“Serge, the pool’s overflowing.”

“And we’re in a drought. Another sign of what’s gone horribly wrong with society…” He ran and turned off the faucet, then quickly returned and pulled a Magic Marker from his pocket.

“Where was I?”

“Colgate.”

“Right. In 1935, the swim team came to practice in the Casino Pool, filled with comfortably warm saltwater from the Atlantic.” Serge reached into the bed of the truck and wrote something on the plastic. “Besides splashing around, they also enjoyed pristine beaches and an incredible climate that stood in stark contrast to what they’d just left. The very first spring breakers! When they returned to school, word spread. The following year: Why hunker down in snow when paradise awaits? More and more teams descended, and the informal practices turned into the massive annual College Swim Coaches Association forum. Non-athletes started joining the party, their numbers swelling steadily over the next twenty-five years until Where the Boys Are blew the roof off.“ Serge pulled a plastic specimen jar from his pocket and set it next to the pool.”Let’s rock!”

A Crown Vic with blackwall tires drove past the end of the street. Agent Ramirez opened his phone.

FORT LAUDERDALE

Serge’s convoy peeled out on A1A. “Remember to take plenty of pictures…”

A Delta 88 passed them northbound. Guillermo pulled up to an independent convenience store and went inside. He casually collected sodas and granola bars.

The man behind the register was bald with gray on the sides.

Guillermo set his purchases on the counter. “You the owner?”

The man nodded and began ringing up.

“Noticed your security cameras…”-pointing fingers in different directions-“… That’s the business I’m in. Make you a great deal on a new system.”

The owner scanned the bar code on a Sprite. “We like the one we got.”

“I know those models,” said Guillermo. “They never last. And when they go, you won’t find another offer like mine.”

“Thanks, but I’ll pass. That’ll be nine sixty-two.”

“Understand.” Guillermo pulled a ten-spot from his wallet. “But mind if I take a look at the monitors and recorder in the office anyway and see if I can work up a price? What do you have to lose?”

“I don’t think so.”

The ’73 Challenger turned off A1A and parked under a sign.

FORT LAUDERDALE AQUATIC COMPLEX.

Serge led the gang through yet another gate.

“Damn!” said Joey. “Look at the size of this place!”

Competitors triple-twisted off high dives and breast-stroked down lap lanes.

“Is that the Casino Pool?”

“No,” said Serge. “Fuckers demolished it in the mid-sixties.” He dipped a hand in the new pool and rubbed it on his neck. “This is its spiritual replacement, so we’ll have to make do. The cool part is that it’s open to the public for swimming.”

“We’re going to swim here?”

“Got something far better in mind. Follow me.”

They walked out the rear of the patio, across a lawn and past a giant abstract sculpture of someone doing the Australian crawl. Ahead: a nondescript building stashed in the rear of the property. Serge stopped at the entrance. “Andy, come here…”

Behind: A white Crown Vic with blackwall tires raced by the swim complex on A1A, Agent Ramirez frantically dialing and redialing his cell phone. “Come on! Why won’t he answer?”

“Check it out, Andy.” Serge looked down at the sidewalk and old inlaid blue-and-white ceramic tiles: INTERNATIONAL SWIMMING HALL OF FAME. “I’m getting tingles.”

Andy stood next to Serge, staring down with a pained expression of desperation as his pocket silently vibrated.

“You need to loosen up.” Serge slapped him hard on the back. “I know you’re thinking something utterly horrible might happen any second, but I have the same feeling all the time and it doesn’t stop me from being a happy chipmunk. Let’s go inside!”

Serge signed the guest book with bold calligraphy. They had the place to themselves as he gave the group his whirlwind A-tour. “… Here are Buster Crabbe’s medals and trophies… life-size mannequin with a creepy wig of Duke Kahanamoku, father of modern surfing… Mark Spitz… Rowdy Gaines… 1935 seashell plaque honoring Katherine Rawls, the greatest swimming sensation of her day, who trained here…” Students rushed to keep up with Serge’s unbroken stride. “… Esther Williams’s movie poster… 1958 photo of the Casino Pool with Mediterranean bathhouse… and finally the piece de resistance-check out this glass case. Those are Johnny Weissmuller’s five gold medals from the 1924 and ’28 Olympics in Paris and Amsterdam. Imagine that! Tarzan’s coolest shit! And nobody knows it’s just sitting here in this fabulous empty museum, which should be mobbed but isn’t because they don’t have any rides. Let’s get the hell out of here!”

“But, Serge”-Joey held up his watch-“We’ve been here less than two minutes. And we only stopped running when we got to the gold-medal case.”

“That’s right. I like to turn it into a ride.” Serge ran out the door.

Despite their age advantage, the kids had to hustle. They jumped back in vehicles as Serge left the parking lot. He raced fifty feet and parked in another.

The kids pulled into adjacent slots. “We drove ten seconds just to park across the street?”

“It isn’t about parking. It’s about hallowed earth.” Serge dropped to his knees and placed a palm on the hot tar. “This is the exact birthplace of spring break, where they paved over that first pool. A moment of silence. That’s too long.” He flipped down the pickup’s tailgate and hopped into the kiddie pool, reclining with arms hooked over the inflated edge. “Who wants to join me?”

Students stared at Magic Marker on the side: THE CASINO.

“Andy?” said Serge.

He jumped and swung the phone behind his back. “What?”

“Get in here! The water’s great!”

“I don’t really feel like-”

“Andy!”

“Okay.” He hid his phone on top of the pickup’s front left tire and climbed over the side of the pool in shorts.

Serge pumped his eyebrows. “How do you feel?”

“Stupid.”

“All the best things in life feel stupid at first. I think Dahmer said that.”

A police officer approached the pickup on foot. “Excuse me?” Serge turned. “How may I help you, officer?”

“I’m not saying what you’re doing is wrong. But what are you doing?”

“Resurrecting our state’s lost heritage!”

“Why do you have a kiddie pool in the back of a pickup?”

“Because if I set it up on the ground, that would be unusual.”

“Are you okay?”

“Excellent! You’re standing on sacred ground,” said Serge. “This was the original site of the Casino Pool, birthplace of spring break. So existentially any pool set up on this spot becomes the Casino, like this one. Under new management. Tarzan, Amsterdam, Colgate. I drank a lot of coffee today.”

The officer had seen everything but this extended the list. “Well, you’re not disturbing anyone and…”-he craned his neck to survey the pickup’s bed-“… I don’t see any beer cans or drugs, which is a welcome change, so I guess there’s nothing else here for-… Are you trying to signal me?”

“Me?” asked Serge.

“No.” The officer pointed. “Him.”

“I was just scratching,” said Andy.

“The heartbreak of psoriasis,” said Serge.

The officer tipped his cap. “Have a nice day.”

A few blocks north, other students with beer on their minds ran across A1A toward a convenience store.

The first jerked the door handle.

Bolted.

“That’s weird.”

They cupped hands around their eyes and pressed them to the glass. “I don’t see anybody.”

“The lights are on.”

“Damn.”

In the back room, Guillermo sat at a surveillance monitor and rewound a tape. It was a split screen: the view from behind the register, and another outside toward the gas pumps, in case of drive-offs. On the desk in front of Guillermo lay a sheet of paper with the location and time of a cell phone purchased with a credit card.