Wings of Fortune - Part 1

Sitting in the warm sand, Sam swallowed hard as Candace slipped off her sarong and pranced toward the water in her skimpy bikini, vibrant waves of ginger hair shimmering under the late afternoon sun. As his eyes traced the sexy lines of her nubile figure, he was suddenly very glad he had joined Candace and her close friends for this party at the quarry pond. He didn’t normally attend these sorts of things, but they would be going to different colleges in a few weeks, and he wasn’t sure he would have another chance to see her.

Sam had had a crush on Candace since the eighth grade. Nearly everyone at school had known it since the Valentine’s Day incident of 2016, Candace included. Since that day, she had loved to tease Sam, giving him tantalizing glimpses of her developing, gorgeous body at every opportunity throughout high school.

A shriek erupted from Megan nearby. Sam’s attention was pulled from his reverie to see the playful aftermath of something. From the red mark on Megan’s firm, swimsuit-clad butt, Sam guess that Rob had pinched her. He grinned. Those two were always enjoying frisky flirtation. Why couldn’t he have that with Candace?

He knew the answer, of course. Candace was the untouchable beauty, school president, captain of the cheer team, wanted by everyone and had by no one. She had gone on the occasional date, never lacking for suitors on homecoming or prom. But she had never developed a serious relationship. He hadn’t either. He had never wanted anyone but her.

Matt, the quarterback of the football team and one-time Candace homecoming counterpart, handed Sam a beer. Sam had never had one before, and he almost refused. A surge of what-the-fuckness on this, his final opportunity to see Candace, made him accept it. He cracked the can and gulped a mouthful. It tasted awful! Seriously? This is what beer tasted like? Why on earth was the stuff so popular?

Matt laughed at Sam’s sour expression, slapping him on the shoulder.

“Proud of you, man! We’ll make a proper partier out of you yet…”

Sam nodded to the affable athlete, his pursed lips relaxing into an easy smile. He couldn’t prevent his gaze from wandering back to Candace, whose shapely calves were disappearing under the water as she waded in.

Matt followed Sam’s gaze to the beautiful girl in the pond. He leaned down and mussed Sam’s hair.

“Give it up, man. Better men than you have tried and failed. Namely me…” Matt plopped in the sand next to Sam. His longing gaze looked remarkably similar to Sam’s as both young men watched Candace continue into the warm water, which was now up her slender waist.

Mara came up behind them both, smacking them on the backs of the heads.

“Dumbasses,” she said. “Everyone knows Candace is gay.”

“Shut up,” said Matt, grabbing her arm and pulling her on top of both guys with a tangle of toned, athletic limbs. Mara was the school’s star soccer player and self-proclaimed class clown.

Matt tickled her flat stomach, and she flailed, kicking Sam in the face a few times.

“Ow!” he said, annoyed as he skittered further away. “Get a room, you two!”

Matt ceased tickling for a moment, turning to Sam to respond, when he noticed something dropping from the sky. It looked like a person! No, there were white wings! Was it a bird? No, it was a person. Two people! Locked together in some kind of struggle. The white wings seemed to be tangled with black wings. Was it two parachutists who had tangled their chutes? It had to be. They must be white and black parachutes, partially ejected. They just looked like wings.

Before he could really get a proper look at the falling figures, they crashed into the surface of the pond with a huge splash. The pond glowed with a swirling black and white pattern as a pulse of what appeared to be electric power crackled over the surface of the lake.

Candace gave a startled cry, then slipped beneath the rolling wave from the parachutist strike in the center of the pond.

Sam leapt to his feet, legs lurching into a full sprint the second that Candace disappeared under the waves. Rooster tails of sand flew behind each foot strike as he instinctively raced toward the water.

Matt was up nearly as fast. The two splashed as they ran to thigh-deep water, then dove in. They swam to Candace’s last location, swallowed one last breath, and dove downward. Spotting her quickly, they snaked their arms around each side of her limp form. Securing their quarry, they kicked hard, driving upward until they broke the pond’s glimmering surface.

Both young men extended one arm with the other wrapped around each of the beautiful girl’s bare shoulders. They swam their precious payload to shore.

As they dragged Candace out of the water and onto the beach, Matt looked directly at Sam and gave him a quick, questioning nod, breathing heavily from exertion. Then, he gave a brief tilt of his head toward the pond and slapped his chest.

Sam gave a quick nod in reply, understanding exactly what he meant. Upon receipt of Sam’s nonverbal reply, Matt sprinted back into the lake to find the two parachutists. Sam turned his attention to Candace.

She wasn’t breathing.

Despite the urgency of the situation, Sam felt a thrill shoot through him at the prospect of giving the beautiful girl mouth-to-mouth. He mentally chided himself. He needed to focus on saving her life right now, not his own desires.

He pressed his lips to hers, forcing his mind to the task, not the sensation. He began heart compressions as the others formed a circle around him. Sam gave a silent prayer of thanks that his gym teacher had required CPR certification as part of their requirements as he lowered his mouth to hers once more.

As Sam removed his lips from hers a second time, Candace sputtered a splatter of water right into his face. Never in his life had he been so glad to be blasted in the face with water!

Candace twisted her svelte abs and cleared her lungs of the remaining liquid into the sand. Giving Candace a bit of space, Sam permitted his relieved eyes the reward of a momentary linger over her glistening curves.

God, she was gorgeous.

As her coughing subsided, grateful emerald eyes found his. Tunnel vision enveloped Sam’s gaze, only her warm, beaming eyes existed for a long moment. Until she reached up and pulled him into a hug.

Sam’s lips broke into a huge grin, his eyes aflame with delight as her breasts touched his bare chest.

“Thank you, Sam,” she whispered into his ear.

Could this day turn out any better? Candace in a bikini? Beach party? Candace in a bikini? Beer? Rescuing his dream girl from the brink of drowning? Okay, he could do without the beer.

Had he thought of Candace in a bikini already? Hugging him? Grateful to the boy who had saved her life? Yeah, that. And that. And that again.

He sighed dreamily.

Candace heard his exhale and released the hug. Her eyes found his inane expression, their corners crinkling in amusement.

“Oh my God, are you okay, Candace?” Mara asked, reminding Sam that the rest of the world outside of Candace did, in fact, still exist.

Sam’s grin began to fade as he realized that Mara’s reaction was probably more appropriate than his. It didn’t diminish entirely, however. This was much too marvelous a day for that.

Candace. Bikini. Hug.

Those three mental images would keep a smile on his face for a long while.

The group heard a splash and five pairs of eyes turned back toward the pond. Sam sprang back to his feet, remembering that Matt was still out there attempting to save lives.

He seemed to be struggling to pull something to the surface of the water. Apparently, he couldn’t do it, though, because he slipped back under the waves.

Sam dove back into the water to help the athletic quarterback. Sam submerged and scanned ahead as he swam. After a moment, he spied Matt with a tangle of bodies in his arms.

Before his eyes, the tangle vanished! He paused mid-stroke in utter astonishment, then continued toward Matt.

Matt didn’t need help getting himself to the surface, however. A shocked expression on his face, his cheeks puffed to release a few bubbles. After glancing around and below for his lost targets, he kicked upward. Sam surfaced with him, took a deep breath, then both of them swam down, searching the area down to the pond floor, finding nothing.

After several more such fruitless sorties, both boys swam back to the shore.

“Did you find them?” asked Rob.

“No,” huffed Matt between breaths. Sam shook his head in confirmation, dropping to his knees as he gulped air. “They were there… and then... they were… just… gone.”

Matt turned his palms toward himself and examined them.

“Watcha doing? Your hands okay?” asked Megan, furrowing her brows.

“Yeah,” said Matt, dropping his hands suddenly.

Rob and Mara helped Candace to her feet.

“You need to go to the hospital, Cand,” said Megan to her friend. “You stopped breathing for a minute!”

“I feel fine. Great, actually… Thanks to Sam here,” said Candace, bathing him once again in the warm glow of her dazzling smile.

Sam flushed.

“Don’t forget Matt,” he said. “Both of us pulled her out of the water.”

Matt nodded at Sam, appreciating the acknowledgment. Candace’s eyes never left Sam, however.

“She’s right! Nice work, both of you. You saved her life!” said Mara. “I’m pretty sure Sam enjoyed the…”

Rob cut her off with a trademark pinch of her toned ass. Mara whirled and smacked him.

“You!!!” she cried in mock outrage.

Rob gave her a crooked grin as Megan took Candace’s elbow and guided her back to the parking lot.

The rest of the gang brushed off sand and hustled to the cars as well. As they pulled out of the parking lot to head toward the hospital, bubbles rippled the surface of the pond.