Part 2!

I've been super busy for the past weeks with other work HUHU Sorry for being inactive for some time!

ESTJ (male) x INFP (female)

Teaching something that he is good at has never been difficult for Chico.

This person, though, has proven to be a challenge.

"Really? You're going to choose to walk out on me again?"

"I've had enough of you!" Dara declares angrily, balling her hands into fists just as she climbed out of the edge of the pool they have been practicing at for the past nights in secret. Chico knows the owner of the small resort that owns the pool and struck an agreement with them that they will keep the lessons a secret and he will give them ten percent of his fresh catch for each day.

It's almost been a week of night swimming lessons for Dara. Meaning, it also has almost been a week since Dara has been giving up every night.

Chico was actually surprised to see her climb out of the pool without any assistance from him. A bit of progress there, but only there.

"I've been telling you that I can't kick through the water well!"

"You know what? Aside from eating so much, you also know how to run your mouth well without stopping," Chico, who is still in the swimming pool, berates her. "How about you try to place your energy into kicking yourself from this end," he then points toward the opposite direction of the pool, "to that end?" His finger then moves to point at the kickboard that is floating idly on the water. "You have your kickboard to help you stay afloat."

"I told you that I can't!" She cries out.

"Them how else are you going to start to learn?" Chico asks in a level voice. His tone was deadly serious. He climbs out of the pool and runs his fingers through his hair, moving some of the stray wet strands away from sticking to his skin. "Look into my eyes and give me a serious answer. How else are you going to learn?"

"I-I don't...I really don't-" She is unable to finish as a wave of self-pity overcame her and she burst into tears.

"Dara-"

"Stop it! I'd rather quit!" Then she rushes to the chair at the side where she placed her bag and hung her towel. She collects all her stuff and hangs the towel on her shoulder before walking out of the area.

Chico decided it was not the best time to go after her, especially when she couldn't get her head straight. In all honesty, the way she acted pissed him off. Don't knock it 'til you try it, he wanted to say.

It's clear that the thing Dara is criticizing is only herself. And her nonexistent ability in swimming.

Chico runs his fingers through his wet hair again and gazes at the water in the pool beneath him. He shakes his head, knowing that he's doing more than just teaching this woman how to swim.

----------

Clink! Clink!

Dara instantly gets up in bed when she hears something being thrown at her window.

Clink!

There it goes again.

"W-What the heck," she grumbles. Squinting her eyes when she looks at her phone screen which she grabbed from the small nightstand beside her bed, she checks to see that it's around two in the morning. Around four hours after walking out from her swimming lessons.

Clink! Clink! The sound won't stop and she's sure that someone is trying to get her attention from outside. Maybe the person outside knows that she's staying in this room by herself? The rest of her production team are sleeping in the others rooms of the house they rented for these two months.

"Well, if I check now and find out it's someone who wants to kill me, then Que sera sera," she muttered. After that swimming lesson and crying so much, she felt like she didn't want to do anything from now on.

She switches on the bedside lamp and walks to the window covered by the curtains. She pushes the curtains to the sides and jumps a bit to see a pebble thrown at the glass, making another clinking sound. There was no hesitation when she looked out the window. Streetlamps illuminated the narrow way and she finds one person standing right outside, about to throw another pebble in her direction. "What the heck?" She muttered, "What's Chico doing out there?"

She slides the window to the right and shouts into the cold night air, "What the heck are you doing?!"

Chico smiled brightly at her. "Good morning!"

She scowled at him. "It's three in the morning!"

"I'm aware of that!"

"Again, what are you doing here?"

"I'm here to take you back to swimming lessons."

She rolled her eyes and huffed out, "I told you that I'm never going to take lessons again. I can't swim, okay?" She wanted to end the conversation there.

Just as she was about to slide her window closed, Chico's voice is then heard saying, "But what if I reward you with my fresh clam specialty?"

Dara pauses in her actions. Did she hear him right? "What?"

"Take one more swimming lesson with me and I will prepare my special clam dish for you. Everyone in the village loves it and I'm sure you will too."

"Are you seriously bribing me with food?!"

"Yes! Is it working?"

"...How will you prepare the clams?" She asked at length. The way she asked sounded shy, but in reality, she was actually excited by the prospect of food. Especially free food.

Chico let out a laugh. "With only the best ingredients! But that's a secret and it's going to be the best clam dish you'll have in your entire life. So, what do you say?"

Dara fiddled with her fingers, trying to think about this new proposal. She can't keep her mind straight because now she's starting to feel hungry. And her mind doesn't really work well when she's hungry. "I just go back to swimming lessons, right?"

He nods and raises a hand at her. "What you do tonight is that you go back to sleep, then you do whatever you need to do for your eating show the whole day but at 11 in the evening I will be expecting you at the pool, got that?"

Finally, she relented. "F-Fine."

"Good! Sleep well, Dara!"

----------

Now that she has slept on it and spent a few hours going around the village to eat and film new segments for her show, Dara has just realized how weak she was to accept the offer to swim again because she'll be getting food after.

It's late at night and she's taking her usual route to the resort where she'll be having her classes. Inside her casual wear is the wetsuit that Chico has allowed her to borrow.

"Dara, you are so stupid!" She scolded herself in a voice above a whisper. "You shouted and cried in front of him and now that he's going to give you food, you forget everything and say yes?!" She pauses in her step and feels a wave of regret wash over her. Then she drops her head into her hands. "What is wrong with me?"

Now it's too late to turn and head back to her place. She's sure that Chico is waiting and he won't be happy if she won't show up at their fixed time. He'll definitely visit her place again.

Reaching an internal decision, she continues on with her way, this time trudging more than usual.

She passes through the back gate of the resort. It is what the employees use and it won't draw attention to her compared to using the main entrance. When she walks to the pool area, she freezes in her spot with her mouth agape.

There is a long table with fresh clams on five different plates. There is a small charcoal grill beside and Chico is feeding more chunks of charcoal to the small fire. The man turns and flashes a smile her way. "Checking me out?"

Actually, Dara is stupefied because of the amount of food waiting for her to devour. But with the way Chico looks now...and maybe that Dara has a teensy crush on him, maybe her mouth might also be agape because of him.

The man is wearing nothing but a pair of board shorts. All those years of swimming and diving have formed a svelte build for him.

"Hey, Dara," Chico breaks her from her reverie. She only noticed now that he has moved close to her. "You okay?"

"Y-Yeah," she mutters, turning her gaze to the pool. "I-I was shocked because of the amount of food."

"It would be stupid of me to prepare one serving of clams, right? I've overheard from other residents that you can finish at least 10 servings of seafood."

"Overheard? You haven't seen me eat in person?" She leaves her belongings on the ground, a bit far from the pool.

"Why would I? You're just eating. Place food in your mouth, chew, swallow, and bam! That's the whole process," Chico says as he moves to the side of the pool. He takes a seat at the edge, dipping half of his legs into the water. "You eat like everyone else, the only thing that stands out is that you have quite a bigger appetite than a few more people."

"You..." Dara didn't know what to say. "You do raise a good point," she mutters.

"So," a splash came from the pool as Chico submerges into the pool, "you ready to try swimming again?"

Dara threw her gaze at all those fresh scrumptious-looking clams waiting for her to eat. Then she looks back at the pool. It's only four and a half feet deep but the lingering fear of the fact that she'll eventually be diving into the ocean which is way deeper scares the crap out of her.

"Hey!" Chico calls out. "I know that look in your eyes. Before you burst into tears again, stop overthinking and just join me in the pool now!"

Dara angrily turned to him. "I wasn't about to cry!" She exclaimed, clearly displaying her hurt. Now that he has said it out loud, she feels the sudden urge to cry - not because of swimming but because he pointed out her crying bouts. "Why do you always have to point it out?"

"You started it."

Dara's jaw dropped. "I-I started it?" She pointed to herself, completely stupefied. She then points accusingly at him. "You're the one who decided to say something about it!"

"Enough with all your talking." Chico slowly walks from one end of the pool to the other end. "Let's stop wasting time and start swimming. Got that?"

Dara rolls her eyes. Every time that man opens his mouth to talk, she remembers how annoying he is.

Without another word, she grabs the kickboard that was sitting on the first step of the pool and descends to submerge most of her body in the pool. The cool water sends shivers throughout her whole body, but her mind was someplace else. She knew that she was overthinking again.

"Again," he drawled out loudly, "even from here I can see that you're overthinking again!"

"Try being in my shoes!"

"I can't. Yours would be too small for my feet."

"Why are you so mean?"

"Hey, I'm not mean. I'm merely stating the facts."

Dara rests her arms on the kickboard, floating slightly left and right on the water. "Well, I'm sorry if people have gotten used to that attitude of yours but I'll be the first to say this. You can't just act like a...like a mean person to everyone!"

"You know what, Dara? You can say dick and get it over with," Chico nonchalantly utters.

"You...you..." There was an edge of reluctance in her voice.

"Come on," he coaxes, "Say it."

"You dick!" She finally spits out.

Chico cups a hand around his ear from the other end of the pool. "I can't hear you!"

"You DICK!" She repeats in a louder voice.

"Nope." He shakes his head. "Still can't hear you!"

Unconsciously, Dara found her way kicking against the water. She keeps the kickboard in front of her and fixes her body in a position where she's lying on the water, stomach first. The movement of her legs propels her through the water, but she's not aware of that. She was fueled by her own anger which she has now allowed herself to let go of.

Still kicking her way to his end of the pool, Dara continues to huff under her breath a piece of her own thoughts for her 'caring' swim teacher, "You stupid, stupid man who thinks he can always have his way! You're just one big meanie who doesn't know how to be a decent human being to someone new! It doesn't hurt to be nice! It wouldn't hurt to say something kind to me but noooooo you're only good at acting like a dick!"

"Oh, would you look at that?" Dara was shocked to hear his voice so near her. It was then she realized that she reached the other end of the pool. Did she just kick her way through the water?

For the first time?!

With wide eyes, Dara silently looked at Chico who had a knowing and proud smirk plastered on his face. He rests his arms on the kickboard. "I finally heard you call me a dick."

"I did it," she breathes out.

"You did it."

"I did it."

"Yes, you did it."

"I did it," she repeats in awe of herself.

Chico frowns. "I heard you the first time," he mutters, but Dara paid no attention to him for her happiness was over the roof. After wallowing so much in self-pity, she is now finally proud of herself for doing something new and what was once scary for her.

"I did it!" She announces happily. She tosses the kickboard away and suddenly throws her arms around Chico's shoulders to hug him close to her. "For the first time, I got to swim through water!"

Suddenly, the feeling of his slick skin from being submerged in water feels too close to her liking. And now she's questioning herself internally why she decided to hug him out of the blue. She pulls away from their hug and smiles awkwardly at Chico. "I-I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to-"

"I think someone deserves her 10 servings of clams," Chico interrupts her gently. He chooses not to comment on the unexpected skinship on Dara's end. Literal skinship since he's not wearing anything to cover his upper body.

Dara was relieved that Chico did not remark on her hug. But it still did not take away the fact that she might be looking as red as a tomato. Hmmm, tomatoes. I would love to have some if I could, she thought.

"But I'm not going give you any of the clams yet."

Chico breaks her train of thought. "What? Why? I swam!"

"Another lap, Dara," he tells her while raising an eyebrow. He juts his head to the other end of the pool. "If you could kick your way here, then you can kick your way back to where you started."

She pouted her lips, feeling her mood go down. "You're unfair."

"Life is unfair," he corrects her almost immediately. "I'm simply teaching you a lesson of it."

~~~~~~~~~~~~

I think this calls for one more part! ♡ Hopefully will have part 3 out soon.

I hope you liked this one!