by Pace, Pepper
She had purposely arrived at 5:30 even though she didn’t have to be at work until 8:00. She figured she would work out for an hour to an hour and a half, take forty-five minutes to get showered and dressed, and another half hour to have breakfast in the cafeteria. She’d seen that they had egg white omelets and turkey sausage now. She’d have time to kickback and recuperate before starting her day. But best of all, by coming so early she’d get to the gym before anyone else showed up.
The Federal Building was quiet when she arrived. No one had yet arrived to visit the Social Security Office or to have their taxes prepared. None of the workers were crowding into the building carrying their cups of piping hot Starbucks and wheeling their briefcases behind them, no mom’s with strollers to drop their children off at the daycare before they dashed off to work.
There were just two guards who looked at her in surprise whether it was because they were unused to seeing the stylish woman without makeup and dressed in sweats, or because it was too early to begin scanning people in. She dug out her badge and they allowed her to bypass the metal detectors. She went to the elevators; the only set that would lead to the subbasement and nervously hit the down button.
There were lights on, thank god. She walked rapidly to the female lockers trying to remember the route; walk down the first corridor, left, left and it should be there. Viola! There it was. The lights were off in the room and she cut them on. It was clean and bright and didn’t feel like a basement so she breathed easier and put her bag into one of the lockers after retrieving a hand towel and a bottled water.
She left the lights on as she left the locker room and headed purposefully for the gym. She wouldn’t look at her workout as a chore but the first step into recreating herself. Ashleigh began to hear the faint sounds of music. As she got closer she thought she heard Jimi Hendrix; All Along the Watchtower. So she wasn’t alone. She was kind of relieved but also a bit disappointed. She didn’t think anyone would be working out this early.
She pushed open the metal doors to the gym room and All Along the Watchtower was playing at a moderate level; not quite loud but it could have been softer. There was only one other person in the room and he was running the treadmill. Ashleigh allowed her eyes to linger on the man. Damn he was big. He wore black nylon workout pants and a black hoodie, both damp with his sweat. The pants molded nicely along the man’s butt. He had a great butt, like two boulders. His fists were pumping as he ran and she could tell that he was a white guy but other than that couldn’t tell what he looked like.
He was a giant! She could see the muscles rippling along his back as he ran, even through the hoodie. Nice.
She moved to the mat in front of the mirrors happy that they weren’t close to the treadmills and began to stretch thinking; Ugh…it’s too early for this. Her tummy rumbled and she grimaced and tried to touch her toes. Her tummy got in the way so she opted for touching her knees. After about two minutes of that Ashleigh moved to the bike. Might as well start there. She hoped the man wasn’t watching her but he hadn’t even glanced in her direction. Good. He was just pounding away on the treadmill.
She rode the bike for ten minutes but then her legs began to ache and her chest burned. She decided to work on her upper body and moved to the curl machine set at the second to the lowest weight. She was sweating and thinking about which machine to hit next when the music stopped. She looked up in time to see the man leaving the room with a CD in his hands. His hood shielded his face and he didn’t even glance in her direction. She watched him leave and when the door shut after him she went over to the radio and turned it to Tom Joyner in the morning.
~***~
Christopher hit the shower and tried not to scowl. The lady had come in making everything smell pink like flowers. Gyms were supposed to smell like sweat and hard labor. He’d seen girls like that before. They came in dressed in designer workout clothes and were all gung-ho the first day, maybe even the first week. But then they disappeared.
He’d seen her come in, using the mirrors so that he wouldn’t have to turn around. She was curvy. Her stretchy sweat pants pulled across her more-than ample-bottom and he noted the way her rear-end moved when she walked. When she bent to stretch Christopher had stopped peeking, her butt was pointed right at the reflection in the mirror that he was using to see her. Her shirt had slipped up some and her pants had slipped down a bit and he could see cute pink panties and a bit of her crack.
He suppressed a growl. Why was this lady wearing pink and smelling pink invading his space?! And why was she in here so early? Well he had no plans of changing his workout time, she could just change hers if she didn’t like him here.
Afterwards he got dressed in fatigues, which was his uniform while working surveillance. Christopher’s workout was actually factored in to his work-day. His boss wanted them kept in tip top shape and each man was required to spend at least three hours a week working out. He easily achieved that twice over. Most were addicted to it and like him, didn’t see working out as a chore. But unlike him, they preferred having an audience and scheduled their workouts around optimum female presence.
He poured himself a 32 oz size cup of Lipton Iced Tea with Citrus and sauntered in to the security room, his muscles pleasantly throbbing. Several of the guys were there guffawing and pointing. Crap…another homeless dude accosting the protectees. They’d make a call up to one of the uniformed guards to run him off.
“Yo, Beast! Check this out!” Carlos’ brown face was split by a wide smile. Christopher walked over to the camera and did a double-take. The pink lady—well she wasn’t pink. She was a black lady; light skinned with light hair and eyes, maybe multi-racial. But she had moved to the treadmill. She had it set to a fast walk and what the guys were guffawing about was the way her butt bounced with each step. Damn…he watched for a moment before scowling and walking away.
“You were down there with her. We were taking bets that she’d get one look at your big-ass and run.” Roddy said with a smirk. “She was checking you out, dude.”
Christopher had just sat down in his chair to run the reports and he gave Roddy a sharp look. “I don’t want no parts of your bet, and before you ask, no I’m not going to scare her.” He had a bit of a country drawl to his rumbling voice.
TK made a face letting him know that’s just what they had wanted. Hell it got boring down in the basement and they found fun wherever they could. But he wasn’t going to mess with a lady minding her own business when he was minding his.
“Remember that time you scared that drug dealer away?” Carlos hinted.
“That was different and you know it.” They had watched the monitors and were laughing like crazy when he went up to the young thug. The dumb fuck was selling his drugs on the same corner as the freaking Federal Courthouse! How dumb could you get? Christopher had been wearing his cap pulled down low and had come up on the thug in broad daylight. He grinned and tilted his cap back.
“What you got there, buddy?” He had asked in his best redneck drawl. The young man’s eyes had widened at the sight of the grinning giant with the split face.
“I-I don’t know what you talking about…” He had stammered, eyes not able to leave the sight of the monster before him.
Christopher knew that his eyes had gone cold at that moment when his smile disappeared. “Well sell it somewhere else, asshole. And give me your name. NOW!”
The boy had stammered out a name, maybe it was real and maybe it wasn’t. But Christopher nodded once and walked back to the Courthouse. When he got back the guys were on the floor rolling. They said the boy had about pissed his pants running away. They hadn’t seen him since. Of course that was all different.
Bruce came in to the room then. He had surely heard them laughing long before but he too knew that the subbasement made a person punch drunk. It’s why it alternated out with field duty.
“You idiots get back to work. I can hear you laughing like bitches all the way down the hall!” His voice was stern but
each of them knew that it was more talk than anger. The men disbanded grumbling. “Sweeps aren’t being made, screens aren’t being monitored and reports aren’t being run while you laughing assholes are watching…” He peeked at the screen and scowled. “…big bitches working out. You can see this shit on Youtube!”
Everybody cleared out except the essential people assigned to the room; which included Christopher. He saw Bruce watch the monitor for a few more moments before he made an appreciative grunt and walked out of the room.
He buried his head back into his report.
~***~
In theory, Ashleigh’s plan was great. But nothing worked out as planned. She’d sweated her hair until it was soaking wet and once she got to the locker she’d had to wash it. Her hair was too short to just pull back into a ponytail and it had taken her forty-five minutes alone just getting her short hair blow dried and curled into a passable manner and then fifteen minutes on makeup and ten minutes getting dressed. She’d only had time to grab a breakfast wrap and a bottle of juice and to get up to her office where she gobbled it up.
Kendra and Lance came into her office and looked her up and down. “Did you work out?” Kendra asked in disappointment.
“I did!” She said defensively. “My freaking legs are knotted up and I’m limping,” she added.
Lance gave her a doubtful look. “Girlfriend, you look like you just left the spa. Make-up and clothes are flawless.”
Ashleigh smiled. Lance was so sweet, even if he thought she looked too good to have just put in over an hour on her first workout—still, he thought she looked good.
“I am not coming up here looking like those other women with the sweat stains under their arms and hair all jacked up and spending the day wafting in my own funk.”
They talked for a few minutes and Ashleigh’s friends finally believed her when she tried to stand in her heels and groaned in pure pain and then limped to the coffee pot.
The next day she brought hair gel so that she wouldn’t have to worry about straightening her hair again. After placing her things in the locker she headed for the gym. Once again she heard music playing; The Dave Matthews Band, Ants Marching. Not quite the music you’d think about working out to but she liked the song.
Again the same man was on the treadmill. Again he was wearing all black with a hood concealing him pretty well. She pretended not to watch the way he made running the treadmill look effortless. She almost fell off the thing when she’d done it the day before.
Today she wore navy sweatpants and an oversized shirt. She did her stretching, or tried to. Her muscles were so tight that she could barely bend. She plopped down on the floor and stretched her legs, and tried to reach for her feet. Well that wasn’t going to happen. She lay on her back and pulled one leg than the other up against her body. She peeked over at the sexy guy. He just stared straight ahead and didn’t look at her once. Hmph. She guessed that was good. She didn’t need to worry about some guy checking her out while she was straining just to touch her feet!
It took her about seven minutes to get loosened up enough to hit the elliptical machine. Ten minutes in to it and Ashleigh was asking herself, ‘Why am I torturing myself like this? Who really cares…?
And then she thought about DeAngelo and Shaunda and the woman’s perfect body. Her throat tightened. Ashleigh’s eyes glazed but this time not with tears but with determination. She pushed herself when she wanted to stop—when she would have stopped she just kept going. One day at a time she said this to herself when the stitch formed in her side.
A journey of a thousand miles begins with one step…
~***~
After leaving the gym and showering Christopher returned to the monitoring room. A few of the guys were there watching the lady workout but they weren’t hooping and hawing because they didn’t want to attract Bruce’s attention. With a sigh, Christopher joined them.
“Dude, look at her go.” Roddy said.
“We’re taking bets that she’s going to black out.”
Christopher watched the woman pushing herself. She was on the treadmill again and this time she was going at a run. After a few more minutes she finally stopped and the hooping and hollering grew a bit louder as money passed hands.
“Fifteen minutes!” Someone said loudly. “That’s my girl.” They disbanded and went about their duties. Christopher lingered. She’d dropped down on the mat on her back. She was breathing hard. Shit, she was going to seize up doing that. Her arm was across her face. He leaned in closer.
She was crying.
Christopher’s back straightened. Did she hurt herself? Should he go check on her? He was contemplating this when she pulled herself back up to her feet. She moved stiffly back to the treadmill. She started it again and got back on it!
Christopher placed his hands on his hips and watched. She was going to walk it out, he thought. That was good. But then he saw her pushing up the speed and she began running again. Damn…
Christopher tapped the controls and zoomed in on her face. Sweat and tears were evident but he could see that her brow was drawn and he saw that she wasn’t going to stop until she met her own personal goal. He heard Carlos come up behind him and he quickly flipped the screen to the corridors. He didn’t want any of the guys seeing her cry.
~***~
Ashleigh hurt so bad that even though she knew she shouldn’t, she came straight home, popped ibuprofen, took a hot bath and then crawled into bed without dinner.
The next day when she went to the gym she was walking stiffly. Blues music was playing this time. How apropos. She looked at the giant on the treadmill. Did he even know she was there? He never even flinched when she came in through the door. He never even turned to look in her direction. Well today she planned to keep her eyes on him. She just wanted to know what he looked like. He had to be fine with a body like that.
He generally left at six so while she was on the curling machine she kept her eyes on him. He didn’t look tired even though his dark clothes were made even darker with his sweat. But his gait was steady. Six came and she saw him switch off the machine. His head was down when he headed straight for the boombox and removed the CD. She finally saw him do it. Generally the music stopped and he was half out the door before she looked up.
He must have sensed her looking because he glanced at her; just a glance. And in that one brief second Ashleigh’s light brown face paled even lighter. Her eyes widened as her brain tried to make sense of what she saw. The man’s face was split in half.
Jesus, she’d never seen anything like it. It was as if someone had taken a machete to him and then someone else had tried to sew the pieces back together. There was a visible seam that ran from his chin, over his lip up into one nostril. His nose was flattened and flared crookedly. The seam continued up between his brows and then ran a crooked pattern to disappear beneath the hood.
They called it a cleft palate but she’d never seen one so bad. The two halves of his face had seemed to shift; the bone structure beneath the flesh, causing his face to sink in slightly giving him a gorilla–like appearance. He also had no color. He was as white as an albino. His grey eyes were fringed in reddish lashes that looked almost non-existent. His upper lip seemed to have three distinct sections that she couldn’t quite understand. He was by far the scariest looking man she’d ever seen.
He was out the door before she realized that she’d stared. She felt herself blushing and hoped that she hadn’t made him feel like a monster. But he’d shocked her. She rubbed her face in chagrin. Tomorrow she would make a point of not looking disgusted. If the opportunity arose she would speak.
~***~
Christopher’s keys broadcast his arrival as he unlocked his front door. Maggie quickly jumped down from where she was perched on the back of the couch, and wrapped her sinewy body around his feet. He reached down and quickly scratched beneath her chin and then put his things away. He had stopped and got carry-out on the way home and after feeding her he sat down
with the newspaper and ate his meal.
His thoughts moved to the lady at the gym and he lost his appetite for the third burger and tossed it in the trash. He didn’t like the shocked look in her eyes when she caught a glimpse of his face. Not that he blamed her, just that he wished someone could see him for the first time without grimacing in horror. His parent’s had been too poor to get his bilateral cleft palate fixed for a long time. By the time that he was three years old it became critical as his breathing and lack of nutrition began to affect his life. The state took over and the surgery was performed for free. Unfortunately his was a very complex situation handled by surgeons not experienced in his extreme case.
After three corrective surgeries his mother could take no more and he’d been left with bad scars though his palate was now closed. Yet his teeth were crooked and several were missing. Although his hearing had been affected, it wasn’t enough to keep him out of the military. And normally speech problems occurred with his condition but his voice was fine—although not often used. Christopher was pale, but not because he was albino. He was just a pale skinned red-head. He kept his hair cut short in a military fade. He was the epitome of a jarhead. He even had semper fi tattooed across his bicep. He had planned to get it tatted on his neck because he would never be anything but a jarhead, but his mother had objected and so he hadn’t done it.