Summer Boy Ch. 01

Adam looked back, his face blank. The practically twin supervisors chuckled.

"You're going to make him feel self-conscious," Olivia scolded Lynn jestingly.

Adam suddenly straightened up. Through a sharp smile and a sharper angling up of his eyebrow he said, "Ça ne fait rien. It's cool. It's nice to be noticed. Get used to them, 'cause these shorts, they are not going anywhere."

Her small lips still pursed, Lynn frowned slightly but nodded. "Well...good," she replied, "Good for you...ah..."

"Adam," he replied, "Adam Dupuis."

"Good for you Adam Dupuis. Ooh, Francophone. Quebecois?"

"From Hull," he acknowledged.

"'Ull'...I really like the accent," she said with her warm giggle. "Looks like you've got one to watch out for, Olivia."

"Okay guys, tours are done," Olivia announced with a clap of her hands, "Go get things set up for the day. You have half an hour."

The trainees turned away and dispersed. Adam immediately had his arm wrapped around the shoulders of the pretty blonde trainee. "This is gonna be fun," he said. As he walked away, he could feel the eyes of the two supervisors on his back and his name whispered between them. He didn't mind at all. As the months went by, he did what he could to encourage that reaction.

Three years later, it was a skill he had mastered.

**********

Adam pulled himself up from the pool. After clearing the public out for the indoor pool's brief afternoon closure, he always liked to do a few laps before going on break. He toweled off at poolside, but only his hair. He enjoyed letting the water dry off his skin naturally.

"Can't believe you can swim like that after all that ice cream cake," Trevor, his coworker at the pool, remarked. He sat by the wall along with two other community centre staff, Juan and Marek.

"Got some excess energy to burn," Adam replied.

"Not gonna save some of that for your partying tonight, birthday boy?" Juan said and nudged Marek seated beside him.

The buzz-cut redhead Trevor winked. "Yeah, don't want to disappoint Cassie. She's eager to celebrate with you, that's for sure."

"Cassie?" Marek asked anxiously. Leaning over and adjusting his wire-rimmed glasses he said, "I thought it was Irina?"

"Hell, I thought it was Joy," Juan added.

Adam smirked and looked down, shaking his head. "I've no idea what you guys are talking about."

The group was thumbing through one of Adam's men's lifestyle magazines, guffawing at some of the raunchier, racier articles and making lewd remarks about the pictures of the digitally enhanced models.

Adam leaned back against the wall then slid down, joining them seated on the floor. "You guys learn anything yet?"

"Yeah, don't clean your weapon with an electric toothbrush," Trevor remarked bluntly.

The four young men snickered. "Yeah, that's good advice for only $9.99," Adam sighed.

"'In Praise of the Older Woman'," Juan read the title of a magazine article, frowning, "You know, I'm not really into this whole mature women deal."

Adam reached across and pulled the magazine out of his co-worker's hands. "They aren't talking about making out with your grandmother, Juan," he joked with a slight sneer on his upper lip.

Trevor hung his head between his knees, "Man, don't even joke about shit like that!"

"It's all relative to age, isn't it?" Adam stated, "I mean guys like us wouldn't want to screw your grandmother but maybe someone around 50 years old would."

"My grandmother's 75," Marek mumbled.

"Maybe someone who's 60 will do your grandma, then."

"So what's your 'expiry date' when it comes to a woman?" Juan asked.

"What's that joke about women and Christmas trees?" Trevor interjected, "Nobody wants'em around after the 25th?"

As his coworkers laughed, Adam waved his hand dismissively. "How about this: A woman who would still looks hot in a school girl kilt but would never think of wearing one at her age?"

His cohort all tilted their heads and looked upward quietly as they thought about it.

"Someone who let's you know that you're not with some air-headed cheerleader but with a woman," Adam continued, accentuating his words with his fingers grasping inwardly, "All the parts are there. The body's still as sexy as ever. Not old enough to be your mother but just definitely more mature, experienced."

Marek spoke up, "Ah...anyone at the centre like that?"

"Lynn," Juan immediately replied.

"Lynn. Fuckin'-A," Trevor concurred, "I would so hit that!"

Marek nodded, "Uh, yeah. Glad I'm not the only one."

"Make that sweet-ass China doll bitch scream! That's what I'm talking about! Mm-hmm!" Trevor growled with his fists clenched as he continued on his one man race to be the most obnoxious of the crew.

Adjusting his glasses and, after eyeing the manic-eyed Trevor warily, Marek turned to Adam and asked, "What about you?"

Adam remained silent, staring out straight ahead, a pensive gaze on his face.

"Juan and Marek!" A stern female voice echoed throughout the complex. Lynn stood across the pool from the young men, her hands on her hips, "You're not on break!"

The younger two staff members scrambled to their feet and quickly made their way towards her.

"No running around the pool, guys," Adam remarked, still seated. Trevor chuckled.

From the other side of the pool Adam could see Lynn glare at him.

"You were supposed to clean up the equipment in the gym!" Lynn berated Juan and Marek.

"Sorry! We thought the class was still going on!" Marek piped in, his voice pitching higher.

"It ended 10 minutes ago," the supervisor quipped, "That means all the stuff in the gym should have been put away 9 minutes ago."

"But..."

"Go!" Lynn snapped, "Now before I get my baseball bat!"

Without another word, Juan and Marek tucked tail and shuffled quickly from the pool area. Lynn stood at the pool and lowered her forehead to her palm. Her sigh drifted across to the other side.

Leaning over to Adam, Trevor whispered from the side of his mouth, "She really is fucking hot. Crap, now I can't get that thought out of my head. Wish I could fuckin' do her in the showers right now, man."

"Ça ne se fera pas," Adam remarked with a low, detached voice.

"What?" Trevor asked.

"Nothing," Adam said, patting him on the shoulder, "Aim high, guy."

As his coworker snickered to himself, Adam stood up, keeping his eyes on the slender supervisor standing at the other end of the pool. He saw her look up towards him and for a moment he stood still, letting her get an eyeful of his lean body. She continued to watch him as he pulled on his T-shirt. Adam nodded then walked out the side exit of the building, knowing her eyes were still on him as he left.

************

"She's not even that old," Adam mumbled to himself as he crouched down against the outside brick wall of the complex, tanning himself under the bright sun. He cast his blue eyes across the parking lot, long lost in thought as he pulled out a cigarette and lit it in his lips. Opening up the magazine again, he thought of Lynn, saw her smooth, heart-shaped face and sweet-yet-sexy smile in his mind, and grinned.

He didn't even notice when a pair of smooth legs came up and beside him.

"Adam."

He turned his head and raised it slowly, starting at the person's feet and moving up her legs and body until they settled on her face. Lynn looked down at him, arms crossed, eyeing him suspiciously..

"Salut. Beaut of a day, eh?" he greeted her. He shaded his eyes with his hand.

Lynn looked up, squinting from the glare of the sun shining through a shimmering haze. She turned back to the young man and said, "Uh-huh. Are you supposed to be out here?"

Adam smiled and held up the "peace" sign with two fingers. "I'm on lunch," he said.

She nodded. "Okay," she grumbled, "Sorry to bother you."

Adam winked and waved off her apology. "Just doing your job, boss."

"Could you at least put on your T-shirt?" she added, looking away toward nothing in particular.

He chuckled and then put on the staff shirt.

For whatever reason, his flirtatious response and easy-going smile actually seemed to relax Lynn a bit. She definitely had been having a tense morning. She sighed, and could almost see a black cloud of air slip through her lips. She dropped her hands to her hips and chided, "That looks like a really nutritious meal. Poutine just doesn't cut it?"

Adam looked at his cigarette then back up at the supervisor. "Helps keep the calories off," he replied, "Gotta watch my figure."

Lynn leaned forward. "You, mon ami, don't have to watch your figure," she said, "Myself on the other hand..."

"Don't have to watch your figure, either," Adam slipped in. He always had a ticklish rasp to his boyish voice, possibly a combination of the smoking and his accent.

The woman threw him a sceptical grin. "Oh, 'don' I?" she chuckled.

"Leave the watching to someone who can appreciate it," he added.

Lynn paused, her fine brows frowning slightly, only the dark circles of her pupils seeping through the edges of her narrowed eyes. A cautious thought germinated in her mind.

Adam could sense the hesitancy in the woman. "You want one?" he asked offering a cigarette.

Lynn blinked and, after a noticeable pause, shook her head. "No thanks."

"Ah, that's right," he nodded, "Health freak."

"No. No not really. I mean I try," she said, leaning back against the brick wall, "I used to smoke...a pack a week."

"Yeah?"

"Used to do a lot of things which weren't so good for me," Lynn continued as she looked ahead. There was a slight grin on her face as she sifted through her memories. She sighed, rolling her eyes, and giggled quietly then looked down at Adam. "It was when I was still very young and very stupid."

Adam grinned and nodded appreciatively. He already knew that Lynn had a bit of a mischievous side. He experienced it first hand. A couple of years ago, she nearly side-swiped him and cut him off at 20 km over the neighbourhood speed limit during his driving lesson. She even turned her head to wave back at him. She was always teasing him about his clothes and hair as well.

"Now I'm just old and stupid," she said, looking away again.

The young man shrugged. "Older, not old," he corrected.

"Thank you, Adam," Lynn replied politely. There was a pause then she added, "Uh...excuse me. What about being stupid?"

He shrugged again and chuckled, "Not gonna argue."

Despite herself, Lynn laughed and poked Adam playfully on the side of his head. He barely flinched.

"Hey, you know, nothing wrong with being stupid," Adam remarked, "Stupid can be fun. Stupid can be exciting. Stupid can be naughty and sexy."

"'Naughty and sexy'? Oh, give me a break!" Lynn scoffed. She slid down the wall and sat beside him. Snatching the magazine from his hands, she asked, "Did you learn that stuff from this?"

"Yup," Adam said, exaggerating a nod, "That and how to keep my hair well-groomed."

Lynn frowned at him, her mouth at a crooked angle. "Pfft. You've been suckered, buddy."

"Eh. C'est possible," Adam offered, unfazed, and took another drag of his cigarette as the woman flipped through the pages of the magazine.

"Do you really need this to teach you how to get a girl's attention?"

"I've graduated from pulling on pony-tails," he shrugged, "Need new material."

"I think you're doing pretty well on your own talents," Lynn said, half-sarcastically as she continued to examine the magazine. Then her face suddenly froze, her eyes widening slightly and her small lips ajar in a crooked grin. "Oh wow," she breathed, "'A Position-A-Month'?"

"Good article," Adam said, giving her the thumbs up.

Lynn tilted her head as she looked at the article, her expression shifting from shocked to quizzical. She caught herself thinking just how effective some of the 'techniques' actually were.

"Don't tell me they don't talk about stuff like that in those chick mags," Adam scoffed.

"Yes. Yes, you're so right," she replied. She continued to read the article intently then added, "It's just that the pictures aren't as...uh...graphic as these. Also, they're not written as if it sounds like you could be servicing your car. I mean, come on...'Welding her chassis?'. Yuck!"

"Guess it's geared towards hip young studs," Adam grinned, "Like me."

"I'm also quite amazed with how many ways you can refer to male and female genitalia," Lynn remarked as she continued to flip through the magazine. After a pause, she raised her brow and asked Adam with a saucy tone, "So, do you have a name for...yours?"

Somehow, the way she asked the question, playful yet provocative, left the young man speechless for once.

Lynn bit her lower lip. A second removed from speaking, she suddenly realized the question was more than a bit inappropriate. She stared blankly at the open magazine, unable to look at the young man, unsure of how to move past the moment of awkward silence.

He recovered quickly, however, and flashed her a very wry grin as he bounced his eyebrows up and down. "I just refer to it as Fred."

Adam's boyishly coy response was enough to break the tension. Lynn rolled her eyes and laughed. "Here, 'stud'," she said and slapped the magazine dismissively against the young man's chest, "Obviously that magazine isn't geared towards people like me. I couldn't even begin to relate to the sexpot bombshell on the cover."

"You have more style and class," Adam said.

"Good answer!" Lynn replied, smiling. "Style and class don't sell too many men's magazines."

Adam shrugged. "I'd buy it if you were on the cover."

"Why thank-you, Adam...a kind of creepy thought, but I'll take it."

He grinned and bounced his eyebrows up and down adding, "I'd immediately flip to your pictorial to see if they got you into a leather thong and bra!"

Lynn rolled her eyes. "There you go again..."

"Then I'd read what your likes or dislikes are in the bedroom," Adam continued.

"Stop...right there!" Lynn insisted, lowering her head and holding a finger up in front of his face.

"Just kidding, Lynn."

"You'd better be."

She breathed a noticeably loud sigh.

"Not having a good day?" Adam asked.

"No. Not 'aving' a good day," she said mimicking his accent, "Not having a good month! Not having a good year!"

"Work?"

"Partly because of work," Lynn said, "I feel like I've been managing puppies in a pet shop...but nowhere as cute and cuddly."

Adam angled a smile and spoke through the corner of his lips, "Some of us are cute and cuddly, no?"

Lynn rolled her eyes. She looked away and said, "Sometimes cute, maybe. Definitely not cuddly."

"I can live with that," he replied. After a moment, he added, "You okay? Want to talk about it?"

Lynn heard his voice and frowned. He sounded remarkably sincere. She was sure that if she turned and looked at Adam he would have been sporting some sort of goofy expression on his face, so she didn't bother. "It's ok," she answered, "I'm good."

"Seriously, my advice can be just insightful as Oprah's," Adam said, "And I'm not some fat megalomaniac bitch."

"You know, you're much easier to talk to when you're not being an obnoxious punk," Lynn sighed.

Adam suddenly looked remorseful.

"The thing is, Adam, you sometimes just push things too far. You're obviously smart and you're funny and charming as it is," Lynn scolded as she stared out into the parking lot, "If you weren't always playing such an ass you'd be really...."

She caught herself as she looked at him. He was looking back at her with a disarmingly solemn expression.

Adam blinked and frowned as he looked away. "Sorry. C'est vrai. You're right."

Lynn watched him for a moment and nodded her chin slightly. She may have been unexpectedly harsh with her words. Also, she didn't quite know what she was about to say if she hadn't stopped herself. She let it go.

Adam reached into his shorts pocket. "Sure you don't want a cigarette? How about a maple candy?"

Lynn looked at his hand as he held out a couple of small, leaf shaped, beige candies to her.

"I shouldn't," she winced.

"Oh, yeah, you should."

"Fine," she sighed taking a piece, "You're always carrying around these things. Don't suppose you have anything stiffer in your pockets?"

Adam's brows angled sharply. "Not at the moment, but that can quickly change," he sputtered into a laugh.

"Oh for God's...totally inappropriate!" Lynn rolled her eyes and groaned, exasperated, "I meant a bottle of rum or something!"

"That would be a little harder to come by," he replied, composing himself.

Lynn shook her head, but looked away to hide her own grin.

The two sat there for a minute, soaking in the sun, re-energizing for the afternoon. It always struck Lynn how odd it was that she always seemed at ease when she was alone with Adam. During work, he was a constant source of frustration, often the epitome of it for her. He was the mischievous gnat who had to be swatted away from buzzing around the other staff. His cockiness as he hovered around others, especially the females, was an annoying act to witness as a supervisor. Yet, talking like this --hanging around together like this-- that act seemed to give way to a natural, cool confidence -- a little edgy, a little charming...undeniably attractive.

And as long as no one else was around to see, what was the harm in hanging around an attractive young man?

Adam flicked away his cigarette and pulled out his cell-phone.

"Planning out your evening, birthday boy?" Lynn asked, eyeing his phone.

Adam shrugged.

"Not going to do anything special tonight?" Lynn mused, pouting her lips in mock sympathy, "It's your 20th. Not going to whoop it up with friends or one from your harem?"

Adam muttered something under breath and grinned.

"What?" Lynn frowned.

His brow arched high as his grin sharpened. He turned and gave her a very deliberate and lingering look with his cool green eyes. "Nothing," he said, shaking his head very slowly.

Adam's look caught Lynn off guard. There was transparency in the look, but she didn't want to see through it. Even as she felt her own eyes linked to his, she leaned away slightly as the young man's gaze push-pulled at her. She remained unblinking for a moment as Adam returned to clicking away on his cell phone.

Trying to think of something to say, she finally remarked aimlessly, "I can't believe you're 20."

"And you're 30," Adam said, still thumbing buttons, "So what?"

Lynn finally blinked. "How did you know I was 30?"

Adam shrugged and side-stepped the question. "Wasn't your birthday at the beginning of the summer?" he asked. "I don't remember you making a big deal about that. No ice cream cake in the staff lounge for you."

The woman looked down and away. "No," she said quietly, her thoughts trailing, "I didn't want to make a big deal about it."

"Don't worry," Adam sighed nonchalantly, "You absolutely don't look 30."

Lynn chuckled at the off-the-cuff compliment. "Oh yeah? What does a 30 year old look like?"

He tilted his head to look at her. "Not like you," he replied.

Lynn matched his gaze in silence, not quite able to smile and laugh off his remark. She looked away. Damn this kid. So far during their short conversation, the young man had been pulling her up and down emotionally like a yo-yo, allowing her to relax before snapping her back to a wilting anxiety with seemingly calculated remarks and glances. It always seemed to go that way whenever they talked. She realized that they had talked often during the two years that she knew Adam. For a person she claimed she could never be able to relate to, she had actually spent an awful lot of time chatting with him as compared to everyone else at the centre. A lot of their talks could have actually been considered a breech of professional conduct if she were to be honest. She couldn't help herself.