Lifeguard AU
1. Sarah hadn’t been sure what she expected: more action or a completely mindless and unnecessary position that would give her a horrific tan by the time the summer ended. Instead, she spent most of her time blowing her whistle at kids who weren’t paying attention and feeling her skin turning red and bubbling. She almost wishes she was the reading type, except that she really ought to at least watch the water.
2. Rachel holds herself with comfortable ease under a nearby umbrella, waiting patiently for Sarah’s shift to end and hers to begin. Unlike her mangy counterpart, Rachel has a book with her - only light reading, of course. She wonders absently if Sarah has surpassed an eighth grade reading level.
3. Sarah hears a scream - something with a vaguely sharper edge than the usual shrieking of beachgoing kids - and rockets to her feet. Shading her eyes, she searches for the source of the disturbance while her heart kicks into high gear. Her first real test.
4. Rachel’s book closes with a snap and she looks to Sarah to see how this new girl handles herself beyond just lounging in the sun and looking pretty (though Rachel wouldn’t say that much out loud). She adjusts her weight in case she has to interfere (it would be just her luck to have to interfere when her shift hasn’t even started yet). But then Sarah takes off running.
5. Sarah isn’t sure she has a brain in this moment. She’s all legs and lungs and whistle. The water is cold after the warmth of the sun, and all thought whooshes away the second she goes under. The kid is flailing (and then he isn’t), but Sarah is there, fully equipped to handle it. She doesn’t remember the trip back, only the fabric cries of the mother and the sand sticking to her knees as she drops down beside the kid, checking for breathing. But it’s nothing; the boy winks at her and makes a show of dramatically rising from the dead, to a horrific reprimand from his hysterical mother.
6. That charade was well worth the five dollars Rachel paid the little brat to fake drowning, especially the storm cloud that followed Manning all the way back up to the lifeguard chair.
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