Chapter 4: Settling In
The following weeks settled into a rhythm, a double life conducted in the spaces between things. In the open, nothing changed. Brandon handled the college recruiters with a polite, detached focus, nodded through the Sports Illustrated interview about "the future of American strength," his quotes coming out bland and inspiring. He trained. The powerlifting meet the gym was hosting loomed, and his sessions were brutal, focused things—600 pound squats that made the whole rack groan, deadlifts that tore callouses from his palms. He wiped down machines, refilled the paper towels, smiled at members.
He was popular. The gym’s suburban moms found excuses to ask him about protein powder, their eyes lingering on his arms as he demonstrated a form. College girls on winter break "just happened" to be doing hip thrusts near the squat racks, giggling when he walked by. He was friendly, helpful, utterly oblivious. Their interest was a background hum, like the fluorescent lights.
Medina, in her domain, was similarly occupied. She trained her figure competitors with merciless precision, her Croatian accent sharp as a blade. “Your posing is sloppy. You look sleepy. You want to look sleepy on stage? Go home and take a nap.” Male clients, lawyers and realtors with more money than sense, signed up for her sessions hoping for something else. They made clumsy comments about her discipline, her body. She’d stare them down, her green eyes flat. “We are here to work. Your glute medius is inactive. Get on the floor.” They always listened.
Neither of them were jealous. How could they be? The secret world they inhabited was too consuming, too absolute.
It was a Tuesday, 5:15 AM, an hour before opening. The gym was a tomb of shadows and dormant equipment. Medina was in her office, reviewing schedule notes on her computer. The click of the door. She didn’t turn. She knew his footfall, the particular scent of him—clean sweat and cheap bodywash.
His hands were on her shoulders, then sliding down her torso, pulling her back from the desk. He turned her chair, knelt between her spread legs, hooked his thumbs in the waistband of her leggings and underwear and pulled them down to her ankles in one motion. He didn’t speak. He put his mouth on her. His tongue was relentless, a focused, devouring pressure that had her biting her own fist within thirty seconds, her other hand tangled in his blonde hair, not pushing him away but holding him precisely there. She came quickly, a sharp, silent convulsion against his mouth. He stood, unzipped his shorts, and guided himself into her while she was still trembling. It was a fast, deep, pounding fuck, the only sounds their ragged breaths and the creak of the office chair’s wheels on the linoleum. He finished with a stifled groan, buried in her neck. They stayed like that for a ten-count. Then he pulled out, kissed her shoulder, and left. She pulled her clothes up, straightened her ponytail, and went back to the schedule. By 6:30 AM, she was barking at a new client for rounding his back on a deadlift.
On her lunch break, he’d come in, lock the door, and eat the lunch she hadn’t touched. He’d do it slowly, luxuriously, with a dedication that made her toes curl and her calves cramp from tension. She’d stare at the ceiling, one hand clamped over her own mouth, the other gripping the edge of her desk until her knuckles were white.
Once, in a vacant shower stall at the end of the day, the echoes of the last members leaving still ringing in the tiled room, she pushed him against the cold, wet wall and took him into her mouth. She worked him with a savage efficiency, her eyes locked on his the whole time, until he shuddered and spilled. She swallowed, wiped her mouth with the back of her hand, and walked out without a word. He followed five minutes later, finding her at the front desk counting the day’s cash drop, her face a mask of calm concentration.
They ran into each other at a downtown coffee shop on a Saturday. A chance thing. He was getting a post-training americano; she was buying beans. A look passed between them. She went to the bathroom. He gave it sixty seconds, then followed. The single-stall restroom was barely bigger than a closet. He locked the door, lifted her onto the sink, and drove into her, her legs locked around his waist. The mirror shook. A customer rattled the door handle, muttered, gave up. She muffled her cries against the muscle of his shoulder, marking him with her teeth. It was frantic, dangerous, over in minutes. They exited separately, five minutes apart, back into the bland, sunny normalcy of the afternoon.
The two worlds were separate. Perfectly.