rise again that morning, after all, there’s no snooze button for a star, Jonathan showered in the men’s locker room, wearing his faded red lifeguard shorts and lanyarded whistle.
The shower was an open area with four communal showerheads. Jonathan liked to stand in the middle with all four pointed at him spraying steaming hot water, but that day he modestly used just the one.
He pulled his shorts away from his body with his thumb, then dripped some soap to his nether region, allowing the sudsy water to run down into his shorts.
In the snack bar he made himself breakfast. He licked a red, white and blue Rocket Pop as he flipped a burger on the grill. He wore his favorite apron, the one that said, Kiss the Cook…Please!!!?!
He ate his breakfast at one of the picnic tables in the outdoor dining area. He looked out over the pool, and all was good.
And as the day wore on, it went better than the last. More moms were showing up for lap swim, and more old gents ambled in and sat at the back picnic tables, playing euchre or gin rummy, and then people started coming to swim. It turned out to be a hot day, and maybe some thought that a good way to honor Bill’s memory was to go hang at the pool that he had made so special for them.
A lot of people were heading to the grill, too. Charlie worked feverishly there, cooking hamburgers and hot dogs and a chicken quesadilla that some brash customer ordered. Chicken quesadillas were the worst, because you had to cook the chicken, cut it up, lay it on a tortilla, cover the meat with cheese, then cook the tortilla on the grill. The hardest part was flipping the thing, because if you waited too long, the tortilla would burn, but if you didn’t wait long enough, you would flip the quesadilla and all of the cheese would spill out on the grill…there was a small window on those gosh-darned things. Smoke poured off of the hot meat and into Charlie’s eyes. He wiped away tears and sweat.
There were dozens of orders that needed to be filled scrawled on Post-It notes and clipped to a strip of wood that ran above the order window. To make matters worse, someone had bought the Post-Its where the sticky strip alternated top and bottom in an infuriating accordion style instead of just being sticky all at the top like the traditional strips. As Charlie cooked away and struggled with the Post-Its, Roheed diligently prepared the drinks and sides and arranged them with the cooked meat in buns on trays.
Jill idled by the order window. A customer approached with two cardboard boats of sad-looking fried cheese.
“I just received two orders of mozzarella sticks…”
Jill, uninterested, said, “Yeah?”
“… that are completely frozen in the middle.” He banged a frozen stick against the metal counter.
“Sucks.”
“And my Sloppy Joe was only an Unkempt Joe. I want my Joe really disheveled. I need more Joe sauce.”
Jill snickered.
Charlie stuck his head out the window. “We’ll refund your money and replace those. I guess whoever was working the fryer wasn’t paying attention.” He glared at Jill.
Jill batted her eyes.
In the grease fryer bubbled a large cluster of food that was forming a huge mozzarella-stick-chicken-tender-filet-of-fish hybrid.
Charlie sighed and told the customer, “I’ll put my best man on it. We’ll call you in five.”
The customer skulked off and said to himself, “But I’m hungry now.”
Charlie called to Roheed, “You heard all that?”
Roheed popped his head from around the back corner, already balancing a handful of mozzarella sticks like a breaded, white cheese cheerleader pyramid. “I’m on it!”
Charlie’s phone rang. It was his dad, Art, calling. He put down his burger flippin’ spatula and headed toward the back of the bar, passing Roheed as he skittered to the front. He turned to watch Roheed deftly multitask.
Jill was carrying a tray of condiments, not paying attention to where she was going. She bumped into Charlie, smearing ketchup and mustard onto his crotch.
Jill smiled. “Woopsies.”
Charlie answered the phone anyway, dabbing at his pants with a wet paper towel. “Hello?”
“Hey, there,” Art said. “I was wondering if we could do that lunch soon.”
“How soon?”
“How about in an hour at Ben’s?”
“I already have lunch plans.”
“Cancel them.”
“I don’t think my mentor is around.”
“He left you unsupervised? Balderdash. I expect you outside Ben’s with your mentor in an hour.”
“I really don’t think—”
Art clicked off.
Charlie looked around, assessing the situation.
Roheed appeared. “Anything the matter?”
“If the health inspector comes, don’t let him or her in. You’re the grillmaster now. Wear this apron with honor.” Charlie handed Roheed the apron. It read Hot Meat Patrol.
Roheed regarded it with reverence.
Charlie dashed out the door.
Roheed called after him, “I will not let you down…,” and added a “sir!” for good measure.
•••
Charlie rushed past the guard office, where Jonathan was examining some pool water samples. Jonathan looked up and saw Charlie’s distress.
“Charlie!”
Charlie poked his head into the office. “Yeah?”
“What’s the matter? You need some help?”
“No. Kind of. Maybe.”
“What can I do to help you?”
“Have you ever acted before?”
“I played charades once with my dad in middle school.”
“I have a spare outfit in my trunk,” Charlie said to Jonathan, then continued to himself, “That means I’m in the trench coat.”
“Okay…”
Jonathan called out the guard office window, “Judas, you’re head operator in charge.”
“Righteous!” Judas waited for Jonathan to be just out of sight before he opened a beer and began to chug it.
A very fair-skinned portly young man waddled by.
Judas tweeted his whistle at the lad. “Get a tan!”
•••
Art stood outside Ben’s. He looked at his watch impatiently, then had to look at it again because he realized that he hadn’t registered what time it was when he had looked the first time.
Charlie and Jonathan arrived, Charlie in his trench coat cover-up and Jonathan in Charlie’s other pair of business clothes that fit him rather snugly, size M for the medium amount of deception this costume would warrant.
Charlie whispered to Jonathan, “Be cool.”
Art extended his hand to Jonathan. “Hello, I’m Arthur Heralds, Charlie’s father.”
“Hi, Jonathan Poole, Charlie’s manager.”
“He means mentor,” Charlie said to Art and turned to Jonathan with a glare. “Don’t you, Mr. Poole?”
Jonathan, graciously, said, “Of course.” Jonathan’s whistle dangled from the red lanyard around his neck.
Art eyed it. “Is that a whistle?”
“Why, yes.” Jonathan fingered the scuffed metal. “Yes, it is.”
Charlie forced a laugh. “It can get pretty crazy in the office. Sometimes Mr. Poole here has to blow it to make sure we’re staying on task.”
“And no running,” Jonathan added. “We’re a very safety conscious atmosphere.”
Art gestured to the restaurant. “Why don’t we go in? They have the best burgers.”
“Oh, man,” Jonathan said glumly. “That’s what I had for breakfast.”
Art looked at Charlie. Charlie said knowingly, “Atkins Diet.”
Art rolled his eyes. “I guess that would explain why someone smells like a grill.”
“I don’t know anything about that…” Charlie darted into the restaurant.
Soon, Art, Jonathan, an
d Charlie were sitting and chowing down.
Art grilled Jonathan like a Yellow County Snack Bar All-American beef hamburger sandwich patty. “How long have you been doing what you do?”
“A long time. Crazy long.”
“And what is it exactly that you do at the um, Commission?”
Jonathan nervously reached for his glass of water and spilled it directly on his crotch. Charlie grabbed his napkin, reached for Jonathan’s lap, then thought better of it and just handed the napkin to him.
“It’s okay, guys. I have my bathing suit on underneath.”
Charlie laughed nervously. “Office joke, long story. Too long to tell.”
“Anyway, Jonathan, how has Charlie been doing this summer?”
“We haven’t gotten any complaints yet.”
“That’s good. I wouldn’t want my boy embarrassing himself. Do you know what his last job was?”
“Umm…”
“He worked in a snack bar. Can you believe it? A snack bar. How low can you get?”
“At least he wasn’t a lifeguard, right?” Jonathan chuckled.
Art nodded and took a bite of his burger. “That’s true.”
Charlie received a text from Roheed: ETA?
Back at the pool, Roheed waited for a return text from Charlie. Within seconds, it came: ASAP, hold down the fort.
Roheed put the phone in his pocket and surveyed the snack bar. Jill looked up guiltily from the three-basin sink—it was overflowing with sudsy water. Roheed looked out the window. June was talking to a patron. She laughed at something the patron said and started to walk toward the snack bar. As soon as she turned away from the patron her fake smile retreated from her mug, which had been described by many as a “resting B word face.” Her features, left to their own devices, yearned to frown, clench and seethe.
Roheed texted back to Charlie: Hurry.
Back at the restaurant, Art was “peeping the scene” as they say and asked Charlie if he was, “Talking to someone important?”
“No, just Roheed…from accounting, such a kidder.”
“When can I get the grand tour?”
Charlie and Jonathan exchanged worried glances. Charlie spoke. “At the office? No, they’re doing a lot of renovations right now. Lots of asbestos, you know.”
Jonathan piped up, “But they’re getting rid of it ‘as-best-os’ they can!”
“Plus the air conditioning has been acting up. It’s just not comfortable to be there right now.”
“But you’ve been wearing that huge trench coat every day.”
“Yeah, too much AC is the problem. I know how you hate being cold.”
Charlie got another text: June here, trying to stall…
Back at the pool, June was standing at the snack bar window.
“… I believe he went down to dry storage to get some twenty-ounce cups,” Roheed told her.
“I hope that is the case, Aladdin. I don’t like to think about what I would have to do if I caught you running this place without a state-licensed food handler.”
“Yes, ma’am. No, definitely twenty-ounce cups. They’re very popular, you see, because the average human bladder can hold thirteen ounces of liquid, so after you fill up and urinate you can be like, oh, good, another…seven… ounces… for um, later.”
June wasn’t thoroughly convinced of the twenty-ounce cup’s rabid popularity. “I think I better come in and take a look…”
The patron that June had been talking to called out to her, “June! June, come watch little Padme. She can stand in the four feet now.”
June turned to the woman, all smiles. “Be right there, honey.”
She turned back to Roheed, all business. “Charlie better be back with those cups by the time I’m done watching this little brat stand in the shallow end.”
Meanwhile at the restaurant, Charlie had just finished a dissertation on why Art should never and could never visit the office where he and Jonathan worked.
“I get it,” Art said. “Well, what’s the website at least? I’d just really like to know more about what you’ve been doing with your summer.”
“Just drop it, okay? You’re meeting Jonathan right now. What more proof do you need? Come on!”
Art’s face crinkled. Charlie softened. “What I mean is…I’m really busy most days, and I just don’t want to interrupt our work flow.”
Jonathan nodded, his mouth full with his last bite of burger. “Definitely.”
“In fact, we need to be getting back.” Charlie stood and left some money on the table. He motioned for Jonathan to follow.
Art sat, stunned, and then he noticed the money that Charlie left behind. There was a smudgy ketchup and mustard fingerprint on one of the bills.
Back at the pool June walked toward the snack bar smiling and talking to the patron. “She is getting so big…” The patron nodded. June, sweet as Southern iced tea, said, “Alright, see you soon now.”
She turned to the snack bar window, fire in her eyes. “Time’s up, Jafar.”
“I thought I was Aladdin.”
June shot Roheed an even angrier look. Roheed quivered.
She pulled out her cell phone. “It looks like I need to make an anonymous call to the health inspector.”
Just then Charlie walked through the door with a huge box of twenty-four-ounce cups, totally out of breath. “Man, either I am out of shape or these twenty-four-ounce cups are los populares!”
“Twenty-four-ounce cups?” June slit her eyes in suspicion. “Roheed said twenty ounce.”
Roheed knew the jig was up.
Charlie shrugged nonchalantly. “Like Abraham Lincoln once said, ‘Go big or go home.’ ”
If June were a robot, her head would have exploded. Instead, since she was a human woman, she just opened her mouth to speak, shook her head and walked away.
•••
Later that afternoon…
Jonathan wasn’t wearing a watch, so all he could be sure of was that it was about a hair past the freckle when he walked into the guard office. Judas was still asleep on the cot with beer cans scattered about.
“Judas, rise and shine. Time to train.”
Judas grumbled and sat up. He picked up a couple empty cans until he found one with some liquid in it. He took a swig and spit it back out.
“Oh, yeah, that’s the one I peed in.”
A few moments later, on the pool deck, Jonathan stood before Florence, Judas and Roheed. Roheed was the only one not in a swimsuit. He was still wearing his work clothes.
Jonathan addressed his squad. “Alright, team, if we are going to be able to even think about starting to pretend that we have a one in a million chance of beginning to consider that we might win…we need to train.”
He began walking down the short line of three, looking them in the eyes and barking orders like a colonel.
“In order to save this pool, we are going to need to be here every morning to do laps before Ruby’s Swim & Sweat. We’ll need to swim laps on our breaks from work and dream about swimming laps in our sleep. Whenever we sit down, it should be on someone’s lap, and when we take drinks, we shall lap the liquid up into our mouths with our tongues like a cat. Today we will begin the most grueling conditioning that most of you have ever experienced in your life. Now get in the water and let’s see what you can do.”
Judas raised a finger. “What about Rasheed?”
“Seriously?” Roheed said.
“What?”
“My name is Roheed.”
Judas shrugged. “Whatever.”
“He has to work in the snack bar for now. He’s more advanced than the rest of us so he can afford to miss a couple practices.”
“Really?” Florence was surprised.
Roheed blushed. “Yeah, well, I better go. Those fries aren’t going to cheese themselves.”
Jonathan dove in and powered through the water, hit the wall, and swam back to the edge of the pool. He wiped his face with his hand.
Flo
rence stood poised to dive in. “I didn’t expect you to be so fast.”
Jonathan shook some water out of his ear. “I love to swim. I practically live at the pool…in the pool I mean.”
And so practice began. Florence dove in and began swimming lap after lap. Judas crushed a brew, lowered himself into the water and started swimming expertly. Roheed watched from the picnic area near the snack bar. Charlie walked up behind him.
Roheed grumbled, “How is Judas so good at swimming? He just woke up from an alcohol coma.”
“I think his frat has a water polo team. You getting in?”
“I have tennis elbow. I’ll start training with them soon.”
“Okay.”
Roheed entered the snack bar.
Jonathan bounded up to Charlie, dripping wet from the pool.
“You alright?”
“Yeah, yeah. Thanks for helping me out today.”
“Anything I can do to help. So your dad thinks you work somewhere else?”
Charlie nodded.
“Here’s my advice: Be true to yourself, do what you love, and work hard at it. And if that thing that you love just so happens to be working at the snack bar, so be it. Your dad will come around eventually.”
“That’s not exactly it, but thanks. I smell what you’re cooking.”
“That’s what I’m here for, buddy.” Jonathan spread his arms.
“You’re soaking wet.”
“Come on.”
Jonathan pulled Charlie in for a big hug.
Charlie wanted to be annoyed but couldn’t help but smile big-and-goofy style. “Get off me, you big creeper.”
Jonathan just squeezed tighter.
CHAPTER 14
THE NEXT COUPLE of weeks flew by. If this whole thing were shot as a movie, those weeks would be the portion where the story progressed and was heightened through a series of different but related images, probably with an awesome song behind them like “Eye Of The Tiger” or Gwen Stefani’s “Hollaback Girl”—you know, true classics.
So hum “Hollaback Girl” to yourself and visualize the following snapshots:
Jonathan showing his team a flyer announcing that the Tri-County Relay Race would take place in two weeks.
In the dead of night, Roheed walking through the guard gate and knocking on the guard office door. Jonathan appearing instantly.