Don't Run

“Don’t run!”

Kellin rolls his eyes and skids to a halt at the sound of the lifeguard’s voice, glancing over his shoulder and resisting the urge to put his middle finger to good use. He’s at the community pool, and, yeah, it does say “NO RUNNING” on one of the nearby signs, but sometimes he forgets or gets too excited or carried away. It’s kind of childish, sure, but his younger siblings like to play here in the summer a lot, so he ends up inviting his friends sometimes, and they swim laps back and forth or fuck around on the diving board or something. And every single time, Kellin ends up getting yelled at for running at least once by that same goddamn lifeguard.

Okay, so maybe the lifeguard himself is kind of hot, but that doesn’t change the fact that he’s fucking annoying and takes his job way too seriously for Kellin’s taste. He knows it’s just for the safety of the people at the pool, and he knows it wouldn’t happen if he would just slow the fuck down, but now he’s almost tempted to keep running purely out of spite.

“I think that one lifeguard likes you,” says his friend Jack as they reach one end of the pool and rest their hands on the edge.

Kellin turns to him with skepticism, pushing his wet hair out of his face. “What? You mean the one that keeps yelling at me? No way, dude.”

Jack nods toward the lifeguard’s chair, the two of them noting how the lifeguard scopes out the area, his gaze lingering for a few seconds on where Kellin and Jack are resting. “Come on,” Jack says. “No one pays that much attention to a single person unless they’re interested. My girlfriend always stared at me in trig class before we started dating. I think we paid more attention to each other than we did to the teacher.” He snorts.

Kellin bites his lip, shaking his head in absolute denial. “Yeah, but this is his job. He’s supposed to watch us and make sure we don’t get hurt. So he has to enforce the rules.”

“Yeah, but we’re older than a lot of the other people swimming,” Jack points out. “He should be focusing on the little kids, not your ass.”

Kellin smacks him lightly, laughing in disbelief. “He doesn’t stare at my ass!”

“He could.”

Kellin rolls his eyes once again. “He’s probably too old for me or something,” he says, still making excuses so that he doesn’t have to admit to being slightly attracted to this annoying lifeguard. “Like, I’m a senior this year, but I’ve never seen him around our school or anything, so unless he goes to a different district, I’m gonna bet that he’s a college student.”

Jack snorts. “So? That’s only a few years apart.” He shrugs, turning his body around and preparing to swim back down to the other end of the pool. “Whatever, dude. You do you. Also, I’ll race you back.”

Without another word, he kicks off and shoots out into the water. “Hey!” Kellin shouts, and a few seconds later, he’s chasing after Jack.

—

Kellin has nicknamed the lifeguard “Mr. Don’t Run,” since that’s all the guy ever says. It’s his own personal inside joke, and almost every time he goes to the community pool, he hears that sentence spoken to someone, even though sometimes it’s not him. It has gone from being annoying to being extremely amusing, and he finds himself laughing every time the lifeguard says it. The lifeguard then turns to glare at Kellin; they have turned to mutually getting on each other’s nerves, but at the same time, neither of them can seem to keep their eyes off of the other. Jack often laughs at this, and Kellin often smacks him.

One particularly rainy summer afternoon, though, Kellin is not at the community pool (because the community pool is outside and the weather is the exact opposite of ideal at the moment); instead, he’s working the register at Walmart, trying to find something productive to do since nobody is coming up to pay for anything at the moment. At this point in time, he really doesn’t expect something exciting to happen. He certainly doesn’t expect to see that stupidly attractive lifeguard walking past the check-out lines.

At first, Kellin can’t believe his eyes as he watches Mr. Don’t Run stroll past (actually wearing a shirt for once). He’s technically not supposed to be texting when he’s not on break, but there’s nobody around to tell him what to do and this is important, so he discreetly pulls his phone out of his pocket and sends a quick text to Jack: I’m at work and I just saw the cute lifeguard that yells at me I’m not kidding send help

Jack responds a few minutes later, as Kellin is (still) trying to find something to do: wait really?? seduce him!!

Kellin rolls his eyes. He expected nothing less from Jack.

At that moment, the lifeguard appears around the corner with a couple of things in his hands, making his way up to the checkout lines. Kellin’s not sure whether he wants the guy to come to his line or to stay as far away from him as possible, but he doesn’t get time to make a decision, because the lifeguard has already made his. Kellin feels a tiny smirk cross his lips as he watches the guy put his things up on the little conveyor belt.

“So,” Kellin says as he scans the dude’s items, “how ya doing today, Mr. Don’t Run?”

The lifeguard makes a face, rolling his eyes. “Is that your name for me?”

“Yep,” Kellin replies smoothly, putting the items in a bag. “Because that’s all you ever seem to say. If you have another name, though, I’d love to hear it.”

“Vic,” the guy responds. He glances down at Kellin’s name tag. “And it seems that you’re Kellin.”

“Indeed I am,” Kellin replies, his smile widening a little bit. The tension between them is so obvious and so there, and part of him wants to actually do as Jack told him to do.

Vic looks Kellin up and down before nodding slowly. “If you want a little fun,” he says, “meet me after my shift tomorrow.”

“Absolutely,” Kellin says, leaning forward a little bit and letting a few pieces of his hair fall into his face. “It’s a date.”

With that, he finishes ringing Vic up, and then Vic walks away with a playful and almost seductive glint in his eyes. Kellin watches him go, and then he pulls his phone back out again to text Jack: ok so I’m not exactly sure what just happened but I think we’re gonna have sex

Jack’s response takes only a few seconds: did you actually seduce him oh my god I was KIDDING

This is then quickly followed by: but good for you bro go get him

Kellin just shakes his head and laughs a little. Whatever happens, tomorrow is going to be an interesting day.