Chapter Two #2
“Tell you later. Today was the first official day.”
“Well...” Misty could practically hear her mom struggling to say the right thing. “Good for you!”
That was exactly what Janice had said, and in the exact same tone, when Misty had come out as bisexual, launched her official freelance website, joined the kickball team, and done just about anything that would never have crossed her own mind to do.
Misty could never decide whether it was meant to be praise or patronizing, and didn’t feel like going into it now.
“Thanks.” She took a breath. “If it all works out and I make the team...you told me that there was some money set aside for me. Can I use some of that to go to this?”
When Janice and Ed Kaufman had sold their Upper West Side apartment to follow their older daughter to Vermont, they’d found that it had nearly quadrupled in value since they’d bought it in the nineties.
It had left them with enough money to buy a new house and set aside small nest eggs for Misty and Natalie.
And yet, Janice hesitated. “I meant that for when you get married or if you decide to have a baby and it doesn’t work out the way you hoped.” Indeed, Misty’s older sister and her wife had spent the past year or so going through IVF with help from their parents.
“Mom, I’m not even dating anyone.” Maybe now wasn’t the time to go into detail about her hot but strict trainer. “And I don’t need a big wedding or anything like that, but I have this incredible opportunity now.”
She could hear her mother hedging. “Let’s get you on the team first and see what happens.”
“Okay. Thanks. How’s Lisa and Natalie?” The IVF had finally taken for them a few months ago. Misty was happy for them, and not least because they offered a ready subject change.
“Well, your sister yelled at Lisa for heating up leftovers with cabbage, and that started a fight. But once it came out that it was making her morning sickness worse...”
Misty let the story wash over her as she finished the walk home. Impressing her family hadn’t even factored into her decision to try out for the team, but it would be a nice perk.
****
“Good start,” Spencer chirped after their next session, this one on the strength side. “Now that we’ve gotten your arms warmed up, let’s give some chin-ups a try.” He gestured to a bar off to the side.
Misty pulled a face. “Have I died and gone back to early elementary school? This feels right out of that stupid fitness test.”
He knew exactly what she was talking about. “Think about it this way. That taught you something you actually need in your day-to-day life now. Can you say that about some of the things you learned in calculus?”
A sound that could have been a laugh or a grunt slipped out of her. Either way, he felt oddly gratified. “Come on. Show me what you can do.”
Misty approached the bar with a wary expression. Spencer slid a block over, and she climbed on it so she could grab the bar. “Ready?”
When she nodded, he nudged it away. He saw the muscles in her arms, shoulders, and neck straining. It was like she thought if she tilted her head back far enough, she’d get it over the bar. Too bad that wasn’t how any of this worked.
“Switch up your grip and pull from your upper back.”
She flipped one hand over at a time before trying again. It brought her chin a little closer to the bar, but she wasn’t quite there yet. “It’s okay. We’ll try again when your upper body’s stronger. But for now, I have something for you.”
He reached into his pocket and handed her a folded sheet of paper. “Your diet plan. I can also email it to you if that’d be easier.”
“Thanks. It might.” Her eyes widened as she looked over the list of meals, snacks, drinks, and the best times of day to have them. “Wow, that’s a lot of food.”
“You’re going to be working hard for this, building more muscle, and burning more calories than you are now in the process. You’ll need to fuel up to be ready for it.”
“Good thing I brought a protein bar for today.”
She reached into her gym bag, and Spencer couldn’t help making a face at the sight of the wrapper. “Actually, can I have that diet plan back for a sec? I should make a note of which brands to go for and avoid, and that bar’s the latter.”
“It has twenty grams of protein.” She flipped the bar around so he could see the nutrition label reading exactly that. Unfortunately for her, it also showed way more added sugar than he would have liked to see.
“You might as well eat a candy bar.” He plucked it out of her hand, ignoring her sound of protest. “There are almonds and yogurts for sale in the café. Either would be a better source of protein by itself, or you could mix the almonds into the yogurt to get double the protein and more of a treat-like texture. Tell the barista to charge it to my account.”
She didn’t move, only glared at him. “My workouts, my meals... Are you also going to tell me when I can and can’t have sex?”
Spencer’s eyes widened as his face heated. Misty looked startled as she seemed to realize she’d said that out loud. “Shit. Sorry. I—”
She stopped talking, but her mouth kept moving as if she was trying to think what to say next.
As she worked, Spencer forced himself to school his expression back to normal.
After she closed her mouth, he opened his to explain.
“Some athletes operate under the impression that if they don’t have sex in the days or weeks leading up to a big event, it’ll hone their edge.
Others take the opposite approach and make a point of having an orgasm the night before.
They swear it helps them relax enough to get a good night’s sleep before game day. ”
He thought back to what he used to do with his fighter fiancée when he’d still been on the kickboxing circuit.
They’d gone about it both ways, and he hadn’t noticed a difference in his or Haley’s performances.
Instead of going into what was now ancient and painful history, he gave Misty the facts.
“Because there’s no scientific basis for any of it, all I’ll tell you to do is whatever feels right for you and your partner. ”
“No partner now,” she blurted.
“Ah.” Spencer did his best to keep this next part as clinical as possible. “Still, you should know that your question applies to more than sex with a partner. There’s no reason you can’t masturbate before tryouts if that’s what you need.”
“Okay, I get it!” Her eyes still looked wild.
He spoke as calmly as he could in the face of what looked like her hysteria. “I get it too. The question, that is. It comes up more often in training conversations than you’d think. Did you have any others?”
She shook her head. Her ponytail swung as her head moved but stuck to the sweat on one shoulder.
“Then I’ll see you tomorrow.”
As she left, Spencer’s spirits felt as limp as her ponytail had turned.
In a city with so many workout options and gyms, he wanted his clients to come away with the feeling that they’d made the right choice by coming to this gym, and from there, to him.
He wasn’t getting that feeling from Misty and didn’t know how to bring it out in her.
His phone buzzed in his pocket, startling him out of the reverie. “Hey, Dad.”
“Hi, son.” All these years since he’d started using his middle name, and Spencer couldn’t be sure whether Mitch Whitford addressed him as “son” because it was a neutral term or out of disappointment in him not using his first name anymore.
His dad was still talking. “Where are you? I hear traffic in the background.”
“I’m leaving work. I was just finishing up with a client.”
“But it’s almost 8:00 PM.”
“Mm-hmm.” It wasn’t like they lived in different time zones, but Spencer knew exactly where his dad was going with this. He could picture it as clearly as he could picture his dad sitting in the Delaware house Spencer had grown up in.
“This late and you’re just winding down the workday,” Mitch said. “Back when I was working, I’d been home for a few hours and was in the room for whatever show you or your sister had on by this time of night.”
“Because you worked a nine-to-five job, and I don’t,” Spencer reminded him. “It’s not like I’m going home late because I didn’t finish my work, it’s because I meet with my clients when they can meet up. For some of them, that means early in the morning or after 5:00.”
“Still, when I was your age...” Spencer could practically recite this speech, having heard it on almost every call since he’d ended his engagement, quit his corporate job, and gotten certified as a personal trainer.
When his dad was his age, he’d already had two kids.
When his dad was his age, he’d been married for a few years and had recently made a down payment on the house Spencer had grown up in. Blah, blah, blah.
“Hey!” Kurt called out to him from the exit.
Spencer was grateful for the interruption. “I’ve gotta go, Dad, but we’ll talk again later.”
He hung up and turned to face his colleague. “What’s up?”
“On my way for a private session with Naomi.” Kurt grinned wolfishly, then scowled at Spencer’s expression. “Don’t give me that look. I know what I’m doing.”
“It’s not you. That’s my face after talking to my dad.”
Kurt’s face softened. “The usual?”
“Yeah. You’re working past quitting time. When I was your age...”
“And maybe he’d have a point if you were... What’d he do again?”
“He worked in an insurance office.” And thanks to Mitch’s executive position at the local branch office, so had Spencer during the darkest days of his life.
The memories of those soul-crushing days were such that Kurt’s full-body shudder didn’t strike Spencer as melodramatic at all. “And you don’t have to wear a tie or even real pants to work here, and a free gym membership is part of your benefits. Who got the better end of the deal?”
Spencer’s spirits lifted a little at the reminder. “True.”
“If you wanted to take some time in the middle of the day to go for a run or do a workout, I bet office workers didn’t like that.”
“Definitely not.” Spencer had gotten strange looks every time he’d so much as gone for a walk around the block to try to clear his head.
“But they allow—hell, they encourage—that here. Not to mention, weren’t secretaries the only women he worked with?”
“Dude, it wasn’t that long ago.” Actually, when Spencer thought back on his dad sharing stories about his workdays and colleagues, he didn’t remember a lot of women being mentioned, if any at all.
Kurt ignored this so he could keep up his pep talk. “But you look around us and see all these great-looking girls in tight workout gear, and they came right to us. Hell, we’re getting paid to meet them!”
“It’s not like we can do anything with our clients.” Not without getting fired.
“Not on gym premises.” Kurt wiggled his eyebrows before heading off to his client’s apartment.
Spencer walked home, trying to hold onto the good aspects of the pep talk and figure out how to better connect with Misty without giving too much away. Or without dwelling on her having sex or touching herself.
He sighed and wiped a drop of sweat out of his eyes. He’d been in the air-conditioned gym during the worst of the day’s heat, but it was still stifling out. Suddenly, he wasn’t sure he could wait for his window unit to cool his studio. He’d feel better after a nice, cold shower.