She had had the worst day imaginable. Training had started off well enough with simple swimming exercises to determine their endurance and their speed and form in the water. She had had no problems there. In fact, she was a shining star early on, winning many of the timed events and showing amazing lung capacity and strength in the other tests. It was no surprise, really, since she had been in love with swimming from the time she could walk. She had been a competitive swimmer since she was five years old and every summer she had lived with her uncle in Oahu, swimming the clear blue Hawaiian waters while helping him with the tourists on his diving tours. So, she didn’t shy away from demonstrating those skills as a lifeguard trainee.
And that seemed to be the problem. She was one of the few females in the group and she was very aware of the leering stares of her fellow lifeguard trainees. She knew there was a lot of jealousy and outright anger that a girl should be one of the top in the class. As for the other two females, they were doing so poorly; she doubted they would still be around next week. They definitely were not on her side. They often sat with the boys at break and talked about her while flirting so obviously it made Keilani laugh.
So, it wasn’t the training exercises themselves or the other girls that frustrated her. It was the outrageous behavior of the boys, and two in particular, that was making her want to quit. They hooted at her and called her names every chance they got, which wasn’t anything she couldn’t deal with, having grown up with four older brothers, but today, they had sabotaged her performance in the timed rescue and she was beyond angry with them.
Of course, she had no proof that it was them that had messed with her suit, tying it in so many knots that she had been forced to ask her instructor for a loan that ended up being too big on her petite athletic frame. She had been angry with that, but it had been manageable. It was the blatant lies about her performance that had made her furious. The moment she had raised her hand and signaled she had finished the test, Tru Merrick, ignoring his name, decided to tell a bald-faced lie and get her time disqualified.
It just wasn’t fair. She had worked long and hard to get to this point and now a couple of morons were going to take her dream and trash it. She hadn’t cried, but she had been close and she was pretty sure that Tru and his accomplice, Jarret Mallory, knew it. Their smug looks as she climbed out of the water had been all she needed to see to know the truth.
Now, she sat in the locker room and felt a wave of hopelessness attack her. She had always been tough, a tomboy, a fighter. She had had to be with four big brothers at home. Now, though, she didn’t know what she could do to deal with these boys who seemed determined to see her fail. Was there anything she could do? If she went to her instructor, she would be branded as a tattler and, even if she passed, it would follow her, especially if she had to work with any of her fellow trainees at future jobs.
She also couldn’t punch the shit out of them, though she thought she might just win a fight against their pansy rich boy asses, since she would probably end up kicked out of class for it. So, she was stuck. She probably could leave this class and find another somewhere else to try, but what would that do? She would know in her heart that she had let them chase her off and she would just be likely to run into the same moronic behavior wherever she trained. No, she had to finish here or not finish at all.
Standing up, she grabbed her towel and her soap out of her bag and headed for the showers. At least in here, she was left alone. The other two girls, surviving on their last legs, always packed up their stuff and headed home to shower, driving together out to their rich little homes beside the bay. Keilani had
M.Scott Verne, Wynn Wynn Mercere