“Fine, fine.” I pull my T-shirt off over my head, step out of my shorts, and plunge myself in before I have another thought about it. How long has it been since I stepped into icy water? Years.

When I surface, I try very hard to not objectify Teddy, but the fluorescent lights are giving the flat planes of his muscles a heavenly glow, and cutting darker shadows between them. It’s inexplicable that such an unhurried, cheese-eating person has a body like this. But he does, and what a treat. I lose strength in my legs and I sink down to my eyeballs.

“Please welcome to the class Miss Ruthie Midona,” he tells the group, and now I’m getting the smiles and cheers.

I get it now. Life requires full, up-to-the-neck participation. And for the next few minutes, we obey Teddy as our instructor. Every dance move he can think of, we’re doing it. We’re moonwalking. We’re doing the twist. We’re singing lyrics. The Parlonis are clapping along. We’re all shrieking with laughter and half drowning, and I’m not as fit as I thought. But I’m having the most fun I’ve had in years.

“You must be Sandy,” Teddy says when our regular instructor arrives all sweating and flustered. “I kept them all nice and warm for you.” And with that, he performs an illegal cannonball that almost wets the ceiling and swims up to me. “Can you believe we’re being paid to do this?” he says, scraping his hands up his face.

I really can’t believe it. On a weekday midmorning, earning actual money, we do aqua aerobics.

I didn’t know that guys could be so open to try new things. But Teddy is. He’s either laughing, or earnestly concentrating with a crease on his brow. His arm curls are magnificent. We line up against the side to perform push-ups and he doesn’t notice how the oldies angle for a space either side of him. No one needs to get jealous; he mingles and shares himself around. For anyone getting tired, he provides a shoulder to hang on to. I am almost needing it myself.

I know he’s being paid for this, but really the bare minimum required of him was to drive the Parlonis here. The way he spreads around his energy and kindness is so generous. He’s completely, deep-down lovely, standing there with elderly ladies hanging on his shoulders, just so they can feel that kind of youth and beauty firsthand.

It’s sad that he doesn’t realize how generous he really is.

We’re allowed ten minutes of free time after the class and we hand around pool noodles for floating. I think I should get out, so I can get dressed and position myself to help, but Teddy might watch the extraction process. I wait for a minute, hoping he might haul himself out and wander off, but he’s enjoying himself too much. He’s got a floatation ring around his neck and is carrying Mrs. Washington piggyback through the water. She looks like she could die happy tonight.

I didn’t think this through. I’d be climbing that ladder into the heaven-bright light, water streaming down my butt and thighs. I haven’t worn this swimsuit in years and it’s shrunk up my crack. The backs of my knees are really weird. I’m completely stuck in this moment I should never have stolen to begin with.

“What’s up?” Teddy swims over to me, his passenger now dismounted. “You look like you need to pee. Hold it in, girl. Think dry thoughts.”

“Come on, you know I’m not a rule breaker.”

“I’d say I’m relieved, but …” He laughs until I worry for his own bladder. Now he swims around me in a circle. “But seriously, what’s up? You’re stressin’.”

“When I get out of this pool, I want you to close your eyes.”

He covers his face. A sparkling hazel eye peeps through a big gap in his fingers. My laugh turns up his wattage. His hand drops away, revealing saucy eyebrows. “What’s the big deal?”

“Gravity’s the big deal.” We’re very close, but there’s something about floating that makes it feel okay. “Not everyone looks like you in their swimwear.”

“You flatter me.” We’re now floating closer, our hands making circles in the water, knees sometimes touching. “Do you think I’m a bit pretty, Ruthie Maree?”

I’m starting to get out of breath. “What’s it like being so self-confident?” I sink lower in the water.

“It’s just how I feel when I’m with you. But then I can’t seem to get the reaction I want from you, and I start doubting myself. Then I look at my reflection in a spoon and I’m an abomination. By dinnertime I’m a wreck and the ugliest man in existence.” He seems to bite off this torrent midstream and closes his eyes for a second like he’s exasperated. “I say the stupidest stuff to you. Why does this keep happening? I’m actually really normal and cool.”

I nod sagely. “I want to believe you.”

He goes completely still, because he’s tall enough to stand on the bottom. He puts my hand on his shoulder like I need assistance and a rest. Accurate. His eyelashes are crisscrossed spikes. Under my palm there’s a lit match inked onto him, and I feel that tiny spark.

His lip lifts in amusement. “Now you’re making me feel pretty.”

“As if you need little old me to pump up your ego.”

“Oh, but I do.”

Keeping the smile off my face around him is turning me into a medically certified killjoy. But if I relax, what will happen? He’ll be unstoppable. He’ll annihilate me.

“Hands where we can see them,” one of the residents shouts at us, and the shrieks of laughter echo off every reflective surface.

“Okay,” I hold my other hand up, and the laugh gets louder. “They honestly suspect me of feeling you up on a workday? Dirty old women.” The cogs turn in my brain. “Oh. They were talking to you.”

“You have a guilty conscience, don’t you? Where were we. Oh yeah, self-confidence. You gotta start walking around like you’re the shit, because you are,” he tells me, gathering up my hand and walking me in an improvised backward water waltz. “Want to hear a secret?” Even before he opens his mouth, I see the compliment coming straight for me like a shark fin. “Neat and tidy is my absolute favorite kind of girl.”

I don’t know how he can switch modes so easily. He was just horsing around poolside. Now, he’s got darkening eyes and that seductive husk in his voice.

I decide to try swimming for shore. “Okay.” I’m twirled out to the length of his arm, the water churning around us.

“But you don’t believe me.” He pulls me back, closer this time. “Your eyes are …” He blinks away from me now. Why would he feel self-conscious? He does, and it flips my heart. “Magnetic,” is what he goes with. Then he groans at himself. “I’m corny as fuck.” He dips down under the water for a bit.

When he resurfaces, I say sternly, “You’ve found the only female under the age of fifty in the building to mess around with. That’s what this is.”

But it’s too late. A flattered sizzle goes down my spine at the exact moment that he puts his hand low down on my back, only a wafer of wet fabric between us.

“Learn to take a compliment. Appreciate yourself. You’re sublime.” That’s the last word I ever thought would be applied to me.

“That’s kind of you to say.”

“Oh, I’m not kind. I nearly reverted to my old ways the other night, at your place. You should know my secret. I have a major HeavenSent-Francine-Percival kink.”

“Okay, well, she is gorgeous.”

“I love neat-and-tidy types who have label makers and smell like a bubble bath. All the soup cans in the cupboard with the labels facing the same way. The bath filling up at the same time every night. God, you walk around in this haze of bubbles. I just want to eat all your cheese and snuggle up in your bed. I can admit it.”

“I’m pretty aware of that.” My throat is making my voice weird. That was too many lush words for me to process. Bubbles, kink, snuggle, bed.

“You feel it, right?” His mask slips for a second as he looks down at my floating legs. Maybe he’s considering the possibility that he’s alone in this. “I think we’ve got an interesting sizzle.”

I look at the word GIVE, written on his skin forever. He’s always so brave. I’m going to try to be more like him.

I put my hand under his chin to tip his face up for my inspection, and his mouth opens in surprise. I look at his lips and the porcelain sharpness of his teeth. His stubble feels like wet sand on my palm. Men: so animal, growing bristles and beards. It must be a lot of effort to disguise it.

I decide to give him what he craves so badly. It’s not exactly my well-kept secret. “Teddy, you’re so pretty it’s crazy.”

Instantly he replies, “You’re so pretty I need to buy a pencil sharpener.”

He looks at my mouth and his pupils dial out, ink black, and everything on the edges of this moment washes away. I think he’s going to kiss me. I’ve only just come out of romance retirement and I’m very inexperienced, but even I know that this is it.

I swear, he’s going to do it. Another inch closer.