Page 96 of Losing the Rhythm

“It’s one of those days,” he said, a new note of sullenness in his voice. “I brought a friend.”

Justin rested his hand on my lower back. “Cadence, meet my teacher, Miya.”

“Oh? A friend?” Miya came closer and looked me over slowly. “That isn’t clothes for training.”

“I surprised her, so she wasn’t able to wear appropriate clothes.”

Miya seemed confused. “What kind of surprise is this? I think you need to talk to someone about how to make a girl happy. Maybe that Seth guy.”

Justin gave her a wavering smile. “I think we both need this.”

“Uh huh. Class starts in thirty.”

“Thank you.”

She shook her head. “Haven’t seen you in a while. You’ve probably gone soft. Be prepared.”

Justin chuckled. “Never go easy on me.”

Miya patted Justin’s shoulder before stepping out of the room.

“She seems nice,” I said.

“She’s tough, that’s for sure. Let me show you around.”

The gym ended up being rather cool. There was a huge space dedicated to all the usual equipment, more than enough available so people weren’t waiting or fighting over machines. There was even a second floor with a track on it. People from the track could look down into the gym area and some of the other rooms too. There was a court for basketball or volleyball. A room where you hit the ball against the wall and it bounced back and hit you. There was even a spa attached with tanning booths and someone to give massages. There were some offices too for nutritionists, personal trainers, and other people I’d be able to give money to help me.

There was even a little daycare section so parents could drop off young ones while they did their workouts. That was pretty neat.

“What is this room?” I peeked inside a small room next to the daycare. It looked pretty comfortable inside with a plush chair, soft lighting and counter.

Justin pointed to the sign. Lactorium.

“Oh. I never saw one of these,” I mumbled, feeling a little embarrassed.

“Come on,” Justin said while laughing. “Class will start soon.”

“Okay.” I let him lead me away as I tried to not feel embarrassed about my naiveté.

Chapter Thirty

I flopped down on the mat, wheezing, trying to learn how to breathe. Why was this so intense? Justin promised this was a beginner’s class, but nothing about this felt like it. The warmups included running around the room, doing high knees and kicking our butts. Then it went into painful stretching because I’m about as flexible as a steel pole apparently. Then it went downhill from there. Really quickly.

“Here.” Justin held out a water bottle.

“I thought this was supposed to be a beginner’s class?”

“It is.”

“Liar. There was nothing beginner about this.”

“How much more beginner do you want to get when she even went over how to properly throw a punch.”

“Sure, but then she made us throw punches for like an hour.”

Justin laughed.

“Don’t laugh at my suffering.”

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