Okay.Enough teasing.I watch her push the squat rack tentatively and it creaks on its hinge, tipping slightly to the right.“I think it will hold.”
“You know how I was going to help you with your impostor syndrome?”
She quits setting up the bar and turns to me.“Yes?”
“Lesson one.Quit apologizing all the time.”
She rolls her eyes, fighting a smile, and I enjoy watching her trying and failing to look annoyed.“Quit toying with me, then.”
“But it’s so fun,” I shoot back, and at this, she doesn’t laugh; instead she stands up straight, puts her hands on her hips, and nods at the weights.I drop my eyes down her body, and then, catching myself, keep going until my eyes are on the kettlebell on the floor.
“Enough.We’re here to start you training again.Squats.Kettle swings, dead lifts, sumos, um,thrusters.”She clears her throat, and I try not to laugh.“Lunge press...yada yada yada...core and then we’ll work on your neck.”
I clear my throat.“You’re working out too?”
“Until we get your trainer over,” she says, nodding at the rack.“Squats.”
“You have to show me how to do it.I can’t remember.”
Chloe narrows her eyes at me.“I won’t be bullied,” she says, moving toward the weights and ducking her head under the bar.“Forty on each.”
“You can squat eighty pounds?Impressive,” I say, joining her by the squat cage and resting my hand on the bar.Our eyes meet, and for a split second, I find myself wanting to bury my nose in the crook of her neck.She takes a breath and drags her eyes quickly away.“I remember when you could only squat the bar.No weight at all.”
She doesn’t reply at first, but then she ducks her head under the bar, and I step back to watch.
“It’s weird the things you remember,” she says, dropping down into a low squat, and I move around the front to face her, so I’m not staring at her ass as she squats.I have some restraint.But then I spot the mirror along the back wall, where I can see it anyway.
“I thought you forgot the old days,” Chloe says.
“Not everything,” I say.
“Most things, though,” she replies.
“I remember you drown everything in hot sauce.”
She heaves the bar upward.
“You used to listen to those romance audiobooks, like, all the time,” I continue, grinning at her.“And I was thinking this morning about how you never showed up to my leaving party.”
Chloe drops the weights onto the rack with a bang.
“Your turn,” she says curtly.“Andno.I didn’t.Come on.Focus.”
“All right, all right,” I say, holding my hands up.“No more reminiscing, then.”
She steps back and holds her hand out.“Get to work,” she says firmly.“Three sets.One minute rest.”
“Bossy,” I murmur.
“I’m not going to apologize for getting you to work hard.”
“Would you look at that,” I say, holding two thumbs up.“You’renot apologizing.”
“Fuck you,” she says, sighing, half-amused, half-furious.I want to keep prodding her, but it’s starting to feel a little bit like I’m flirting.AmI flirting?
I put my head down and work hard, and within an hour Chloe has me lying on the floor, arms burning, begging for mercy.
“You need work,” she says, collapsing next to me as I peel off my sodden shirt, and we lie side by side on the stinky old training mat, breathless.
