Whoever said that being a lifeguard was fun, Hiro thought mutinously, deserved to get their faces smashed.
Sure, it paid decently enough for a part timer. But frankly, Hiro was bored out of his mind. He’d been at it for what, a good two months now, but the most exciting his job had gotten thus far was when a teenage girl had stumbled towards him, looking like she wanted to be anywhere but there, only to say, “Um, I-I’m sorry but could you umm, showmetothepool?”
He almost felt bad for her when she ran off, cheeks glowing impossibly red as she rejoined the gaggle of giggling high school girls, after he wordlessly gestured at the pool they were standing next to.
Unbelievably, today’s shift was even less action-packed than usual. He’d blown his whistle once at a couple of baby-faced brats who clearly didn’t know the meaning behind ‘no fighting in the pool area!’, and then spent the rest of the day swinging his legs idly while he focused on not falling asleep on the unforgivingly hard plastic of the elevated lifeguard chair. College was a pain in the ass sometimes, and frankly he was surprised that he had managed to keep himself from dozing off after only three hours of sleep the previous night.
He picked at his bright blue t-shirt, the blocky white of the word ‘LIFEGUARD’ gleaming brightly back at him. Hiro wrinkled his nose as the shirt peeled away from his skin. His sweat was beginning to prick tiny dark spots into the fabric, and the sun was really not helping the situation either, with the way it beat down relentlessly from the bright cloudless sky. He swore he could see steam rising from the pool, and oh god, it was humid …
Hiro dropped forwards to lean one arm on his thigh, the other reaching up to wipe away the beads of sweat that had accumulated under the mess of bangs that hung limply over his forehead. Just two more hours, he thought miserably.
The college student straightened up to scan the pool below him lazily. Front to back, left to right, and zigzag, he reminded himself, even if he didn’t expect much other than maybe some twat of a child hazardously sprinting along the slick flooring. Constant vigilance, Hiro. Constant vigilance.
A few middle-aged women chatting animatedly near the steps, a child getting flung off a makeshift boat made out of floatie pads, a group of girls sitting along the side of the pool, their high pitched giggling echoing towards him as one flicked some water droplets in her friend’s face. Nothing out of the ordinary, of course.
Hiro was about to lean back, satisfied, but when he sent one last cursory look over the scene, out of the corner of his eye, he noticed splashing towards the deep end of the pool. He turned to watch carefully.
There it was, the source of the splashing – a toddler was drifting slowly down the pool, short black hair plastered to his head as he paddled wildly back towards the shallower end, foamy white streams of water bubbling around him. It almost looked like he was swimming, maybe, only he wasn’t making much headway at all. In fact, it looked a lot more like he was flailing in one spot – and in Lesson 2 of lifeguard training, that was Sign #3 of Drowning.
Hiro had assumed that the kid was just playing earlier, but now that he was really looking, he wasn’t quite so sure anymore. Throat constricting and tying itself into a knot, dread prickling its way down his neck, his hands suddenly cold as he gripped the cool metal handles, he planted a foot firmly on the first step down of his elevated chair, body taught, ready to fly into the pool at a moment’s notice. This could very well be the first potential incident during all his shifts so far, and oh no what if I have to perform CPR what if I don’t even remember how to CPR ohgodohgodohgod –
When the toddler’s head bobbed under, Hiro only had enough mental capacity to think a terrified ‘oh my god’ before he clambered down the chair as quickly as he could, legs uncooperatively stiff. He turned to launch himself into the gently undulating water –
Hiro let out a small shriek as someone – a man – bounded past him and dived into the pool without so much as a splash. The teen stood frozen, mouth agape, as the tall, lean form surfaced and began swimming towards the struggling toddler in smooth, calm strokes, built arms breaking the waves easily. Even as he spun around to grab the nearest floatie to toss to the pair in the pool, Hiro could barely form a coherent thought, with only the choice words of ‘what the actual fuck’ coming to the forefront of his mind.
*
A commed coworker, a saved toddler and a thoroughly reprimanded mother later, Hiro was stood a ways away from the pool in front of mystery man, his arms crossed in front of his chest as he glared huffily up at the other male.
Now that Hiro had the chance to really take a look at the would-be-martyr, he immediately regretted taking that look at all. Mystery man stood in all his near-naked glory, with just a pair of army green swim trunks to stop Hiro’s eyes from wandering just a bit too far. While the man was lean, he definitely had some muscle definition (Hiro was doing his best not to stare too long at the just-there dips and valleys of his abdomen). And, well, it was really pissing Hiro off. Because, honestly, who did this guy think he was, to have taken a dunk in the pool and still be able to look like he could walk straight onto set with a Korean pop star band and have zero trouble fitting in?
Mystery man had his own arms hanging in a loose cross in front of his bare chest – those pecs were really unfair, Hiro thought petulantly – an easy smile gracing his attractive (as much as Hiro hated to admit it, the dude was definitely not unblessed in that department) features as he watched Hiro expectantly. Hiro took a deep breath.
Focus, Hiro! “Alright, you. Answer some questions for me. Are you on shift?”
“Nope.” Hiro had hoped his voice would be obnoxiously nasally and borderline Mickey Mouse-ish. No dice. The man’s voice was surprisingly low and soothing, much to Hiro’s chagrin.
“Are you a lifeguard?”
“Nope.”
Hiro breathed hard out of his nose, shutting his eyes tightly before snapping them open to glare vehemently at the still smiling man. “Alright buddy, answer this for me then – what on earth were you thinking?”
In some corner of his mind, Hiro knew how comical the sight was – here he was, a scrawny teenager attempting to berate a stranger who had at least an entire layer of muscle on Hiro, not to mention that this pretentious dickwad stood a good head over him. Frankly, he didn’t care though – who did this guy think he was, to try and dive straight into a drowning case without even a First Aid license? Hiro was honestly this goddamn close to socking the smug, just a little bit crooked smile off the man’s face.
“Do you have any idea how dangerous that could’ve been, especially since you haven’t been trained?” he plowed on, throwing up a hand to emphasize his point. “What possessed you to dive into the pool like that?”
“Sorry,” the asshole said sheepishly, rubbing the back of his neck. “It was kind of an instinctive response.”
“I can’t believe this,” Hiro muttered waspishly, sticking his hand through his mess of hair, the tangled strands catching on his fingers. “What kind of person does that on instinct?”
“Well, if you want the honest answer, I did kind of do it to impress you,” was the mild response. “I wasn’t sure if you’d take well to that explanation though.”
Hiro threw his hands up in exasperation. “I knew you couldn’t have done it because of – wait,” Hiro froze. Beginning to feel like he was hearing things, the teen frowned up at the taller man, pressing his lips together. “I’m sorry?”
“Well, the honest answer is –”
Hiro waved impatiently at the other man. “No, I got what you said the first time. What I meant was – what do you mean, impress me?”
The man shrugged, before smiling that infuriatingly crooked smile again (Hiro wanted to cry as one half of his brain begged to wipe the smirk of his face with a well-placed uppercut, while the other half just wanted to aggressively drag the man down so he could meet those upturned lips with his own, because hell if this guy isn’t attractive). “Well, did it work?”
“Oh my god –" A distinctly unwelcome heat that was quite unfortunately unrelated to the heat wave was beginning to creep it way up to Hiro’s cheeks. He buried his face in his hands as a response. “Ugh, what do you – I mean, you can’t just – I don’t even know who you are!”
Mystery man laughed a deep gravelly laugh (even his laugh was hot; seriously, fuck this guy). “I'm Tadashi, if that helps,” he supplied.
“That’s not the point!” Hiro replied from his behind his hands, the effect diminishing somewhat when it came out in a bit of a muffled unintelligible mess.
Hiro peeked out from between his fingers to see the grown ass man pouting – pouting, for goodness sake – at him. Don’t think about how endearing the puppy dog eyes are Hiro, don’t do it – “Does that mean that I won’t be getting your number out of you?”
“I – well –” Real articulate, Hiro thought darkly to himself. You’ve got this attractive dude asking for your number, and suddenly you lose the ability to speak English. Great going, genius.
“I mean, I didn’t say that,” he finished lamely.
Hiro guessed his sudden lack of grasp on the English language was okay with Tadashi though, as the smile the man gave him burned brighter than the dazzling July sun.