When dream becomes reality (A Bondi Rescue FanFic)

Time flies

Five weeks had passed since Chappo's accident, and the day of the lifeguards tryouts was upon us.

I had been back working both at the hospital and the beach, and surprisingly, had managed to get through the past five weeks without any major injuries. I mean, I'd had a concussion, and a couple of cuts and scrapes, but they're not exactly major... Especially compared to previous injuries. Also, I took Jesse up on his offer to help me train, and it's fair to say that the training has gone swimmingly, and I am pretty much back to full fitness.

Chappo has also recovered and has been training just as hard. However, we haven't been training together at all, because secretly, despite the fact that it is only the tryouts, we want to beat each other.

So, this morning I was woken by the loud, annoying and monotonous beeping of my alarm. It was 5:30am and we had to be at the pool to register by 6:30am. I dragged myself out of bed like I did most mornings and shuffled through into the kitchen. Chappo was already in there, hogging all of the space like he did most mornings.

He was making himself a strawberry, banana and blackberry smoothie - my favourite - but wasn't making me one!

"Hey, thanks for making me one too Chap," I commented sarcastically,
"Sorry Charl, but today you're the competition, so needs must,"
"Oh you're so charming,"
"I know,"
"Fine then, I'll just make my own smoothie,"
"Ah, well, about that... I kind of used all of the blackberries... And the strawberries.... And I had the last banana too,"
"I'm so going to kill you,"

So, after my lovely boyfriend had decided that it was perfectly fine for him to finish off all of the fruit, I had to resort to granola and yoghurt, which I didn't really mind. However, just to make Chappo feel like he had the upper hand, I acted as if the granola was really going to after my performance today, even though it would had no effect whatsoever.

Once I had polished off my breakfast, I went and got ready, using the same routine that I used to use when I swam competitively back in England. I pulled on my favourite costume from when I won gold at the Junior World swimming Championships in 200 metres backstroke. Then I pulled only my leggings and hoodie get the top before putting my hair up into a loose ponytail.

Whilst Chappo was still in the bathroom, I saw an opportunity to get the upper hand on him, and I took it. I snook out through the the front door and gently jogged up to the swimming pool. When I used to compete, a gentle jog always warmed my muscles up perfectly.

When I arrived, I was met by the friendly faces of Deano and Azza, who were two of the most experience lifeguards on the service. They signed me in and told me to go and get myself ready.

As I walked to the female changing rooms, I expected it to just be Nicola and myself, but was surprised to see a very young looking girl there as well. She was stood talking to Nicola when I came around the corner and threw my bag down.

"Oh my God, you would never believe how much of a big girls blouse Chappo is being today Nic," I huffed as I turned to face her, which is when I met the young girl,
"Geez, and you wonder why you got the nickname Pom!" Nicola replied,
"What are you on about?"
"Charl, you can't go around using phrases like 'big girls blouse' and not expect to be called a Pommy!"
"Point taken, anyway, aren't you going to introduce us?"
"Oh yeah, sorry, this is Megan, she's trying out today,"
"Ah sweet, pleasure to meet you Megan, I'm Charlotte, but as you've probably noticed, everyone calls me Pom,"

And with that, we all continued to get changed and then headed out onto the poolside where all of the boys, including Chappo were all waiting.

"Why does it always take the women so long to get ready!?" Harries shouted across the pool,
"Ah shut it Harries, we all know that you've been for a spray tan just for today!" Nicola shouted back, making all the boys stood round the edges of the water laugh.

There were five lanes set up, and Hoppo, Kerrbox, Azza, Deano and Harries were each timing a lane. No time was wasted in getting started.

In the first heat there was myself, Nicola, Chappo, Whippet and Maxi. I was in lane three with Harries as my timer.

As I approached the lane I mentally spoke to myself. Right then Charl, come on, this is only 800m and you're used to swimming mega distances. It's just 800m - that's 32 lengths of this 25m pool... You can do this.

Whilst I was stood on the edge, preparing myself, I realised that I still had my inhaler in my hands, so I bent down to put it on the side so that I could grab it if I needed it and take a quick puff. However, Harries must have seen me because he told me to let him look after it, and that if I needed it I should just give one tug on the chain and he'd get it ready for me when I got to the pool wall.

Everyone had to start in the pool which felt strange to me because I'm so used to diving in, but I just got on with it anyway. When Hoppo started us off, I took of gently, not wanting to burn out half way through. I found that I was going well, in fact I was going really well - I was on my sixteenth length, and was already a full length in front of the others.

As I came up to do the tumble turn of my sixteenth length, I felt the all too familiar sensation of my chest beginning to get tighter and my breathing starting to get shallower. Oh for God's sake, I thought, why does this always have to happen at the most inconvenient times?

On my way back down to the end that Harries was stood at, I gave one pull of the chain, and saw that he immediately started to fumble around in his pocket. When I reached the side, he bent down, put the inhaler in my mouth, and squeezed two puffs out. I held my breathe for ten seconds and signalled for him to give me another dose.

"Hey Pom, if you want to stop them that's fine, you're well ahead of the average time anyway... Nobody is going not judge you for not finishing," Azza informed me from the lane to my left,
"Nah Azza, I'm fine, honestly!" I replied enthusiastically before getting back into the freestyle motion.

I quickly glanced to my left and to my right and saw that the others had begun to catch up and were now only a couple of body lengths behind me, so I decided that it was time to get down to business.

Once I had decided that it was time to go up a level, there was absolutely no stopping me. My legs kicked like there was no tomorrow, and my arms were springing out from the water faster than they had done in a long time - it felt like I was flying through the water.

Within no time at all, I had left the rest of the field in my wake. I had gained two lengths on each of them, and finished the swim in eight minutes and twelve seconds.

When I had finished, I hung onto the side and took another couple of puffs on my inhaler, just to try and get my breathing under control properly. By the time the others finished, I had sorted out my breathing and I could feel my heart rate slowly going back to normal.

"Hey Chap!?" Whippet shouted from lane one,
"Yeah?" Chap replied from lane 4,
"She absolutely smoked ya! She absolutely made a mockery of ya!"
"Well Whip, I think you'll find that she kicked your arse too,"
"Yeah well, I'm not the one trying to beat her, am I?"
"Oh shut up, I'll own her when we get down to Bondi, just you wait and see!"
"Blimey lads, the banter sure is flying about this morning!" I said, piping up and involving myself in their conversation.

We all ducked under the lane ropes and made our way out of the pool, and dried off as we watched the rest of the returning lifeguards, and the newbies complete the swim. I was pleased to see that little Megan had done well, and had come out top of her heat.

After everyone had finished their swim, we all packed up and made our way down to Bondi where the main part of the lifeguards tryouts was about to get underway, and I couldn't wait.

HEY GUYS,
SORRY ABOUT NOT UPDATING FOR A COUPLE OF DAYS, I'VE BEEN RIDICULOUSLY BUSY, BUT HERE IS THE NEXT CHAPTER, SO I HOPE YOU ENJOY IT!
IF YOU HAVE ANY IDEAS ABOUT WHICH LIFEGUARDS YOU WOULD LIKE TO SEE MORE OF THEN PLEASE LEAVE A COMMENT, BECAUSE YOUR OPINIONS ARE ALWAYS VALUED!
AS ALWAYS, DON'T FORGET TO VOTE,

MUCH LOVE,
Charlie x