Chapter Two
It was probably naive of me not to expect Kai to come calling that same evening. Somehow, though, the reality of my neighbors’ twenty-something son actually inviting himself over had been divorced in my head from the reality of, well, my neighbors’ twenty-something son inviting himself over.
Naivety I had only a brief time to reflect on as I crossed the hallway to answer the front door.
“Hey Tate!”
The exuberance of youth. Kai was wearing a short-sleeve t-shirt, board shorts, and sandals. There was a folded towel slung over his shoulder; I glanced at it, pointedly.
“I’m really sorry, I can’t help you with your car right now,” I told him, forcing a serious expression onto my face. Was rewarded by a momentary frown in response.
“Oh,” he replied, after a moment’s pause, “no... I mean, I was hoping...” His voice trailed off as he registered my growing smirk. “Unkind, Tate, very unkind,” he scolded, though his grin told me the teasing wasn’t really unappreciated.
I stepped to the side, holding out an arm in welcome. “The pool awaits.”
Kai walked through the hall and across the open-plan living room, nodding approvingly at the tasteful decor that I’d had no involvement in.
One of the advantages of a turnkey rental was that, when your ex-boyfriend was the one with all the aesthetic aptitude, your own shortfall in skills needn’t be immediately obvious.
“Well, doesn’t that look good,” he said, stopping at the doorway to the deck and admiring the shimmering water.
I’d already pushed the button to open the cover, but was still at the wine-pouring stage of my evening.
Kai half turned, to catch my eye. “Seriously, though, I really appreciate you letting me use it. It’s so damn hot next door, but my dad views turning the A/C up as a shameful admission of defeat. ”
I shrugged. “No problem, it might as well get some use.” I made a bee-line for the open bottle. “Do you want a drink?” I called over my shoulder.
“No, thanks,” came the reply, and so I glug-glug-glugged the white wine into just one glass. Enjoyed a healthy sip, then turned and almost dropped the rest.
Kai still had his back to me, but while I’d been sating my thirst he’d already peeled off his t-shirt and, more surprising, dropped his board shorts.
Wide shoulders, healthy with muscle, tapered down to a narrow waist, to which a black square-cut swimsuit clung.
Broad thighs emerged underneath, themselves atop shapely calves.
He was, even after just a few moments’ glance and the rear view alone, stunning.
“Oh,” I said, quietly.
Loud enough still, though, for Kai to hear me. He followed my gaze down, to where his shorts lay in a messy heap on the deck.
“Oh right. Yeah, I can’t swim in those things. Not since I was on the team in high school, anyway. It just feels like you’re being dragged down by a pillow case tied around your waist, y’know?”
I nodded, mute, but I didn’t know. Not really.
Honestly, I’d always been self-conscious when I was in the water.
Partly because, without my glasses, I was just short-sighted enough for the world to be disconcertingly blurry.
But also because of the healthy - well, unhealthy - amount of body shame in there, too.
Certainly, I never looked anything like the young swimmer in front of me.
It was taking all my focus not to rake my eyes over his body.
Not even in a sexual way - though I’d be lying if I claimed not to have recognized he was absolutely gorgeous - but more the same way that you find yourself marveling at a beautiful work of art, or a sublime classic car.
Appreciative awe, more than everyday lechery.
Hurriedly I took a gulp of wine, with the hope of distracting myself. A faint hope, sure, but the alcohol helped a little.
As I watched, Kai stepped up to the edge of the pool.
Paused, in a way that seemed perfectly designed to let the soft, warm glow of the patio lights coax even more shapely grooves and bulges out from his muscled torso, then toppled forward in a casual but still well-executed dive.
A demure splash the only evidence of his entry.
He emerged from beneath the water on the opposite side, long moments later, sporting a gleeful expression.
“Holy crap, this feels so good!”
I had to laugh at his exuberance. Watched as he shook his head, sending a shower of droplets flying before raking fingers through his unruly hair. Then he was pushing off, body knifing with barely-restrained urgency as he broke through the wavelets to the other side.
A happy head, bobbing at the edge closest to me. Arms folded - biceps bulging with casual profligacy - on the wooden slats.
“Aren’t you coming in?”
The thought of taking off my shirt and having my body compared to Kai’s was... well, mortifying was the best word I could come up with at short notice.
I wasn’t overweight. Had even lost some of the “comfort padding” that long-term relationships can introduce to your midriff.
Mainly because, when left to my own devices, I just ate less, more than from any active attempt to be healthy.
No, the reality was that I was just painfully average, and only going to look more pedestrian when next to someone like him.
“I might just finish up this, y’know,” I replied eventually, holding up the glass.
Kai frowned. “I feel like I’ve screwed up your routine.”
I shook my head, trying to look casual and relaxed and probably appearing like neither.
“Or is it the suit?” he continued. “I can totally put the shorts on, it’s fine.”
I shook my head. “The suit is great.” Shit, no, that’s not what I meant to say. “I mean,” I stammered, “the suit is fine. I don’t have a problem with it, it’s fine.”
Kai stared at me, skeptically.
When I’m uncomfortable I can’t handle a conversation vacuum. I just have to fill it. “You haven’t screwed up my schedule or anything, I promise. I’m going to get into the pool.”
He waited. Neither of us moved.
“Tate,” Kai observed, “you’re not getting in the pool.”
I blinked. Then blinked again.
“No, right, totally,” I said eventually, inwardly wincing at how ridiculous I knew I must sound. Set down the half-empty glass on the table, then picked it up again and took another gulp. Set it back down.
He was still watching me, leaning over the edge of the decking with a lack of self-consciousness that was as equally alluring as it was impossible for me to imagine ever feeling myself. Staring with, if not outright curiosity, then a sense of what I could only read as bemusement.
I already had the running shorts on, thankfully, but it took a deep breath - sucked in with careful discretion - before I could bring myself to tug up the hem of my t-shirt and pull it over my head.
Steeled for the chuckle I knew, rationally, Kai would be too polite to give, but felt I heard in my paranoia anyway.
Then it was a case of getting into the pool as rapidly as possible, but not so hastily as to make it look like I was rushing. Whether I struck that questionable balance, I was too preoccupied to assess.
The cool water felt like a slap. Enough to derail my racing thoughts so that, for a moment at least, it was only my body in its clenched tightness and the embrace of the liquid that registered in the world.
A short-lived distraction. Though, when I opened my eyes, I found Kai had gone back to his casual gliding from one side to the other.
Each short lap completed with the minimum of effort, the water hardly churning as he pushed off with his legs, crawled the last of the distance, and then neatly flipped to position himself for the return.
It was hypnotic to watch, and so I did. Bobbed in place as I admired the way his muscles flexed, torso and arms twisting, a blur of smooth flesh punctuated by that scrap of black stretched across his hips.
“You’re good,” I said, honestly, when he paused again. Caught on one elbow raised onto the decking, his other hand wiping across his face. The width of the pool separating us.
A scowl, though only brief. “Nowhere near what I used to be, though. I used to compete in swim meets. Now all the muscle memory is gone.”
I had to laugh. “Your ‘underwhelming’ is still impressive to the rest of us mortals.”
Kai grinned. It was charmingly boyish, and completely free of guile.
“Sorry, I probably sound like an ass right now, don’t I.”
I made a show of pretending to consider the possibility, then shook my head. “Nah,” I told him, “I’m only jealous, is all.”
“You’re the one with the pool.”
I nodded, slowly. “True. I just never really got into swimming. But let me guess, you were a total water baby?”
A flex of his arm sent Kai coasting carelessly across. He steadied himself on the side as he reached me.
“I basically had gills when I was growing up,” he said, laughing.
“Medical marvel turned medic,” I observed. Laughed, as Kai put a finger behind each ear and wiggled them. “The embarrassing truth is that I just tend to sit in it,” I confessed, “not use it properly.”
Kai grinned. “Well, you sit, and I’ll try not to send too many waves your way.”
Before I could say anything he was pushing off again, settling back into his rhythm of glide, stroke, and turn.
With equal ease I settled into watching those movements.
After a few minutes, it was as though the totality of Kai’s body broke down; as if the precise, controlled twisting of arms, legs, torso, and head were each mechanisms in their own right, caught up in the happenstance of perpetual motion.
Eventually, eyeing the wine glass where it was beading gently with condensation on the table, I took advantage of his focused distraction to pull myself out of the water.
Ran a towel across my shoulders and around my chest with what I hoped wasn’t too much visible eagerness, then slipped my t-shirt on top of still-damp skin.
By the time he’d finished, I was sitting on the lounger and another third of the way through the wine.