Author's Notes: I haven't even finished watching the latest Flash episode, but the remark about Joe throwing Barry into the pool was irresistible. Enjoy!
"C'mon, Bar; the shallow end is three feet. You're five-two. You will not drown."
Barry shakes his head, backing away from the pool. He took his shoes off at the door like Joe did, but the second he saw the big body of water in the center of the room, he froze. "I don't wanna swim," he insists. "I thought we were going to the dentist."
"You are the only kid I know who hates the pool more than the dentist," Joe says, bobbing in the water in the deep end. Barry can't even see the bottom of it; it's gotta be twice Joe's height. He shivers at the thought. "It's like taking a bath. You don't mind taking baths."
"I can't drown in a tub," Barry gripes.
"Hell you can't," Joe retorts, shifting towards the edge of the pool. Barry scoots back farther. "Would you rather I took you to the dentist?"
Barry scuffs a toe on the ground. "Where's Iris?" he deflects.
"Hanging out with Linda," Joe replies, arms up on the siding. "Come on. You will not drown."
"I don't wanna," Barry insists. He's old enough to not stamp his foot, but he's so desperately unhappy that he wants to.
"Bar, everybody's gotta swim. What're you gonna do if you fall in the water someday and can't?"
Barry ducks his head, staring at the ground. He bites his lip. "Call you," he says, looking up.
Joe's expression, always comfortingly open, softens. "Buddy, I'm fast, but I can't fly to you. You're gonna have to stand on your own two feet sometimes, too. But I can help you here. Now come on. It's lonely all by myself."
Barry shakes his head, backing up against the wall, heart pounding when he realizes he's as far as he can go. That's not true – he could run. He's run before. Plenty of times. He knows how to run, he's not fast but he knows how to run. But something fuzzy keeps him from connecting the dots, and when Joe steps out of the water he hears the whoosh and the mini-shower of droplets hitting the floor.
Then a pair of strong hands snake under his arms and he swears he flies for a second before a wall of water hits him.
Fwoomph.
He's under it, flailing for the surface, panicking because water-water-water. Then there's a reverse whoosh beside him and the same strong arm loops around his back and shoulders. It propels him to the surface and he's gasping, still flailing mightily in Joe's hold. Joe lets him go and he starts sinking. Half-jumping, half-lunging, he gets both arms around Joe's neck, holding on tight.
"See," Joe says, and Barry can actually feel it pass between them, like a sound wave. Joe wades, too far from any edge of the pool for Barry to hold on, left with only one rock to cling to in the still churning water, settling down slowly. "Nothing to be afraid of."
"Y-you – you threw – me in."
"Were you gonna jump in on your own?" Joe retorts.
Barry buries his face against Joe's shoulder, still shaking like a leaf and holding on for dear life. "Nothing to be scared of," Joe insists, bobbing around the deep end and keeping them effortlessly afloat. It's aweing, the strength and ease with which he does it. But Dads are like that; they lift you up. They don't let you drown. Barry almost relaxes, knowing that he can't do anything to save himself, that he has to trust Joe.
I trust Joe.
As if it passes silently between them, Joe wades into the shallow end of the pool. Relief floods Barry as his feet finally settle on the bottom, and he shakes when Joe lets go of him but hesitates at the prospect of getting out.
Somehow, it seems safer in the water with Joe than outside it without him.
Against his will – you wanted out, he thinks, but he isn't so sure, not like the scared fifth-grader he was a moment ago, straining towards safety – Joe lifts him up to the edge of the pool. Even out of water, he makes Barry feel like he's featherlight. Maybe Joe's just that strong. It wouldn't surprise Barry; Dads aren't just safe, they're strong.
He takes a breath before Joe carefully peels his soaked shirt off of him, letting it rest on the side with a wet plop. Shivering, he considers getting up, but the warm water around his calves is too enticing. He slides back into the water, latching onto Joe's neck.
His breathing speeds up a little when Joe wades back into the deep-end, but he doesn't panic, just tightens his grip and holds on. "How come your dad never took you swimming?" Joe asks.
"H-he did," Barry admits. He can't stop the shiver in his voice. "But when we went T-Tony was there, and after he-he said he'd—" He stops, realizing just how silly it is to complain to Joe of all people about threats Tony made. Tony was a bully. Bullies made threats. That was just how the world worked. Besides, the worst Tony had ever done was shove him. And shut him in a tall locker after the bell rang so no one found him for half the day. He also pushed him down those stairs that one time, and chased him til he fell and kicked him, til he had painful blue bruises all up and down his sides, and—
"I'm gonna have a talk with your principal again," Joe says, a sort of fierce I'm-gonna-fix-this voice that it scares Barry.
"Please don't," he pleads, hugging Joe's neck for emphasis. "Please, he'll – he'll hurt Iris or –"
Joe shifts him so he can hold him at arm's length. "Bar," he says seriously, looking him in the eye, "nobody's gonna hurt Iris. Or you. Never again."
Barry has to swallow or he might actually cry.
"Tell you what," Joe says, guiding him to the edge of the pool and setting him up there before hauling himself out of the water, showering droplets on the ground, all calm and strong. "Let's go see if Iris wants to join us for some ice cream."
Barry perks up in spite of himself. "Mint chocolate chip?"
"I said ice cream, didn't I?" Joe says with one of his big playful smiles. Joe walks over to his bag on the bench and pulls out a couple of towels and his own shirt. "C'mere," he commands.
Barry hurries over as quickly as he dares on the slick floor, letting Joe bundle him up like he's half his age. Joe lets him dry off, fetching the wet shirt from the side of the pool and stuffing it back into the bag carelessly. He shrugs into a big dry shirt and offers Barry one of his own smaller ones. "Growing like a leaf," he huffs, as Barry pulls it over his own head and it covers his belly, just. "You're gonna be tall as I am at this rate."
Barry thinks about being as tall as Joe, as strong and mighty and unbreakable as Joe, and feels a sense of hope at the thought. I wouldn't be scared of anything if I were like you, he thinks.
They pick up Iris and she's full of stories, literal stories, and Barry can scarcely keep up with them but he figures out that the main character's name is Terebithy, or Terebita, or maybe just Tera, and nods like he's supposed to every now and then. Really he just loves listening to her talk, especially when she gets so excited she forgets to let him even say hi, because they don't need to say hi. With Iris, he can just be himself, as quiet as he wants to be.
At their favorite ice cream parlor, Joe gets them all mint chocolate chip ice cream and Iris finally asks what they were up to between licks and Joe says, "We went to the pool."
"Barry hates the pool," Iris says automatically.
Barry's ears turn red.
"But he knows how much I love the pool," Joe says, already most of the way through his cone, he always wins their races; one day Barry'll beat him at that, too, and Joe'll be so proud of him 'cause look how grown up I am. "So he kept me company."
"That was nice of you," Iris says, looking at him.
"I got in the water," Barry pipes in at last, and he sees a smile on Joe's face that wants to add I threw you in, buddy. But he doesn't say it. And Barry's kind of happy he doesn't.
I'm not scared, he thinks, then and the next time he stands at the lip of the pool even as he shakes like a leaf. I'm not.
He's just … careful. Sometimes. Maybe because he isn't careful enough, or maybe because he wants to be careful enough, so then the bad things won't happen.
The next time they're at the pool, they take Iris, too, and Barry has actual swim trunks on, and he draws in a big deep breath before jumping in.
Iris squeals with delight at the splash and he bobs back to the surface, feet touching the bottom. This isn't so bad, he thinks, relaxing a little. Joe wades in the deep-end and tosses him a soft water-ball to catch, and he doesn't know how to swim but this isn't the deep end, this isn't bad at all, and he catches the ball.
"Attaboy," Joe says, catching it when Barry throws it back.
He doesn't learn to swim that day or the next or even the next, but by the fifth time he hops in the water, he doesn't feel afraid.
You're gonna have to stand on your own two feet sometimes, Joe said.
He does, and after just a moment's hesitation, he wades into the deep end, holding the rail when he can before letting go and drifting. Just for a few seconds, retreating to safety when he starts to sink, but it's an achievement.
Iris, of course, paddles effortlessly into the deep-end, fearlessly through the center of the pool, but he isn't like her and that's okay, because Iris has always been bolder and that's okay with him, too.
"Didn't even have to throw you in that time," Joe teases him out of Iris' ear-shot.
Barry puffs up his shoulders, just a little. "I didn't want you and Iris to be alone," he sniffs, lying and Joe knows it, but Joe just ruffles his hair in passing and Barry knows he's understood.
Joe always understands, even when Barry doesn't. It's what Dads do.