I Was Here All Along

by Blake, Penny

  While everyone milled around with their partners, I left my studio-issued mat on the floor, slipped out the side door and ran to my car, vowing never to speak of, or even think of, the incident ever again.

  Now I would take the same approach with Total Impact Fitness, and maybe with exercise in general. It seemed like every time I tried to get in shape, it only lead to humiliation.

  Maybe I should just give up once and for all. Maybe some people just weren’t meant to exercise. And I needed to embrace myself the way I was, then find a nice chubby chaser to embrace me, someone who would see my extra pounds as a positive.

  I’m biting into a mozzarella stick and contemplating where I might meet a gentleman who prefers larger ladies when my cell phone rings. “Hello?”

  “Ember, it’s Rio. From the gym. You never called.”

  “Oh, sorry,” I say through a mouthful of fried cheese. “I was going to call you later.”

  “Well the gym is closed now. How’s your head?”

  “I told you, I’m fine. No lumps, bruises, headaches—nothing.”

  “Good, then come to the gym tomorrow morning at 8:00 and I’ll give you a complimentary training session. We’ll talk about your fitness goals and begin to put a plan into action. I’ll see you then.”

  “Uh, okay.”

  Then he hangs up. I stare at my phone in shock. Who did this guy this he was? And what had I just agreed to?

  I’m not going back to that gym. I’d already shamed myself in front of him and a whole room full of people. There’s no way in hell I’m subjecting myself to that again. What gave this guy the right to call my personal phone and bully me into doing something I have no intention of doing? I call him back.

  “Hello, Rio speaking,” he answers.

  “Um…hi, it’s me again. So…I won’t be coming in tomorrow. I’ll be working on my fitness routine on my own, but I appreciate your offer.”

  “What is your regime going to be like? And what’s your diet plan? Will it be high protein, low carb or calorie control?”

  “Well…I’m just kind of taking it one day at a time. Free-styling it as they say.”

  “That’s not going to work. If you’re serious about your health, you need a concrete diet and exercise plan. Let’s talk about it tomorrow. Eight o’ clock, you and me. Be on time.” And he hangs up.

  “God damn it!” I yell at the phone. But I get off my bed, brush the crumbs off my chest, and make sure I have clean gym clothes for tomorrow.

  Chapter 8

  The Fighter

  When I ask for Rio, the guy at the front desk tells me he’s in the boxing room and points to the back of the gym. Total Impact is surprisingly busy for 8:00 in the morning. It’s then I realize I’m probably here at the same time as the highly motivated exercise-before-going-to-work crowd. A quick look at all the fit bodies around me confirms my theory.

  I make my way to the back of the room to find Rio, and he’s a sight to behold.

  Yesterday I’d been so focused on my own embarrassment that I had little time to drink him in. But standing in the doorway watching him, I’m completely mesmerized.

  He’s wearing boxing gloves and a tank top that shows off massive biceps and shoulders. He doesn’t notice me and continues wailing on the punching bag, relentlessly pounding on it with powerful blows that cause his muscles to flex and ripple. There’s a sweaty sheen over his powerful arms and gorgeous face, and an intense focus in his dark blue eyes as he pummels the bag.

  He’s a vision of masculine grace and power, and a jolt of pure lust shoots straight through me. It makes me feel lightheaded, and for a second I get the urge to turn around and flee, but that’s when his eyes light on mine, and he smiles. A gorgeous white smile that softens his face and makes my mind go blank.

  “Ember, you came! I wasn’t sure if you’d show.”

  “I said I would, so…I try to keep my promises,” I say, trying to shake off my mental haze so I can carry on a normal conversation.

  “So you’re okay after your fall? I was worried about you.”

  “The only thing I hurt was my pride—and maybe my ankle. It was a little sore this morning, but I could have just slept on in wrong.”

  “Come on,” he says, leading me through the gym. “Let’s stretch you out first. When we work out, I’ll go easy on the ankle.” He stops in front of a large mat and points to it. “Lay down.”

  “Aren’t you going to buy me a drink first?” I ask as I lie on my back.

  He completely ignores my comment and instructs me to bring my leg up to my chest, not unlike the pose that ended my yoga career. I make a special effort to ensure that no gasses are emitted.

  He sits down next to me on the mat and holds my calf in his hands, then presses my leg down against my chest to stretch the muscle. “How does that feel?” he asks.

  Like heaven. His face is just inches from mine, and I suspect that I’m being bombarded by his pheromones, because I feel hot, cold and dizzy at the same time.

  At 5’ 9’’, I always wished I was small and delicate like my sister. But Rio’s tall, broad and loaded with muscle, and being close to him makes me feel tiny and feminine in comparison, not an easy feat. It’s all I can do not to pull him closer, bury my head in his neck and inhale the scent of him. His warm sweaty skin and rich male potency.

  “Are you okay?” he asks. “Your face looks red.”

  “It’s nothing.” I say, searching for an excuse. “Just a hot flash. I get them sometimes.”

  He gives me an odd look and presses down on my other leg, sending a pool of liquid heat straight to my sex. “Okay!” I say, scootching away. “That’s enough. I think I’m fully stretched now. Let’s get this workout started.

  ***

  We’ve just finished a series of squats, lunges, planks, crunches and bicep curls. I’m gulping down water and catching my breath when he says, “I noticed on your registration that your first name is listed as Ember, but on the driver’s license we have on file, it says December.”

  “Yeah, my real name is December but I shortened it to Ember as a kid.”

  “A nickname? Ah, December. I get it now. What made you change it?”

  I shrug. “Well, my last name is Snowe, so together the whole thing sounds kind of corny. December Snowe? My sister’s name is April—April Snowe—and she totally rocks it. But me?” I shake my head. “Ember suits me better.”

  “You stick with me and I’ll make you into a new woman. You’re already a very pretty girl. Even now you could be a plus size model.”

  “Uh, thanks. I think.”

  “Or maybe not a plus size model, not yet,” he continues. “I think you need to lose a little weight before that could happen.”

  I give him a sharp look and he holds up his hands. “I only say that because most plus size models are thin. Regular models are unnaturally thin. No one looks like that, and most of them aren’t healthy. Plus size models tend to look like ordinary girls—most of them don’t even look overweight, so I find it strange that they’re called plus size. But if you lose some weight, you can look like an ordinary girl who models—a plus size model—that’s what I’m trying to say.”

  “Okay,” I say, deciding to take it as a poorly worded compliment. “I know it’s going to take some work, but what I want, what I really, really want, is to be a size four.” I think of the tiffany blue dress my sister wore to the wedding. When I moved into April’s apartment, I found it in her closet. I checked the tag and saw that it was a size four, then just to torture myself, I held it against myself in the mirror. It was so small in comparison to my body that it might as well have been a child’s size.

  But now, standing in the gym in my new workout clothes, my limbs feeling like jelly after an hour of intense exercise, the thought of asking my sister to borrow her dress someday doesn’t seem completely impossible.

  Rio is standing with his hands on his hips, nodding at me thoughtfully. “I’ve trained a lot of people, and I can usually t
ell right away if they have what it takes to meet their goals. And you?” He nods. “I believe in you—you have what it takes. You know why?”

  “Why?”

  “Because just yesterday, you fell off that treadmill right over there and passed out on the floor.”

  “Yeah, I really didn’t need to be reminded of that.”

  “Yet you came back the very next morning and pushed yourself to the limit without one complaint. I saw in your face how hard this was for you—especially the plank—and yet you pushed yourself all the way through it.”

  I’ve seen enough episodes of The Biggest Loser to know that the fat people always cried when they first started working out, and it’s not attractive, so I tried to power through it without breaking down or freaking out.

  Rio nods approvingly, and it makes me way happier than it should. “Right now you’re Ember Snowe, and Ember is very beautiful and very strong. But train with me, and I’ll turn you into December Snowe. You’ll be a fitter, healthier, more confident version of yourself, and you will be a knock out. You’ll have men eating out of your hand.”

  “I just want to be a size four,” I say, thinking of my sister’s dress. “I know it’s a long shot, but that’s my goal.”

  “Why is that a long shot?” he asks, and before I can answer he says, “You see that woman over there?” He points to someone who’s tan, cut and probably 0% body fat tearing it up on a weight machine. Her level of fitness seems completely unattainable, and I feel depressed again.

  “I think you’re losing me here Rio, you might want to go another direction with the pep talk.”

  “This isn’t a pep talk, December. You listen to me.” He puts his hands on my shoulders, his face inches from mine as looks me directly in the eyes. “There’s only one difference between you and her, understand? It’s up here.” He touches my temple. “She wasn’t born physically superior to you. She has a different attitude—that’s the only difference. And it makes a big difference, doesn’t it? So you change this.” He touches my temple again, sending a frission of energy through me. “And you change all this.” He gives me a quick, clinical look up and down, then meets my eyes again. “You got it?”

  His closeness, intensity and belief in me are overpowering, so it’s all I can do to hold his gaze and nod my head.

  “Good.” He smiles. “I’ll see you tomorrow morning.”

  Chapter 9

  Truth or Dare

  Sex with Brian had been familiar, comforting and tender. It was usually a lights off affair, with him on top and me on the bottom, and at the end he’d kiss me on the nose and tell me he loved me. On Valentine’s Day, he’d always give me a silk nightie that showed off my best asset, my large breasts. I would wear it for about two minutes before turning off the lights and stripping it off, and that’s about as wild as we got.

  But now that Rio sent my hormones into overdrive—and I’d been without regular sex for the first time in years—I wanted to get my freak on. I didn’t even know what that meant, but I wanted to find out.

  To educate myself, I looked at some internet porn, and then imagined Rio and I doing the exact same things. Him pinning my arms behind my back and taking me doggystyle. Or planting his head between my thighs and licking me slowly, gently easing his fingers inside me and sliding them in and out. Or plunging his tongue in my mouth and shooting his hot white essence all over my stomach.

  I’m not going to lie. I spend the afternoon going at myself like a horny teenage boy, and I’m about to go another round when the front door swings open. I’m on the couch and fortunately, my nether regions are hidden under a blanket. I quickly pull my hand up and put it in full view just in time. My sister comes in the door and drops a small duffel bag by the door, looking at me strangely.

  “It smells weird in here,” she says. “Bad, like something died. Of leprosy, and then spent a week rotting in the sun.”

  For a minute I’m paranoid that while exercising my self love, I released some kind of crotch funk I wasn’t aware I had. Then I realize it’s the lingering stench of the microwave tempeh chili that I picked up at the health food store on my way home from the gym. It tasted even worse than it smelled, so I dumped it in the trash and ate a monster salad instead.

  “Whose are these?” April asks, picking up my running shoes.

  “Mine—I joined a gym today. I got a personal trainer, and I’m keeping a food journal.”

  “Oh my God, that’s such great news, Ember.” She sits next to me on the couch. “You’ve always been so self conscious about your weight. This is going to make you feel so good.”

  I shrug. “It was only my first day, so we’ll see how it goes.”

  “This calls for celebration,” she says, retrieving her duffle bag and pulling out a bottle of wine. She goes to the kitchen and comes back holding two glasses of Merlot. She hands me one and makes her way to the iPod deck in the corner.

  When she turns it on, Dolly Parton’s version of I Will Always Love You comes on. “What the hell is ‘When Forever Ends’?” April shuts off Dolly Parton and shoots me an accusatory look. “I wanted to give you some space while you went through your grieving period, but if I knew it was this bad, I would have staged an intervention.”

  She fiddles with the iPod and puts on Pink’s So What, I’m Still A Rockstar. “Now that’s a break up song,” she says, sitting next to me on the couch, wine in hand. “So does this mean you’re coming out of your funk? Because I’ve been trying to give you space—I figured the last thing you need is me and Drew under your feet being all gross and lovey dovey when you’re in the middle of a huge break up.” She puts her hand on my knee. “But I miss you.”

  “Where is Drew, by the way?” I ask. “I thought you two were attached at the hip.”

  “That’s only because I’ve been trying to give you space.” She reaches for her phone. “I’ll text him and tell him you and I are hanging out tonight.”

  ***

  About half way through the bottle of wine, April and I decide to play an old favorite game of ours from when we were kids.

  “Truth or dare?” she asks.

  “Truth.” I sip my wine and watch her bite her lip and stare intently at the space above my head, searching for a good question.

  Her eyes light up. “Tell me about this personal trainer.” She waggles her eyebrows, knowing me all too well.

  “Three words: so fucking hot. Oh my god, April, you have no idea. He’s this massive beast of a man with huge muscles and the most manly, gorgeous face ever.”

  “I figured. The food journal was a dead giveaway. You’d never do something like that on your own. So are you gonna eee-er eee-er eee-er eee-er,” she says, indicating the sound of a creaking bed.

  “No! He’s my trainer, not a male prostitute. And anyway, I need his help. There’s something really motivational about having a hot personal trainer. It’s like you want to impress him, so it motivates you to work extra hard.”

  “Mmmm, extra hard. She waggles her eyebrows again. “Okay, now me—truth or dare.” Before I can reply she says, “Dare!” She always picks dare, nine times out of ten.

  I think for a minute before saying, “Call Drew and tell him—and it has to be convincing—that you had a sex change operation. You used to be a man.”

  She nods confidently, grabs her phone and puts it on speakerphone. It rings three times before he picks up. “Hey beautiful,” he says.

  “Drew, there’s something I need to talk to you about. It’s serious.” She has a big smile on her face, and I know he’s never going to believe her.

  “Am I on speaker phone?”

  “Yeah, Ember’s here. She’s giving me emotional support so I can admit something very difficult. I’ve wanted to tell you about this for a long time, but I didn’t know how.” April looks at me with a huge smile and puts her hand over her mouth.

  “What is it?”

  “Well, before we met…I wasn’t the person you know today.”

  “O
kay.”

  “I didn’t know how to tell you, but since we’ve gotten so serious, I feel like you deserve to know. I used to be a man. I used to have a peen, but now I have a poon.”

  I put a pillow over my face and lay back on the couch to stop myself from laughing.

  “Uh huh,” he says patiently. “Well that’s very brave of you to tell me. And now that you’ve been honest with me, I feel free to tell you something that I’ve been hiding.”

  “What?” asks April.