Jack Be Nimble: Gargoyle by Ben English Page A

as a raven’s wing, and a gypsy’s smile. A Black Irish girl.
    But no form carved itself out of the glittering night. Jack sighed, rubbing at his temple briefly. Time to go back to pretending you have a normal life, he thought. He looked once more down the Seine, toward young love, and then stalked briskly into the Parisian night.
     

Girl in a Berkeley Sweater

    Forge, Idaho, United States of America
    7 AM

    Garret leaned through the doorway, arms against either jamb, and felt the muscles across his chest tighten as he looked out at the pool. It was already half awash in the slanting sunlight of early morning, as placid as the surface of any mirror. Garret had been a lifeguard at the Forge city park for two years—had practically lived at the pool every summer, as far back as his memory ran—and the sight of the L-shaped pool motionless against the morning light always somehow reminded him of a great, sunken slab of lime Jell-o.
    He wiped the last of the sleep from his eyes and stepped, barefoot, onto the concrete deck. It was cold, as usual, and its dry porosity clutched at his feet as he made his way to the centermost guard tower. He swung his steel whistle around his wrist by its lanyard until it slapped against his arm, then reversed the swing, keeping time with his slow, unhurried stride across the deck. Though it was still early, he slipped on his sunglasses.
    The steel gates leading to the locker rooms creaked open, emitting the half-dozen patrons that forced Garret out of bed at this ungodly hour. He swung his long, lean body up the brief ladder of his tower, then sat on its edge, watching as the elderly women arranged their paraphernalia on the benches at the shallow end of the pool. One of them smiled at Garret and waved as she tucked a loaf of blue hair into the side of her equally blue swimming cap. He waved back.
    The Fish family (if that wasn’t ironic, Garret didn’t know the meaning of the word) came nearly every day. If the yelling in the dressing rooms was any indication, the kids had arrived. Their parents were religious swimmers, absolutely addicted to the water. They kept their children in the water nearly all day, starting with lap swim, then lessons, through two swim team practices, and then picking them up at 7:30 at night, after open swim. Garret smiled. Pretty smart parents. No doubt the chronically hyperactive kids fell over themselves trying to get to bed.
    The morning shift wasn’t so bad. Between the older ladies who drifted, jellyfish-like, from one end of the pool to the other, and the thrice-weekly triathlon maniacs who showed up an hour before lessons started to grimly thrash out their two miles, Garret had an easy time of it.
    And the past few days, one visitor in particular had made it even better.
    He yawned, this time in earnest, closing his eyes and tilting his head back until it felt like he was flexing his entire face. The sun had eased up over two-thirds of the pool now, and small curls of steam began to appear above the water, quaking now as the ladies edged into the pool.
    “Gets colder every day!” one of them said.
    Another, submerged up to her waist, shot back, “The city ought to pay its electric bill!”
    They all laughed. Part of the morning ritual. They chattered among themselves like they did every morning, commiserating their fate and admiring their collective willpower at being able to withstand the frigid water. Listen to them, he thought, you’d almost expect to see chunks of ice floating in the water around them.
    Ripples spread out across the pool, deepening as they widened.
    The city pool stood on a small hill in the center of the park. From his vantage point, Garret could see over the fence and down into most of the wooded, terraced grounds. The sunlight was still caught in the tops of the trees; it hadn’t yet found its way down onto the jogging paths and brown benches. As he watched, half of the sprinklers shut off and the other half sprang on,