What are we sweating out?
I’m about to tell her, but I stop at the fresh memory of Cooper’s knuckles going white, gripping the chair when headmitted he is struggling, as if it was the first time he’s allowed the truth to emerge.
I’ve been there. After my injury and during recovery, realizing I’ll never play again.
I respond with a half truth.
Had some free time pop up.
Elliot
Bike 15
“Last two minutes!Lower your resistance to thirty-five from forty. We will be in the saddle, but when the beat drops”—Elliot smiles, sending a devious brow raise across the room—“turn that resistance back up! Minimum forty-five.”
Her cycling classes are the best. She’s been teaching on campus for the past two years.
The rec center drops classes on Sunday for the following week. If you don’t log in precisely at two, you won’t even make it on the waitlist for her cycling or mat Pilates classes. And even then, students show up in the hopes that someone no-shows.
I adjust the red knob, pulling back my resistance. My legs are killing me as I try to keep up with the eighty-to-one-hundred cadence she calls out. Even though I’ve graduated from cycling to running in physical therapy, my left knee still throbs occasionally—the pulse syncing with the beat of the song.
Elliot is already calling out another cue. “In ten, we are out of the saddle. Resistance minimum forty-five and maintain cadence. Ready? Three. Two. One.”
A Justin Bieber remix carries us through the last minute of work before our cooldown.
The song changes, and everyone sits back down, toweling off and grabbing their water bottles. Elliot leads us through five minutes of stretching before high-fiving the group at the door.
I unclip my shoes, then hang around till everyone is gone. This was her final class of the morning, and I promised her when I showed up, I’d help her clean before we went to lunch at the coffee shop in town.
She bounces over to me, straight hair tied up in a high pony with her emotional support scrunchie. “What’d you think?” Elliot asks.
“I don’t think I’ll be able to move tomorrow.” I offer her a half smile, half grimace. “That was your best one yet, Elle.”
Her cheeks are tipped pink. Unlike the rest of us, whose cheeks are tomato red from the intensity of cycling for forty-five minutes, Elliot looks like she could hit the red carpet. I swear she’s glistening instead of sweating. Her self-tanned skin is highlighted by the periwinkle set she’s wearing.
“Thanks.” She bites her lip. “Wanna know something? You can’t tell anyone.”
Did I miss the memo that today is National Secret Day?
“Yeah, of course.” I give her a weak smile, bracing for my second secret bomb of the day. Elliot never keeps anything from me. I give myself one second…then another to question our friendship before I mentally slap myself.
I follow her to the cabinet in the corner of the room to grab a rag and disinfectant spray. We start wiping down the bikes and weights.
“I submitted an audition tape for a new virtual cycling studio. It’s a stationary bike that people can buy and then take classes whenever they want. I’d record different rides—time, music, intensity.”
“What! Why didn’t you tell me sooner?”
“Because let’s be real, they aren’t going to accept a college junior. They probably received applications from instructors who have been doing this for more than two years.”
“So? Doesnotmean they are better than you. When are you supposed to find out about next steps?”
She shrugs. “I’m not sure. Application window closes in two weeks.”
“No keeping it a secret when you find out.” I tug at the end of her pony.
“Fineeee. It was on a whim, though, so I don’t expect anything, and I would have told you once I heard back. I didn’t want to get my hopes up.”
I know a little something about that.
