Sweatpants at Tiffanie's

by Pernille Hughes

  It amused him.

  ‘Not today. Besides, Blackie wanted you to have it. Don’t want his spirit harassing me, now do I?’ Tiff was under no illusion that he wasn’t mocking her for the other night. ‘I might not have liked all of his decisions,’ he added, ‘but I never knew them to be wrong.’ Given Ron’s response, it was nice to have a crumb of support. ‘How’s it going?’ he asked, nodding towards the wall.

  She felt herself sag. Good question and again she wished she could call Gavin. He’d direct her. Was this a conversation she wanted with Mike? She thought about the arrogant arse he’d been at the wake. And the teasing he’d started the other night and seemed intent to continue. Did she want to risk more ridicule from him? But teasing aside, they’d always been honest with each other as teens. She could do with impartiality right now, even if it was from him.

  ‘Lots of choices to be made. Deciding what to do.’ Her brow was furrowed. Uninvited, he sat on the bench next to her, Tiff budging along without comment, though clearly unsettled by it. He was too close.

  He waited for her to continue, apparently not in any rush. ‘I guess it was a surprise?’ he prompted. ‘Overwhelmed?’

  ‘Definitely. To both questions.’ She leaned her head back onto the brick and closed her eyes, the sun warming her face and calming her.

  ‘Who thinks they should have had it?’

  ‘Aaron, the evil stepson.’

  ‘The scrote from this morning?’

  ‘The very same. Stopped by to offer his opinion.’

  ‘Ignore it. He’ll be all mouth.’ She opened an eye to see if he was sure. Apparently so.

  ‘Ron, the assistant and now head coach. He’s worked with Blackie for years.’

  ‘Head for business?’

  ‘Not to my knowledge.’

  ‘Well Blackie didn’t think so either, Tiff, or he could’ve left it to him instead. Which he didn’t.’

  While Tiff had had the same thought, it was ridiculously uplifting to hear it from someone else. And oddly, this someone felt new to her; this Mike sounded business-like and experienced. It wasn’t a Mike she’d met before. It eased things.

  ‘So, having established your true entitlement to the bequest, let’s hear the troubling decisions.’

  She sat up properly and faced him. ‘In a nutshell; keep the status quo or modernise? Ron’s pushing for me to be a silent partner. He’ll take over and pay me rent. He wants an answer by Friday.’

  ‘Aggressive,’ Mike nodded. ‘But do you really think he’ll walk if you say no or don’t give him an answer by Friday?’

  He had a point. She’d been thrown by Ron’s bolshiness.

  ‘There are no clubs anywhere near and he’s not skilled in much else as far as I know.’

  ‘He’s not young either,’ Mike pointed out, ‘That’s on your side too.’

  ‘So there’s the easy option,’ she concluded. ‘Take the money and run. Plus there’s the top floor which I could lease separately.’

  ‘What’s up there?’

  ‘An insurance firm used to rent it. I’ve never been up there. It’s been closed since they moved out years ago and Blackie didn’t re-lease it, in case the ex got her hands on the income.’

  ‘So it’s still rentable?’

  ‘Probably needs some sprucing. In that scenario I’d maybe expand my own business.’

  ‘What’s your business?’ he asked, his interest heightening.

  ‘Oh, um, bookkeeping,’ she mumbled. ‘Small clients. Just me.’

  He tilted his head to the side. ‘You wanted to be in high finance.’

  ‘Yeah well, teen dreams and that,’ she brushed it aside, not wanting to bring back the past or her negative feeling towards him. This neutral territory with the new Mike was tenable. ‘The thing with the “take the money and run” route is I don’t believe the club will sustain itself over time. That’s what I’d been telling Blackie; the club should transform into a modern fitness club, with the boxing at its heart.’

  ‘Go on,’ he coaxed, sensing her mood pick up.

  ‘There’s loads of unutilised space in this building. I’d invest in spinning bikes, rowing machines and treadmills. The upper floors can be divvied up to incorporate studios for movement classes. I’d love some kind of social space too.

  ‘The thing is,’ she continued, ‘if the gym wants a long future, then we need the women. This place is a huge vat of testosterone. We only have two female boxers. There are fitness centres popping up all over and eventually the boxers will go there instead. Not to box obviously, but if they’re offered memberships with their partners, they’ll go. I could offer both. Let’s be honest, boxing is a dwindling sport. Lots of sports are now, given kids have so many other distractions. Focusing solely on the boxing club feels like putting all my eggs in one basket. I genuinely believe this place could be so much more.’

  She came to an abrupt halt. She’d been getting all passionate about it and Mike was grinning at her.

  ‘There’s your plan, Tiff. The first didn’t get you fired up at all. That was the safe option. Blackie didn’t give it to you to play safe.’

  She suddenly felt shy. Saying it all aloud to him had regenerated the confidence she had, if not in herself, then in her ideas. Moreover, he wasn’t mocking her plans. He wasn’t telling her not to change things. He believed in her. He took her seriously.

  ‘And you need pole-dancing in the mix.’

  ‘What?’ she said, taken aback. Maybe not taking her seriously after all. Bastard. He’d totally had her there. Nothing had changed – he was still taking the mick.

  ‘Seriously, it does miracles for the abs,’ he said, seeing the appalled look on her face. ‘Pole-fitness. That’s what it’s called. Pole-fitness. It’s legitimate. There’s dedicated clubs for it.’

  ‘Yeah right,’ she snapped, unsure whether to laugh in his face or shout at him again. She’d seen adverts for those clubs. They weren’t affiliated to Sports England.

  ‘Straight up, Tiff, there’s proper pole-fitness studios out there. No dodgy stuff. It’s bloody hard work. Arms, legs, abs. It all gets toned,’ he insisted, then shrugged and added, ‘If the husbands and boyfriends get demos at home, that’s a bonus. Nothing wrong with that.’ He seemed sincere. Maybe she simply couldn’t tell if he was taking the piss anymore. It put her on edge. But…she needed to talk about the club.

  ‘You think women would come to do that?’

  ‘I know so. They get fit, lean and flipping confident. Sexier all round. That’s priceless. You’d have boxing downstairs and pole-fitness upstairs and everyone will leave confident. They’ll barely make it to their cars. There’ll be a baby-boom, you’ll see.’

  ‘I won’t be responsible for overpopulating the town and I hadn’t planned for a crèche,’ she stated, although the crèche thing might work for daytime classes…

  ‘Future clients, Tiff. Don’t knock it.’

  ‘Right. Good thinking,’ she said, almost laughing, but not quite. ‘Is that what Verity does to keep fit?’ His face clouded momentarily, before swiftly reassuming his game face.

  ‘Verity’s fitness regime is down to her personal trainer, shopping marathons and parties.’

  Tiff garnered there was more to that statement than the simple facts, but it definitely wasn’t her place to pry, nor was she overly interested.

  His pocket buzzed. Checking the text, he rolled his eyes.

  ‘Speaking of … I need to go.’ Getting up, he asked, ‘So you’re okay to hold onto the ring for a little while?’

  ‘Sure, no problem.’ She didn’t confess he was doing her a favour. She’d never liked being beholden to anyone. Rich international sportsmen who’d seen her naked then left her, were definitely on that list. The hurt began to creep back into her head and she was glad this was coming to a close.

  ‘But you’ll let me know if you need it gone?’ he asked, handing her his phone. The new contact page was headed Tiff. Just Tiff.

  ‘Of course.’ She
got up from the bench and followed him towards the car park, typing in her number before handing it back. He hit call, then cancel, linking them.

  ‘Great. I’ll give you a shout when I want it.’ A smirk leapt onto his face. ‘My turn to shout at you.’

  ‘Yeah, about that,’ she said, slightly sheepish, ‘it was a rough day in a rough week.’ The sparkle in his eye and the wave of his hand said it was forgotten already. She guessed he’d suffered worse blows than her venting at him.

  They stood for some moments facing each other, not quite knowing the protocol. His pocket buzzed again, but he didn’t bother looking at it.

  ‘Good luck with the club, Tiff. Call me if you need to.’ He walked away with his hands back in his pockets, resolutely ignoring his phone.

  As she watched him disappear across the car park, Tiff still felt some misgivings – he’d walked away from her once and not come back. Memories like that never really went away; their damage was permanent. But he seemed to believe she could do it. Not only that, looking back up at the building, Tiff saw the new Mike had left her with something else too; a new spark of determination.

  Chapter 10

  The office telephone rang at precisely 9 a.m. Tiff had been up for hours, having spent the night negotiating the new mattress. In contrast to the undulating lumps of the sofa, the mat stack was perfectly level but only fractionally softer than concrete. She’d given up at six, pulled on a Blackie’s Gym sweatshirt she’d found in a storage box and her trackie bottoms, in an effort to appear more club-corporate. She’d brushed her brown curls up into a tight pony tail, imagining this was what gym staff did. Her supermarket trainers finished the look.

  Looking the part, Tiff ran six laps of the empty gym before knocking out a cartwheel at the door. It wasn’t competition standard; it had been years and she’d changed shape, but that wasn’t the point. She was reminding herself she owned the room. Ron wasn’t going to run her off her own property.

  She puffed and panted out of the hall, vowing to make the purchase of a water cooler the first task of the day.

  The webpage for cooler suppliers appeared on the screen as the phone rang.

  What should she answer? Blackie’s?

  ‘Pull yourself together, woman,’ she imagined Blackie barking and snatched up the receiver.

  ‘Tiffanie Trent,’ she said. It seemed the safest option.

  ‘Tiffanie? Your phone’s ringing out.’

  Gavin.

  Gavin! OMG! Tiff was totally thrown. She hadn’t heard from him in over a week, and here he was calling the gym. He was calling her. That was good, right? Her heart picked up its pace. Hearing his voice again, his lovely firm voice, which had steered her for so long, made her want to cry, in a reaching-the-promised-land kind of way. But she needed to play this right. Keen, but cool. Enthused, but not needy.

  ‘Gavin. Hi. I’m fine, thanks,’ she gushed, then realised he hadn’t actually enquired how she was. Brilliant. ‘How was your course?’

  ‘Awesome. Enlightening stuff. Focused my thinking about things.’

  Now Tiff’s heart started to gallop. Had the focusing brought him to the epiphany of having made a hideous mistake and he couldn’t live without her?

  ‘Oh yes?’ she asked, trying to manage her anticipation. ‘Lots has happened here too—’.

  ‘Yes, I see you moved your stuff out,’ he cut in. ‘Thanks for that. We should probably divvy up the furniture now I’m back. Actually, it’s quite serendipitous, as I need to tweak my surroundings with regard to moving things on. Framing my mind properly, you know?’

  Hang on. Wasn’t serendipity about good luck? Was he saying it was good luck she’d moved out? It left her reeling. He hadn’t had a change of heart at all. He wasn’t remotely concerned about how she was doing. She dug her nails into her thigh to distract from her hurting heart. Nothing had changed.

  She couldn’t think of a single thing she’d want from the flat … except…

  ‘I only want the bed, Gavin. The rest is yours.’

  It sounded snippy – which she wouldn’t normally do with Gavin, nor would it help her quest to win him back – but she needed him off the phone before she started to cry. Also, crucially, she could kill for a decent night’s kip. If she could just get some proper sleep she’d be able to deal with him more sensibly. With a bit of rearranging, their bed could fit in the storeroom.

  ‘But—’

  ‘Sorry Gav, I need to go. If you have it sent to the gym, I’ll handle it from there.’ It probably came across as officious, but she was trying to keep a grip on a tsunami of begging him to take her back, whilst simultaneously trying to take his focus off the bed; her stomach cramped with the cringe emanating from the last time he’d been in it with her. With a quick damage-limiting ‘Bye’ she hung up. She hadn’t had a chance to tell him about the gym. Which was perhaps just as well, where impact was concerned; he apparently hadn’t changed his mind about them, so she was going to have to implement her show-him-your-striving-abilities plan.

  Tiff slid out the lower desk drawer at her side and assessed the contents. Blackie had had it stocked with brandy but she’d made some changes. She considered a Pot Noodle but it was too early. Scampi fries it was then.

  Snack scoffed, water cooler contract sorted, the morning’s can-do attitude had been reinstated. She was doing it. She was making decisions, (okay, decision singular) and actioning them. Not at Blackie’s request, not in response to a problem. For herself. Tiff was annoyed at having let Ron cow her so easily. She’d already grown a business before, she made her own decisions there. Somewhere she’d lost sight of that. Maybe Shelby was right, she could do this. She could be capable like Leonards said. Or at least give it a go. Mike too had been right; modernising was the plan she believed in.

  She found an A4 pad and started a list of all her revamp ideas. She allowed herself anything that popped into her head, no matter how bonkers. Yes, even the whole foods pick’n’mix display. She wanted everything on there. The mad, the bad and the impossible too. Having immersed herself completely in this for the best part of the morning, she found she had a page-worth of ideas, all in varying degrees of rational.

  Outside of her bookkeeping life, which, bar filing her annual tax return, equated exclusively to Arrive – Do the numbers – Leave, Gavin had always made the decisions. Her role within their partnership dynamic was to make them happen. With his goal in mind, she was deft at planning. But this sort of planning was far broader, open-ended and flying-by-the-seat-of-her-pants-y than she’d experienced. It was thrilling.

  Checking no-one was watching, Tiff stood for a couple of star jumps and air-jabs to psych herself up, before dropping back into the chair to start the second phase of The Planning. Turning to a fresh page, she folded the paper into three columns, which she titled NOW, SOON, ONE DAY. There were small changes she wanted immediately, like de-cluttering the office and sorting the storeroom-cum-bedroom for when Gavin shipped the bed. But those things were just for her. She added Water Cooler to the NOW column and immediately struck it through as complete. She liked a list with something crossed out already. No, not cheating – morale-boosting. Encouraging.

  SOON covered the transition from boxing club to fitness club. She immediately listed Locker rooms. The Gents needed an overhaul, and the Ladies – a hastily added DIY-job shower in a former cupboard – barely existed. This could never be a unisex gym without decent changing facilities for the women; nice benches, decent sized lockers, brutal showers and proper hairdryers. Tiff got quite carried away with her fantasy locker room, not least because she was grossed out using the men’s showers after hours. And the never-worked-as-long-as-she’d-been-there lift needed fixing. Her club would be for all abilities.

  The final column homed her total indulgences. Top of the list; a cafe-bar space. Gavin always pinpointed the social opportunity when glamourising sales particulars. She’d have hers under the same roof. She wasn’t fussed about a juice bar, she wanted a place where people
could wind down together after classes. In the daytime, the mums might stop for a skinny latte before the school run. All of this was pie-in-the-sky, but it got her excited. Perhaps it was her dream to run this place, after all. Perhaps Blackie saw more than he’d let on.

  She halved the ONE DAY column, (there wasn’t much on it because she wanted everything right NOW) and added a new title to the lower half. CLASSES. Boxing went on first, primarily out of respect for Blackie, but also because keeping the regulars was key to her plan. She wanted to draw in their partners, and she wanted to tempt prospective female members with a hive of buff men (okay, buffish – there were as many party-kegs as six-packs downstairs). Business was business and she needed to use all the resources available. Humans included.

  She started listing. Pilates, Yoga, Zumba, Spinning, Step, Jazzercize, Aerobics, and more she’d pinched from Google-searching other gyms … and finally, Pole-fitness. She might not get all of them, but she reckoned she could pull a decent programme together. By early afternoon Tiff looked at her page and was chuffed. It was strong, achievable in most places, with scope for her aspirations. Gavin would be impressed.

  It had been a great use of her morning, even if it’d been office-bound. Tiff wasn’t hiding per se, but she was doing her best to keep out of Ron’s way. She felt awkward around him now. It was easier making herself scarce, sorting the office. And besides, sorting the office was right there on her NOW list. In ink. Which made it a high priority.

  Whilst ‘not hiding’, she was scoping the car park. Loitering by the windows, she had a panoramic view of the Eastcote Road and vigilantly monitored all the approaching cars. Quite bluntly, she was on the hunt for a woman.

  Finally, as Tiff was contemplating a Pot Noodle dinner, a van pulled up and Jess jumped out.

  ‘Just the woman,’ she called down through the window. (Nope, not hiding.) Jess looked up at Tiff, surprised, but pleased.

  ‘S’up Tiff?’

  ‘I need you. Upstairs,’ she said, then considered it might have sounded slightly flirty. Jess’s eyes grew wide and Tiff was glad Amina wasn’t there to hear. ‘I mean, I’d appreciate your professional advice. Would you mind coming to the office?’