The Resort by Bentley Little Page A

forget the debacle of last night.
    panties
    Almost.
    He thought of Blodgett, which made him think again of Mr. Mack. One of the reasons they’d taken this vacation now, at the end of June, was so that he could generate a legitimate excuse—to himself if no one else—to avoid his high school reunion. But his brain had been strolling down memory lane ever since they’d come here, and he was not really sure why. He was certainly not one of those pathetic middle-aged men living off former glories and pining for those idyllic teenage years. Yet he could not deny that he had spent quite a bit of time lately recalling his own past. Even now he saw a quasi-punk teenager dashing through the parking lot without shoes or sandals, yelping “Shit, shit, shit, shit . . .” as his feet hit the hot asphalt, and he found himself thinking about some of his old friends from high school and college, realizing that he could not imagine them middle-aged. They were frozen in his mind at their most carefree and irresponsible, and doubtlessly they had succumbed to the pressures and responsibilities of life to become respectable citizens—everyone did—but he still could not see it and hoped it wasn’t true. Toby and Russ and Carlos from high school, Dennis and Lu from college; he still saw them playing hackeysack in the park, partying all night long, and it was sad to think of them balding and in business suits, running in the rat race. He’d rather imagine them as beach bums or professional students, refusing to grow up and grow old, living on the fringes of society in rented apartments filled with strewn CDs and tacked-up posters.
    In a way, he supposed, he was glad that he had not kept in touch with them.
    And he was definitely glad that he’d avoided the reunion.
    But what about himself? How had he turned out? What would they think of him?
    Those were questions he did not want to examine too closely.
    The pool room was empty. He’d half expected it to be filled with jocks and health fanatics, all getting in their two hundred morning laps, but the pool area was unoccupied, the cement floor dry, clean towels all folded on a cart, and he saw no one exercising as he passed through the weight room. He had the entire building to himself—luckily—since the rules posted above a bench along the side wall stated that all swimmers must shower before entering the water and he clearly hadn’t bathed this morning. He quickly jumped in and dunked his head before someone else entered and saw his wild uncombed hair.
    The water was bathwater warm and remarkably free from the strong chlorine smell of the outdoor pool. He’d read somewhere that chlorine did not really smell, that the scent everyone associated with swimming pools and ironically thought was a “clean” odor, was actually caused by the interaction of chlorine with sweat and urine and other bodily fluids. Which meant that this pool was relatively uncontaminated.
    The pool was divided into five lanes by ropes and buoys stretched across its length. He was in the first lane, and he paddled back and forth aimlessly for a few moments, acclimatizing himself, before backing against the wall of the shallow end and shoving off.
    Lowell could not remember the last time he’d swum for exercise, and it felt good to be swimming so swiftly, with such purpose. Ordinarily, on vacations, he’d horse around with the boys, make a few halfhearted runs across the pool of whatever hotel they were staying at, then join Rachel for some sunbathing and reading. Other than vacations, he never swam at all these days. He had always liked the water, though, and it was invigorating to be doing laps, feeling the liquid sliding sensuously against his skin as he propelled himself toward the deep end of the pool.
    He reached the far side, flipped over, pushed against the wall, and with swift kicks and broad, even strokes sped back down his lane, feeling the