Sunny...Rescue

Taking the stand for the other guard, he quickly scanned and counted the crowd. Forty-five. Too many, way too many. The pool just wasn’t that big. He’d seen larger pools in the backyards of single families. Noticing too that there were way too many people for one person to guard at once, the other guard caught his eye and indicated that she would be staying on deck to help monitor. He wasn’t particularly relieved. His obsessive compulsive nature would make it impossible to focus only on his zone, meaning he’d be guarding the entire pool anyways. But the added help meant that he would be able to lighten up, at least a little bit.

It had been a long day. Opening the grocery store had left him drained, no matter how many monster mochas he “borrowed.” And the sun was no help, easily 100 degrees, with a high UV rating, and to add insult to injury he hadn’t had time to pack a lunch, so he was starving. Scanning religiously, counting heads, watching eyes, arms, head position. Listening to splashing, yelling screaming, crying, choking, gaging. Hundreds of sounds, movement everywhere. A lady in the far corner was sneaking some beer, the kid in the red bathing suit had been underwater swimming for five seconds, the non-swimmer in the spiderman floaties, was on the stairs standing. A couple teenagers were flirting in deep water but they could swim. Two year old walking on the deck, non-swimmer, a yell pulled his attention, it was nothing. The two year old was gone. He scanned quickly and saw her, safe with her mother.

Rapid movement caught his eye as a blue suited boy tripped into the water, non-swimmer, twelve meters away, six seconds with a clear path, there was no clear path. Standing whistle blasting he sprinted, nine seconds on foot with tight corners. House wife was going to get wet. The other guard was trying to figure out what was going on. He leaped over an ignorant six year old, into the water, hit the bottom calculated the angle pushed off reaching under the child's arm lifting him up, making sure his head was out of the water, and all but threw him onto the deck. His heart beating again as time caught up with his brain.