“Let’s get you started on some stretches before we get into upper body. Today we’re doing arms, tomorrow we will do legs. Tonight, I need you to eat a large bowl of pasta and some lean beef because we are about to destroy your muscles and I need you to aid them in recovery,” he said casually as we walked outof the room. I nodded my head in obedience, still being sure to avoid looking at him. He led me over to the arm machines, and I brushed up against him accidentally as I sat facing the grip weight machine.
“I’m sorry,” I said as I looked away.
“If you don’t look me in my eyes when you tell me, it don’t count,” he laughed deep in a baritone that sent shivers down my spine. This was going to be a long week for me and I knew it.
Twenty minutes later, I was actively rethinking my entire life. Why didn’t anybody tell me pushups felt like personal attacks, row backs with weights felt like betrayal, and overhead bench presses made my lungs feel like they were trying to claw their way out of my chest? I was bent over, with my hands on my knees, trying not to die, while Co stood beside me, calm as ever.
“You’re doing amazing,” he said.
I couldn’t help that my mind went straight to the gutter and it sounded like he was talking me through it.
“I can’t feel my arms,” I whined.
“You’re not supposed to feel them, just know they’re there,” he retorted.
I snapped my head up, sweat rolled down my brow and dropped into my eye causing my eyes to burn.
“I am about to faint on purpose, and I want to see how that makes you feel,” I grunted.
He laughed loudly, that deep baritone laugh that I hated so much because it sounded so good. He grabbed a fresh white towel from a nearby rack and handed me my Stanley cup.
“Take a break,” he said.
Those words were music to my ears. I sat down and wiped the sweat from my face then drunk the water, like I had been in the desert for forty days and forty nights. My nutritionist wasn’tlying; we were only on day one and Co had me sweating like a runaway slave at the bottom of a boat. I wiped the sweat from my face and sat down allowing my arms to flail at my sides. I had no idea how I was going to drive home my arms were so weak. They felt like noodles attached to my body. It hurt to lift them up to hold my water bottle.
My thirst for water was louder than the pain shooting through my arms, so I was forced to lift the Stanley and take another soul cleansing gulp. When I lowered the bottle, I noticed Co watching me. It looked like he was assessing me. Like he was studying me and he didn’t want to miss anything.
“You always stare at people like that?” I asked him quietly.
“Just beautiful people. I’m sorry I didn’t mean to be unprofessional,” he said as he looked away and down at his hands. For the first time, he looked like he didn’t have something smooth to say. I sucked my teeth and rolled my eyes dramatically.
“Oh please, I’m sure that line works on all the women in here, but that was weaker than me down there trying to do another push up.” I laughed at him causing his eyes to go wide and him to smirk.
“You talk a lot of shit, but that wasn’t a line, I was being honest. See why niggas lie? When we tell the truth, women still think we lying. We may as well prove y’all right.” Co shrugged causing me to roll my eyes in annoyance.
“Men lie because they want to lie, not because women assume they are going to lie. You tried it though,” I chortled as I lifted the bottle and drank more water. He sat down next to me and looked over at me.
“Nothing I have said to you today was a lie.” he shrugged and my stomach began to feel like it was full of butterflies because even though I didn’t want to, I believed him.
Before I could say another word, Trallis walked by and gave Co the nastiest look I had ever seen a woman give a man. He was too busy looking at me to notice, so I dramatically cleared my throat and nodded my head in her direction so he could follow my gaze. Catching the hint, he looked that way, and he locked eyes with her.
“Don’t start this shit Trallis we will discuss it further later. I told you what I expect you to do, and I would like for you to remember that you are an employee in this establishment, and I am currently training one of our members,” he told her angrily as she folded her arms across her chest and stared at him like she was ready to make the biggest scene in the world. I felt so uncomfortable sitting there, while she stared at him maliciously. I would have rather gone back to doing pushups instead of sitting next to him while she shot daggers at him with her eyes.
“I hate you,” she said angrily as tears filled her eyes and she ran away. Seeing a woman so powerful, so sure of herself, and so beautiful being brought to tears hurt my feelings. Great trainer or not, I hated the fact that Cozart hurt women and used his attractiveness as a weapon.
“Why do you do it?” I whispered as I looked down at my hands.
He turned back towards me and tilted his head to the side in confusion.
“Why do I do what?” he asked as he stared at me with that look again.
“You don’t have to answer the question because what you do in your personal time is your own business, but why doyou have all of these women while you are married? You have a woman at home, why isn’t she good enough?” I asked him honestly.
He sat for a long while, looking down at his hands like he expected the answer to be in his palm.
“It’s more complicated than it looks,” he shrugged.
“Fuck the woman you married, ignore every other woman that’s not her. Seems pretty easy to me.” I retorted.
