CHAPTER 23

23.

© 2010 GREG DUNAJ

              "I dunno what to do here," said the old woman, frowning.

              Wearing tights that showed in every frightening detail an aged, sagging body, the barrel-chested woman grabbed at 3 pound dumbbells and tried curling them. Rocking her upper body back and forth without really moving her arms up and down the woman nevertheless was panting after just two "reps". She bent at the waist with a grunt and a couple of coughs and dropped the weights onto the rubber padded floor of the gym.

              "Oh, give me them," said another older woman gruffly. She was considerably taller than the first woman and had watched this feeble attempt at strength training with her skinny arms akimbo on skinny hips. She too wore black tights. While the tights on the one woman gave her an overall bulging oval to her shape, the tights on the tall, skinny woman made her look like a head teetering on licorice whips.

              She grabbed at the weights and holding them at her sides she turned to the mirror and puffed her cheeks and exhaled several times rapidly. Her eyes were focused, her cheeks billowed with the effort, but her arms remained by her side.

              "Ya gonna do something besides huffing," said the first woman after half a minute.

              The second woman stopped her breathing and glowered at her friend in the mirror.

              "You don’t know anything do you Bernice? You have to concentrate!"

              "Too heavy for you? They were too heavy for me."

              "They're not too heavy for me," she said with a sneer, still staring at her friend in the mirror. She started huffing and puffing again and looked back at her own reflection. The breathing got quicker and quicker as she slowly curled the weights to her chin.

              "Wow," said the first woman with oval eyes. “I didn’t know you were so strong Beatrice.”

              The satisfied smile on Beatrice’s intense face peering out over the dumbbells in the mirror suddenly became a grimace.

              “Oh,” she said in a weak voice.

              “What, what,” said Bernice.

              “My back, uh, help, uh, take the weight…TAKE the weights!”

              Bernice scrambled to take one dumbbell from Beatrice and dropped it to the floor and then grabbed the second one. Relieved of the weights Beatrice’s arms flopped to her sides. Bernice gingerly grabbed at her friend and sat her down on a nearby bench.

              “I guess we both don’t know what we’re doing, huh,” said Bernice.

              “Will you shaddup,” snapped Beatrice. “I know what I’m doing, I just worked out too much the other day,” she said. “Uh,” she moaned, “I just overdid it today that’s all.”
              Bernice held her hands clasped under her chin. “S-should I get someone,” she said with a worried look on her face, “from the gym?”

              “No!” Beatrice’s eyes were wide and embarrassed. She shook her head rapidly. “No, I’ll be alright.” She bit her lower lip and then reconsidered this request. “No, just let me sit here a moment.”

              A rotund man maneuvered his bulk between Bernice and Beatrice and the rack of dumbbells and plucked a pair and began curling them.

              “Hey,” said Beatrice with a nod of her head and staring at tufts of hair peeking out from beneath the back of the man’s shirt, “I’m hurting here, give me some space, huh.”

              “Oh, I’m sorry Ma’am,” said the man and he took a couple of side steps away from this triage unit.

              “They really should have someone here for us,” said Bernice, gingerly touching Beatrice’s shoulder. The other woman shrugged her off and gave her a dirty look. “Isn’t that part of the deal for joining up here? We get a personal trainer for an hour right?”

              “I don’t need a personal trainer,” said Beatrice, grimacing as she touched her lower back. “I’ve just been working out too much, I gotta slow down that’s all.”

              Bernice wagged her head slowly. “I don’t think we’re doing this right,” she said, grimacing herself as she watched her friend on the bench, “this shouldn’t happen. Besides, they said Marv was going to be our personal trainer today. But, he’s not even here. What’s that all about?”

              “Bernice, I told you, I don’t need a trainer. I know what I’m doing. You may need someone to hold your hand, but I don’t.”

              “I think we should have waited for Marv to get back. They said he would be back in a few minutes; that he was running late.”

              “You want to sit around waiting for someone to lead you by the hand you can go ahead, but not me.”

              Beatrice lifted her arm and motioned Bernice to help her up. The shorter, squat woman obliged and she got Bernice to stand up. Bernice pushed her away and stood and admired her figure again in the mirror. The fat man with the dumbbells lumbered into her view to replace the weights and Bernice frowned and stuck her tongue out in distaste. After the human eclipse moved away she smiled again at her bony figure. “You see Bernice, I’m in good shape. I think I work out too hard sometimes. I just have to slow down a bit.”

              “Well, I think we should stop, or at least you. I don’t think you should do anything else. Perhaps, you can tell me what to do here, I mean you‘re in such great shape and all.”

              “Yes,” said Beatrice, allowing herself a smile. She tested her back by trying to bend forward and winced. “Okay,“ she said with a small grimace, “since you don’t have your personal trainer here I’ll be your personal trainer.”

              Bernice nodded her head, her hands clasped together beneath her chin.

               “Okay. First, Bernice, you have to practice your breathing. Breathing is very important. It concentrates your strength where you need it the most.”

              Bernice mimicked Beatrice’s stance. She stood with her feet shoulder width apart and she clenched her hands into fists and held them before her chest. She watched Beatrice puff and she puffed. She took deep breaths and her cheeks billowed as she concentrated on forcing the air out of her lungs. Beatrice puffed as well and nodded her head and gave a thumb’s up to her short friend, but after thirty seconds of puffing Bernice had to stop. She began coughing and searched out the bench and flopped onto it. She looked up at the glowering Beatrice and shrugged her shoulders.

              “Wow! This is hard work.” Bernice hung her head down. “I don’t know how you do it Beatrice. This is hard.”

              “Ha!” Beatrice laughed sharply. She was very happy that her friend was having such difficulty. It made her feel stronger. The stern look on her face melted and she almost smiled again. “It is hard darling and just imagine, that’s only the breathing part!”

              “I know,” Bernice said wagging her head side to side slowly. She looked up at Beatrice again. “Do you think we could call it a day on this?” Her eyes searched Beatrice for relief. “I’m winded. I can’t keep up with you, even with your back hurting, I can’t keep up.”

              Beatrice eyed her figure again in the wall mirror. She clenched her buttocks and then patted one of her cheeks with a hand. “Well,” she said, testing her back by bending forward slightly with barely a wince, “I could use a little cardio work-out. How about you?”

              “What’s cardio?”

              “Treadmills or elliptical machines.”

              “Oh, Beatrice, I can’t. I mean I’m out of breath standing here breathing. Can’t we just go to breakfast now? I’m hungry. I can go for a muffin.”

              Beatrice just shook her head, her arms again on her hips. Her smile was now stretched across her face and her teeth winced from being exposed to such bright light.

              “Or perhaps, an omelet, with cheese. Oh, maybe I shouldn’t have so much dairy, huh?”

              Beatrice chuckled again and motioned for Bernice to stand and give her a hand. She claimed it was just to steady her for she did not quite trust her back. Bernice obliged and put her arm around Beatrice’s waist and the two began trudging towards the exit.

              “Why don’t we start with a strong cup of coffee instead?”

              Bernice’s belly burbled a protest, but she said nothing.

              The attendant at the front desk of the gym was a young man. Blond hair tickled his brow and a brilliant smile never faltered even as he eyed the women curiously when they hobbled up.

              “Hi Guys,” he chirped. “Leaving already? Did you have a great workout? Why don’t you get back in there and give me ten push-ups for the road?”

              Beatrice stopped this geriatric shuffling and sassed at the young man.

              “First off… I’m not a ‘guy’…”

              “Oh…”

              “And I’m not a circus animal. I just don’t do tricks when you demand.”

              The wide smile on the young man faded ever so slightly.

              “Huh,” he said, rightfully confused.

              “I’m not going to do push-ups for you,” Beatrice said, explaining herself.

              The smile returned though his eyes searched out the ceiling.

              “And…we did not have a great work out!”

              The man’s jaw dropped, his brow furrowed. He fixed his eyes on Beatrice with a very concerned look on his face.

              “What went wrong?” His voice had a panic stricken tinge to it. “You didn’t have a healthy time here?”

              “No. Actually, we did not. I think we overdid it. We’re new members here and…”

              “Wait!? You’re new members at our gym?”

              “Yes…”

              He consulted some sort of ledger behind the desk. He tapped at the keyboard of a computer and then ran his finger down a column in the ledger again. He looked up at Beatrice and Bernice, although he could not see the shorter woman very well from his seat and only saw the top of her head. He said their names and Beatrice and Bernice nodded yes. Bernice stood on her toes and clutched at the counter in order to see, a worried look on her face. She and Beatrice exchanged glances.

              “I see. I see,” said the attendant, blinking. “You had Marv. Marv let this happen? How could he? There are only healthy times with Marv! He’s a great guy. You could only have a healthy time with Marv as your personal trainer.”

              “What Marv?” said Beatrice, “He never showed up. We didn’t want to wait. He was supposed to be here at what, 10 am, and he wasn‘t here.”

              “Well, I would’ve waited,” said Bernice quietly.

              Beatrice glared at her.

              The young man stood up and gave them a leveled serious look for several seconds. His smile faded enough to nearly form a frown. His eyebrows were arched and he nodded his head at the ladies. He cautioned Beatrice and Bernice against utilizing the gym without proper supervision, especially since they were new members. He noticed that something was not right with Beatrice.

              “You used the equipment, and you hurt yourself? You look stiff. You should not have done that. Are you all right?

              “NO! I’m not all right,” yelled Beatrice, losing it. “For crying out loud, stop talking to us like we’re children! This isn’t about me anyway. It’s about Bernice. She needed her personal trainer to lead her around and your ‘Marv’ wasn’t here! Some healthy time, huh?”

              “Yo, Dude, there’s no reason to yell. Everyone’s here to have a healthy time,” he flopped onto his chair behind the desk and rolled his eyes. He picked up a small blue ball and started squeezing it rapidly. He swiveled in his chair and faced the wall cutting off all further conversation. Beatrice blinked at the man’s shaggy haircut for a few seconds before Bernice tugged on her waist and urged them to leave.

              Near the door to the gym were black and white 8x10 photos of all the personal trainers. The gym had seven personal trainers to choose from. There was Marv, in the center, smiling broadly. He was obviously older than the younger trainers around him, but his eyes were bright, his jutting jaw cutting a brilliant smile. Bernice stopped them to pause and look at all the trainers. She sighed.

              “Perhaps we should have waited for Marv?”

              “Yeah, well,” said Beatrice, sighing herself.

              They left the gym and walked into the parking lot. Beatrice let go of Bernice and she shuffled fairly well on her own, though she absently put a hand to her lower back. The morning sun was nice. It had rained the past few days, but now the sun was breaking through some residual cloud cover and the shafts of light were enchanting.

              “Oh,“ said Bernice as she lumbered beside Beatrice. “Let’s go to Café au Lait and sit on the patio and look out on the river for our breakfast. It’ll be beautiful.”

              “I don’t know,” said Beatrice. “Their chairs aren’t so comfortable and I like to dress up when I go there. You never know who you’ll meet.”

              “Come on, let’s go there. We’re a couple of athletes now, we can tough it out,” Bernice giggled. “You can sit on my sweatshirt so your bony butt won’t be too inconvenienced.”

              “Bernice!” Beatrice rolled her eyes and giggled herself.

              They neared Beatrice’s older Chevrolet sedan. It was the only possession of her husband’s that she kept after he died two years ago. Everything else she tossed. His clothes and knickknacks and his pipes were sold in a yard sale or simply thrown away. She never liked his pipe smoking. She gave many of Edgar’s tools to her next door neighbor and sold the rest. Even their pictures were not immune to her purging. Beatrice burned many of them, though she did keep a few that depicted the two of them. Everything else that reminded Beatrice of Edgar was flotsam and jettisoned from her life.

              She kept the car because it ran well enough and it was a necessary item to get around. It had been her late husband’s pride and joy. Prior to his passing, Edgar tended to the car’s every need and treated it with such delicate kindness that Beatrice’s resentment of her husband deepened every time he admonished her to wipe her feet before she got in, to gently close the doors and not slam them shut or to avoid eating inside the car. He was loathe to even drive the Chevy and would only do so sparingly and mumbling all the while. Since his death Beatrice tripled the mileage the car had been driven in the eight years they had owned it together. Beatrice drove the car everywhere and had taken it on several extended road trips to Florida in the two years since Edgar’s death. 

              Somewhere, Beatrice knew Edgar was looking down on her and he was hopping mad.

              Beatrice did keep up with maintenance checks and regular cleanings for the sedan. She did not abuse it at all. She treated the car nearly as well as Edgar had, she simply drove it a lot. Bernice never got the chance to drive as Beatrice insisted on picking up every time they would go out.

              As the women neared the Chevrolet, Beatrice remarked that it was her neighbor’s car parked just across from her sedan. Another Edgar trait Beatrice retained was noticing other people’s cars and associating them together.

              “I didn’t know Kris was working out here too,” she said.

              When Amanda was brought home from the hospital, Beatrice greeted the couple with a parcel of children’s clothes and fawned so over the infant. Childless herself, Beatrice, cooed and sighed that day and over time kept up weekly calls to the house. She would seek out Kris if she put Amanda in a stroller so she could poke a long willowy finger in the toddler’s face to solicit a smile.

              Beatrice reasoned Kris began to work out because she had seen her own lithe form heading out of the house for her daily power walk.

              “I’ll bet she wanted to get in shape when she saw me,” whispered Beatrice as she walked up to look inside, perhaps to see if the children’s car seat that she had bought the couple was in the back.

              There were two people sitting in Kris’ car. They were kissing. One was Kris. Beatrice could recognize her haircut. She did not recognize the other person at first. He was a gray haired man.

              “Oh,” said Beatrice, shocked and embarrassed. She stopped a few steps away from Kris’ car and brought a hand to her mouth to stifle her cry. Turning on her heels she shuffled rapidly to her car, eased her body that had suddenly stiffened again into the Chevy and admonished Bernice to hurry up.

              As she backed up to pull out of the spot the kissing couple disengaged and the man turned around to look at Beatrice. She had seen him before, but was unsure of where. It certainly wasn’t Kris’ husband, Harry.

              “Say, wasn’t that that Marv guy,” asked Bernice.

              All along the short ride to Café Au Lait Bernice kept asking Beatrice what was wrong. Her tall friend had gotten very quiet. Beatrice drove with pursed lips and said nothing. At one point she wiped away a tear. At the café, on the patio overlooking a pastoral view of the river, she told Bernice not to ask any more questions and Beatrice’s round little friend happily busied herself with her omelet.