Page 6 of The Lawyer's Quandary
Sounds great. I’ll GPS it and meet you there at 11.He added a smiley face.Got to get back into court. See you tomorrow.
Mark smiled and put the phone back in his pocket, glad he had taken the chance.
The followingmorning, he got his gear together and headed to the pool. He had keys to the building, but it probably wasn’t going to be necessary. Members of the team also had pool keys, and it was likely some of them would have already been there to swim laps.
He entered the building and turned on the main lights, the familiar scent of water and chlorine reaching his nose. It was funny, but that scent, which could be irritating to many, was calming and familiar to him, like he was in a safe space.
“Hey, coach,” one of the women said, carrying a bag.
“Morning, Chris. Have a good session?”
“Shaved a whole second off last weeks’ time,” she told him with a grin. “Two more to go.” She was the most competitive swimmer he had ever seen and determined to be the best.
“Way to go,” he told her. Chris’s goal was to beat the women and the men, and if she met her goal, she would be the fastest person in the water. But shaving two seconds off her already impressive swim time in the 200 was going to be a real challenge. She waved as she headed out in the spring sunshine, and he went farther inside to the desk in the lobby.
“I’m meeting a friend,” he told the student worker, and showed his ID. Then he sat down in the chair, waiting until Greg came in with a red bag. “Go ahead and sign in,” Mark said to him, and then led Greg down to the men’s locker room. “You can use any of these lockers,” he explained, and went to a differentbay where he kept a locker and changed into his bathing suit. Then he met Greg at the door to the pool.
“This thing is huge.”
“It’s a competition-size pool, so it’s fifty meters.” He grabbed a couple towels and led Greg to the steps. “Now, this pool is going to be about eighty degrees. It’s going to feel a little cold when you first get in, but this is for competition, so its kept a little cooler so the swimmers don’t overheat.”
“Good to know,” Greg said, walked into the pool, and went underwater. He came up and shivered, but then began to paddle around. Then he stood as Mark entered the water. Greg was just as he expected. His chest was lean and waist narrow, skin pale and smooth. In short, he was attractive as hell, as far as Mark was concerned.
He slipped into the water and slowly swam to the far end, turned, and made his way back, surfacing right near Greg.
“God, that was beautiful. I don’t think I could ever swim like that.”
“You probably can,” Mark told him. “I’ve been swimming since I was six. I learned lifesaving when I was fourteen and have been teaching people to swim since I was eighteen. So I’m sure I can help you. Why don’t you show me how you swim.”
Greg nodded and began to swim. It was floppy and inefficient, but he’d seen worse form. “See, I really suck at this.”
“No, you don’t. Not really. Let’s start by lengthening your stroke. When you reach forward, try reaching a little farther and rolling a little on your side.” He showed him, and Greg mimicked his movements. They stood and worked together before Mark had Greg try again. His stroke was smoother, and he moved a little better through the water. Mark took off and swam from one end of the pool to the other with Greg in the next lane. He wanted to give Greg a chance to practice on his own without Mark watching over him like he was his coach.
He reached the far end and stood. Greg was making good progress, and Mark knew the next step was to teach him how to breathe properly. “You go so fast,” Greg told him as he finally reached the wall.
“Part of that is that I don’t need to stop to breathe. Remember how I had you reaching out and rolling your body slightly? That’s so you can breathe. You take a high stroke, without breaking your stride, turn your head above the water, breathe, and then continue going. As you swim, you exhale and then do the motion again. For competitive swimmers, one of the ways they can speed up their time is to breathe less. So they try to get as many strokes between breaths as possible. It’s just a quick movement.”
“I don’t know if I can do that. I mean, what if I inhale water?”
“You won’t. A nice, smooth stroke and you’ll do just fine.” Mark approached him. “But we can leave that until next time if you want.” He stood right in front of Greg, and damned if the guy didn’t have the most stunning eyes. Excitement built for a few seconds, just long enough for Mark to realize that getting out of the water was going to be embarrassing.
“Why did you ask me over here today?” Greg held his gaze. “I know you said that it was to improve my swimming, and though I’ve been struggling for years, you helped me in a few minutes. But….” He bit that lower lip of his again, and Mark knew he was seeing Greg’s tell.
Mark nodded. “Well. You told me about the swimming issue, and I thought I’d try to help. I have experience in this area and… I thought you were kind of cute and that maybe I saw the same spark on interest in you that I felt, so I guess I hoped that maybe I wasn’t reading things wrong.”
“Oh. So this was supposed to be a date… of sorts.” Their voices echoed off the walls of the otherwise-empty pool building.
“You could call it that if you wanted to.” He didn’t dare look away.
Greg cleared his throat. “I guess the important thing is if that’s what you wanted?” He drew closer, his chest rising and falling. “You were the one who did the asking, after all.”
Mark’s heart beat fast enough that he could almost hear it. The pool was quiet, with only the air-handling system whirring in the background, along with the water pumps. He took an additional step forward and cautiously slipped a hand around Greg’s waist, drawing him closer. “Then if I get to make the decision, I’d say that this was a date and that I was hoping to do this.” He tugged Greg to him and kissed him, heat and excitement building in seconds.
Laughter in the background broke into his momentary reverie, and Mark backed away, groaning under his breath.
“Hey, Coach,” one of the women on the JV swim team called as she and a friend entered the pool area.
“Morning, Joselyn,” he called back, and wished to hell that she had better timing, especially since there was no way he could get out of the water now. “Go on and swim back, remembering what I taught you, okay?” he said to Greg. “I’ll watch you. And just remember to keep your strokes long and smooth. Kick and think about propelling yourself through the water.” Giving himself something else to do cooled him off, and by the time he reached the other end of the pool, Mark had himself under control.
