The Academy - Introductions (12 page)

Nathan disappeared into the house. I moved under the
overhang of the back porch and toward the sliding glass door he had gone in.
The house was one story, with brown and beige brickwork and I half remembered
what it looked like from the street. What it lacked in height, it made up in
sprawling. From the doorway, I could see into a living room with a high,
white-painted ceiling and exposed beams. The floor was a gray stone tile. The
walls were white. The furniture was dark brown and leather. It reminded me of a
cabin that I’d seen on occasion on television. There was a musky smell that
tasted like a mix of the leather and the lacquer in the wood fixtures.

Nathan returned from a hallway beyond the living room. He
held out a pair of green shorts in his hands. He moved to the door, bending his
head to look down at me. “Want to come in?”

I made a face, pointing to my wet clothes. “I’m dripping,”
I whispered.

“So am I.” He pulled the sliding door open further and
beckoned to me. “There’s a bathroom right there. You can put the shorts on if
you want.”

I nodded.

“Do you want a t-shirt?” he asked. “It’ll probably be big
on you.”

I tugged at my blouse. “It’ll give time for this to dry.”

He smiled. “I’ll toss them in the dryer after you’re done.”

He pointed me toward the bathroom again and I stepped
inside of it. There didn’t appear to be anyone else around. My parents would
have killed me if they’d known I was alone with a boy in an empty house. As it
was, my own mind was coming up with all the things my parents warned me about.
Would he have me follow him to his bedroom? Would he pressure me for sex? Would
I be interested? And why did I feel like I was betraying Kota, Silas and Victor
by being here? Were they worried about me right now and wondering what was
going on? Did they even care? Maybe I needed Nathan after all. If I messed up
too badly with Kota and the others, maybe Nathan and I could be friends
instead. Were we friends now?

The bathroom was big. There was a wide tub with a glass
sliding door. Black stone tile covered the floor and the counter was carved
dark stone. The walls were white. Photos of helicopters lined the walls.

I was just putting on the shorts when there was a knock at
the door. “I’ve got a shirt.”

I opened the door and he handed me a dark blue t-shirt with
some writing in a language I didn’t recognize.

“Does your dad fly helicopters?” I asked. My voice was
weaker. What little ability I had gained to talk was becoming lost.

“Yeah,” he said. I closed the door again. It sounded like
he leaned against the door. “He makes trips between here and New York.
Sometimes to Florida. He’s gone a lot.”

I picked up my wet clothes from the floor, holding them
away from my body as they were dripping. I opened the door.

Nathan was against the door frame, leaning his head against
it. He stood up straight when the door opened. “It fits?”

The shorts were tied tight to my waist but the lower hem
was down at my knees. The t-shirt was a couple of sizes too big and covered my
butt. “I look weird.”

He laughed. “You’re actually kind of cute. You should
totally wear that your first day of school.”

I narrowed my eyes at him but betrayed myself by giggling.

He took the wet clothes from my hand. “Go jump in. I’ll put
these in the dryer.”

I crossed the living room, went outside and stepped up to
the edge of the pool again. The smell of the chlorine was intoxicating. I
wondered for a moment if he felt I was intruding on him for his pool. I had
already interrupted his run. What other plans could I have been interrupting?

I did a shallow dive from one corner and took off across
the water. Despite my worries, I wasn’t going to waste a moment of swim time if
I had his permission. Holding my breath, I wriggled my body to make my way to
the opposite corner on the far end. I wanted check to see how long I could hold
my breath before getting up on the other side.

I almost made it. I blamed jumping in first and being so excited
as to why I couldn’t do it. I surfaced a couple of feet away, sucking in a
breath of air and starting a slow breaststroke. When I reached the corner, I
stopped for a moment and relaxed to slow down my breathing. I knew being calm
under the water was important to being able to hold my breath longer. I pushed
off with my feet against the edge of the pool.

I used my hands this time under the water to give me a
little extra push but most of the power came from the movements I made, almost
mermaid like. I cut through the water quickly, reaching the other side. I
touched the far wall and popped up at the surface, taking in a breath.

“You could get faster,” Nathan said. He was standing on the
edge of the pool in front of the house. I almost smiled at him, ready with a
joke that I knew he wouldn’t be able to hear. I wanted to break the tension
because he’d startled me. His face was serious. “Pull your hands to your
chest.” He did the motion with his own hands. “Shoot them out above your head
as you do that thing where you bring your head up. Then as you’re moving your
feet, spread out your hands and pull like you’re crawling through the water.”

I watched his arm motions and then nodded. It didn’t look
difficult. I sucked in a breath and kicked off.

While I wasn’t trying to go at my fastest speed before,
knowing he was watching now, I threw my body into the motions. My body curved
against the water and I tried the hand movement he was showing me. It was more
work forcing my arm muscles into sweeping motions but he was right. The stroke
was much more powerful and the effort was twice as effective.

I broke the surface at the far corner and I heard him
hooting.

“You’re good,” he said.

I was breathless but I smiled at him. I moved a hand to my
arm, rubbing the bicep. It was going to be sore tomorrow if I kept up that
pace.

“You should do some weight training.” He walked over to
where I was against the edge of the pool and slid in to stand next to me. He
tilted his head at me. “Are you going to join the swim team?”

I blushed, shaking my head. “I’m not much of a competitor.”

“You’re shitting me.”

I half laughed. “I don’t mind a short race.”

He blinked at me, smiling. “Should we race?” he asked.

Race him? He had to be kidding. “I’ll try,” I whispered.

“Should we bet on the outcome?”

My eyes narrowed at him. “You’ll win.”

“You don’t know that. You’re pretty quick. You’re smaller
than me, too. You could probably move through the water faster than I could.”

“What do you want?”

He shrugged. “If you win, what would you want?”

I raised an eyebrow at him, unsure of his motives. Was this
a trick to get me to do something else crazy? “I want to know the secret to
getting into the back woods.”

His mouth broke into a wide grin. “I was going to show you
that anyway.”

I made a face. I didn’t know what else to ask for. Then I
pointed to the t-shirt I was wearing. “This?” When I said it, it seemed to be
too much. Was he being serious at all about it though? Or was this just for
fun?

He nodded. “If I win...” he paused, looking at my face like
he was trying to read something from me. I got the feeling he was weighing out
what he could get away with asking me. “If I win, you promise that if we end up
with a class together, you’ll sit next to me.”

It was an odd request. I felt my brows lifting. I wasn’t
sure if he was serious. “That’s it?” I croaked out.

“Hey, if I’m going to cheat off of someone, I’d like a
willing participant.”

My mouth popped open and my fingers flutter to the base of
my throat. “Nathan?”

He shook his head, laughing. “I’m kidding. I don’t cheat.”

I grinned. “I do.” There was no way I could win this race.
I knew he wouldn’t let me. I positioned my feet up against the edge of the
pool.

The smile remained on his face and he tilted his head
toward me. “Really?”

Before he reacted, I shot away from the wall under the
water, pushing myself against the resistance with what strength I had inside
me. I managed to get past him and I tried to widen the distance to be out of
his reach. I used the arm movement he showed me, throwing my whole body into
the stroke. If I was going to have a chance, I needed to get clear of him.

I was halfway through the pool when I felt a hand on my
ankle. In one pull, I was sailing backward through the water faster than I’d
ever moved at my own doing. Nathan flew ahead of me. His reddish hair broke the
surface and in a few easy breaststrokes, he was on the other side.

I made it over hallway again before I surfaced. I bobbed in
the water, my chest heaving as I was laughing too hard. “Cheat!” I gasped out.

“You can’t cheat if you didn’t set rules.” He stood up,
drips of water sliding over the muscles in his chest and stomach. I tried not
to gape but it was hard not to be in awe of the power he had.

I made a face at him, sticking my tongue in his direction.

“Don’t go pulling that face on me. You owe me now.”

I laughed, splashing him. I didn’t think I would have
minded sitting next to him in class, anyway. Although when I thought about it,
I wondered how I would concentrate if I had someone like him nearby.

He smirked, sizing me up and positioning his legs against
the wall. “I warned you about splashing.”

He caught me before I had a chance to move.

It was another hour before I crawled my way out of the
pool, falling on my stomach on the concrete, gulping in air.

“Give up?” Nathan asked, coming up beside me and sitting on
the edge of the pool with his legs in the water.

“You play rough,” I wheezed out. Between all the races and
him tossing me around the pool, I was dizzy.

He laughed and shook his head, rubbing a palm at his
temple. “And here I thought I had my own little mermaid who could keep up,” he
challenged.

I blushed. Was he claiming me? “You know she dies at the
end of the original story.”

His eyes darkened and his lips twisted. “What? Why?”

“She sacrifices herself for the prince’s happiness.”

“That’s fucked up. Wasn’t he happy with her?”

“He was in love with another girl.”

“What an ass.”

I rolled my eyes and then flopped over until I was on my
back, letting the sun warm me. There was a gentle breeze that flitted around
us. I remained jealous of the pool he owned. Whenever I could own my own house,
I decided I wanted one just like it.

His eyes focused on my body. I thought that he was being
perverted for a moment as the shirt was sticking to my chest but I felt the
breeze on my skin and then realized my side must have been exposed. The bruise
near my butt was prominent.

“Where’d you get that?” His eyes focused in on it. He
reached out as if to touch it but he only lifted the shirt a little to get a
better look. He sucked in a breath and then reached for his other hand to pull
down the fabric of the shorts, leaning in to get a closer look. “Jesus. What’d
you do that for?”

“I fell,” I said softly.

“On to someone’s foot?”

“On to the concrete.”

“How the hell did it get that bad on your hip?”

“It was the angle, I think.” I moved a hand to pull away
the shirt and stuff it down to hide the bruise. “It’s fine,” I recited. “Looks
worse than it feels.”

“Probably not,” he said. “I’ve had my share of bruises. That’s
a nasty one.”

I shrugged and swallowed to try to get some voice back. “I
can’t do anything for it.”

He pushed himself up until he was standing and then reached
a hand down to me. “I’ve got something.”

I wasn’t sure if this was another trick but I’d gotten sort
of used to his face. When he expressed that serious look, he meant it. Then I
hesitated because he was asking to touch him again. I reached up, feeling his
hand wrap around mine and he pulled me up until I was standing.

He held on to my hand, walking around the pool and heading
toward the large shed that was in the back. It made me blush that he was
holding my hand. We’d just met. He was touching me. Was this normal to happen
right away? I mean friends held hands sometimes, I was sure. I’d read about it
in books. It also happened when a guy liked you a lot and wanted to be your
boyfriend. So which was it? Why did these things have to be so confusing?

“Wait here,” he said. “The floor is wood. I don’t want you
to slip.”

“What about you?”

He ignored the question or did hear me that time and opened
the latch, pulling open the wide barn-like door. The inside of the shed did
have a pine floor. The polish gleaned. There was black padding along the edges
about a foot high against the wall and karate posters above them. There were a
few belts in cases in different colors, dates etched into gold plates in the
frames. A skylight at the top let in some natural light but he flicked a switch
and two rows of fluorescent lights turned on.