“Oh, in high school,” Missy said. “There were a lot of guys after me. Dennis was average-looking, but I’m telling you, he worshiped me. After a while you decide, if someone’s going to treat you like a queen, why fight it? We had a few good years. It doesn’t last forever. The more you realize you can have in life, the more you want.”
Gert knew she wasn’t the same type of person as Missy. She definitely would choose Dennis over the mailroom guy.
“Anyway, now Dennis is obsessed,” Missy said. “I’m sure he took that FedEx from your desk. He knows I’m not coming back, regardless of what happens with Derek. As soon as you left that message for him, he knew he’d make me crazy by swiping it. He always calls Derek’s house to see if I’m there, and then he hangs up. We have Caller ID, so I know. He doesn’t even bother to hide his number.”
Gert thought that was too bad.
Missy yawned and rubbed her eyes. “He’s going to have to get over it,” she said. “Even if I didn’t have Derek, I could never go back to Dennis. I’ve come too far.”
At four, Missy let Gert leave work early. Gert was pleased to be able to use the gym with the room nearly empty. Unfortunately it wasn’t completely empty. The Annoying Gym Guy who worked there was hovering around her side of the room, near the windows. All the treadmills faced the windows. The windows, in turn, faced a luxury hotel across the street. But the hotel’s windows were black and couldn’t be seen through.
Gert stared at the clouds reflecting in the hotel, put on her headphones, and started walking to a U2 CD.
Gert thought briefly about Todd. Then she thought that she shouldn’t think about Todd. Then she thought about the fact that she should run for thirty minutes and not think about Todd. She’d get just as toned as Missy. Then everyone would want her. Especially Todd. Wait, she wasn’t supposed to be thinking about Todd. She wasn’t doing this for Todd. She was doing it for herself.
What a load of pig offal that was.
She pushed the buttons to increase her miles per hour to 3.5, then 4. Then 4.5. She was sprinting now.
This felt good.
Yes, it would all work out. She’d be beautiful, funny, and fit. There were plenty of people to meet out there, and if not, she’d revel in her aloneness for a little while longer. Was being alone really so bad?
She didn’t see the Annoying Gym Guy anymore. Perhaps he’d retreated back to his little office by the free weights instead of bugging her. Good.
A faster song came on. Gert pressed the treadmill to get up to 5. She watched a piece of paper fly through the air outside. She watched a plane soaring in the distance. It seemed really low. She kept her eye on it until it disappeared.
She closed her eyes for a second and felt her muscles working. She really was doing this for herself. She should go three times a week. She always said she was going to get on a schedule, but hadn’t.
She hurried a little more and was running briskly. She pushed the machine to 6.0. Nothing bothered her. She was in the Olympics, twenty yards from the finish line.
She started to get winded. She pushed herself for a few minutes more, then pressed the down arrow to return to a walk.
The machine didn’t slow.
It had happened before when she pressed it too fast. She pushed again.
It stayed at 6.0.
She waited a couple of seconds, then pressed again.
It was still at six miles an hour, and she had to keep running quickly.
She looked around. The room was empty. The mirrored wall in the back, by the free weights, showed only bars and pulleys. The Annoying Gym Guy definitely must have gone into his little office.
She was getting tired. She pressed the down arrow again, but nothing happened. She felt sweat on her back, and on her forehead.
She couldn’t jump off. It was moving too quickly.
She looked around again. She couldn’t believe it. She had actually become a cliché. You weren’t supposed to literally get stuck on a treadmill.
Maybe she was being punished for something. For all the things she had taken for granted, for the fact that she had never joined a gym until now.
She collected her wits and pushed again. Maybe she’d been doing it wrong.
Nothing.
She sensed someone near the back of the room. It was the Annoying Gym Guy, but he was too far back for him to hear her. And the noise coming from her machine would drown her out.
She irrationally wondered if he’d rigged the machine to get back at her for being snippy to him. That would be a good way to get back at someone—fix the treadmill so it’d get stuck. There could be a movie, like Speed, where you had to keep going six miles per hour because if you slowed down, the treadmill would explode.
The sweat was dripping down her back, under her shirt, now. She panted heavily.
She felt panicked.
Calm down, she told herself. The gym will fill up soon. Someone will know what to do.
Her cell phone was on the sill in front of her. It was too far to reach.
A new guy came into the gym. He was skinny and hairy in a sleeveless top, which hairy guys shouldn’t wear, and he sat down on one of those giant blue rubber balls on the floor. They reminded Gert of the animal things you used to hop on in pre-school. She wasn’t sure what they were called. Or what they were for, exactly.
The guy wasn’t close enough to hear her, either. She pressed the button once more. Still stuck.
The Annoying Gym Guy was coming to the middle of the room. He was wearing his oversize glasses and a fluorescent netted shirt.
She managed to turn her head. “Excuse me, sir?”
He didn’t seem to hear.
“Sir?”
The Gym Guy jogged over. “Yes, ma’am?”
“I can’t get this to slow down. I’m stuck.”
The guy said, “Just push it.”
Brilliant, Gert thought.
The guy reached out and pushed it himself, but it didn’t change.
“It’s stuck,” he said.
Thanks.
He shook his head and tried again. “This has never happened before,” he said.
The hairy guy on the blue ball hopped over. “Is she stuck?” he asked.
“Looks that way,” the Gym Guy said.
The hairy guy hopped on the ball and stared at her.
A girl entered the gym, thin and blond, and noticed something was wrong. She came over to watch.
Not only was Gert embarrassed, but she had to keep running six miles an hour.
“Can’t you unplug it?” the blond girl asked.
“It would stop too quickly,” the Gym Guy said. He moved forward and said to Gert, “Okay. Here’s what I’ll do.”
Someone else was coming into the gym. Gert hoped it was someone sane, but it was a buff fellow who veered toward the free weights.
“You see the treadmill next to you?” the Gym Guy said. “I’m going to drag it back a little, then get it up to 6.0. When it’s ready, you can jump sideways onto it and keep running at the same pace.”
The Gym Guy and the hairy guy shimmied between the two treadmills and pulled back the one that was parallel to Gert’s.
The Gym Guy turned it on and got it up to 6.0. Gert watched it while she ran. She was ready to collapse.
“Okay,” the Gym Guy said. “We’re spotting you. When I say jump, jump!”
Gert kept running, though. What if she slipped and fell off? Still, she had to make that leap.
She focused on the parallel treadmill. She watched it so much that she slipped for a second. She balanced herself and kept running. She prepared to jump sideways.
She hesitated for a second. Then she jumped.
Landing on the new treadmill, she righted herself and began running.
“Yeah,” the blond girl said, and people clapped.
“When you get off, come see me,” the Gym Guy said, and then he walked to his office.
After Gert eased the speed down, she went back to the guy’s office.
His office was small, with flyers pinned up about fitness tips and anatomical diagrams. There was a metal desk with piles of papers and a few framed photos. One was of a stately, but pretty, woman with a teenage boy next to her. Another was just a boy.
“Did you ever take the orientation class?” the guy asked, sitting at his desk.
“No,” Gert said, looking at the ground.
“You’re supposed to take it right after you join.”
“I know,” she said.
The man stared at her.
She looked up.
“I guess I never wanted to acknowledge that I joined a gym,” she said.
He didn’t seem to understand.
“I didn’t want to believe that this is my life…. I always thought going to the gym was for people with low self-esteem.”
He still looked puzzled.
“My husband died a year and a half ago,” Gert said. “My college friend, she goes to the gym…a different one…she suggested I start going. But I resented being here.”
“The gym is supposed to make you feel better, not worse,” the guy said.
“I know,” Gert stammered. “It usually does.” She tried to think of a polite way to leave. She just wanted him to understand so he wasn’t insulted by her snippiness.
“My wife died five years ago,” the guy said suddenly.
Gert stopped.
The guy motioned to the picture on his desk, the one of the older woman. They were quiet, looking at the picture.
“I’m remarried now,” the guy added.
Gert saw there was a different photo by the wall.
“I’m sorry about your loss,” Gert said.
“It’s all right,” the guy said.
But Gert knew it wasn’t really all right. He was lying to himself, like everyone else.
She forced herself to smile, though. He had his pain. Why had she been thinking only of herself?
“Well, I’ll take the intro class,” Gert said.
“You should,” the man said, nodding. “It’ll help you.”
She left. She got the feeling that even though she wasn’t staying to talk more, he understood.
Warm water splattered against Gert’s back. It pummeled her neck, tickled her spine, streamed down her buttocks. She turned toward the shower faucet and let it rail against her face.
Before Marc had died, showers had been a chore to endure on a cold morning. Then, after Marc’s death, she just couldn’t bear them in the winter anymore. It was just so cold and dark out in the morning that she didn’t feel like getting in. She didn’t need to get up and torture herself. The only benefit to showering in the morning rather than at night was that her hair looked better right after a shower and blow-dry. And who cared about that now? Was anyone she saw during the day really going to complain if her hair didn’t look perfect?
But at night, her showers began to take on a new significance. She stayed in for a half hour, let the room steam up, breathed the moisture, felt the warm water beat against her skin. It reached parts of her that had been untouched by human hands for some time.
Nighttime showers were a treat. She turned around, letting the water massage her shoulders. It felt like the most wonderful thing in the world.
She thought of Todd again. Her stomach sank. Now she had two men to miss. Was this supposed to help? Dating only led to more heartbreak.
She wasn’t supposed to think about Todd. Not until he called.
She got out and dried herself off. She found a short skirt. She hadn’t worn it in a while. She put it on to look good, as Missy had recommended. As she left the condo, she did feel kind of sexy. But she wanted to look that way for Todd. She needed another chance.
Gert and Hallie were splitting a fried onion at an Irish pub. When Gert had been little, she’d thought they were healthy—after all, they were onions. Now she knew they were maybe two thousand calories, but for some reason, even Hallie joined her in this trespass against good nutrition. It was a special occasion, after all. It was a night to not talk about Todd.
Instead Gert asked about Brett Stoddard.
“I saw him for the third time yesterday,” Hallie said, “and we sat on my bed and he looked around and he asked about everything I’ve ever been interested in, and I don’t remember a time when I wanted to take someone’s clothes off so badly.” Gert thought of Marc burrowing through her closet. “And I had to sit there and tell him I didn’t want the responsibility of starting to sleep with him. I said I liked how uncomplicated things were and that I wanted to focus more on getting to know each other. And what I know is, it’s killing me! He’s incredible.”
“He knows how to get your attention,” Gert said.
“Exactly,” Hallie said. “The third date is usually the time he bags women, and I could see why. Poor things! If I really believed he was a poet and a cook and a philosopher, I’d be in love with him by now. When I told him I couldn’t sleep with him, he said he understood. Then I watched him leave and I felt crazed. And I spent the next day worrying he’d never call again. But he already has.”
“So it’s working,” Gert said. She got a sinking feeling again that she’d been too easy with Todd.
“Yes! But how long can I hold out?” Hallie said. “All I can think about now is having sex with him. This is not how it’s supposed to be.”
Gert smiled. She looked behind Hallie at all the shamrocks around the pub. If you donated a dollar to muscular dystrophy, you could sign one. “You only said you weren’t going to sleep with him,” Gert said. “You can do other things with him, right?”
“We’ll do them,” Hallie said. “But it won’t be enough for me. I’m just a sucker, aren’t I? Are all women just suckers? There’s some new book on the market now telling men how to seduce us. Why do they need a book to tell them how to treat us? And why does it work so easily?”
“Women aren’t suckers,” Gert said, shaking her head and spearing the mustard cup with an onion shard. “We just have feelings.”
“I know,” Hallie said. “You know what he said on the phone today? He said, ‘You’re the first girl in a long time where I don’t think it’s entirely physical.’ And I’m trying not to let myself get emotional over him. But it’s all related!”
“Maybe you should just go with your feelings,” Gert said.
“No.” Hallie shook her head. “I’d end up just like every girl who dates him—dumped. For once, I’m going to stick it out. I’m not going to let some silly female emotional feelings—and, okay, some physical feelings—ruin this. He’ll be the best boyfriend around.”
Gert was doubtful. But she didn’t think she was one to talk right now.
“You told me not to mention Todd…” Hallie said.
“Let’s don’t.”
“But you’re worried,” Hallie said. “I can tell.”
Gert was.
“With one phone call, I can find out what Brett knows,” Hallie said.
Gert had started to feel crazed. But could Hallie really help her? If she was going to see Todd tomorrow, maybe she should just hold out.
“There’s nothing I can do anyway,” Gert said. “You said it yourself. When women are the ones doing the chasing, it’s never going to work. Todd either wants to keep seeing me, or he doesn’t.”
“But you should at least know what you’re up against.”
“Why would it help?”
“Because,” Hallie said, “then you’ll know if there’s anything you can do to get Todd back. If Todd’s just bored, you can act indifferent next time he calls, and show him you’re not putting pressure on him. And if he does have another girlfriend, then you’re going to have to be seductive and beat her out.”
Gert thought about it. Maybe for once, Hallie’s manipulation would help her.
Gert watched a couple stroll past the front window, laughing. Gert wondered if Todd really did live with a girl. Or maybe he had a girlfriend where the train went. Right now, he might be strolling the
cold streets of Binghamton, holding her hand and telling her about the sprinkles at Busch Gardens. And the girl would have no idea about Gert.
Todd was a great guy. Had he really had only one major relationship by twenty-six? That didn’t seem right.
Maybe he had a girlfriend at every whistlestop.
Yet again, Gert felt naive. Always, naive.
“You know,” Hallie said, “Todd told us these things about Brett, but what if he knows so much because that’s what he does? Todd knew a lot about Brett’s ‘three dates and out’ rule, about how he acts sincere and then dumps girls…. What if all along, Todd’s been telling you about himself?”
Gert nearly dropped her piece of onion.
That was it, wasn’t it?
Todd had asked her lots of questions about herself, especially the night that she had finally told him about Marc. Maybe he’d said all that to try to get into her pants again. A seduction book would tell him to act exactly the way he had acted. And now, for him, the chase was over.
But Todd didn’t seem like that.
How could she know?
“He didn’t dump me after the first time that he…uh…spent the night,” Gert said.
“I know,” Hallie said. “But it doesn’t hurt to know as much as you can. You still haven’t met this guy, Doug, he rooms with. Have you ever talked to him on the phone?”
“I never call Todd’s home number. He uses his cell.”
Hallie looked at her.
Gert felt stupid.
“You don’t have an address, I suppose,” Hallie said.
“I do, somewhere. He sent me a card at work.”
Hallie brightened. “We could go to his place, knock on the door and see if a girl answers,” she said. “Then we’ll leave.”
“What if a guy answers? He’ll tell Todd we were checking up on him.”
“Doug’s never met you, right? He won’t know who you are. Or we can just say we’re delivering something. Then we’ll try to peer inside the apartment.”
Gert didn’t know if this would work. It sounded like something Erika would suggest.
But she wanted to know. Now.
It was nuts, but it would make her feel less nuts to do it.
“What could we be delivering?” Gert asked.
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