by Sarah Ready
“Well, I never,” says Mona.
I cough to cover up a laugh. Mona fans herself and I think that she and Ginny have a different idea of what “personal trainer” means.
Bill pokes his head out of the window. “I sure loved you in Spiderman,” he says.
“Um, I didn’t—”
“You mean that rated R one? That one with all the violence?” asks Mona.
I try not to drop my head into my hands.
“Wait ‘til the boys hear that I saw Spiderman,” Bill says.
Ginny’s shoulders start to shake. Her face is beet red and she’s pulled her mouth down, she’s trying so hard not to laugh.
“Thanks for the coffee,” I say.
“On the house,” says Mona. “Just try not to do so much violence and swearin’ in the future.”
“I’ll try my best, ma’am,” I say.
The coffees are handed over and we pull away.
At a stop sign, Ginny snorts, then she starts laughing and can’t seem to stop. She pulls in a breath and wipes at her eyes.
“Oh my gosh. You shoulda seen your face. They were bawling you out for a movie you didn’t even do.”
“They had no idea,” I say.
We grin at each other and I think we’ll go on looking at each other like this for a long time, but a car honks behind us.
Ginny looks back to the road and pulls forward.
At Route 511B she turns left.
“Where we going?” I ask.
“It’s a secret,” she says.
“Are we there yet?” I ask.
She swats at me and I laugh.
“I’ll show you ‘there yet,’” she says.
I smile then settle back and watch her drive. Every once in a while I take a sip of hot black coffee. Mona and Bill really know how to make a good brew. I usually like coffee full of cream, but this is good enough to not need anything.
The mist has cleared and the dashboard clock says it’s nearly seven a.m. The soft light spills over the rounded tree tops and the hills. Ginny’s still flushed and full of color. Morning looks good on her.
The car slows and Ginny turns onto a wide gravel road. She follows it for a half-mile and then pulls into a parking lot with wooden railroad ties that mark out spots.
“We’re here,” she says.
I climb out of the car after her. My muscles protest, so I stretch them out as I take in the shrill sound of a bird and the fresh smell of summer woods. There’s a honeysuckle bush nearby sending out a sweet sugary scent.
Ginny walks toward me and the gravel crunches under her shoes.
“Where are we?” I ask.
She tilts her head toward a narrow dirt path at the edge of the woods. “Come on.”
She looks back at me to make sure I’m following. I’m not yet, but I do when she gives me her smile.
She jogs through the trees and I keep up with her. We already ran today. Ginny was worried that too much running would hurt my hip and back, but I consulted with my doctor and I’m all clear to go. It feels good to stretch out my legs. The dirt of the trail kicks up behind us.
Then, when I’m about to ask if we’re there yet, the woods open up and I stop at the edge of a stone ledge.
“Wow,” I say.
Ginny takes in my expression. “You like it?”
“It’s incredible.”
Ten feet below us is a lake. The water is morning smooth, not a ripple on its surface. The deep blue of the sky, white clouds, and the green of the surrounding trees reflect on its surface. I peer down, the two of us are reflected in the water, standing on top of the jutting white ledge. A mallard and his mate call out and bank overhead, then land in the lake. The water splashes against their beating wings, then ripples around them and spreads out until the ripples hit the rocky edge.
“Can we?” I ask. I don’t even think about the fact that jumping is a lot like falling. And if I do jump, it’ll feel just like it did before.
Because, I’d like to dive in just like that mallard.
Ginny nods. Then she grabs the bottom of her tank and lifts it over her head. She drops it on the rocks. My mind goes blank. She’s beautiful.
I take in the smoothness of her skin, and the flare of her stomach to her hips. She kicks off her shoes. She has the most delicate, the cutest little toes. I want to kiss each of them. Suddenly, I’m in motion. I don’t want to be left behind. I pull off my shoes and my shirt and kick them into a pile.
When I look back at Ginny, her eyes are on my chest. There’s a strange look on her face. I look down, is there something wrong? But no, it’s still me. Although maybe a little flatter than a few weeks ago. But it’s still me.
I look back up at her.
She’s backed up a few steps and her knees are bent. There’s a glint in her eyes.
“Last one in,” she says.
My eyes go wide and she starts to run.
“Runs three miles,” she says as she darts past me.
She laughs and I charge after her. I don’t think about heights or fear or breaking bones. The only thing on my mind is chasing after her and catching that laughter.
We both reach the edge at the same time. I grab her hand.
I whoop as we fly through the air. Our fingers tangle and then we’re falling. My stomach rushes up to meet my throat. But my throat doesn’t close on me. I squeeze her fingers.
Then we hit the water. The cold catches us and we plunge deep into the lake. I lose Ginny’s hand. I open my eyes. Air bubbles float around me, there’s lake weed. Ginny kicks to the surface and I follow. I burst to the top and pull in air.
She treads water next to me and I swim toward her.
“We tied,” she says.
I do a few strokes to swim closer. The water’s deep here. At least fifteen feet, and we’re about twenty feet from a low ledge. The water’s choppier now, stirred up by our jump and treading.
It’s only sinking in now that I jumped and fell and I didn’t panic. I check to see if my chest is tight or if there’s any numbness spreading through my limbs. Nothing.
I look at Ginny in amazement. I did it. We did it.
Does she realize?
She gives me a small smile.
Yeah. I think she does.
“Alright. Play time’s over,” she says. “Give me ten laps.”
I look to see if she’s joking, but she’s dead serious.
“Yes, ma’am,” I say.
While I swim freestyle across the lake and back, Ginny lays out on the ledge and warms herself in the rising sun. Every time I swim away I think about catching a glimpse of her long legs. Every time I swim back I take extra breaths to sneak a peek. I can feel her watching me too. And I like it. She’s looking at me like I’m worth watching.
At ten laps I pull myself up on the ledge next to her. The water floods her spot on the rock.
“Hey. I just got dry,” she says as she scrambles up.
“That so?” I stand and shake off. My hair flings drops all over her skin.
She raises her eyebrow, and right when I think, uh oh, she pushes me back in. I grab her hand as I fall and she drops in right on top of me. When we come up she sputters and wipes at her eyes.
I laugh at the look on her face. “Fair’s fair,” I say.
“Guess I deserved that,” she says.
“Meh. Maybe I’m just a villain.”
“Nah. I think you’re better at playing the hero,” she says.
A lightness fills me. But also a warning. Am I getting too close to her? Becoming too dependent on her? After only ten days?
She swims to the ledge and grabs the rocks with her hands, but she doesn’t pull out of the water. She just holds herself there, hanging on, looking at the rock wall.
I realize that I’ve been thinking how jumping in was a triumph for me, but what about her. Didn’t she say that she nearly drowned?
I swim up next to her and look at her profile. She doesn’t look sad or scared. I actually can’t
read her expression.
Water drips down her face and I lift my hand to wipe it away, but then stop myself.
“How do you still swim?” I finally ask.
She looks at me, and her eyes crinkle into a smile. “I’ve never been afraid of swimming,” she says. “Just drowning.”
“And sleeping?”
“Not anymore.”
I pull myself up onto the ledge and the cold water sluices off me.
I hold out my hand and she takes it. I pull her up next to me. She’s strong enough that instead of flopping like a fish onto the rock she steps up all graceful and poised.
“I wouldn’t think you’re scared of anything anymore,” I say.
Her head jerks toward me and her eyes widen. “Everyone is scared of something.”
She starts to climb the path toward the upper ledge where our shirts and shoes are. She puts on her tank and her shoes and I follow suit. The cloth of the tee sticks to my wet skin, and my shoes barely slip on.
I don’t want to ask her what else she’s scared of. I think I know.
Maybe I’m already in too deep. Because more than anything, I want to take all her fears away.
10
Ginny
Two weeks of training pass. Every morning I get up at four thirty and make it to Liam’s by five. Grandma Enid, bless her, agreed when the early morning trainings started to watch Bean and give her breakfast in my absence. Although, she did make it very clear what she thought of my plan. Specifically, that I was driving down the road to hell and tarnation.
I’m beginning to agree with her. Why did I take him to the swimming quarry? Why did I let him hold me at the archery range? Why do I open up to him and share?
He’s leaving. This is temporary.
Grandma Enid is right in a way. She thinks that hell and tarnation is getting Bean’s hopes up, but the real hell is me starting to feel again. To think that I could have happiness. That Liam and Bean and I could…what? Nothing. We could nothing.
This happiness and hope, it will be what destroys me. Because nothing can ever come of any of this.
I had another appointment with Bean yesterday. She vomited when they put the needles in her back. I gave a brave face, let her hold my hand the whole while, her grip tight. But afterwards, when we got home, I told her to go paint models with Grandpa, and I took a shower. I sat on the floor, with my arms around my knees, the water running over me, and I felt like I was breaking in half. I let my sobs fall into the drain, they broke out of me, I couldn’t stop them anymore. I couldn’t hold it in, so I let them come. Then, when my stomach ached from it all, I stood up and let it fall away. I tucked it aside, got dressed, and went and made Bean a ham and cheese sandwich.
I kissed her head. Made her drink her milk. Praised her painted tank model, told a joke, made her feel loved and safe.
That’s all I can do.
It’s another morning of training. I left Bean curled up under her covers, sound asleep. Grandma Enid was making pancakes in the kitchen. She’s given up the lectures, she just waved her spatula as I left.
Liam was waiting for me on his porch when I arrived.
So far, I have nothing to complain about. He works hard and does all the exercises I demand. I ask for one hundred push-ups, he does two hundred. I ask for fifty sit-ups, he does seventy-five. He seems even more determined than me to get back in shape. Most evenings he swings by to take Bean and I out for superhero training. To Bean’s delight after the archery range we went to the park for rock climbing, horseback riding, and the library to check out books (because a superhero’s greatest weapon is her mind). Every time Liam comes by, he has a new lesson planned for Bean. She’s glowing lately, so high on life.
It’s all thanks to Liam.
The sun’s just rising over the trees. The birds sing and last autumn’s leaves crunch under our feet. I let my legs propel me forward. I love running. The reason I became a trainer was because in the worst of times, running forward, that solid pounding of my feet on the ground was the only thing that kept me going.
Liam looks back at me and smirks. Sweat drips down his face and he wipes at it. I wave at him and motion him on. He turns back and runs on.
I try to fit in two hours’ worth of exercise in the morning before it gets too hot and humid. At night, I have a routine that Liam does on his own. Right now, we’re on our daily trail run, it’s three miles through the woods. We follow a narrow hiking trail through a county park near Liam’s property.
I run behind him. He’s already stripped out of his shirt. His back muscles flex as he jumps over a stump. There’s a stream ahead and he clears it in a leap. My legs aren’t as long so I skip on a mossy stone and hop to the opposite bank. Cool air rises up from the stream and I take in the smell of cool water, mud, and summer leaves.
We run down a short steep hill. I’m distracted looking at his shoulders, so I’m not as careful as I should be. I slide in loose dirt. I can’t stop my momentum.
I yelp as I fall, then I smack into Liam. My hands slide down his bare back. He’s covered in sweat and my hands slip on the smooth wetness of his skin.
“Sorry.”
He turns and grabs my arms. Steadies me.
My breath is heavy and labored. His hands still clutch my arms and suddenly I feel dizzy. He’s breathing heavy too, and his chest rises and falls as he sucks in the morning air.
“No problem,” he says. His fingers slowly curl over my arms, and he unconsciously tightens and loosens his hold on me. I don’t move, I just stay in his grasp.
Then he gives me that heartbreaker smile that I’ve gotten used to. The one that made women across the world fan themselves and clench their lady parts. I’d like to say I’m immune to it. But I can’t. Even though I know it’s only his movie persona smile, the one he gives when he’s amused or trying to be charming, I’m not immune.
Finally, his expression changes. The morning sunlight sifts through the trees and turns his eyes from amused to something else.
“What?” I ask. I can’t decipher the look he’s giving me. Slowly, he lets go of my arms and reaches up to slip a strand of hair behind my ear. His fingers run over my skin as he tucks it in place. Strangely, him doing that feels more intimate than anything he’s done before.
He swallows and I watch as a drop of sweat runs down his neck and falls down his bare chest.
I want to splay my hands over him. Run my fingers through his hair in exchange for what he did to me.
“Sorry,” he says. “Sorry about that.” He takes a step back.
I shake my head. Try to brush off the funny effect his touch is having. “No problem,” I say. Then, “Shouldn’t you be running?”
He grins then, and his amused expression is back in place. “You ever get tired of bossing me around?”
He starts out at a jog and I fall in behind him. The trail’s too narrow to run side by side. Usually we don’t talk, we just listen to the rhythm of our feet on the dirt. But today, something feels different, and now it’s like the quiet would be more intimate than talking. So…
“Nah. It’s why I’m a personal trainer, so I can yell at people all day.”
He looks back at me as he chuckles, then quickly looks forward again. You have to pay attention when you’re running on a trail, or risk tripping on a root and falling on your face.
“Why’d you become an actor?” I ask, when the silence lasts too long.
“Oh, you know. So people can stare at me all day long.”
I smile then realize he can’t see me. “I bet,” I say, but I don’t believe him. “You don’t care about that.”
He looks back. “Sure I do.” And he means it. His face is serious and a little sad.
“Really? You don’t seem like that. You’re not—”
“Big-headed?”
“No.”
“Conceited?”
“No.”
“Narcissistic?”
“No. You’re definitely all those things.”
“Hey,” he says. He turns and gives me a look.
And I laugh, because none of that’s true. He’s none of those things.
We hit the end of the trail and turn to loop back to the beginning. The sun is just over the trees now and the forest is awake. Liam jumps over a log that lies across the trail and I follow. The sweet scent of damp earth and decomposing wood washes over me.
I glance at the shape of him. His back is strong and defined. His legs are gaining muscle. His hair is still overlong, but I like it.
“So what then?” he asks, as he glances back at me. “I’m not…” he prompts.
I smile. “You don’t only care about yourself.”
He stops, and I just catch myself before I run into him again. “Why’d you stop?”
He turns. “That’s where you’re wrong. I only care about myself.”
“Come on,” I push at him, start him running again so our legs don’t cramp up. After a hundred yards of running I say, “I see you with Bean. You’re amazing. That means you care.”
“About myself,” he says, almost like he’s talking to himself. The muscles in his back are stiff and he seems angry all of a sudden.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” I ask. I don’t understand the sudden change in his mood.
“I need to get something clear,” he says. He turns back to me. He looks conflicted and angry.
“Okay,” I say. “Feel free.”
He turns again, then faces forward.
“I’m not doing this for you.”
“I know.”
“Or your daughter.”
I flinch. “I know that too.”
“I’m doing it for me, I want to get back to Hollywood.”
Okay, it hurts to hear him say this, but I already knew all this. “I know,” I say more forcefully than before, and maybe with a trace of bitterness.
His shoulders bunch up. He looks back at me again, and a cloud passes over his face. He turns forward then says, “Just so we’re clear. You’re a means to an end, yeah?”
Suddenly, my throat hurts and I swallow the burning sensation down. “You’re an ass,” I spit out. I don’t know what’s gotten into him, but he’s being an ass.