Terry headed toward what they called the island, the island was a small concrete island located beside where the shallow end of the pool went to a deeper area more meant for adults and teenagers.
The island was a concrete tower located above the water with two channels on either side for people to pass freely between the two areas of the pool. It was one of the worse assignments a person could get
.
It was horrible because you had to watch people in all directions, so you couldn’t keep as close of an eye on any one area. Parents tended to like to sit on the island, which wasn’t allowed to watch their kids in the shallow area while their slightly older kids played in the deeper area. And dealing with entitled people who thought they could go anywhere they wanted was never fun. You also had to deal with little kids fighting in the shallow end and older kids/adults getting into trouble in the deeper area. It was also one of the busiest pools and on a busy day like today it was packed.
It did come with some benefits, the guard assigned to the island got time and a half pay for the entire day because they had to deal with all the issues. So Terry wasn’t too upset to get the spot, called in on a day off which meant he was already on over time, plus working the island for a whole shift meant he was getting paid almost 3 times his normal rate.
That caused a smile to cross his face.
The only issue was that in order to get to the island, the lifeguard had to swim out to it.
Terry dove into the water and swam out the short distance to the island climbing back onto it and up onto the tower.
He had no idea, just by entering the water he had introduced the mermaid virus to a pool full of people.
Over the course of the next four hours, he had to go into the water multiple times, to break up a fight, deal with kids being kids and a couple of adults who didn’t understand that they couldn’t bring drinks into the pool.
Each time he did so, he spread the virus.
After his lunch break, he head back onto the island, when the first sign that his day was really about to change happened.