(Welcome to) The Machine

"Woo wee! I'd like to ride up and DOWN your dangerous curves." That was the first thing I heard when I arrived at the pool. "You must be Shelly. I've heard a lot about you."

There was a man standing there looking just a bit older than me. "I am. What have you heard?" I asked trying to squeeze past this unknown person blocking the front entrance.

"Oh, nothing but good things. Nothing bad at all," he said moving past me to uncover an open door. So far we were the only people there. "My name is Hoolihan. Greg Hoolihan."

It had been a long and dreary winter. It had seemed like it was winter since the pool closed, cold and dark, but it is much warmer now. "Did they hire you as a lifeguard?" I asked. This guy was brand new and showed no signs of ever being to a pool before.

"Kind of. They did hire me."

"What does 'kind of' mean?" He was seeming rather ambiguous.

"They kind of hired me to help the manager and you are here to show me the ropes. Teach me the in's and out's of the pool. They said you'd be the one to show me." I felt rather flattered at that point. I had been through my share of difficulties with being shuffled around from pool to pool, and here I am at yet another pool, and there seems no promise of more staff. But at least THIS pool was smaller.

He seemed to follow me as I walked around finding my way around the place. I guess he considered it a tour. I considered it a nuisance.

With no manager around, I did what I normally did before the pool opened – clean everything. This Greg person had been on my heels since I had got there and there seemed no chance of kicking him off. I eventually got a break when I walked into the girl's locker room. I could tell this was going to be a long summer.

With the smaller pool came smaller areas to clean and more idle time. This place had already been done up once, it seemed, and I was rehashing the place. I decided to take a break when he decided to reappear.

"So when I said they told me you are to show me the ropes, I don't think they referred to the ones floating in the pool."

"What are you saying?" I sharply replied.

"You are to be my… You are supposed to show me…." He hesitated for a while, then said, "I can't swim."

"You what?!" That caught me in disbelief. They've hired a guard who can't swim! I'm not at all qualified to deal with this load of crap! "What are you doing here?!"

"I'm supposed to learn. You are supposed to show me. I don't know… just.. you've done with kids lots of times they tell me. Just think of me as another kid." He was seeming pretty childish to me!

"Let me think this over a bit. I'll be here around ten tomorrow." I was done cleaning. The pool still had a twinge of green to it and it was getting late. There was no use starting swimming today. Plus this way I had time to think it all over.

The next morning he was waiting at the gate for me. "OK, fine. We'll see how this goes." My decision wasn't based on how attractive he might have been, or a chance to help him float, but because they are so disorganized and small headed downtown that they seem to hire people just to fill numbers, qualified, liability, or not. "We have a little less than two weeks until we are open."

"Good. That should be enough time to get everything done."

Getting everything done didn't seem too probable too quickly. As I began to get into the pool, I watched as he stripped down to his white Speedo. I didn't realize I was starring until he began waving back at me. I spent most of the morning just trying to convince him the pool was like a big bath tub and there was nothing to fear. "But I take showers," he said. He seemed to have a reply to everything I said.

The furthest he got into the pool was to his knees. It was either 'too cold,' 'too early,' or 'too wet.' "It's water," I yelled back at him, "Of course it's wet!" We haven't learned how to dehydrate water. Not yet." By noon I was tired and hungry. He was cold and dry.

I left Greg alone at the pool while I left to get us lunch. I wasn't sure how long I could play this charade. A week of this will get us no where. If there is no fluid communication, then there will be a lot of waves in the water.

When I returned with lunch, he was no where to be found. This task of teaching someone who has been stubborn about these things their whole life will take a lot of breaking in to do. I ate my lunch in solitude and pondered what his intentions were. I couldn't really come up with much more than going out somewhere. But those were becoming my intentions, I think.

I remembered an old trick that was once shown to me by my lifeguarding mentor on one of those days I hung around the pool. He convinced someone afraid of the water to go into the baby pool. The next day I did just that. I forced Greg to dress out in floaties and everything to ensure he wouldn't drown. The whole pool was knee high. "I look macho in this, don't I?" He came out saying. It was hard at first for me to get him to do much of anything in the baby pool with floaties. I was laughing too hard. But we made progress.

Everyday I would spend all morning getting him to wade around the baby pool. Every afternoon he would disappear. It didn't become a problem until the one day the baby pool refused to hold water. We still had to move on, there was only a week left 'til the pool opened.

"That rope over there," I said pointing at the shallow end, "designates where you can stand and where it is too deep." I had been through this a week prior. "We can take you to the other side and you will be ok."

"No, I don't think I am ready yet."

"You only have a week left. We have a lot of ground to cover." If he were smaller, I would have carried him to the middle and make him waddle the rest of the way out. Being as he is larger than I am, I just pushed him in.

"What – What did you do that for?"

"Now that you are in – Work with me." Amazingly enough, he doggy paddled like a pro. Once I got him going on basic strokes, he could go from one side to the other. It was ugly, but doable. "I will make you a deal," I said. "You can swim. It is not pretty, but you can. You are doing fine in here now, so we will spend the last few remaining days we have mostly in the shallow end and work on basic lifeguarding stuff. Agreed?"

"OK." He replied.

At least I broke the barrier and he got in and can swim. Lifeguarding is something beyond my realm, but if that is what they want… they could have at least asked me, and not through him. He, of course, disappeared at lunch.

The following day the baby pool was fixed and everytihng had been set up for class. He must have been here for quite a while.

"Been here a while?" I asked.

"Yeah. Couldn't sleep. Started in early."

"Work?"

"Yeah. Um.. Practicing."

"But you aren't wet."

"I haven't got that far yet?" As if THAT made sense!

He willfully got into the pool. "Let me take you out tonight. As a thanks for getting me to where I am."

"But we aren't done yet. We still have tons to do."

"I know this great spot. I think you'll like it."

"I will consider it, but you at least have to be able to swim all the way across the pool with all of the strokes for me to even consider it." Oddly enough, he did. We got through a lot that morning. He progressed much better than expected. So I held true to my end; I let him pick me up.

He drove up in his flashy car, blaring out some peculiar music. It sounded like country rap. He was dressed in shorts and a shirt. I had on a dress. "I thought we were going to some place nice. Let me go change real quick."

"No worry. You look nice. You'll be fine. I won't matter. Come on." The sun had just began to set, but it was still light enough outside to see that he just came from the pool.

"Working late?" I asked looking around.

"Yeah. I had to go back and get something. I was tired all day from no sleep and worn out from this morning. I left some stuff there, so I went back and got caught up in it."

"It?"

"Let's not worry about work tonight. All that we've dealt with this past.. however many days.. have been work, work, work. Tonight is more about you and I. It is more of a celebration."

"Celebration?"

"Of swimming, of course."
Of course…. Swimming.

He drove hastily through town, making sharp turn after sharp turn. 'Where is he taking me?' I thought, 'And at what speed?!' It was getting darker and he was driving faster.

"We'll be there soon."

"Where?" I didn't recognize anything outside my window.

"The curve."

"The what?"

"We're here." He said after a pause and flying past a SLOW DOWN sign.

"That sign just –"

"I know. We're cool." Then came another DANGEROUS CURVES AHEAD.

"I really think we should slow down. It's too dark – too fast. Please."

"You can hold onto me if you need. I have done this a million times. I know we are ok. Trust me.

I had just clicked my seat belt to make sure it was secure. "Ok." I timidly replied and he took the first 'dangerous curve.'

Turn after turn, the car careen from side to side, and with us rocking with it. "Final turn," he yelled, giddy with power, and revving the engine.

As the crest of the turn approached, the car titled on two wheels, carefully careening through the curve. The car crashed back to four wheels to a loud and bouncy thud when the curve ended. I was grinding my nails into his thigh.

"You can let go. It's over."

"Huh? Ok."

"103. Seems I cannot go any faster than that."

"You probably shouldn't go that fast either."

"Relax. Will you possibly un-grip my leg too? I'm getting woozy from your claws grinding in them."

"Oh, sorry."

The rest of the evening was a blur. The first ride was exhilarating enough that I don't remember much past almost tipping over in the car. I do remember him telling me that he does that trip over and over again. Almost daily. But I don't remember getting home.

Going to work the next day was interesting. There were more cars there. I walked into a meeting of sorts at my own pool.

"And there she is," they said as I walked in. "she is the one teaching me how this pool runs. Very well I might add."

"What is all of this?" I asked with my mind still racing from last night.

"I'll show you." Greg said. "Hold on just a moment." He walked to the back room and took us downstairs. "For the past couple of weeks I have spent countless hours constructing a unified life saving unit. This Emergency Medical Integrated Lifesaving Unit, will change life guarding as we know it. EMILY awaits you," he said as he drew back a large curtain. "Lady and gentlemen, welcome to the machine."

This spectacle of wonder threw me aback, I had to leave the room. I was a little upset. All of this time I have been training him to work, and he has been off doing other things. I felt deceived. A few more days until the pool was open and we were now beginning to hit bumps.

"I wanted to tell you," he said coming up to me later in the morning after everyone had left, "but I wasn't allow to. I had signed –"

"don't bother. I was to train you and I did. I don't know why, or why me, but I have trained you. You've come a long ways.--"

"Don't be this way. Please."

"--You just have to pass my last test."

"I've come to trust you and it hurt me that I couldn't tell you. I like Shelly. We wouldn't have gone out last night if I didn't." He reached out and grabbed my hand. I stayed still. A small tear rolled down his eye. "Do you hate me now?"

"No. Shall we?"

"Shall we what?"

"Take you test." I grabbed my towel and headed to the high dive. I could see deep concern crossing his face. "Today you get to use everything you have been taught." I tied my towel on for what might be the last time Super Shelly has a cape, looked at him and said, "I trust you."

Turning around backwards, I fell off of the high dive, breached the water, and began to glide to the bottom. Being female, I knew I would be floating up, so I treaded water at the drain.

I was struggling for air by the time he actually pulled me out. "Are you nuts? You could have died there"

"But I didn't."

That day was the first day he sat down with me for lunch. Things finally seemed good to go for the beginning of the summer. I was happy once again.