"Marco!"
"Polo!"
"...Gotcha!"
"Argh! ...*glug*"
That was the sound at the pool party the next day.
My friend Brendan had called me Sunday night and left a message saying
that he had decided to have a pool party the next evening. So when
I got home I called him back, asking if it would be ok if I brought someone
along with me. It was, and I called Nick right away to invite him.
"Hey...are you losing yet?" I asked him with a laugh.
"Ha ha, that's not even remotely funny...we're playing
strip poker, and let's just say that if I lose another hand I'll be pretty
indecent to say the least...what's up?"
I laughed. "Well, tomorrow night my friend
Brendan is having a pool party, and he said it would be ok if you wanted
to come, so here's your invite. I know you wanted to do something
tomorrow, so we can do it during the day, and then head over to Brendan's
around eightish...does that sound alright to you?"
"Sure! I'd love to see you soaking wet in
a skimpy bikini" he whispered. In the background I could hear the
chorus of "ooh, Nicky!" Then I heard a muffled "shuddup guys" and
Nick said into the phone "I'll be at your place around 9 tomorrow morning,
ok?"
"If you told me where we were going then...."
"...No way! It's gonna be a complete surprise.
And don't even think of asking again, ‘cause I won't tell you!"
"Ok ok, I'll be ready. Bring your swimming
gear along right away in the morning, that way we don't have to go back
to the hotel and risk a mob of girls...See you then."
"Yep, see ya." As he started to hang up, I
could hear him faintly cry "Yo Brian, that's not fair! You fixed
the deck! I can't lose again..."
Anyways, back to Monday. When Nick had arrived
at my place at 9:00am sharp, I was just barely ready to go. It turns
out he'd planned an excellent day (and would you really have expected anything
less?). We'd gone go-carting, and after I beat him 4 out of 5 times,
we'd headed over to the park, where he'd had Brian and AJ set up a romantic
picnic lunch for us. Afterwards, we'd walked through the park and
talked, sneaking little kisses here and there.
When we finally got to Brendan's, everyone was ready
to start a rousing game of Marco Polo, so Nick and I quickly went into
the separate rooms to change, and jumped into the pool. I was elected
"it" as I was the last one in, and when I finally found Nick, I dunked
him under. He jumped up from under the water and grabbed me around
the waist. "You know what's coming now, don't you?" he asked in a
playful tone. "No!" I cried as he shifted his grip so that he was
holding me under my arms and he called out to one of my other friends.
"Joel, help me! Grab her ankles and let's swing her and throw her
in!" Willingly, Joel set his drink down and jumped into the pool.
"Joel," I sputtered, "if you throw me in I swear I'll get you back!"
Joel looked from me to Nick, and finally decided "ah, that's alright Sam,
I'm sure you wouldn't do anything drastic." And with that, they swung
me back and forth a couple of times and tossed me into the water.
I came up splashing and coughing. I knew when I'd been defeated.
I crawled out of the pool, grabbed a towel and plopped down beside my ex-boyfriend,
Chris. "They got you good, didn't they?" he asked when he noticed
me sitting there, sending insanely tortured looks over to Nick. Nick
just laughed, winked, and blew a kiss my way. Slightly embarrassed,
I turned to Chris and replied "yeah, and you sure didn't help any!"
Chris and I had gone out for almost a year when he'd abruptly ended our
relationship. I'd been terribly hurt and angry, but after a while
I got over it and moved on. Now, 2 years later, we still fought almost
constantly, but it was always a friendly feud. "Ah, you're a tough
girl, you can handle them." Chris glanced at Nick and commented,
"You like him a lot, don't you?" I blushed and uttered "Is it that
obvious?" Chris smiled and answered "Yeah, but I mean, that's cool.
I think if you like someone a lot you shouldn't hide it. Don't play
any games, y'know?" I nodded as Chris's girlfriend Melissa approached
us. She smiled and waved at me, and I waved back. "I'm going
back into the pool, I'll talk to you later Chris, Melissa."
I draped my towel over a lounge chair and dove back
into the pool. As I came up I noticed Nick swimming towards me and
remembered what Chris had said about me liking Nick a lot. ‘Yeah,
I really do like him' I thought, ‘But I think at this point it's already
more like love...'