Page 49 of Muscle Cub

Calm down. I just need new shoes.

I spent the evening feeling restless and distracted.

For three hours, I tried to watch the same forty-minute television episode, pausing every five minutes to scroll more of Austin’s social media feed.

I ran across an article he’d shared that claimed the basic fitness level of a man over forty was defined by his ability to do fifty consecutive pushups without stopping.

After barely making it to thirty, I stared at myself in the mirror from a variety of equally disappointing angles before finally accepting that tomorrow was not a test I could cram for.

Still tired from the weekend, I gave up and went to bed.

The next day, as soon as the waiter had taken our order, Eric said, “Okay. Tell me everything.

“Honestly, it was pretty incredible,” I started.

But that was as far as I got.

Eric launched into a half-hour account of the life-changing twelve hours he and Ben had spent alone in their cabin the night before I’d arrived at the campground. “I mean, it was like no time had passed. It was exactly like it’d been when we were in college only with this urgency. He spat on it, and—”

“Okay.” I sat back in my chair and raised my hands. “Lemme stop you right there. Ben’s coming over this afternoon to pick up his tools, and if you go any further into this blow-by-blow, I’m not gonna be able to look him in the eye.”

Eric grimaced. “Sorry.”

“It’s okay. I’m really happy for both of you.”

“Thanks. I’m…” Eric paused, trying to find the words. “I can’t describe it. It’s like I’m watching my life from outside it, you know? Like the past week happened to someone else.”

I nodded. “I can relate.”

Before going to the shoe store, Eric insisted I check out a nearby shop that sold mostly upscale yoga wear. On the short walk down the block, Eric asked me again about Austin, promising this time he wouldn’t interrupt.

I confessed that there had been a surprising connection. That I hadn’t expected Austin’s intelligence and wit.

I knew Eric wanted salacious gossip, but I wasn’t going to share the kind of details I’d been writing about for the past few days. I’d woken up early this morning with words pouring out of me. I’d brought my laptop to the kitchen island so I could get it all down while the coffee was brewing.

I did tell him that Austin had made me laugh more in three and a half days than I had in the last ten years. I heard myself gushing. The more I tried to describe how easy it had been to be with Austin and how nervous I was about doing his class, the more I knew I sounded like I wanted it to go somewhere.

Eric stopped on the sidewalk in front of the shop. “It’s a big deal to take it outside the campground, especially for a guy who works there. But Austin’s initiated this whole fitness-class scenario. He obviously didn’t even have it booked in advance or he would’ve mentioned it to you before you left. I wouldn’t be surprised to find out he called every trainer he knows in town and begged them to let him sub for them just so he’d have an excuse to invite you.”

“He could’ve just come to see me. I would’ve said yes to coffee. I would’ve invited him to dinner at the slightest hint. Why does it have to be a high intensity interval training class. Dude, what the fuck? That’s not my life.”

“Ahh, but it’s his. And it’s him in his element. Maybe he wants to shine for you. Show you he can do more than crack open beer cans and flirt.”

It was a better theory than thinking the universe was testing me or that Austin would end up judging me for being too old for him, too out of shape. Unable to keep up. Unable to perform.

I caught myself. I was enduring life again and focusing on what I didn’t want to happen.

It was more likely that Austin wanted to show off for me. I’d denied him the chance at the campground.

Eric opened the door. “Whatever Austin’s motivation is, you need to look cool. At least expensive.”

The shop workers were all dressed in dark, monochromatic, synthetic clothing that somehow managed to be flowy and tight at the same time. They looked like a modern dance company of hybrid hippie-goths, and they all spoke in the same breathy voice.

I recognized a pretty guy who’d been the only male-identifying student in a Women’s Studies seminar I’d led last fall on A Room of One’s Own. Hogan. He was evangelically vegan. The amount of times he’d managed to work veganism into a discussion about a feminist essay written nearly a hundred years ago was a fucking masterclass in having a consistent platform and talking points.

He’d asked for an extension on the final paper because of a conflict with a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to attend a tantric weekend. I’d allowed it, partly because he had bewitching lichen-green eyes and it made me nervous to be alone in my office with him, and I’d wanted him to hurry up and leave.

Hogan was very attentive to me and Eric, running back and forth to the fitting room with alternate sizes as I kept going larger and larger to escape the skinniness of the clothing’s construction. I had nice, muscular, grown-man thighs. I’d thought Hogan had been taking pity on my middle-aged fashion crisis until I found myself at the cash wrap with well over five hundred dollars’ worth of merchandise he’d smoothly convinced me I needed.