Chapter Thirteen #4
The drills were well underway when Lulu noticed Ariana standing at the gym door.
She waved to Lulu, beckoning her toward the portable classrooms, where Tyler had headed.
Shooting a glance around the room, she spotted Gwendy and Alejandro working with the drill group, and Bill, silently but competently managing the two playing courts.
With everything under control, she and Ariana slipped through the gym door and ran through the rain to the awning outside a classroom door.
“Check this out,” Ariana said.
She could hear the sounds the instant she stepped out on the walkway.
The laughter and the shouts and the distinctive pock-pock of pickleballs bouncing.
Ariana held out a hand to still Lulu’s steps, and they paused discreetly outside the open door of the first classroom.
Inside, the students had shoved the desks into a line to create a net, pushed the chairs to the sides, and with wholehearted and unbridled enthusiasm, they were playing pickleball.
The same scene was repeated, room after room.
Outside the door of the last classroom, a mass of students gathered, cheering and hooting their lungs out.
Ariana pushed her way through, and when Lulu got a look, her laugh bubbled up from her belly.
The four adults, teachers likely, plus Tyler, were deep into a serious game.
Tyler’s partner was a spry lady in her seventies.
She had kicked off her pumps and stood motionless with a paddle protecting her face while Tyler sprung from side to side, fielding all the balls.
Their opponents, two men, battled valiantly.
The younger man, a fit guy in a tracksuit, must have had tennis experience, because when he sliced a missile past Tyler, even the pro was impressed. And the kids went wild.
Well, damn. Maybe she did have a thing for Tyler Demming.
“I saw that look,” Ariana said, packing up her camera equipment.
As they headed back to the gym, Lulu regarded her new friend, still smiling.
Maybe Tyler wasn’t worthy of the bad rep the tabloids claimed.
Immature and reckless could also be perceived as playful and spontaneous.
Reframing her view of him, Lulu hopped over puddles on her way back across the campus pathway.
Inside the now wet and noisy gym, drills and games were still underway. “I’m sure we’re causing multiple fire-code violations,” Ariana noted.
A cheer went up, followed by thunderous applause and foot-stomping.
A swell of students poured out the gym doors and swarmed back toward their classrooms. “Game over,” Ariana quipped, and they joined their tourmates in collecting the equipment.
Alejandro and Bill were all smiles. Gwendy angled her phone camera and took a few shots of the now-empty gymnasium.
“Why, Mom?” Ariana quipped. “Why would you take a picture of the empty gym? What are you going to do with those pictures?” She turned to Lulu.
“There ought to be an app that you could download that would change the sound of the phone camera. Instead of that clicking noise, it could just say, Delete. Delete. Delete.” Ariana shrugged. “Could be a big time-saver.”
Tyler emerged from the classroom bubbling with happy energy.
They loaded up the equipment and Lulu took a seat behind him as they headed to the Arenal Lodge.
As the van jiggled and tilted over the rough road, she stared at Tyler’s bumping back and watched his hair bounce against his neck.
All the jiggling and tilting and bumping and bouncing were giving Lulu ideas again.
She closed her eyes and let them run wild.
Lulu read the sign for Volcán Look Disco and tried to work through the semantic perplexities. The pounding pump of the music energized her as she followed Ariana and Tyler into the nightclub.
Ariana squeezed to the front of the crowded bar and, moments later, spun toward them clutching six shot glasses so full that the liquid spilled over the lip. Ariana chugged one to make the carrying easier. “You gotta try this.”
“That is the smallest Bloody Mary I’ve ever seen,” Lulu remarked.
“Chiliguaro shots. Pure cane sugar alcohol—that’s the guaro part, plus tomato and hot sauce. Hence, chiliguaro.” She handed out the shots.
“Pura vida!” Ariana said, clinking glasses and downing her second shot. “Ah.” She grinned, satisfied. “It’s a national treasure.”
Lulu’s went down smoothly. “I can see why.”
Swaying her hips to the beat, Lulu nursed her second shot, but when the waitress bumped into her, the tomatoey concoction splashed onto her skirt.
“Wanna dance?” Tyler asked.
“Yes,” she answered decisively. “But I’m going to pop into the ladies’ room first,” she explained, glad that she always carried spot remover, wet wipes, and makeup pads for exactly this sort of inevitability.
By the time the hand dryer did its magic, she returned to find Tyler and Ariana already on the dance floor. Spotting her, Tyler nodded and circled his finger in the air. Next song.
Lulu stood near the wall and swayed her hips to the beat. She was feeling good. A fun day. A little shot. And there was nothing better to get one’s blood pumping and pulse revving than the vibrations of music thrumming through the soles of her feet.
Well. Almost nothing.
She watched him—the easy fluidity of his body.
He danced like he played pickleball. Smooth.
In control. And now, studying him openly as he moved, she felt a dual warmth—both of affection and something more primal and insistent.
The motion of his hips was igniting a small bonfire in her nether regions.
Lulu blinked and checked herself. Ever since last night’s almost ignition of The Rocket’s blasters, her lust meter had been tuned to ultrasensitive.
Watching Tyler’s ease on the dance floor was like watching him play pickleball.
Neither made her think about what a good dancer or what a gifted athlete he was.
It had been a long, long, lo-o-ng time since she had considered herself a sexual being.
Maybe it was the tropical weather or the energy bump she got from playing a sport again after such a long hiatus.
Maybe it was the vibrating music. Or the chiliguaro.
Certainly, it was the sense memory of Tyler’s fingers on her rib cage.
At the thought of his touch, her skin grew warm.
Out of habit, her brain pumped the brakes.
But this time, that nagging voice that warned married stopped short.
Where she had been afraid of fire, now she was tempted to lean into the heat.
He had sparked something in her and the coals sprang back to life.
Okay, she thought. Challenge accepted.
He looked hot. And his ass looked tight in those jeans. She could squeeze those butt cheeks. Like a juicer. She wanted to grab ahold of his black T-shirt, push him against the wall, and—
Suddenly, a woozy rush hit her. Lulu swayed on her feet. She shook her head, clearing her brain. The chiliguaro had been strong, but this dizziness walloped her.
Ah. She had once heard the name for her ailment; she must be experiencing a horny high.
People with low tolerance to sexual stimulation were particularly susceptible.
Go long enough without any action, and the smallest taste goes straight to the head.
That’s what this was. Look at her! What was she thinking…
pounding shots, rappelling down cliffs, and mattress-moshing with the likes of Tyler Demming?
She was a grown woman. A mom, for crying out loud.
What did she think she was going to do? Once she got fired from her job, would she run off with an unemployed pickleball pro and they would raise her three-year-old on wishes and crackers?
Lulu was a practical person. She needed to think straight. She needed some air.
She needed to take a trip outside the club to the head-clearing drizzle.
The moment she stood outside, she drew in a lungful of the damp, cleansing air.
The rain pattered down, and the sky was clouded over and black as tar.
She could just as well have been back on Bainbridge rather than standing in front of a volcano for all she could see.
She worried her curls, twisting a strand up against her temple and letting it spring down.
Irrationally, Lulu was mad at herself. What kind of messed-up timing was going on in the world when her job was hanging in the balance, her daughter was not yet old enough to attend school, and she thought it might be a good idea to rekindle a romance with Tyler Demming?
She leaned against the brick wall, her jaw tense with the injustice of her situation. Their openhearted conversation and their brief tangle on the mattress continued to replay in her head. Could it be that she genuinely liked him as a person? And desired him?
How was it that just as she was on a mission to find a relaxing and adventurous way to explore her true self, Tyler happened?
And then, oh the unfairness of life, that his presence suddenly launched this disturbing awakening of her lust. Or worse.
Not just lust, but attraction. To Tyler Demming: that tatted-up, long-haired, sometimes sweet, ripped pickler.
She pictured herself tearing off that clingy, muscle-revealing T with her teeth.
Sighing, she hung her head. This painfully awakened arousal was inadvisable for reasons she could list in a bullet-pointed, six-page document.
A slice of colored lights escaped the club when the door opened, and Lulu’s gaze jolted up. Ariana peeked her head out.
“Phew! It’s nice and cool out here. And wet!” she said, stepping into the parking lot and drawing her long hair into a twist. “You okay?”
“Just getting some air,” Lulu said.