I sighed, picking at the plastic mouthpiece on the hookah hose. “Yeah, but he used to be my boy.”
Willow snatched the hose from my hand and took a drag, kicking back further on the couch. “You want to know what I still can’t believe?” she asked, changing the subject. “That you’re training with fucking Rhodes.”
My cheeks flushed. I had debated telling Willow about my personal training, but she was my best friend and would have found out anyway. I did swear her to secrecy, though. The last thing I wanted was Mason or Shay finding out I had signed up at the club the day after they publicly humiliated me. “Scary, huh?”
“That’s putting it lightly. Remember when he was a senior when we started high school? Dude was terrifying. He was in juvie more that year than I was in gym class.”
I chuckled. “I don’t remember what he was always in trouble for.”
“What wasn’t he in trouble for? Him and that group of kids he hung out with were always up to something. Stealing, partying, drunk driving, public nudity — you name it, they were doing it.”
“That’s the thing, though. I don’t really remember him having many friends. He was always kind of a loner, wasn’t he?”
Willow exhaled a long puff of white smoke. “I guess. But anyone he did hang out with was just as rough around the edges as he was.”
Clearing my throat, I pulled my feet up to tuck them under my thighs. “He’s different now.”
“Oh yeah? Different how, Natalie Poxton?” Willow’s brows shot up.
I blushed harder. “I don’t know, he just is.” I wasn’t exactly sure what it was that made me think he was different. He still didn’t talk to me, he was still terrifyingly strong, and he still had a glare that could make a full grown man run and hide. I had no way of knowing if he did drugs or partied with thugs or stole old ladies’ purses. He could very well have been doing all of that and more. But there was something about him that made me think he wasn’t as scary as he seemed.
“You crushin’ on your PT, Nat?” Willow teased, waggling her brows as she handed me the hose again and reached for her water. I narrowed my eyes to glare at her and she laughed out loud before lifting the bottle to her lips. Suddenly, her eyes grew wide and she almost choked on the water. “Holy shit. Isn’t that him?”
I rolled my eyes. “Ha-ha, Willow. You’re hilarious.”
“No.” She swallowed, twisting the cap back on her bottle. “Seriously, look.”
I turned to face the same direction as her and fought to keep my composure when I realized she was right. Rhodes was there, walking straight toward our table. His arm was draped around the shoulders of an older woman. A very, very pretty older woman.
“And is that Mrs. Landers?” Willow asked, her voice raising an octave. Rhodes’ eyes found mine just as the words left her mouth. They were dark in the dim light of Rook, but I could still feel their intensity. He was dressed in dark jeans and a light gray quarter sleeve button-up that accentuated the tan muscles of his forearms. He frowned when he saw me and, like an idiot, I lifted my hand in a small, non-committal wave.
His face hardened further and he strolled right past our table without a word, pulling Mrs. Landers closer into him and moving the hair from her neck so he could whisper into it. She giggled and placed a hand on his stomach as he opened the door and ushered her out into the night.
I was still staring at him open-mouthed when Willow snapped her fingers in front of my face and grabbed the hose from my hand.
“Hello? You there, Nat?” She laughed, shaking her head. “What the hell was that? He acted like he didn’t even know you. And why is he with our anatomy teacher? Maybe she’s teaching him a thing or two. Or vice versa.” She giggled at her own joke and I finally closed my mouth, crossing my arms over my chest.
“We should probably get going. Church in the morning.”
“Ugh, don’t remind me,” she groaned, dropping the hose on the table after one last pull. “I love Jesus, but this town on a Sunday is something else.”
I laughed a little, but my stomach was still in knots as we walked out to the Rover and drove across town to my place. Rhodes had straight up ignored me, which I guess wasn’t really any different than what he did when we trained together, but it still bothered me. Did he always have to have a stick up his ass? And why was he all cuddled up with Mrs. Landers?
My brain ran wild with possibilities as I tossed and turned in bed that night. When I finally did fall asleep, I dreamed of shoplifting with Rhodes and getting arrested. But for some reason I didn’t cry or scream when they put the handcuffs on us and threw us into the back of the cop car. Instead I laughed, and for the first time, Rhodes laughed, too.
I woke up angry on Sunday morning. I thought praying and singing in church would calm me down, but it didn’t. Instead, I found myself not listening to Pastor Mike and thinking about Rhodes and Mrs. Landers. I convinced myself that it wasn’t him with her that upset me, but rather that he didn’t even acknowledge my existence. Up until that point, I thought he just didn’t like to talk much, but acting like he didn’t know me in a public place gave me a new idea. It hit me then that maybe he was ashamed of me. He was my trainer — not my friend — and I knew that, but I wasn’t okay with him treating me like I didn’t matter. I may not have been as beautiful and fit as the other women he trained, but I still deserved to be treated like a paying client.
He didn’t owe me anything. He didn’t have to be my friend. But I couldn’t for the life of me figure out why he insisted on always being such a jerk. He dodged my questions when we trained, opting for silence, instead, and he ignored me the one and only time we bumped into each other outside of the gym. He didn’t want to be my friend? Fine. But I was his client, and he at least needed to be nice to me.
After church, I changed quickly and ran out of the house to head to my training session. I was fuming in the car, going over all the things I would say when I finally got face-to-face with Rhodes. What’s your problem? Am I really that hideous that you can’t say hi to me? What the hell were you doing there with Mrs. Landers?
Of course, as soon as I actually made it inside the training room and was met with those sharp green eyes, everything I’d planned to say flew out into space, leaving me with my arms crossed and foot tapping on the spongy gym floor like a moron.
Rhodes cocked a brow, though his mouth remained a thin line. “You’re late. Get on the treadmill. Bump the incline up to four and the speed to five.”
I glared at him, willing my mouth to open, wishing the words I’d recited would flow from my mouth like I imagined they would if we were in a movie. But I came up empty, and I couldn’t take the heat from his glare any longer so I huffed and climbed onto the treadmill, doing as he said.
Rhodes didn’t take it easy on me that day. After forty-five minutes on the treadmill changing the incline and speed every three minutes, I was drenched and on the verge of passing out. I couldn’t drink water fast enough. Then he had me on the machines. It was leg day, which was news to me, and I found out quickly that leg day sucked. But, I had anger on my side, and I pushed through everything he threw at me.
I tried to take every question I had and use it for fuel to go faster. I focused on the embarrassment and anger I felt when Rhodes ignored me the night before and geared my frustration toward lifting more and lasting longer. I was doing everything I could to ignore what I was feeling and think only of what my body was doing.
Almost as if he knew I was fighting something, Rhodes pushed me harder than he had the entire week before. He made me do more reps when I thought I was done, yelled for me to run faster when I slowed down even the slightest, and got in my face when I murmured that I couldn’t do another set. He knew I was perturbed, but he didn’t ask me about it. He made me work through it. And that just pissed me off more.
When two hours had passed and he told me to get on the Stairmaster, I’d had enough. I tried to push through it, but two minutes in I felt my breakfast threatening
to make a second appearance.
“I’m done,” I said, gasping for air as I hit the stop button on the machine. The stairs halted and I rested on the top one, laying my head on my slick forearm as I stared down at my sneakers. Suddenly, Rhodes’ hands gripped the bar and he lowered his eyes to mine.
His jaw was so square, so set — just having his face inches from mine made me uncomfortable. When he spoke, his voice low but firm, a chill ran down my neck. “No you’re not.”
“Yes.” I lifted my head, wiping the sweat dripping from my forehead with my towel. “I am.”
“Stop quitting. Tell your mind to get out of the way so your body can work.”
“I have been working!” I yelled. I was surprised at the level the words left me, but I wasn’t sorry. I was exhausted. I was pissed. And I was officially at my limit.
“And you’re still working. You’re not done. Let’s go.” He pressed the green button and bumped the speed up to six, forcing me to walk. I smacked his hand away and stopped it again.
“I’m going to throw up.”
He sighed. “No you’re not. You’re just psyching yourself out.”
“I CAN’T DO THIS!” I screamed at the top of my lungs, my chest heaving as I dropped down to the ground from the steps. There were people staring at us then, but I didn’t care. I stepped right up to Rhodes, putting me chest-to-chest with him. I felt intimidated, but I didn’t dare let it show. “All you do is scream at me and push me and I feel like nothing is happening other than me feeling like I want to die every night when I leave here. You never let me breathe, you never smile, you never talk to me, and last night you pretended like you didn’t even know who I was. I don’t know if you’re ashamed to be seen around me or what but I’m not putting up with it. You may be my trainer, Rhodes, but that doesn’t give you the right to be an asshole.”
Rhodes’ eyes were on fire as he stood back, arms crossed, taking every lashing I handed out with my verbal beating. At first he seemed amused, but with every word, his face fall a bit further.
Satisfied with his dumbfounded expression, I tossed my towel over my shoulder and snagged my gym bag from the floor, heading for the Rover.
I was shaking as I strapped on my seatbelt, physical proof that though my words were confident and sure, I was far from both. Starting the car quickly, I pulled out of the club without looking back to see if Rhodes was trying to stop me. My breaths were still hard in my chest and my heart hammering against my ribs when I made it home.
The house was quiet as I dropped my bag at the door. I heard Mom on the phone down the hall, but I headed for the kitchen first, grabbing a Gatorade out of the fridge. I chugged half of it before heading toward where I heard Mom’s voice. I wasn’t sure the whole training thing was for me anymore, but before I made any decisions, I wanted her advice. My hand lifted to knock on the door frame when I heard my name. Pausing, I tucked my hand back to my side and leaned back against the wall, straining to hear what she was saying.
“I’m proud of her, I just hope she can stick to it. You and I both know the kids in college won’t be as kind as the kids here in Poxton Beach. No one knows who she is or who her father is there. They’ll judge her based on her looks. I think she sees that, too. I’m just glad she’s finally doing something about it.”
My chest tightened and my throat grew thick with something I couldn’t quite swallow down. I silenced my breath as much as I could, trying to hear her soft voice more clearly, but my heart was beating like a helicopter in my ears.
“Yeah, exactly. Natalie has always been pretty, but I can’t wait to see what she looks like once this trainer is done with her. And she’ll feel so much better when she’s not carrying around so much weight.”
An ache ripped through my chest as she paused on the phone, the other person talking now.
“Oh, no, I, um… I think he’s getting better. We haven’t had any instances recently. He’s just a man, I don’t hold any of it against him.”
She had moved on to something else, something that I didn’t have a clue about. But I clearly understood the conversation before that. A familiar sting hit my nose and I sniffed, wiping at it quickly before walking as quickly and quietly as I could back to the living room. I snagged my camera off the coffee table and slipped back out the front door, pulling it shut almost silently behind me.
I was shaking even worse now and I dropped the keys to the Range Rover twice before finally climbing inside, carefully setting my camera in the passenger seat beside me. My hands found the wheel and I gripped it tight, heart beating in my ears, breaths coming erratically. When I pushed the START button and the engine purred to life, it was like a sort of numbness settled over me. My muscles were becoming more aware of the hell I’d put them through that afternoon while my mind tried to process everything I’d just heard.
Mom was right. I did know that college would be different, should I decide to go. I knew that no one would know who I was, that maybe who I was had something to do with the friends I had here in Poxton Beach. But hearing those things from her killed me. Had she always thought I was overweight? Had she always wished that I would do something about it? Was she ashamed of me, too?
My mind was spinning as I drove to the beach. I felt tears stinging the corners of my eyes but they didn’t fall. I pulled into Dale’s reserved parking spot near the pier and threw my camera strap around my neck before peeling off my sneakers and socks and walking slowly onto the beach.
When my toes hit the sand, I powered on my camera and lifted the viewfinder to my left eye, snapping the first photo.
Click.
Just hearing the soft, familiar sound let my breaths come easier than before.
I shot everything and nothing. The water, the sand, a seashell stuck in seaweed, a man and his daughter down the beach building a castle, the old and decaying building on the other side of the pier. I snapped and clicked until my arms were numb from holding the camera and my face was numb from the tears I hadn’t realized had started falling.
It was the first time in my life I fully admitted to myself that I wasn’t happy.
I wasn’t happy with who I was. Or how I looked. Or how I felt. Ever since I could remember, I depended on food for everything — comfort, celebration, mourning. And now that I had finally started to take control and do something about it, I didn’t feel support from anyone around me — save for Willow, who would likely be gone in just a few weeks.
Even my trainer didn’t believe in me.
It was like they all looked at me with pity in their eyes. Poor Natalie Poxton. But I didn’t want to be that girl anymore. If my life was to be a story, I wanted to take control of the pen. I wanted to change the paper, crumple up what had been written so far and start over.
I just hoped I could actually do it.
I wasn’t sure if I was still crying when the sun started to set, only that I didn’t care anymore. I let myself break as I shot the pink and purple streaks across the Carolina sky. I knew right then and there, on a warm Sunday evening with my feet sinking into the sand at the edge of the ocean, that this summer would be the hardest of my life. It would either change me for the better or shatter me completely.
But maybe I needed to break, to fully fall to pieces, before I could ever truly be whole.
I debated not even showing up for my training session the next day, but I dragged my butt to the gym against my own will. I knew I’d have to face Rhodes after going off on him the day before but I hoped he would just let it go. That’s what I was prepared to do. The night before had set a new resolve for me and I was ready to get to work. Even if I was the only one in my corner, I was going to fight for a new me. The summer after high school was supposed to be about change, movement, progress. I was determined to turn my life around and I wasn’t going to waste a single second because of some jerk who’d always been a jerk, anyway. He didn’t think I could do it? Fine.
I would prove him wrong.
Just like I’d prove Mason wr
ong, and he’d realize giving me up was a mistake. Then, I’d be back under his arm, under his sheets on rainy Sundays — back where I belonged.
Even with my new determination, I couldn’t meet Rhodes’ eyes when I walked through the gym door. Walking straight up to the treadmill, I hit the QUICK START button and began walking, staring straight ahead out the window that overlooked the golf course. After a minute had passed, Rhodes walked over to stand in front of the machine. He leaned over and paused it, bracing his hands on either side of the display and blocking my view of the course, forcing me to look at him. When I finally did pull my eyes to his, his features were softer. I tried not to notice the way his hair flitted over his brows as they pulled together and he exhaled.
“I’m sorry, Natalie.”
I shivered a bit when he said my name, but I wasn’t sure why. Maybe because he was just saying it like a normal person yet for some reason the three syllables rolling off his tongue shot straight down between my thighs.
“I’m not sorry for pushing you, but I’m sorry for upsetting you.” His lips pressed together for a moment before he continued. “And I’m not ashamed of you.” Rhodes held my gaze. Even when I tried to look at the ground, he moved his head down into my view until I looked at him again. “Exactly the opposite, actually. You work hard. You want this, for whatever reason, and I can see it. That’s why I push you. I know you can work harder, go faster, lift more. I’m proud to have you as my client.”
I scoffed, the anger I felt from Saturday night resurfacing. “Oh yeah? Is that why you completely ignored me at Rook when I saw you with your…” I paused, not sure what to call Mrs. Landers. “Girlfriend?”
His mouth flattened into a thin line. “She’s a client, Natalie.”
“Is that right? Well damn, do you kiss on the necks of all your clients? I’ve been getting jipped.” I couldn’t believe those words just left my mouth and my cheeks flushed immediately, but I stood straight and kept my eyes on his.
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