Welcome to New Haven

by Dawn Doyle

  Alex had been watching Holly as she was talking with her sister. She’d been sitting, mostly out of view, and when he and the guys began to take off their shirts, Holly had stood, taking this breath away. Her loose white T-shirt didn’t cling to her, but it definitely showed more than the ones she usually wore at school, hinting at a well-developed female form underneath.

  The only one he wanted.

  The pink shorts looked amazing on her and her legs…smooth, toned, and proportionate to her body. He immediately thought of touching and kissing the bare skin on her legs. All the way up and down again.

  Christ! Holly looks so fucking hot I need to get into the water before everybody notices the strain in the front of my shorts!

  Alex had a feeling that Holly wasn’t aware of just how beautiful she was. If he got the chance, he would tell her everyday…

  “Dude wake up.” Ben said as he elbowed him in the side.

  “What? Oh yeah.” Alex felt himself blush, just as he had when they’d gotten there and no doubt Emily had noticed too. She’d looked between the two of them instantly.

  The girls took off their over clothes, and they were wearing vest tankini's, but with boy short bottoms, like Em’s.

  “Where are the bikini’s?” asked Ben, and Holly noticed he looked at Dev when he said it.

  “This isn’t the beach.” She replied.

  “Yeah, it’s Seattle, not California” chuckled Kayla.

  “Well!” gasped Ryan in mock alarm. “I feel all kinds of naked now.” He said as he covered his nipples with his fingers. Getting laughs from everyone.

  “You’re a divvie” laughed Em.

  “What’s a divvie?” He asked.

  “Idiot” she replied.

  “Hey, I resent that!” He shouted.

  “Why? Because it’s true?” laughed Alex.

  “Quite possibly.” Said Ryan with his nose in the air, getting another round of laughs.

  Holly liked it very much. It took her mind off the huge pool with deep water and slippy floors… She had to take a few deep breaths to calm herself down.

  “You ok baby girl?” whispered Em.

  “Yeah, I’ll be fine.”

  “Good. Don’t worry hun.” Em smiled sympathetically and turned towards the others. “Ok, let’s get in kids!”

  Everybody jumped in the pool and went to their sides.

  “This is unfair” Em stated. “We’re all short arses compared to you, gigantaurs.”

  “You’re all in the shallow end though.” Said Ryan.

  “Still…your legs are stronger; you can jump higher. What do you think Hol?” Em said and winked at her.

  This could be fun.

  “Yeah, I think a change up would be fairer” She said. “Ben, Dev, Ryan and Riss should team up together, I think.” She gave Em a little smirk.

  “Hey! Ryan’s our best player!” whined Kyle.

  “And I’m the worst!” countered Dev. Dev knew Holly was putting them in the same team on purpose.

  Holly picked up the ball, took a coin out of her back pocket.

  “Call it.” She said to Riss.

  “Heads!”

  “Riss chooses head!” Shouted Ryan “I’m in agreement.” He said with a big toothy grin.

  “Oh my God, That’s not what I meant!” She said, shocked.

  Ryan just waggled his eyebrows, which earned him water splashes from Riss and Dev. Ben was trying to stop himself from laughing, as was Alex.

  “Ryan, you’re a pig!” chuckled Kayla. They knew Ryan was just playing. Holly shook her head and tossed the coin.

  “Heads it is.” She said and narrowed her eyes at Ryan as he opened his mouth to say something.

  “Ryan, if you say any’in, I’ll come over there an’ web ye,” Said Em.

  “Speak English, woman!” Ryan said with a really bad, gruff, English accent and shaking his fist.

  “Oh you’ve ad’ it cock ‘ed” she warned as Holly passed the ball to Riss.

  “Let’s just play” Holly said.

  As the game went on, it was evident how good a player Ryan was…and Dev wasn’t. Holly was trying her best to avoid watching Alex’s ripped, muscular arms, chest, abs… running his hands through his wet hair…

  ”Holly!” shouted Kayla.

  “Huh? What?” Holly said, blinking a few times to break the fog.

  “That was totally our point wasn’t it?”

  “Um…”

  Oh this is going to be embarrassing!

  “I…um…wasn’t paying attention. Sorry.” Cue hot, red face… There it was. Holly bit her lip, looked down and rubbed her forehead to try to hide her embarrassment. And failed

  All eyes turned to Alex.

  “What did I do?” He asked and they all looked at Holly again. It was Alex’s turn to blush.

  Just fucking great.

  Luckily Ben grabbed Dev around the waist and pulled her backwards with him and dunked them both under water.

  “Ben!” she screeched, which caused everybody to turn to them and laugh. Holly was glad for the distraction when the game was quickly forgotten about as it turned into a ducking frenzy. Alex was looking at her when she glanced at him, and he smiled.

  Yep, he definitely knows what I was paying attention to. Ground, please swallow me up already!

  Riss’s Mum came through the door with the pizzas and placed them on the counter of the bar and they all got out of the pool and dried off. Holly averted her gaze when she started to imagine drying Alex off herself…with her tongue…

  “Holly, put your music on.” Said Riss.

  “I’ll put them on shuffle. “Holly replied as she tapped her phone screen.”

  ‘Poison’ by Alice Cooper was the first song to come on.

  “I love this song!” Em gasped as one of her favourites played.

  “I didn’t think you were a rock chick” Ben said, turning to Holly.

  “You’d be surprised.” Said Em. “Our Hol’s got, shall we say, broad music tastes.”

  “What like?” asked Alex, which startled Holly that he was interested in her musical preferences.

  “You’ll find out soon enough” Em spoke up when Holly’s mouth stopped working again, with Alex being shirtless and so close to her.

  They grabbed pizza and all sat down by the couches. They sat on the floor because they were wet.

  “You guys should put your shirts back on.” Said Kayla.

  “Why?” asked Kyle. “Too much hotness to handle?” He said with a wink and a smirk.

  “More like not wanting to be put off our lunch.” Said Dev, which made Kyle’s mouth open in shock.

  “Oh, Holly…” Em said with a sigh. “…What ‘ave you been teaching these girls ay? That sounds exactly like sum’n you’d say.”

  They all chuckled because they knew how Holly could be.

  “Holly’s a great teacher.” Said Dev, waving her hands in mock worship.

  “Hey!” Holly protested, but she smiled. “I’m not a bad influence…much.”

  “Give it time…” Em said in a sing-song voice.

  Holly just shook her head at her sister.

  Poison finished, and ‘counting stars’ by One Republic came on.

  “Ok I guess that’s different to the last one.” Ben said.

  “Any Pitbull in there?” Asked Dev.

  “Um…probably.” Said Holly. “You like Pitbull?” asked Kyle.

  “Yeah, why?” Dev looked at him as if he were strange for asking that question.

  “Doesn’t he speak Spanish in a lot of his songs?”

  “Mhmm.” Said Dev as she was chewing her food.

  “Do you know what he’s saying?” asked Ben.

  “No” Holly shook her head. “A few words here and there but that’s it.”

  “So you could be singing ‘I wanna tap your grandma and cuff her to the bed.” Said Kyle, with a smirk.

  Holly’s eyes widened in utter shock at that.

  “I…guess…so” she said
, with surprised disbelief at what Kyle had just said.

  “Oh yeah, I’m gonna tap that old lady and rock her on the chair lift.” He sang.

  Holly laughed out loud, which made everyone else laugh harder.

  “Stop it, Kyle!” She said as he laughed. “That’s so wrong in so many ways”

  “Yeah it is,” he said, still laughing.

  “Anyway, I sometimes use the translator app but even then it comes out backwards.” She said.

  “They aren’t that great” Dev said. “The verbs get mixed up a lot of the time.”

  “That’s what I thought.” Said Holly. “I have to remember to put a word in a sentence to get the correct translation, or it comes out skew-whiff.”

  “What?” snorted Ryan. “What the fuck is ‘skew-whiff’?”

  “It means ‘all over the place’.” Em said in her best ‘Queen’s English’ accent.

  “Like, for instance…” Holly said, thinking how to describe it. “…The cushions on the couch. They were neat before, but now they’re skew-whiff.”

  “You guys need to have your own translator.” He laughed.

  Em and Holly looked at each other.

  “We do.” Said Em. She grabbed her phone and pulled up the ‘lern yourself scouse’ website and showed it to the guys.

  Ben took her phone and read through some of the sayings.

  “I’ve heard Holly use some of these.” He said. “She told Will to ‘do one’. Ha! That was funny.” He said as he continued to read.

  “Web!” shouted Ryan, followed by a deflated “oh” “So that’s what you meant she you said you were going to ‘web’ me.

  Em had meant ‘hit’.

  “What did you think I meant?” Em asked, slightly taken aback.

  “Well I thought that maybe I was going to get lucky with an older woman…”

  “Oh my God! You dirty l’il bastard!” she shrieked as she started to get up to attack him.

  Ryan jumped up and ran away.

  “Just kidding!” He laughed. “I knew you meant something else. I just wanted to see your face.”

  Ryan was holding his sides from laughing and everybody was in hysterics.

  “Anyway, you’re too much for me to handle. I’ll keep to my own age.” He sat next to Riss. “Hey, Riss is my age.” He put his arms round her shoulder. “Ryan and Riss. The two R’s. Ok, not technically, but…ya know.” Ryan squeezed Riss in towards him and gave her a huge kiss on the cheek.

  “Mmmwahh!”

  “Ryan!” she protested as she blushed.

  Holly saw Riss’ reaction, as did Dev and Em. Kyle was too busy watching Kayla who was busy looking through the scouse dictionary on Em’s phone.

  Enrique Iglesias’ ‘Bailando’ came on next.

  “I love this song.” Holly whispered to Em.

  “This is all Spanish isn’t it?”

  “Yeah. I don’t understand it, but it sounds lovely.” Holly said quietly.

  Alex shifted and Holly though that he heard what she’d said.

  “I know this one!” Said Dev and she started to sing along, in Spanish, of course.

  The boys started chatting about different slang words, and Em was talking to Riss and Kayla about Liverpool. Dev was happily singing along to the song. Holly joined in on the bit that she knew well, keeping her voice quiet down so nobody would hear.

  As she was quietly singing, Alex was drinking his water. And then he almost choked on his water in surprise.

  “Oh my God, are you ok?” asked Dev with concern.

  “Yeah I’m fine.” He said. “Just not expecting to hear that.” He said to Dev, wiping his mouth.

  Holly realised he must have heard her, and her stomach rolled. Horrified, she asked…

  “Oh my goodness, what did I say?” placing her hands either side of her face as she flushed. Dev was giggling…giggling! Like it was funny.

  ”Oh nothing terrible.” He replied. “I wasn’t expecting to hear you. You have a good accent.”

  “Oh…um…thanks.” She said completely embarrassed. When everybody seemed to be listening in, Dev steered the conversation away.

  “When we’ve finished lunch, what do you guys want to play?” she asked.

  “Twister!” Said Ben.

  “No, something in the pool. Besides, you guys would crush us, literally, playing twister.”

  “Well how about just good old fashioned dunking?” He asked.

  As they were discussing different things to do, Alex leaned into Holly, taking her breath away.

  “Do you have your phone close?” He asked in a whisper, sending tremors down Holly’s spine.

  “Y.Yeah, um…” Holly reached to the coffee table for her phone. She was about to hand it to Alex when she held it back.

  “What do you need it for?” she asked nervously.

  “You can look up the lyrics to that song and then translate them or, I could type them out.”

  “Oh ok.” Holly handed him her phone. The real reason she held it back was because there were things on her phone that she didn’t want him to see. Alex tapped the screen a few times and then started typing. He handed the phone back to her.

  “Now, press translate.”

  It took a split second for the English to appear. The realisation was evident as Holly’s mouth dropped open, and her eyes widened.

  “Is that right?” she asked as she showed him the screen.

  “Pretty much, yeah.” He smiled at the line that he’d almost choked after.

  The rest was talking about ‘dancing’ and ’being with you’.

  “Let me see.” Said Dev as she turned Holly’s phone towards her, and giggled.

  “It’s not about tapping grannies, So I guess it’s not bad.” Holly said to Dev, which made both Dev and Alex laugh.

  “No it’s not. It’s actually really nice.” Dev said as she was still chuckling.

  “I suppose” grumbled Holly.

  “You should be careful in future though…” Alex said, looking Holly right in the eye. “Saying stuff like that could give a guy a heart attack.” He smirked.

  Alex got up with the other guys. Holly was frozen in shock, as was Dev. Holly blinked a few times and turned to look at Dev who now had a big smile on her face.

  “I need to use the bathroom.” Said Em in very put-on American accent.

  “Go on den gerl.” Said Kyle, in an awful attempt at a scouse accent.

  Holly and Dev stood and walked to the poolside where Ben and Ryan were standing. They’d taken off their shirts, ready to get back into the pool. Alex had walked over to the tables, at the end of the room. He was taking the drinks bottles they’d left.

  “Hey Holly, did you bring spare clothes?” asked Ryan?

  “Yes, why? Holly asked in confusion.

  “Because…” He said as he scooped her up “…It’s your turn for the pool!”

  “No!” she screamed. “Put me down!”

  “Ryan stop it!” Dev said as she looked to Holly, noticing the panic on her face.

  Ryan was walking to the deep end of the pool when Holly heard Alex shout…

  “Ryan…No!”

  “Please Ryan No…I can’t…sw…aaaggghhhhh!” she screamed.

  Everything seemed to go in slow motion. Alex started running to the pool, and Holly hit the water with a splash, as everybody looked on, laughing. Except for Dev.

  They looked to the water.

  Holly wasn’t coming up.

  Nobody was laughing now.

  Holly’s arms and legs were thrashing about under the water. Her heart was pounding, her lungs on fire and sheer terror coursed through every nerve in her body. She thought she was going to drown.

  I’m dying, I’m dying, I’m dying, was all that was running through her mind…

  She felt strong arms around her, lifting her up. Up and up until her head broke the surface of the water. Holly was trying to take in air, but she was so terrified; she couldn’t catch her breath. The strong arms were
wrapped around her body, keeping her head above the water. Just as Emily came back…

  “Holly I’ve got you. I’ve got you…”

  Alex?

  “Hold onto me, Holly.” Holly tried to control her arms. Alex’s arms held her tight to him, and her arms found him. She wrapped them around his neck and her legs around his waist. The water was so deep, but Alex, at six feet three, could stand up on his toes, clearing the top of the water.

  “What the fuck?!” She heard Emily shout.

  “I…I…don’t…” Ryan stuttered in shock.

  “She can’t swim you stupid twat! She’s scared of the fucking water, dick’ed!” Em screamed at him.

  “I didn’t know…I’m so sorry.” Ryan pleaded.

  “Sshh” Alex was whispering to Holly. “I’m going to walk you to the shallow end and sit you on the side. I won’t let you fall, I promise.” He was talking to her in a soothing voice to keep her calm.

  Holly was still trying to catch her breath, but she was having a panic attack. Em was trying to get at Ryan but Ben and Kyle were holding her back.

  “He didn’t know.” Said Ben.

  “None of us did. It wouldn’t have happened if we had” added Kyle.

  “So this is her fault?!” Em screamed “She said no!”

  “I’m sorry, I’m sorry.” Said Ryan over and over.

  He was sitting on the floor with his head in his hands. Holly could see him as Alex continued to walk through the water. The water level dropping as they neared the shallow end. The girls were holding onto each other as they waited for Alex to get to the other end.

  “It’s ok Holly.” He whispered. “I’ll keep you safe.” Holly was finally able to catch some air and her breathing began to slow down a little, but she was still gasping. As they got to the end of the pool, Alex sat Holly down but she still kept a tight hold of him as she was shaking uncontrollably.