The bike’s screws are orange with brown rust and don’t seem to turn properly. I can just hear this awful screech every time I dare turn a knob. I hear the door open. Forget it, I’ll just ride the bike the way it is. An older woman with a pixie face enters. She looks like one of those wrinkled hairless cats. She starts fiddling around with these weird trainers she has on that look like tap shoes. Bet she actually enjoys eating raw seaweed as a snack.
‘Do you need some help?’ she asks me.
‘Yes please.’
‘Have you been to spin before?’
‘Sort of.’
‘Come here, let me help you.’ She taps over with her silly showy-off shoes. Trip. Trap. Trap. ‘You have to have the seat hip height and the handlebars need to be a forearm away, like this … stand there.’ She measures me. ‘Gosh, you are tall, so let’s bring the seat up a bit. These things are quite rusty! They need oiling.’ She screeches the seat up with a bang; it locks into place. ‘Try that?’
I hop clumsily onto the seat. ‘Yeah, that’s better.’ But the poor donkey bike beneath me groans in pain. Shut up, you.
‘Good. OK, now pedal for me …’
I start turning my legs. I feel self-conscious pedalling on demand; what if it’s just her and me? One-on-one spin tuition. Surely that’s a good thing but the thought alone makes me feel physically sick. ‘Your legs shouldn’t fully lock when they straighten; you need a bit of give.’ I nod. ‘And when cycling on a resistance you mustn’t be pushing too hard so that your knees are struggling. No strain, OK, knees always forward. You push and pull from here … yes, that’s good.’ She smiles and swivels the gear dial around for me. ‘And when you’re on a lower resistance, when we sprint, like this, you mustn’t be bobbing around in the seat like you are now; you should be locked in, firm, you see? Engaging all the muscles, the core, the arms. Keep your form. You don’t want to injure yourself. And breathe. You’ll soon get the hang of it.’
More people start to enter and the room suddenly fills. Phew. It’s not just us. Thank goodness.
This instructor seems so nice, no wonder it’s a full class.
She pulls a headset out of her bag. Why’s she got that? There are a lot of people, I suppose. It must be quite hard to hear, plus her voice is quite soft. Fine. OK. I gently begin to turn and the wheels spin in response. Others begin arranging their bikes just like I had been taught moments before except they don’t need guidance. I watch how everybody fixes theirs. People exercise for different reasons: weight loss, fitness, habit, depression, alone time, boredom, last-minute bridezilla panic, last-minute holiday panic …
The instructor swings one leg over her bike at the front, which is facing us, like a cowgirl mounting a horse. Still, I’m glad we have an older lady taking the class, it should be nice and relaxed. Miles away from the nightclub Ibiza trauma.
She then affixes her microphone and peels her top off … errr, why does she have a six-pack and a flat pair of breasts? If I tried to take my top off, while wearing a headset, I would be suffocated. But oh no, not her two little kidney-bean perkies popping out of her tiny yellow belly top. Her arms are muscly and toned. Her stomach is ripped, muscles pinging out of every square. I was NOT expecting that bod.
‘She’s had four kids, you know,’ a woman with a tash whispers in my ear. ‘Un-belivable.’
I gawp.
‘RIGHT!’ she roars at us – awwwright, motor mouth! ‘YOU LOT ALREADY DECIDED HOW MUCH ENERGY YOU WERE GOING TO SPEND IN THIS ROOM TODAY. I WANT TO SEE THIS SPIN CLASS SPEND YOUR ENERGY LIKE THE MONEY YOU SPENT IN YOUR GAP YEAR WHEN YOU WERE EIGHTEEN …’
Can everybody stop going on about bloody gap years? I gulp. I’m not even seventeen. I haven’t even got any money to spend today let alone in a year. Still, I pedal … everybody else is. I’m gathering by the class’s reaction that this must be her weekly motivational speech.
‘I WANT YOU TO WORK HARDER THAN YOU’VE EVER WORKED, SWEAT LIKE YOU’VE NEVER SWEATED AND DON’T STOP … UNTIL YOU CHUCK!’
Chuck? What does she mean? Vomit? Surrounding spinners pant like thirsty dogs, sniggering at the idea of being eighteen. Chortling at the thought of chucking. Meanwhile I feel food rising in my throat.
‘LET’S GO!’ And the music begins as she roars, ‘WELCOME TO HELL!’
The music is some sort of heavy death metal. Loud screeching electric guitars and terror-tomb drums. A big screamy high-pitched voice sneering away.
Oh. God. Oh. God. Oh …
HELL?
THUMP. THUMP. TURN. TURN. MORE. MORE. HARDER. HARDER. GO. GO. GO. GO. ROUND. ROUND. Heart is pumping. Legs are burning. Sweat is POURING. Head is spinning. Ears are blurring. Blinding. Eyes are watering. Nose is dripping. ROOM is tight. Air is NOWHERE. Sweat from my forearms. My chest. And all around me are other people. Competitively spinning and groaning and churning with gritted teeth and crinkled eyes and wrinkled foreheads and spinning legs that look as though they might take off like that scene from E.T. where they cycle past the moon. In fact, the man in front of me is cycling so hard that sweat is just squirting onto the ground. I’m trying to catch somebody’s eye to do an eye-roll or something, any sign to be like …’HELLO? ISN’T THIS HELL? IS IT JUST ME OR ARE WE ALL DYING? ARE WE ALL INSANE?’
But they’re all locked in, spinning tight. Normal people, hypnotised. And I am on the outside, staring in at the discipline and strength, just thinking HOW? I look up at the instructor as she bellows at us to turn on another gear. Her six-pack is splattered in pearls of sweat, her taut, ripped body is churning as she tells us to go up again. Why is she not drinking water?
‘COME ON!’ she yells again.
And the whole room spins so fast that the sound changes to a whisking noise, like spinning cupcake batter on a high speed. I taste blood in my mouth. Rancid iron mixed with phlegm. I think of my remarkable sister. I am spinning for her. Keeping fit for her. My heart beating for her. For me.
The music is buzzing, vibrating through the metal frame, and I am pounding, spinning, sweating in my oversized T-shirt and I want to take my top off so badly but nobody else is. EVEN though it’s boiling hot and all I have on underneath is my one sports bra. My boobs are so big, I don’t want them flopping around but the instructor, she’s only wearing a crop top too, surely it’s fine. Everybody else just seems to be suffering, panting away with red raw cheeks. Oh, whatever.
I take my top off. People stare. WHATEVER. Fudge off!
THAT’S BETTER. PHEW. I feel my boobs and arms rattling away. My back fat quivers. My sweat trickles into all my folds, leaking into the flesh but WOW I feel better. Stronger. My tummy fat rolls over my leggings and the lip of the elastic is all folded down. Teeth gritting. I’m like a girl in one of those adverts to show that girls can do stuff. Locked in.
GO! GO! GO, ME! YES! And pant. Pant. CLIMB THAT MOUNTAIN. CAN. CAN. CAN! A dot of sweat from my head lands on my wrist. I watch it splash.
And … as if by magic, it happens …
The endorphin hits …
I am alive. POW! WOW! BOOM! KA-POW! RAAHAHAHAAHHHHHHHHHHH! I FEEL SO AMAZING! Like a wicked spell has been cast over me and I reel in the thrill of the drill of my heart as the music switches I realise I am smashing it to It’s Raining Men! YEAH IT IS! Hallelujah!
And before I know it we are winding down, bikes are slowing. The music changes tempo, soft and simple. We can stretch. We can settle. Bones crack and creak like grandfather clocks, like fractured antiques. We clap. We say well done to each other and thank you. A fully grown adult man tries to high-five me but we miss; it’s awkward because we’re tired and also I’ve never really been good at high-fives anyway, especially with a stranger – no, with anybody. They make me anxious. We wipe our bikes down. The mirrors are foggy with a mist of sweat and condensation. I can’t see myself even if I wanted to. Pant. Pant. Red. Lungs crushing. Arms rattling. Legs zinging.
I did it. I actually did it.
I am the last to leave …
‘Well done,�
�� she says to me. ‘You did really well.’
And I go over to the mirror and write the letters BB in the steamy mist.
SUSHI
I grab one of those little sushi trays from a sandwich shop on the way to the gym. Japanese people must laugh at our sushi. Even I know it’s embarrassing and I know nothing. But I like the idea of it as a snack and using the little plastic fish of soy sauce to dribble over my rolls. Mum and Dad think it’s hilarious that kids eat sushi these days. It was so exotic to them. You know the wasabi, in most places, isn’t even wasabi. It’s horseradish dyed green. It’s really hard to grow wasabi here. It’s OK though. Too cold. A bit cloddy. I LOVE horseradish.
When I work at Planet Coffee more I’ll save up all my tips and take Dove to Japan to eat real sushi. I think of Max. And the cafe with the cats. Shame that never came to anything.
BAGELS
Everybody fights over who invented the bagel but I can completely understand this because did you know bagels are poached for a bit in water before baking? Who even thought to do that? They are amazing.
SALAD CREAM
I know it’s gross but sometimes I really enjoy taking a page from the book of ham in the fridge and dolloping a splodge of salad cream inside it and wrapping it up like an envelope wonton parcel and eating it down like a snake would an egg.
I like the vinegary sweetness of it.
Salad cream really can bring any sandwich to life.
I think about calling Max back. But is he the kind of person I can eat salad cream ham wontons in front of? I just don’t know.
Besides, these days, I might intimidate him with my own mighty wonder-self and badass strength.
GREEN TEA
After basically being a boss at spin I decide to try yoga. Some people have brought their own mats. I don’t even have a mat. I should get a mat. Where do you even get a yoga mat from? Can’t you just use a towel? Will people judge me if I use one of the gym’s mats? Why am I worrying? SHUT UP.
The teacher is an older man. The sort of man my dad would hate because he seems like the kind of person that is an accidental millionaire and just does this job for the fun of it. We start on our feet. Talking about posture. The gaps between our feet. Our hips. Breath and shoulders. We all watch our reflections in the mirror. Some can’t do it. They avert their eyes. We are all different. With bits that go in and go out, that curve and fold. We are different ages, with different interests. The only thing we all have in common is that we all have bodies that we want to, or need to, take care of.
Yoga is actually quite hard. There are bits where my body shakes, my muscles trembling weakly under the weight of me. Sometimes the mat slips, my hand so sweaty that I slide forward. Sometimes I can’t wait for a pose to finish, so I can untangle myself and rest. My breathing is short and stubby in places; other times I find my breath has held itself all together and my jaw is so clenched that my teeth feel like they might be cracking and I have to remember to let the breath go. My knees stiffen. I can only just touch my toes. Some people can’t even touch their knees but nobody is bothered by that in here. Once I warm up and relax I start to enjoy it. I like warrior pose, where the instructor tells me to pretend I have a laser beam of light shooting from my middle finger, and then in triangle pose I look up to my open hand pointing towards the sky. I let my spine twist. I like the animal names of the poses: the hare, the cat, the cow, the cobra, the downward dog. It’s so visual. We put our hands to our hearts. We rub our hands to ‘make warmth’ then we place the warm hands on our chest. It’s nice.
I could get used to this yoga business, I think. But then, suddenly, the whole class betray me and zip up into headstands. HUH? WHAT? When did we become acrobats, please? Even the old people are doing it. And I’m just on the floor, in child’s pose, out of my depth. The youngest in the room and maybe the least agile and flexible.
Great. Yoga is annoying anyway. Green tea tastes like fish-gutty pond water.
BUT THEN we get to lie back on the mats and relax. I do a position called ‘corpse’. But I don’t feel dead. I feel far from it. My mind is racing. Thinking about Dove and her life and her body. About what’s going on in her brain. How small we are. I’m thinking about all the things I’m going to do this year. And something changes. I feel a small tear sneak out of my eye. They might call this reflection. I don’t know what it is. Because it isn’t sad tears. Is it OK to be this young and confused? I feel overwhelmed, flooded with promise. I think about how exciting and scary it is to be alive. Why it matters so much: because we care. Because it’s all so important and precious. You know … whoever is reading this … confidence isn’t something you can buy on a shelf in a chemist and roll under your armpits to protect you. Confidence isn’t something you can simply dream up or manifest. It comes from a place deep down. It’s a muscle, just like a bicep or the imagination, that needs training and attention; it can’t go to sleep. Self-love needs reminding. Needs activating and strengthening. You have to love yourself. It’s the start of everything, the rest will follow naturally.
OIL
‘I didn’t throw the oil away, all the oil is there.’
‘That one we got in Greece, in the can, that’s gone!’
‘It’s all gone because you used it; it was empty!’
‘You could have asked me.’
‘You weren’t here, you weren’t living here before Dove –’ Mum stops herself. ‘Why would I keep your stuff here if you weren’t here?’
‘It’s still perfectly good food regardless of whether or not I’m here.’
‘Perfectly good food?’ Mum laughs. ‘Bill, ask the girls, ask the girls if a seven-year-old jar of anchovies counts as “perfectly good food”.’
‘I’ve been putting this stuff in food for years. It’s preserves. You don’t have to worry about sell-by dates and all that rubbish – it’s the supermarket’s way of convincing you to buy more.’
‘I’m sorry, but we didn’t all grow up in the olden days of black-and-white televisions where everything came in a tin or vinegar!’
‘You’re just being spiteful now, Lucy.’
‘You’re just being unreasonable.’
‘Me? That was hundreds of pounds of produce.’
‘Hundreds of pounds. You’d get more for your moth-eaten tracksuit bottoms.’
And Dad bolts over to us both, kisses us both on the head, puts a lead around Not 2B’s neck and storms out of the house.
It was actually me who used all that Greek olive oil so that’s how I know Mum’s telling the truth.
I am well into oil. It has pretty much become one of my main actual factual interests. When I was little I thought of oil more like a cleaning product. I knew it was useful but now I could HONESTLY drink a pint of olive oil. I’m assuming no nurse has the time to read this whole diary like an actual book so it won’t be a problem if I say that my favourite way to have oil is slathered over ripe tomatoes with salt crystals like snowflakes that are as big as clip-on earrings, or just fill a dish and plonk a wodge of crusty bread in and let it sail and sink in the silky green gloopiness.
The oil is always the main event.
Groundnut oil is one of the newest members of my squad. You know groundnut oil makes the best roast potatoes in the world? You have to buy Maris Piper potatoes, peel them, chop them into lovely coffin shapes, boil them up until you can poke a knife easily right through, drain them, bash them about in a colander and then let them cool. Completely. Overnight if you can bear it. The idea is to let them chill with all that fluffy crust around them. In the midnight air, they sort of become frozen yetis. Then smother them in groundnut oil, sea salt, garlic cloves and rosemary … Makes the best potatoes ever.
I am not surprised it took me ages to re-like oil again. It was what I used to smear in between my thighs to make the tops of my legs not rub when I was younger. It only made them worse and fried up my inner thighs like pork chops.
Dad will be back any minute because he really will regret taking
that stupid stinking Dalmatian with him.
‘Thank God, I thought he’d managed to move back in for a second,’ says Mum. ‘I was about to make up an elaborate lie that we had to get the whole house fumigated for termites so he couldn’t come back.’
The termite being – well, you guessed it – Dad.
ICE
It’s boiling at Planet Coffee. My mascara is dribbling down my face, weeping, and Alicia is fanning herself with every available makeshift fan she can find. Because of the insane weather we have a massive queue for iced coffees.
‘Guys, guys, we need more ice,’ she orders, hands on her still pretty much flat belly. Sometimes it blows my mind to think there’s an actual PERSON in there. ‘More ice, now, can you both go? We need a lot. A LOT, A LOT!’
Max and I, aprons still on, leave Planet Coffee and, waiting for the cool breeze, instead get punched in the face with the smack of more hot air.
‘Wow, was the air con on in there? It felt boiling.’
‘It’s warmer out here than in there!’
‘OK, supermarket?’
We jog as quickly as we can towards the supermarket. Max is so tall and his strides are effortless and long and elegant and I’m like a hybrid of a turtle and a pug snorting beside him. Even though I’ve been going to the gym, I’m not like him. I’m panting, red-faced and sweaty. Even my top lip is sweating. My hair has gone frizzy and is sticking to my face. If I wasn’t with Max I’d be calling Cam confessing that this was a major setback to my personal fitness. WHEN does fitness kick in so that you are able to just, like, swim the River Thames and not even feel it?
The closest supermarket is completely out of ice and the queues are so long too.
‘What?’ Max moans. ‘How can they be out of ice?’
‘It is a Saturday and the hottest day of the year, Max. BBQ day.’
Big Bones Page 24
