Chapter 18
Ashby
I was alone by the pool when Aspen showed up, wearing a bright pink bikini that didn’t really cover what it was supposed to. I had just finished warming up, stretching my arms and legs, and I was about to get into the water when she walked in.
I was usually the only one swimming this early in the morning.
Normally, my coach, Ruben, came with me, but this morning he’d texted to say he had to stay home because his daughter was sick.
So I came by myself. Training alone didn’t bother me.
I was used to it. Still, with Ruben there, things were easier.
He pushed me when my motivation dipped, corrected my form, and sometimes filmed me swimming laps so I could watch myself afterward and fix what needed fixing next time.
My first instinct when I saw Aspen was to ignore her.
Maybe she’d decided to start swimming, too.
This wasn’t my private pool. Any student could use it, and sometimes I wasn’t alone.
Jasper came here too, and other, younger kids came to swim occasionally.
Some were from the swim club I was part of.
They never bothered me. They came to swim and then left. Unlike Aspen, as I quickly realized.
“Hi, Ashby,” she said, smiling brightly.
She was wearing makeup, which struck me as odd if she actually planned on getting into the water.
“Hey,” I replied. I’d been raised to be polite and kind. I never wanted to give anyone a reason to think otherwise. Still, when it came to Aspen, or her friend, I would’ve preferred to say nothing at all.
“So nice swimming this early, right?” she went on. “I’m totally an early bird. Sometimes I’m up so early I don’t even know what to do before school. Then I remembered you saying you come here every Monday.”
I hadn’t told her that. Not directly. Not ever.
She must’ve overheard a conversation I’d had with someone else.
I was sure of it. She and Hailie had a habit of listening in, then talking about me like we were friends.
We weren’t. We had never been, and I had no interest in changing that.
Especially not when they were the same two people who had spent years saying cruel things to and about Milow.
From the moment school started, I’d known they were part of the reason she kept her head down and always tried to stay unnoticed.
Milow did everything she could to take up as little space as possible, and their behavior was tied to it.
I didn’t respond. I gave her a tight, polite smile and walked along the edge of the pool toward the starting block in lane two. I hated swimming on the outer lanes, and since the pool was empty, I could choose whichever one I wanted.
I pulled on my cap and adjusted my goggles over it, trying to shift my focus back where it belonged.
When I swam, everything else usually fell away, and it was just my body, my breathing, and the water.
That was it. Swimming was the one thing I knew I was really good at—the one thing I wanted to do professionally.
I’d been working toward this since I was four years old.
When I was little, I didn’t even know professional swimming was a thing.
But the older I got, the more people told me I was good, and the more records I broke, the more serious it all became.
I wanted more. I was on the right path, and I wasn’t about to let anything—or anyone—pull me off it.
As I tried to pull my focus back to myself, Aspen suddenly stepped up beside me. She was still smiling, standing far too close. Personal space seemed to be a foreign concept to her. I had to fight the urge to groan. Instead, I glanced at her with a raised brow. “Can I help you?”
She giggled, like I’d said something funny. “No, I think I’ve got it. I’m a good swimmer too, you know. I swim all the time in summer, and I was thinking about joining the Dunst Swim Team.”
“Cool,” I said flatly.
“Totally cool.” She exaggeratedly bit her bottom lip, then let her gaze drift over me in a way that made my body tense.
I was wearing my usual jammer. Actual training gear, like any serious swimmer would wear, unlike Aspen.
Her bikini felt out of place here, especially if she honestly thought about joining a competitive team.
I almost told her she’d need proper gear if she were serious.
That she’d need a kneeskin suit, like every other girl on the DST wore.
But I stopped myself. I didn’t want to encourage her.
Her eyes lingered on my crotch, and it made me uncomfortable.
The jammer was tight, the way it was meant to be, but I wasn’t used to being looked at like that.
Usually, people were focused on their own training.
They were respectful and didn’t stare at others wearing skin-tight stuff.
But Aspen wasn’t respectful. She kept staring.
I cleared my throat and turned toward the starting block, stepping up onto it and shaking out my arms and legs.
Without saying anything else, I pulled my goggles over my eyes and took a deep breath, filling my lungs with all the air I needed.
Aspen was still standing there, close enough to be distracting, but I forced myself to ignore her.
I’d come here for a reason. I wanted to focus on myself, just like I’d planned.
After fifty laps, I pushed myself out of the water and peeled off my cap and goggles. I only ever did fifty here in the school pool, mostly because I didn’t have more time. In actual practice at the aquatic center, I usually did close to 200, sometimes more. Fifty was fine for a Monday morning.
Aspen was still there. Sitting on the bench along the side, watching me like I’d given her permission.
I forced myself not to dwell on it. I’d just finished a solid practice, and all I wanted was to shower, then find Milow.
I missed her. I hated coming to school without her, but I didn’t want to make her get up earlier than she had to just so I could swim before class.
I knew that on mornings she didn’t drive with me, Mom or Dad took her instead, depending on who left for work first.
As I walked over to where I’d left my towel, Aspen stood up and moved too close again. “I was thinking…” she said.
She hadn’t been in the water once. She’d just sat there the entire time, watching me. I wanted to tell her how much that bothered me, but I didn’t.
“About the double date,” she continued. “Hailie and I really want to try that new restaurant in town. You know, the Italian one?”
I frowned. Stan and I had never agreed to a double date.
I was sure we’d made that clear at Scottie’s party.
I hated how entitled she sounded, like she could decide things for us.
I dried off and wrapped the towel around my hips, partly to keep warm and partly to make sure she wouldn’t stare at my crotch. Before I could answer, she kept going.
“We were thinking Friday might be good. Do you have time? Can you ask Stan? Maybe you could give me your number so I can start a group chat with all four of us.”
I didn’t want that. Not now. Not ever. The patience I’d been holding onto finally snapped. “I’m sorry, Aspen, but I’m not interested. And neither is Stan. He’s dating Scottie.”
“Dating?” she laughed. “They’re not dating. They fight all the time.”
She talked about my friends like she knew them the way I did. My jaw tightened as I shook my head. “We’re not interested,” I said again.
“Oh, well… maybe you’ll change your mind if, you know, if you see this.”
It was a moment. A single second in which she lost all her self-respect and decided to flash me.
She pulled the bikini top that barely covered her tits to the sides, her green eyes not showing an ounce of shame.
I wasn’t looking at her tits. I was staring into her eyes, shocked by what she had just done.
“Do you like them?” she asked, tilting her head to the side, trying her hardest to flirt with me. “Every guy at school does.”
And that was the fucking problem. I knew she’d slept with a lot of guys at this school already.
I wasn’t slut-shaming her. It was just facts.
And her pulling this stunt proved, once again, how low she’d go to get someone’s attention.
The worst part was that once she got the attention she so desperately craved, she’d move on to the next guy.
I was never going to be one to check off her list. Neither was Stan.
We had principles. We weren’t up for a quick fuck just for the hell of it, and we surrounded ourselves with two of the most good-hearted girls in this whole town.
Stan and I wanted something real. Not girls who did shit like this to get someone’s attention.
I wanted to shout at her. Lecture her about the fact that what she was doing could be categorized as sexual harassment.
But no words came out. I turned around and headed straight for the showers, relieved that there were separate boys’ and girls’ changing rooms. Although after what she pulled, I bet she’d still intrude on my privacy and ignore simple rules.
My mind was racing, and all I wanted was to get out of there.
I took a shower, got dressed, pulled my backpack out of the locker, and headed out to the main building.
My mind was on Milow. I needed to see her.
I needed her face in front of me to pull my thoughts away from everything.
I couldn’t tell her what happened. It would upset her, and that was the last thing I ever wanted for her.
I found her quickly, standing by her locker with Stan, and relief hit me the second I saw her.
But it didn’t last. Aspen was right behind me.
She wouldn’t let up. She clung to me like a tick, stubborn and relentless, draining every ounce of patience I had left.
No matter how hard I tried to shake her, she stayed there.
Luckily, after Hailie showed up and Stan made fun of her nickname for Aspen, she finally backed off, and I got to walk Milow to her class.
That alone made the morning feel manageable again.
The small, hidden moment we shared lingered in my mind.
I found it fascinating how everything around us disappeared when our hands touched.
I had noticed it back at Scottie’s party, and then by her locker.
That touch alone gave me enough to help me get through the morning.
As she disappeared into the classroom, I already found myself counting the time to the next break.
During the first period, I tried to focus as much as I could.
History had never really been my thing, but I knew that if I wanted to reach my goals and get into UBC—just like Wesley had—I couldn’t rely on athletics alone.
I needed solid grades, too. Athletic success wasn’t enough. Academics mattered just as much.
My focus broke when my phone buzzed. I usually ignored it during class, but whenever I got a text, my first thought was Milow. If she needed me, I wanted to know. I carefully slid my phone out of the front pocket of my hoodie and glanced down at the screen.
Aspen has added you to the group “DOUBLE DATE”
I frowned. Where the hell did she get my number?
My grip tightened around my phone. First, she showed up at the pool and watched me swim. Then she crossed a line I still couldn’t fully wrap my head around. And now, after I had given her zero reason to think I was interested, she still wouldn’t stop.
“Dude,” Stan hissed from the desk to my right, near the back of the room.
I looked over at him. He was holding his phone low, the same message glowing on his screen. My jaw clenched. I had wanted today to be a normal day like it usually was. Instead, we were getting dragged into something we never agreed to and never wanted.
I typed a quick message to Stan, keeping my phone hidden from the teacher at the front of the room.
Me
Exit the group.
Stan
How’d she get our numbers? Did you give it to them?
Me
Fuck, no.
I hesitated for a second, then decided to tell him what had happened earlier at the pool.
Me
Aspen flashed me at the pool. She’s still trying to push this double date thing.
I heard Stan suck in a sharp breath before he quickly covered it with a cough.
Stan
WTF?!
You should report it.
Me
Yeah…
Exit the group.
I did a second later, just as another message from him came through.
Stan
Honestly, what the actual fuck. She flashed you??
Me
Don’t say anything to anyone. I’ll talk to her older brother. He can handle it.
Stan
What a bitch. I’m sorry, man. That’s not okay.
Me
Glad we’re on the same page.
I glanced at him and gave a tight smile before sliding my phone back into my hoodie pocket.
Stan just shook his head, still trying to process what Aspen had done.
I thought about finding Lando, Aspen’s brother.
He was a senior, too, and I only shared one class with him.
But I wasn’t sure I really wanted to tell him what happened.
He might think I was lying. Aspen had a way of convincing people, and I was certain that he’d believe his sister over a guy accusing her of flashing her tits.
The thought of him taking her side made my stomach knot. I didn’t want to start something bigger. It was already exhausting enough dealing with her at all.
By the time the teacher’s voice pulled me back into the room, I’d decided to keep it to myself. At least for now. It felt safer that way. Even if it didn’t feel right.