So, yeah, that happened.
Maybe my isolation was getting to me more than I’d been willing to admit. At least the plumber was the only one to witness my humiliation. Judging by his muttered “weirdo” when he finally left, he hadn’t recognized me either. Thank God for small miracles.
I tugged off my shirt as I walked into my room and then chucked it into the hamper. The rest of my clothes followed. I replaced them with workout gear. The muscle in my back was still complaining, but I had some adrenaline left from my irritation that I needed to get rid of, and the best way for me to do that had always been to sweat it out in the gym. Lifting weights centered me, grounded me, burned off my excess cortisol and replaced it with the good vibes of endorphins.
I’d trimmed down since my football days, and it felt good. I no longer needed to pack the bulk on to pad myself against getting hit by what felt like a battering ram. I’d added more cardio and was surprised to find that I actually liked running. I used to hate sprints. And longdistance? Man, forget about it. But it was different when you did it for yourself than when you were forced to by a sadistic training coach armed with a bullhorn.
All of my workout equipment was in the basement; one of the reasons it was the first part of the house I finished. I turned on the sound system in the corner and then hopped on the treadmill, walking for five minutes to loosen the lingering tightness in my limbs. Note to self: spending the entire day in a full crouch is a dumb thing to do. After I warmed up, I jogged for another twenty to get my heartrate going. Once I hit the two-mile mark on my treadmill and that runner’s high kicked in, my mind sort of fuzzed out. It was a lot like meditation. I definitely understood how people got addicted to distance races.
Maybe once the snow melted I could ask Jack or Ella if there were any secluded trails nearby.Safe, secluded trails. I’d like to avoid coming face to face with a bear, or a moose for that matter. I saw one two months ago, walking through my backyard. It looked primeval. Nothing like the whimsical, be-sweatered creature on Ella’s cards. This thing had been almost too big to be real.
I spent the next hour in a circuit. It was shoulders and biceps day. I alternated from curls to presses to underhand pull-ups and through about ten other exercises, pausing every six sets to jog in place or do a series of jumping jacks to keep my pulse up.
Sweat slicked my skin by the time I finished. I was exhausted, but I felt better. Calmer. Able to understand where my parents were coming from and admit that Mom might have been right about a couple of things.
The shower I took after my workout felt like a luxury. I spent an obscene amount of time standing beneath the rainfall showerhead, letting the scalding water go to work on my sore muscles. Reliablehot water had been a pipe dream – pun totally intended – before the plumber worked his magic.
Eventually I forced myself from the warmth of the shower into the cooler air beyond. I tugged on a pair of thick sweats and a long-sleeved shirt, then headed downstairs in search of my phone.
Ella’s number was taped to my fridge. Good thing I hadn’t put up a stink about taking it from Jack. It saved me the trouble of asking him for it and calling her up out of the blue.
I pulled it off the fridge and punched it into my phone.
Ella picked up on the first ring. “Mom, for the love of God, keep Megan and me out of this. We don’t care whatyou caught Charlie looking at on his laptop. He’s nineteen. Boys that age are gross. Actually, boys most any age are gross, but that’s beside the point. The point is, you should leave it alone. For all you know, it could have been for some biology class he’s taking.”
What the hell was she talking about? “Um…Ella?”
There was a long pause on the other end of the line. “This is not my mother. I see that now from the caller ID.”
I grinned. “No. Definitely not your mother.”
“Sorry, who is this?”
“Ben,” I said, flat-out refusing to say my full name on the off chance that I was on speaker and she wasn’t alone. Paranoid? Sure, just a little. I’d own that.
“Hi, Stan,” she said, voice raised.
“No, Ben,” I told her, matching her elevated tone. We must have had a bad connection.
“Guys, it’s my friend Stan, I gotta take this.”
Oh. She wasn’t alone.
There was another prolonged silence, and then what sounded like a door being closed.
“Okay, sorry. My sister and her wife are crashing at my place,” she said. “Just to be clear, this is the Ben I met at Jack’s the other night?”
“Yes.”
“No offense, but I need you to tell me what we drank.”
“Jack’s homebrew. You graciously shared the last of the oatmeal stout with me.”
“Right, sorry. Needed to make sure it wasn’t a reporter catfishing me or something to get to you.”
I opened my mouth to respond, but didn’t actually say anything. I was too caught off guard by the lengths a woman I’d just met would go to protect my privacy.
“You still there?” she asked.
