Page 8 of Deceit

A lankier guy with auburn hair takes a seat in front of me, setting all of his things out on the desk in what looks like a perfected system when Maggie smiles.

“Hey, Andrew.”

He turns around, giving her a smile before his eyes stop on me. They take me in for a moment, before his cheeks begin to pink up.

“Hi,” he rasps softly.

“Hello,” I smile, causing his blush to deepen before he quickly turns around.

I watch as Maggie does her best to contain her laughter, before she whispers into my ear.

“Andrew Hutchinson. He’s very sweet and super shy as you can see.”

Nodding at that, I smile as the teacher walks in and introduces himself, beginning the class with the syllabus for the semester.

As soon as class is over, Maggie and I file out together. Liam is just ahead of us and I watch as he meets up with a tall brown haired man. It only takes a second to place my fiancé and disgust fills me as I see him tuck two girls beneath his arms, one of whom was the naked girl from my room. Liam does the same, taking two beautiful girls under his arms, as he gives them a smile as bright as the sun. They both seem to melt under it, and I honestly can’t blame them.

Asher’s eyes land on me, irritation filling them as he sneers and turns away abruptly. The naked girl, because that’s what I’m going to call her, casts me a venomous look. She snuggles into him further, as if he wasn’t holding another girl under his other arm while they walk away.

Liam turns to see what has Asher running for the hills, and when his eyes land on me he grins mischievously before tossing me a wink and following after him. Maggie rolls her eyes at them, before looking over my shoulder at my phone.

“What do you have next?”

“Looks like I don’t have anything until eleven,” I say.

“Ugh, lucky bitch. Give me your phone,” she says as she takes it out of my hand, quickly tapping the screen before handing it back to me. “K, I gave you my number. Text me at lunch and we can go grab something!”

With that she’s off, practically speed walking again. I wave goodbye and turn to my left. I haven’t been over here yet but no time to get lost like the present, right?

I make my way through a building of classrooms before it leads me to a separate building just outside of it. Curiosity gets the better of me and I step inside, a heavenly smell filling my senses and wrapping around me like a warm blanket. The distinctive smell of chlorine and wet pavement lingers in the air. The deeper I move down the hallway, the more intense the scent becomes.

Before I know what I’m doing, I’m pushing the door in front of me open, revealing an Olympic regulation sized swimming pool. There is a large set of bleachers to the left of the pool, and I can see the door that leads to the locker rooms off to the right.

My eyes come back to the water, so crisp and blue. I would do almost anything to slip under the surface right now, to sit on the bottom and just forget everything for a little while.

Swimming has always been my passion. As a young kid, Aunt Steph put me into lessons, and I was in our school pool as much as humanly possible. I even made the mistake of mentioning my passion to my dad. I told him how when I grew up, I wanted to be an Olympian. I wanted to swim and swim until my body gave out, for the rest of my life. He didn’t like me having such a strong passion for something that wasn’t in his realm of interests. He quickly made Aunt Steph discontinue the lessons and had my school ban me from the pool.

The last time I had been near one was at my friend Marissa’s house. She had an indoor pool, and on the weekends I would spend hours upon hours in it. It was never quite the same though.

I look to my left and right, before I set down my bag and slip off my shoes. Quickly, I move across the room, rolling up my wide legged pants up to my knees before sitting on the edge ofthe pool. As soon as my toes hit that crisp water, pleasure rolls through me and I tilt my head back, closing my eyes as my feet slowly glide through it.

I’m not sure how long I’m sitting there, enjoying the feeling of the water wrapping around every inch of submerged flesh when I get the feeling that someone is watching me. My eyes fly open, looking up to see a man staring at me. He’s tall, at least 6’3”, his shoulders are wide, and his waist tapered. He’s wearing a black polo shirt with the school’s crest on it and a pair of almost charcoal dress pants.

His deep brown hair is not buzzed, but not long either. It’s the perfect length, where he has just enough room to style it a bit in the front. Those eyes are what get me though. He has these piercing blue eyes that are practically the same color as the pool.

My eyes come down to his sharp jawline, a smattering of stubble covering it as his perfectly pink lips dip into a frown. Quickly, I flick my gaze back up to his eyes to find them shadowed with confliction.

“Pool is closed,” he says sternly, a rough gravel to his voice as he speaks.

Fear of being in trouble rips through me, as I quickly pull my legs out of the pool and go to stand.

“Oh, sorry. Sorry. I just…I’m new and I found this and—”

He walks over to me and holds his hand up to stop me from talking, which I appreciate because I didn’t really have anything to follow up with. His eyes trace over me, assessing, before he kicks off his shoes and socks. Taking a seat a few feet away from me at the edge. He rolls up his pant legs, much like I did before slipping his toned calves into the water.

I watch him carefully as I return my legs to the water. He stares out at the pool silently and I do the same, a sort of comfortability settling in the air as we just…exist.

I find myself stealing a glance in his direction and when I do, I find that he’s already staring at me.

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