Romantic Comedy Box Set (Helen Grey Series Books 1 & 2)

by Hodge, Sibel

  ‘Well, that about wraps it up for tonight. I will be signing books for purchasers in the next few minutes.’

  ‘I’m going to get one,’ I said to Kalem and leapt up to be the first one in the queue. After hearing horrible things about itchy bums and up-ya-bums, I decided that I really must give myself a kick up the bum and be more healthy. A full-scale panic started as most people scurried off to buy a copy. Stickwoman elbowed me in the ribs with her boney arm and pushed in front of us as several others became riotous, vying for a slot in the queue.

  In the end, after much pushing and shoving, Kalem and I both bought a copy just as Mars Bar King sloped off without one – he was probably going to stock up on another family pack of choccies.

  ****

  ‘I’ve just thought of the ideal challenge for you tomorrow,’ Kalem said to me as he dropped me off outside the flats. ‘Go up to Ayshe’s when you get up, and I’ll be waiting for you. We’re going to the gym!’ He laughed.

  ‘The gym!’ Hmm, I supposed that the good news was that I’d get to spend more time with Kalem, but the bad news was I’d have to do something I’d spent most of my life trying to avoid: exercise. ‘Well…I guess I could give it a go. Thanks for taking me tonight.’

  ‘What are friends for?’

  I pulled the door open. ‘Yeah, friends.’ I whispered under my breath.

  ****

  I read the entire contents of the book from cover to cover when I got home that night. I was too interested in scratchy body parts and furry tongues to let it slip from my grasp for a single minute. I could see that what she was talking about did make sense and resolved to start a new lifestyle change by doing more exercise and trying to switch to an organic diet.

  It wasn’t until I’d finished my reading mania that I noticed a message on my answer phone.

  ‘It’s me again. It has come to my attention that I’ve been leaving messages on the wrong number. So…no hard feelings and just forget everything I said. Know what I mean, eh?’ It was the whacko nutter again. I put my hand to my chest in relief. At least that cleared up that little mystery.

  I hoped.

  Chapter 18

  Wednesday, day 10 – I Love Exercise

  I was up bright and early the next morning raring to start my new healthy lifestyle. I was extra keen to get started as during the night I’d had a dream in which my liver split into two large chunks and fell out of my body. That couldn’t possibly be a good sign. I even tried out Gloria’s suggestion of starting the day with a glass of hot water and lemon juice.

  I decided that a trip to the gym might not be such a bad thing after all, as long as I wasn’t expected to wear skin-tight cycling shorts and a leotard that went up my bum. I was seriously upset that I’d thrown my old joggers away. They would have come in mighty handy, and I would look just the ticket – well, apart from the manky coffee stains down the front.

  So instead, I threw on a pair of old leggings, which were stain-free, and a baggy white T-shirt. Then I dusted off my slightly mouldy trainers which had been stagnating in the back of the wardrobe and shook them upside down in case there were any mice droppings inside. At last I rammed them on and jogged up the stairs to Ayshe’s.

  ‘Ugh.’ I banged on the door. ‘Come on! Get up.’ I put my hand on my heaving chest.

  ‘Hiya.’ Ayshe opened the door, chewing on a bacon sandwich.

  I took it off her. ‘Hey! You’re not allowed that. Is that organic bread?’ I looked at it. Could you even tell the difference by looking?

  ‘No.’ She frowned. ‘What are you up to?’

  I picked the bacon out of the sandwich and threw it on top of the greasy grill-pan, leaving only the toast behind on her plate.

  ‘Hey, what are you doing? I was enjoying that!’

  Felix eyed the bacon with a hungry look on his face.

  I wagged my finger at her. ‘Have you read that Gloria Cox book?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Well, if you had read it, you wouldn’t be eating that.’ I pointed to the congealed bacon. ‘It will give you severe wind and liver failure. You can eat the toast, though.’

  ‘Thanks, but it’s organic bacon. Kalem brought it with him.’ she muttered with an indignant look on her face. ‘Want a coffee?’

  ‘No thanks.’

  ‘OK. Who are you and what have you done with Helen?’

  ‘Ha-ha. I’m going to be much healthier from now on. I’m actually glad that Kalem thought up the Gloria Cox challenge. I’ll be a changed woman in no time,’ I said as she stuffed the bacon back in-between the two slices of toast and carried on eating it – much to the disgust of Felix, who threw us a filthy look and growled in annoyance.

  ‘Yum.’ A crazy grin spread over her face as she scoffed the lot.

  Atila came wandering into the kitchen with one side of his hair stuck to his head where he had slept on it. ‘Got one of those for me?’ He peered at the bacon sandwich.

  ‘You’re not allowed it,’ I said.

  ‘Why not, is it off?’

  ‘Haven’t you read Gloria Cox’s book either?’ I pointed at Kalem’s copy on the table.

  He picked it up and studied it. ‘Load of old mumbo-jumbo. You don’t complain when you’re having one of my orgasms, do you?’

  ‘What, those chocolate things? Ooh, yeah, they’re gorgeous. Are you going to whip one up for us after we get back from the gym?’ I started salivating.

  ‘Who’s going to the gym?’ Ayshe asked.

  ‘Helen and I are.’ Kalem emerged from the bathroom, smelling of a mix of engine oil and deodorant – which wasn’t as horrible as it sounds. It was actually rather heady, like a chemical pheromone reaction pulling me towards him.

  Atila laughed. ‘Helen, in the gym! I’d like to see that.’

  ‘Well, let’s get up there before I change my mind.’ I jogged on the spot for about one minute, then collapsed on the chair, breathing deeply.

  ‘If you manage a whole session in the gym, I’ll have a reward waiting for you tonight. I was thinking of trying out a new recipe this morning for an aphrodisiac cake.’ Atila raised his eyebrows at me, grinning. ‘And that’s definitely going in my sexy cookbook.’

  ****

  ‘Hi Kalem. Haven’t seen you up here for a while,’ a very over-muscled gym instructor greeted us when we arrived at the leisure centre.

  He wore thigh-hugging, black Lycra cycling shorts and a vest top. His legs were so huge they rubbed together when he walked, and as he leaned on the reception desk, his biceps rippled.

  ‘Wow, awe-inspiring.’ I nodded to his arms.

  He flexed them. ‘I know. The ladies like it.’

  ‘I’ve been doing a lot of walking in the countryside. I only come up here when the weather’s bad,’ Kalem said to him.

  I wondered to myself whether all this weight training made their willies shrink. I’m sure I read that too much exercise could reduce them to amoeba-sized proportions.

  ‘OK.’ He grabbed a form and handed it to me. ‘Fill this in, please. You have to do an induction first. You can show your girlfriend round if you like,’ he said to Kalem.

  I blushed, studying the questions on the form, so I wouldn’t have to point out that I wasn’t his girlfriend. After the usual name and contact details came the hard ones.

  1) Sex? Answer: thanks, but no.

  2) Age? Answer: thirty but look much younger.

  3) Occupation address? Answer: anywhere.

  4) Occupational position? Answer: standing, but occasionally sitting down.

  5) Do you have a heart problem? Answer: probably will in a minute.

  6) Do you suffer from breathlessness during exercise? Answer: sometimes during sex, but that was a long time ago.

  7) Do you suffer from palpitations or unusual heart flutters? Answer: only when I think about someone special.

  8) Do you have any back problems? Answer: only when I did a handstand when I was very drunk.

  9) Are you allergic to anything? Answer
: men who cheat.

  10) Have you had any operations? Answer: I think I had a lobotomy once, but I can’t remember.

  11) Do you enjoy a healthy eating programme? Answer: yes, started an hour ago.

  12) Have you suffered from any illnesses? Answer: hangovers.

  13) Do you suffer from any other problems? Answer: accidents frequently happen around me.

  ****

  I handed it back to him, and he studied it with interest, occasionally shaking his head and looking up at me in disbelief.

  ‘Right, come on, then. I’ll take you round the equipment.’ Kalem led the way into the gym.

  Floor to ceiling mirrors covered one wall and various exercise benches were laid out in rows. There was a huge stack of free weights in the corner, ranging from tiny, weedy ones to monstrously large, hefty-boy ones. Several of the Hefty Boys, with muscles which rivalled the gym instructor, huffed and groaned as they lifted weights in pairs, shouting out the number of repetitions they had done and checking themselves out in the mirror.

  The middle of the room housed quite a few treadmills and exercise bikes and a funny looking skiing thingamabob. A couple of trendy-looking fit women jogged away on the treadmills without even breaking into a sweat. The rest of the area was taken up by free-standing weight machines and exercise mats.

  ‘OK, I’ll show you how to use these machines, and you can get the hang of them. Then next time you come, I’ll show you some of the free weight exercises. Right, this one here is the leg press.’ He selected the lightest weight possible and sat down in the chair. ‘Put your legs flat on this plate, then press them forwards and bring them back slowly. Your turn,’ he said to me as he got off.

  I copied him but it was a struggle trying to press my legs down. ‘Ooh, God,’ I griped. ‘That’s a bit hard!’

  ‘Next one is the lat pull-down which works these muscles in your back.’ He ran his fingers along the sides of my back. ‘Also works your arms. This is a good one for the girls.’ He sat down on a chair facing the machine and pulled down a bar on a pulley system.

  After he’d jumped off, I sat down and tried it out. ‘Which muscles does it work again?’

  He stood behind me, running his fingers along my back again. ‘These.’

  I smiled to myself dreamily, facing the wall. ‘Mmm, nice.’

  ‘Pardon?’

  ‘Er…I mean it’s nice that it works those muscles.’ I pulled on the bar until my arms began to ache.

  ‘Don’t worry, everyone’s like it at first. Just try and do about ten goes of each machine this time round, and then you can increase it a bit every time you come.’

  ‘Aargh!’ One of the Hefty Boys slammed down a heavy weight on the floor in a tantrum and strutted round it while he looked about to see if anyone was gazing at him in awe.

  We wandered over to another machine. ‘This one is the bicep curl machine.’ Kalem sat down, put his hands round a bar in front and pulled it towards him.

  I feasted my eyes on his arms.

  ‘Hurgh!’ screamed one of the Hefty Boys and shot us an angry look.

  ‘Think he needs to lay off the steroids,’ I whispered to Kalem.

  ‘We need to do a warm-up first,’ Kalem said after he’d spent an hour showing me most of the equipment.

  Oh God, what was that? A hundred laps of the car park? A quick sprint to the juice bar?

  ‘And how do we do that?’ I asked.

  ‘Anything aerobic, let’s try the treadmill for ten minutes.’ He wandered over to show me how to work the complicated-looking contraption as the Hefty Boys glared over at me like I was fresh meat.

  We hopped on to the treadmills next to the two trendy, fit-looking women who’d been at it for ages and still hadn’t shed a jot of sweat. They were fully made-up with bright red lipstick and smothered in eye make-up, but there wasn’t a smudgy smear of mascara in sight. We could hear them talking about how many lunges and sit-ups they could do now. One of them mentioned the figure three hundred, but she must have been telling a porky.

  I started a slow walk.

  ‘Oh, by the way, Ayshe wanted me to tell you that she’s not wearing one of those veils or L plates tonight. She said she wouldn’t mind a stripper, though, as long as it’s not a big fat roly-poly-a-gram.’

  ‘Well, she’ll just have to wait and see. She nearly got a pot-belly-a-gram. Angie wanted Barry to be the stripper for tonight!’ I snorted to myself and Kalem pulled a horrific face.

  ‘You know your challenge for tomorrow – Ayshe said it was a surprise? Well, you have to make sure you’re ready at nine for a whole day out. And bring some casual gear and a swimsuit. It’ll be great, you’ll love it.’

  We walked in silence for ten minutes, and I was dying to ask whether Ayshe had said anything to him about Emine yet, but I didn’t want it to seem like I was pushing in case he got suspicious, so I bit my lip hard to stop the urge to blurt out anything incriminating. I could still remember about twenty years ago when one of Kalem’s cousins married an English guy and the whole family was up in arms about it. There was a massive hoo-hah about her getting involved with someone who wasn’t Turkish Cypriot, so I didn’t think they’d be too impressed to learn what was going on now inside my head. And none of her family had ever gone out with a non-Turkish Cypriot ever again. Kalem’s family had taken me into their lives unconditionally when my parents died, as if it was their duty; their calling. How could I repay them for that by falling in love with Kalem and causing another family scandal?

  We upped the tempo to a tiny jog as I stared into space, daydreaming about Kalem until his voice brought me back to reality.

  ‘Huh?’ I panted as sweat poured into my eyes and my T-shirt stuck to my back like a second skin.

  He got off the treadmill and walked behind me mumbling something I couldn’t hear. I craned my neck round to listen to him, but as I was walking forwards and looking backwards, my feet suddenly developed a mind of their own and before I knew it, I’d caught the edge of the treadmill and flown off the back of it, landing in a crumpled heap on the floor.

  ‘Ow!’ I shot up as quick as I could, hoping no one had witnessed my humiliating sharp exit – almost a back-flip – from the bloody thing. I rubbed my bum covertly – didn’t want it to look as though I’d actually hurt myself. ‘They’re a bit dodgy. Don’t think I’ll be going on one of those again.’ I gave it a dirty look, wondering how big the bruise would be tomorrow.

  The trendy, fit women next to us sniggered.

  ‘Ooh, I’m so sweaty.’ I stretched the damp T-shirt off my skin, wafting it backwards and forwards as rivulets of perspiration trickled down my back and in between my boobs. I was not a pretty sight and did a mental cringe. If all my embarrassing moments rolled into one didn’t put him off me, this certainly would.

  ‘Let’s go on those leg thingies.’ I pointed at a couple of machines next to each other with a seat and some stirrups that the gym instructor had shown us.

  We sat down in the seats, stretched our legs out in front of us and put them in the stirrups. There was a little lever to pull to separate the stirrups, which were pressed tightly together. I pulled the lever and my legs flew wide open.

  ‘Ooh,’ I gasped. I’d forgotten to select a lighter weight and the stirrups were so heavy I couldn’t bring my legs back together again. I felt like I was about to have a smear test in front of a large audience.

  Kalem cackled, as did the trendy, fit women. I looked over to see if anyone else had noticed. The Hefty Boys grunted in the corner – I wasn’t sure, though, if it was a laugh or whether the growth hormones were kicking in.

  ‘Can you help me?’ I leaned over to Kalem, who was using his machine perfectly.

  He got off and changed the weight on mine to a lighter one. And then I was off, swinging my legs open and shut like there was no tomorrow.

  ‘Have you had enough yet?’ Kalem asked. ‘I must admit that I’m quite impressed. I thought you would’ve given up by now.’

  �
��I can’t give up yet. I’m determined to be super-fit from now on. Why don’t we go over there and do some stuff that they’re doing?'’ I pointed to the free weights that the Hefty Boys were using. ‘They won’t bite, will they?’

  We watched the Hefty Boys for a bit, then I decided I couldn’t possibly manage to copy what they were doing, unless I wanted my arms to fall off, so I picked up a few of the weedy weights and moved my arms up and down in a unique wobbly fashion.

  ‘You’re doing it wrong,’ Kalem said.

  ‘Oh.’ I thought I’d got the hang of it.

  ‘You’re supposed to do it like this.’ He moved his arms out to the side until they reached shoulder height and then brought them back down again in a slow, fluid action. ‘Here, like this.’ He wrapped his hands around my wrists and maneuvered my arms up and down. ‘That’s it.’

  Maybe I could learn to love this exercise business after all. Helen Grey, Miss Fitness 2009.

  Twenty minutes later we sat side by side on some mats in the centre of the room, and I tried to copy Kalem as he did some stretches. The only trouble was that he appeared to be doing some kind of freaky advanced yoga moves. He sat on the floor, balancing on his bum with his legs open wide in the air like a pair of scissors. I sat gawping as I tried to imitate him. After a couple of attempts, I collapsed over on to my back, giggling profusely. Then he tried a strange double-jointed arm movement where he yanked his arm behind his head. I really didn’t fancy having a go at that one for fear of a shoulder dislocation and complete agony, so I gave up and lay like a starfish on the mat.

  ‘I didn’t know you were so good at Yoga,’ I said.

  ‘There’s a lot you don’t know about me.’ He turned to me slowly, fixing his intense eyes on mine for a second before he jumped up. ‘Come on, I think you’ve done enough for one day.’ He grabbed my hand, jerking me up from the floor so that I tumbled towards him, into his arms.

  And at that moment, I was close enough to feel his heart drumming in his chest; close enough to see his pupils dilate, and I wanted to kiss him so badly I could feel the frustration oozing from my pores. It felt like I was spinning out of sync with the earth, wobbly and light-headed and fuzzy at the edges.