Breaking the Rules (Pushing the Limits 1.50)

“I can’t open my eyes under water.”

“You’re kidding.”

Tiny voice. “No.”

Fuck me. I straighten, pull the shirt over my head and kick off my shoes and socks.

“What about your jeans?” Echo asks. “It’s just us and I’m cool with you swimming around in your boxers. You need at least one dry outfit.”

I glance at my jeans and they hang right at my hips. “It wasn’t a boxer type of day.”

Echo sinks and when she resurfaces, it’s only with her eyes then slowly up to her chin. “One of these days you are going to get us into a ton of trouble.”

“Bab

y, so far the trouble’s been on you. Breaking into guidance counselors’ offices—”

“That was you!”

“—tossing clothes into the pool.”

She splashes me as she kicks back.

I shake my head to get the water out of my hair. “You’re paying for that one, princess.”

“You have to catch me first,” she taunts as she grabs at a floating blob. My favorite black T-shirt smacks onto the concrete with a wet flop.

“Little full of yourself tonight, aren’t you?”

I love the light in her eyes. “I was the three-year-straight swimming champ.”

That I didn’t know. “So was I. Mine in the Y from third to fifth grade. What’s your story?”

Echo’s grin widens. “Backyard baby pool against Lila. Reigning preschool champ.”

“You’ve got me quaking in my boots.”

She goes under for the balled socks in the three foot section, and I eye the deep end. A pile of blue jeans covers the drain. Wonder how many quarters it will take to dry all of this. Doesn’t matter. The answer doesn’t get my clothes onto land. Like my dad taught me, I raise my hands over my head and dive in.

Echo

Dripping from head to toe and shivering so much that my brain rattles, Noah and I scurry down the hallway, each of us carrying a hundred-pound load of completely soaked clothes. Okay, only I scurry. Noah more or less struts, and I tote fifty pounds while Noah shoulders the rest.

My hands shake so badly that I miss the slot for the key card twice and breathe a sigh of relief when the door clicks open. The air conditioner I had turned down earlier in the day has officially become my worst enemy as goose bumps creep up my arm to my neck.

“Damn, Echo. Freezing meat?”

“I was hot.”

Noah dumps his clothes into a lump on the floor and readjusts the thermostat from arctic winter to what will eventually be tropical heat.

“Really?” I ask. “We’ve got to sleep in here.”

“Win the lottery?”

Good point. Even if our clothes weren’t drenched with pool water, hotel dryers cost a fortune to get clothes to somewhat damp. “So what’s the plan?”

“Lay them out flat and bring on the room heat. That is, after a shower.”