Chapter 19
An hour later, the rain is a torrent. Inside the Hyundai, the white-noise sound of the deluge is like a weighted blanket.
I blink away the sleepiness dragging down my eyelids. “We need to rally.”
“Do we, though? I have no energy left.” Nate lifts his hand as if to grab the door handle, then lets it flop back down.
“You should do one of my rides,” I joke. “Energizing is part of my niche.”
“Okay, show me.”
My face goes hot at the idea of him watching me work. Thinking it’s stupid, like he does about everything I do on social media. “You’re missing one little thing. A bike. And it’s not really your style, anyway.”
He sits up on his elbows. “I’m curious. I’ve been curious. I want to know what it’s like.”
“You could’ve bought a one-month subscription and seen for yourself at any time.”
“Paying $10.99 to spy on you doing your job? That wouldn’t have been creepy at all.”
It dawns on me, from how ready his response was and his knowledge of the cost, that he may have considered it at some point.
I don’t know whether it was during this trip or before, and I won’t ask.
A thrill curls in my belly like a beckoning finger at the idea of him visiting the CycleLove website and debating whether to type in his credit card information just to see me.
I pull up the app and scroll through my rides. I have to go back a few months to reach a time when I was truly on top of my game.
Here’s a good one: space buns, silver glitter eyeliner, and girl groups.
Spice Girls, Fifth Harmony, Little Mix. I hand him the phone and tip my head the other way, pressing my palm to the cold windowpane and staring at the shadowy shapes of vehicles and people through the condensation on the glass.
My mind travels unhelpfully to the scene in Titanic where they bang in a car and Rose slides her hand down the steamed-up window in the throes of passion.
When I hear my voice, I cave in, leaning over his shoulder to watch myself instead.
This was one of my last classes with in-studio riders. Even though they’re barely visible at the edges of the frame, it’s clear from my face and voice alone. When there are other people in the studio, everything feels effortless.
It’s a twenty-minute ride, with two climbs and a set of high-cadence intervals.
I try to turn it off after the first song, but Nate shoots me a stern look and moves the phone out of my reach.
The version of me on the screen is encouraging without being patronizing.
Spirited but not annoying. My anecdote about the first concert I attended, a Cheetah Girls show at the local performing arts center, is funny.
And it transitions smoothly into a motivational speech about how we should embrace the little things that give us a boost of confidence.
“Whether it’s finishing this ride or wearing your favorite outfit—say, a skirt over a pair of jeans with a skinny scarf from Limited Too—to see your idols in the flesh,” the Quinn on the screen says, “do it. You’re a star, and you deserve to feel like one. ”
I try to get a read on Nate as the Pussycat Dolls play us out. Until this moment, I’ve never been so aware of the earnestness of it all.
“I know it’s not your kind of thing,” I say quickly.
“And it gets a little cheesy near the end, but it’s supposed to be that way.
People like it.” Am I really trying the whole acknowledge-my-own-flaws-so-you-can’t-hold-them-against-me thing?
It’s one hundred percent effective…at making me feel shittier about the thing I’m trying to preemptively defend against. “The stuff at the end was overkill, probably. But Tracy likes it when we throw in some life wisdom.”
“The life wisdom that also validates the person’s decision to do CycleLove,” he observes. His tone doesn’t give anything away.
“I’ve never thought about it that way.” I guess he’s right. But it’s not some conspiracy. It’s natural to tie in whatever lesson fits with the theme to cycling itself. “Michelle calls that part of the ride ‘the sermon.’?”
His mouth twists as he contemplates this. On the phone, the video is paused on a close-up of my face, the signs of exertion barely visible through my makeup and the lighting. Just a faint pink stain on my cheeks and the lightest glow of sweat at my temples.
“You’re good at it,” he finally says.
“Don’t sound so thrilled.” I wrap my arms around myself. He doesn’t have to buy a pair of cycling shoes and commit to six classes a week, but I want him to respect it. “Which part? The sermon?”
“All of it,” he answers. When he hands back my phone, his fingers brush mine.
“Is that all you have to say?”
“I wasn’t sure what it would be like. After what you’ve said this past week, I didn’t know what you enjoyed about it. If you enjoyed anything about it. But you clearly do.” He almost sounds disappointed.
The app is now recommending that I “try this ride next!” Of course it’s me in bright lipstick and metallic fuchsia, offering cadence work, resistance work, and a bonus nervous breakdown.
I do a double take when I notice the view count in the corner.
It’s an unfathomable number, five times as high as my average.
I turn the screen dark and set the phone facedown in my lap.
“Of course I like it. There are thousands of people who would trade jobs with me in a millisecond.”
The hmm he lets out gives away nothing.
“What I do is actually really difficult.”
The sharpness in my voice gives me away. I see it on his face, the realization that I want his approval. “Oh. Quinn. I know it is. I mean it. You’re incredibly talented, and I know how hard you’ve worked.”
“You hate it, though,” I say quietly.
He sighs. “I don’t hate it. I—look, I just want you to be happy. Okay?”
I nod.
Two muffled thunks follow. He’s toed off his shoes. I open my mouth to protest, but he says, “Just for a minute. The rain hasn’t stopped, anyway.”
“Okay. But in fifteen minutes, we’re going no matter what.”
“What about the day-to-day? You said you were bummed when they got rid of the people taking the class in person?”
“Yeah,” I say. “I feed off their energy, you know? And I like connecting with people face-to-face. Not that it isn’t incredible to think about how many people I’m connecting with through the app.
It’s just different.” I fiddle with the seat belt.
“There’s plenty I like. Picking music, making people feel good.
Actually, something you said a long time ago about why you like your job has always stuck with me. Do you remember?”
He shakes his head. “I mean, I know what I usually tell people, but you say it.”
“You told me you like knowing that when you teach a kid to swim, you’re doing a good thing. Always. That you have a simple, clear purpose. And I relate to that.”
Teaching a spin class is a good thing in the most straightforward way. I demonstrate proper technique, I help people improve their fitness, I give them an opportunity to clear their minds. But it hasn’t felt so straightforward lately.
Nate’s mouth curves, and his eyes are the only bright thing in the dark car. The air thickens, and it’s not just the ninety-nine percent humidity.
“What?” I say. “I think that’s what you told me. Right?”
“I’m sure you’re right. It’s just that what I tell most people is that I like my job because I like the water.”
I breathe out a tired laugh. My arm is stretched out along the center console, and he gives it a playful nudge with his own.
Afterward, he doesn’t move it away, just lets it settle next to mine.
I’m already disinclined to move, and this only makes it harder.
The feel of him next to me, the sounds of the storm, the abstract shapes and periodic movements of people through the rain-speckled windshield—the combined effect is hypnotizing. My eyes glaze over.
“I’m not sure what I’ll do if I don’t get the camp,” he says eventually.
The old reflex kicks in, the one that scrambles to evacuate at the first sign of trouble. It delivers the words right to the tip of my tongue: Think positive. You’ll get the camp.
It’s like when Mom used to invite over a woman who was considering giving up on Jolee.
She’d sit them in the front room of our house, where they could see the purple Range Rover and Dad’s Porsche through the window, and leave her Neverfull bag on a chair—tossed there, like she didn’t care about it.
When they said it wasn’t working, they weren’t making money, that they hated hounding their friends and family to get in on it, she’d cross her legs, frown, and tell them it sounded like they weren’t trying hard enough.
There was no space for fear or criticism.
It was how Mom had been trained, and it was effective.
If a Jolee girl dug too deep, they’d realize the business model was fatally flawed and they were never going to succeed.
To prevent them from doing that, Mom relied on social pressure and flipping around the blame.
It bled over into the rest of our lives too. If I said I was afraid of doing poorly on my math test, or worried that we’d lose our next lacrosse game, she’d say, Well, with an attitude like that, of course you will.
Positive thinking has gotten me far, but it feels useless right now, with our bumbling failure to catch Logan across three time zones. And Nate will shut down if I tell him to close his eyes and visualize success.
So let’s try it his way. We’ll sit with the negative feelings.
“You definitely wouldn’t move back to L.A.?” I try uncertainly.
He looks down. “It feels like that would be going backward.”