“But we have leftover cake from the church mixer!” she calls out. “And fruit salad!”
“I’ve really got to go, but thank you,” I reply, and my eyes meet Bennie’s. “Can you practice with us, say, Friday?”
He nods and I give him another hug good-bye, just to piss off his dad, and leave.
19
BOWEN
I can’t believe I’m doing this, but I’m doing it. I pull open the door to the community center. The cavernous entry smells faintly of chlorine that gets stronger as I head towards the aquatic area. I see the changing rooms side by side on the left and I poke my head into the men’s one, making sure he’s not in there. There’s one guy in front of a locker and I can hear a shower running but I doubt Chase showers before he teaches. I enter and find one of the empty lockers and quickly change into my bathing suit and grab my towel out of my bag before walking down the hall to the indoor, Olympic sized pool.
I don’t know why I’m nervous. I shouldn’t be, but I totally am. I have barely seen Chase this week and it’s been killing me. Tanner scheduled me a lot because Molly was sick, and Chase had a busy work week. The band practice they had last night was with Bennie because he agreed to sub in for the Baldwin gig. Even though I gave my blessing, I hate that he’s drumming with them again. Chase hates it too, I know. And he even offered for me to come over and have drinks with them after practice, but I thought it might annoy Bennie. I can tell he still likes Chase as more than a friend and if I showed up it would be salt in a wound. Because I wouldn’t be leaving that loft with the rest of them. I’d stay and spend the night. So instead, I spent my night at home sulking so badly Autumn asked me if I was PMSing. Then I went to my room and jerked off to the memory of the sex we had in Maine.
So now, unable to go another minute without seeing him, I walk into the pool area, which has about twenty gray and white haired ladies milling about in swimsuits. One of them glances up as I walk in. She’s in a one piece black and red floral bathing suit with a red scrunchie keeping her long white hair up in a high bun. “Hello gorgeous. Are you lost?”
That gets the attention of a few more of them, and the chatter starts to die off, which gets the rest of them to look up. Now, all twenty senior ladies are staring at me, some of them lewdly. I have an overwhelming urge to blush. “No, ma’am,” I say quietly. “I’m here for the ten-thirty aqua aerobics.”
“You are?” another says, her jaw just about on the tile floor. She’s wearing a tangerine, high-waisted two piece that I’m pretty sure Autumn owns. She cocks a hip and puts her hand on it as she picks her jaw up. “Well, I’m Leslie. What’s your name?’
“Bowen.”
“Well, Bowen, you can stand in front of me in the pool. I want a good view.”
A bunch of them giggle. And then there’s a whistle. “Hello ladies welcome to…” Chase’s voice stops completely when he sees me standing amongst his usual clientele. He is trying not to smile, and failing desperately, so I grin right back. “Make that ladies and gentleman. Thanks for coming today. If you’ll make your way into the pool, we’ll get started. There’s free swim immediately after the class so don’t feel like you have to rush off.”
I hang my towel on one of the hooks on the wall by the door and follow the gaggle of ladies down the wide steps and into the pool. Chase’s eyes never leave mine. Neither do Leslie’s or any of the other ladies. One of them has her head turned almost all the way around to keep her gaze on me. It’s flattering, to be honest. I wink at her and she blushes.
“Don’t give Jane too much attention,” a lady to my left says. “She’s been widowed for ten years. Might just ask you on a date.”
“Give the man some breathing room, Rachel,” Chase calls out with a chuckle to the woman who just warned me about Jane. “You know there’s a lot of arm movements in class, we don’t want to be hitting each other.”
“Hittingoneach other is a different thing altogether,” Leslie chimes in.
“I’m going to start the sound system. Leigh, I’m counting on you to keep these ladies in line,” Chase points to a woman with short gray hair closest to the edge of the pool.
“Honey, I make no guarantees,” Leigh replies. “I might just leave my dear Eddie for this one.”
More laughter.
Chase walks over and leans over the edge of the pool, right in front of me. “I can’t believe you’re here.”
“You said it was open to anyone.”
“It is, but…” Chase grins. “There seems to be some serious sexual harassment. I promise Johanna, Leslie, Leigh, Rachel, Jane and Lori are all harmless. Myrtle, I make no guarantees about. She might goose you.”
“I’m cool. Are you cool?”
“Getting to see you? All wet and half naked? Yeah. Cool.” He stands back up and walks over to the sound system tucked into the wall.
Music starts to flood the cavernous room from speakers near the ceiling and Chase unzips his hoodie and hangs it on one of the wall hooks. He’s in gray and red swim trunks with a dark gray tank with the community center logo on it. He looks smokin’ hot and one of the women who hasn’t yet spoken to me leans in. “There’s a reason why we girls never miss a weekend class and it’s not because we enjoy the scent or chlorine or need the exercise. We have a walking group and chair yoga twice a week.”
I lift an eyebrow and she laughs. “Oh, come on, you’re here for the same eye candy we are.”
“Myrtle!” Chase calls her name sternly but with a smile. “Eyes up front.”
“Not a hardship,” Myrtle calls back with a grin.
The class is forty-five minutes and actually more of a workout than I anticipated. Chase is a great instructor, giving out options for each exercise at varying degrees of difficulty. I always pick the hardest but so do a lot of the ladies. My only objection is that he’s instructing from the pool deck. I was hoping he’d be in the pool with us.
