His comment made Arla feel rather exposed. She was the kind of person who was notorious for her short skirts, for not giving a damn about being in a bikini in front of other people. But he'd actually called attention to her looking pretty and she felt her cheeks get hot. She brushed it off. What was she, thirteen?
"You wish," she said, and then she was leaping over him, diving into the pool and splashing her flippers in his direction as she did so.
The moment she was submerged her gills opened, filtering the oxygen out of the water and allowing her to breathe. The chlorine wasn't good for her, but she dealt with it, even if she preferred to go swimming in the lake... or anywhere but a pool. She spent so much time there that she didn't get sick anymore. However, she couldn't stay down there forever when there was someone else there (whose ass she was getting a look at while she was underwater, mostly because ... well, it was there----to be fair, she was looking at his feet and legs, too).
She came back up beside him, her arms resting on the edge of the pool, and her gills closed up. The process was painful, mostly when they opened, as skin had to tear in order for it to happen. Hank had concluded that she had a very minor healing ability that allowed for this, that accounted for the smoothness of her skin after things that should have left deeper scars.
"How's that?" She could only speak when her gills were closed... otherwise she made a creepy swamp-thing noise.