And then the smooth motherfucker winks.
Suddenly, grumpy, sullen Norm is goddamn charmer. Mr. ShutUp and Lift looks like he’s ready to sit down for brunch with Carson and yap about whatever the Real Housewives are up to.
“He’s been really helpful,” she says, glancing at me with a smile. “I’m a little bit nervous, to be honest.”
Norm chuckles. “Oh, it’s not so hard. Just pick up heavy things and put them down again. That’s all there is to it.”
Carson giggles, and I’d glare at Norm for hitting on my girl, but she’s not my girl. And his words also seem to have calmed whatever nerves she was still holding on to, so I guess I should be grateful to the motherfucker.
“You know what the hardest part is?” he says.
“What?” she asks.
He points toward the front. “Walking in that door,” he says. “Congratulations. Now get to work.”
CHAPTER 16
CARSON
Dan leads me to the back of the gym, where a row of contraptions that look like playground equipment lines the rear wall. Giant weights hang on racks like enormous wheels of cheese, and damn, I wish I were at home eating cheese right now instead of standing here in spandex, wishing I had a moment to pick my thong out of my butt. Dan made me eat scrambled eggs before we came, and they’re sitting in my stomach like sour lead.
Dan drops his gym bag beside the rack in the far corner. He’s wearing a pair of gym shorts and a black hoodie. I don’t know how’s he’s not burning up. I haven’t even done anything, and I’m already sweating in here. The air conditioning in this place seems like a mere suggestion, the thick air circulating mostly thanks to a couple of those big orange fans you see on industrial construction sites. They sound like jet engines and do nothing to change the temperature.
“Okay, we’ll start with some Romanian dead lifts. They’re good for hamstrings and glutes, both of which you’ll want to be good and strong for skating.” He grabs one of the thick, shiny barbells and steps back. “You want your feet about shoulder width apart, and you’re going to push your butt back like you’reusing it to close a door, lowering the barbell down your legs like you’re shaving your shins with it.”
I stifle a laugh. “Wow, that’s very…descriptive.”
“Just trying to be as clear as possible,” he says as he prepares to demonstrates the movement. “Watch.”
And oh, I watch. I could watch him all day. Because this man’s ass, which is pushed back and flexing, is a work of art. He’s caked up like it’s my birthday. You could haul mountains with that dump truck. You could bounce an entire roll of quarters off those cheeks. When he stands up, his hips move forward in a way that makes a lot of very explicit images flit through my mind.
Good lord, ten minutes in a gym and I’ve become a Neanderthal. At least I was already pink-cheeked from the heat, so he can’t tell that I’m blushing while imagining him doing something very different with his hips.
He does a few reps while I try not to blush so hard my cheeks sizzle, then places the bar back on the rack.
“Okay, you try,” he says, his voice both gentle and authoritative.
“Are you going to put any weight on it?” I ask.
“The bar weighs forty-five pounds, and right now we’re just learning form. So no.”
My nose scrunches up as I step toward the bar. “Isn’t that embarrassing? To use just the bar?”
I can tell Dan’s working to hold back a smile. Damn, I love infuriating him. He’s usually so stoic. It makes me want to see what happens when he really lets loose. “I only used the bar just now. Carson, nobody here is judging you. Most people are so busy staring at themselves in the mirror that they’ll never even notice you at all.”
“Not even a little bit?” I ask with a wink as I reach down to grip the bar.
“Cute,” he says with an eye roll and a little smirk. “Now, show me what you got.”
Hot damn, I did not know the gym was quite so flirty.
The bar is rough beneath my palms. I adjust my feet, then adjust them again, then adjust them a third time. I look forward into the mirror and see my red cheeks and wide eyes. I look like I’ve been tasked with lifting weights while riding a roller coaster. It’s really super cute. I’m remembering why I never come to places like this.
“Stop judging yourself and just go,” Dan chides. “Were you this freaked out at your first roller derby practice?”
I wasn’t. Which in hindsight is pretty insane. But I loved it from the very first moment I put skates on—the movement, the way my heart pounded, how my breath came in gasps. I’d never felt so inside my body before, never been so aware of every muscle and joint. So in control of a body that, for my whole life, has felt very out of my control. My mother spent every day telling me what foods were good and what foods were bad and in what quantities, and still I woke up each morning in a body that was fiercely determined to be what it was. My body’s will has always been stronger than whatever fad diet my mother put us on. But on skates, for the first time in my life, I felt like I was using my body in a way it was made to be used. For the first time, I didn’t feel like it needed to be any different.
The difference, of course, was that I had a whole crowd of newbies to look stupid with me.
