Chapter Five
“I sent my application package last night.” Tish shared the news at the table in her father’s Village apartment about a month after she’d told Misty about the team.
His chef had just served Tish her usual egg-white and vegetable omelet with a small mountain of dry whole-grain toast. Misty was having a savory breakfast too, as well as a fruit salad with honey-yogurt dressing for dessert.
She wasn’t used to the combination, but the big meal would keep her going all morning, and it was part of Spencer’s nutrition plan.
“Of course you did, Ms. Overachiever,” Misty grumbled good-naturedly but raised her mug in celebration. “You’ve got this in the bag.”
Ever since Darnell Douglass had pivoted to motivational speaking after his success as a sprinter and later an investor, he sometimes seemed to speak entirely in inspirational athletic quotes.
A person could make a drinking game out of it, and yet Misty figured it carried more weight coming from an Olympic medalist than someone like their middle school gym teacher, whose greatest achievement had been taking the softball team to district championships in the eighties. “Definitely not,” she answered.
He seemed to like that answer. “How’s your training going?”
“My new trainer is whipping me into shape, and I’ve asked my kickball team captain and old boss to write two of my letters of recommendation.”
“Keep up the good work, and I’d be happy to write your third.”
“That would be so great! Thank you.”
His stern face softened into a smile. “I wish I could’ve done the same for Tish, but Uncle Jon came through for her.” Jon wasn’t a blood relative, but one of his Olympic teammates.
“I also got letters from Coach Brynn and my principal,” Tish added.
The mention of three of the people who thought the highest of her still sounded like she had this sewn up, but Misty knew better than to say that in front of Mr. Douglass. He turned to Tish. “After you’re done eating, we’ll give it half an hour before stretching.”
It was a polite but pointed way of dismissing Misty. Tish nodded at her dad, but cringed once he was out of earshot. “Sorry about that.”
“I couldn’t have stayed anyway. I have a session with Drill Sergeant Spencer today. See?” She held up her phone to show her the event listed: 11:00—Butt-whipping time.
“Is he really that tough?”
She considered it carefully. “He’s good, but I think he sees himself as more of a life coach than a personal trainer. Pushing me on my workouts, my diet, my days...”
“Pushing you is kind of his job, but is he giving you too hard a time?” Tish looked concerned.
Misty thought about her stance. “I wouldn’t call him mean or controlling, just rigid as hell with this schedule. Not to mention, I’m lucky to get a facial expression out of him.”
Even when he let an occasional quip escape, it was never with a smile to accompany it. She’d thought she’d heard a laugh a while back, but maybe he’d only had something caught in his throat. What would that sound like? Was she up for the challenge of finding out?
She forced herself back to the present. “Though I have to admit the guy keeps me on my toes. He said to bring a bathing suit for today.”
Instead of meeting Spencer at the front desk, Misty met him on the deck of the saltwater pool, which she’d barely acknowledged was part of the gym.
In another departure from a typical day, he was wearing dark green swim trunks and a tight swim shirt that clung to his chest and showed off every muscle detail beneath. She sternly told herself not to stare.
“Do you need to change?”
“I’m good.” She tried to keep her movements nonchalant, but the atmosphere seemed charged as she pulled her t-shirt dress over her head to reveal the bathing suit beneath.
A one-piece seemed the most appropriate for the gym, and yet she was all too aware of showing more of her chest and ass to Spencer than ever before.
He nodded slowly. “Nice. You came prepared.”
“Are you joining me?” she asked, stuffing her ponytail into a bathing cap.
“I’m dressed for it if I have to be” — he gestured to himself — “but I’ll start off guiding you from the side. Rinse off over there before you go in.”
Misty ran a quick shower and snapped on a pair of goggles before making her way back to the edge of the pool. She dipped a toe in the water and flinched. “Colder than I thought,” she said.
Spencer didn’t look moved by her plight. “It’s heated to the low eighties, and it’s going to get worse for you if you stand there building it up to this scary thing in your mind. Better to jump in and get your blood moving. That’ll warm you up.”
She closed her eyes as she lowered herself into the water, only to have them fly open as the water splashed her swimsuit and skin. “Yikes!”
“Well, don’t just stand there.” Spencer’s eyes looked brighter, and — Was that a smile? It lit up his face and would have been gratifying if it hadn’t been at her expense. “Take a walk from one end to the other to start.”
“That’s it? Just walk?” That sounded a little too easy. Not halfway across, though, it was clear that this called for more effort than she would have exerted above the water. She started to lift her arms above the water.
“Don’t do that,” Spencer called. “Hold your arms the same way you would on land. I wouldn’t walk around like that.”
As if to prove his point, he raised his own arms to shoulder level and started pacing the pool deck. “Don’t I look silly?”
“What if I was carrying groceries?” He did look ridiculous, especially having gone back to resting drill sergeant face, but she didn’t feel like conceding yet.
“I’d say not to do it that way. It’s bad for you.” He dropped his arms. “Just walk like a regular person but working against the water.”
Misty was almost sorry Spencer had decided to walk like a regular person, as he’d put it.
By moving his jacked arms away, the demonstration had called attention to the cut of his waist and his muscular legs.
The whole thing gave her something to think about as she put her arms back in the water to finish her walk.
“Good,” Spencer said when she got back. “Can I see you swim next?”
“Which stroke?”
“Whatever you want.” Misty took off, hoping he wasn’t timing her.
It had been too long since she’d been swimming and wasn’t expecting to set any new speed records.
At least she was starting to feel better in the water.
Instead of being shocked by the cold, the temperature of the water was soothing against her skin, which was starting to heat up as she moved.
She looked up to see Spencer watching contemplatively.
He didn’t say anything, though, so she kept going for a few more laps.
When he waved her to stop, he was holding a pair of wide, webbed-looking gloves.
She got back to her laps singing the Jaws theme, but it faded out as she realized just how much more work her arms were doing.
A few laps later, Spencer had her switch them out for flippers on her feet.
By the time their session was up, she’d be amazed if she could move her limbs the next day. She swam a few lanes over to the ladder so she could climb out instead of hefting herself out of the water.
Spencer was waiting with a bigger towel than usual.
He held it open, and Misty was reminded of how her dad would sometimes hold her mom’s coat on winter days.
Maybe that was why it felt so oddly intimate as she stepped forward to have it placed on her shoulders.
But Spencer stepped back once it was on, leaving her to dry herself and consider that the intimacy only went so far. Either that or she’d only imagined it.
****
“Hi, Misty.” Spencer felt himself smiling as she approached him at the gym entrance the next day.
“Hey!” She nudged one of his bare biceps. “Welcome to the gun show.”
The remark reminded him that he’d swapped out his usual gym t-shirt for a tank top. He felt a flare hit his cheeks, and a brief smile flitted across his face. “It’s hot out, and you look dressed for it too.”
She glanced down, as if she’d forgotten she was wearing only a sports bra with shorts that showed off toned thighs and calves. “Okay, I admit I wanted to show off a little. I haven’t had abs like this since high school track.”
Spencer had no way of knowing what she’d looked like back then, but he could see that the past few weeks had literally made their mark on her.
The lines of muscle were carved into her pale abdomen, standing in stark contrast to her soft-looking skin.
He bit the inside of his lip to get a grip on himself.
She was looking at him expectantly, as if waiting for a response. He’d gotten so far in his fantasies that he’d missed it. “Sorry, did you just say something?”
“Nothing important. Just admitting that it was nice to be in a bathing suit yesterday.”
It had been nice to see her in a bathing suit yesterday, and he forced himself to remember why that had been. “If you could do all that underwater, you’re going to have a much easier time of it at the surface without the resistance of the pool around you. Did you like doing it?”
“I did.”
“Then let’s add it to your rotation, go in the pool on one of the days you’d usually do cardio. I might even suggest going swimming the day before you shoot your video. But for now, let’s see if and how it helped you today. It’s recap day.”
After twenty-five minutes on the elliptical, they left the cardio area to go through the exercises for the video.
He noticed her moving faster and jumping higher, but it was hard to tell whether it was the result of their training or her having just been in the water. Probably a combination of both.
“How am I doing, coach?” she asked as she reached for her water bottle.
“Not your coach,” he corrected. He finished making some notes before looking up at her. “You’ve come a long way from when you started, but you could still be doing better.”