2: any of various substances resembling beeswax: any of numerous substances that differ from fats in being less greasy, harder, and more brittle and in containing principally compounds of high molecular weight (as fatty acids, alcohols, and saturated hydrocarbons), or a solid substance of mineral origin consisting of hydrocarbons of high molecular weight
3: something likened to wax as soft, impressionable, or readily molded
4: to treat or rub with wax, usually for polishing or stiffening
5: the process of removing body hair in the most painful, yet somehow satisfying, way possible
6: to follow the object of your affection around the room in an attempt to get them to take notice of you
I stood by the paper towel dispenser, blotting sweat off my neck until the 10-Pence Bet came into view. He was setting up a bench-press-cum-torture-device. When he turned away to slide a weight off the rack, I slid in behind him.
“Work in sets with you?” Gym-speak for asking if you can alternate on the weights. Never regarded as an overt come-on: people who are waxing you are more likely to stand off to the side and watch.
It was a ludicrous request, of course. I couldn’t have spotted the weight he could probably lift with his little toe. “You lifting?” he asked. Soft voice, nice.
“Maybe the bar plus twenty,” I said. Damn, I actually sound like I know what I’m talking about.
He nodded. We went through three sets each. I stood on the opposite side of the bar as he pressed out his reps, watching the long-sleeved shirt strain at his chest. On my sets I tried hard to look cool and serious, not the giggling feeble creature I play when N’s in the gym. We finished on the bench and moved off to other sides of the gym. Play it cool, girl, I thought. Don’t follow him around the room. Don’t wax.
Half an hour later I walked through to the aerobic area. He was on a rowing machine, had been for a few minutes-the sweat was just starting to trickle past his hairline. I sat on one a few seats away and strapped my feet in.
“Hard workout day for you then?” he asked.
I smiled. “Just cooling down.” I rowed through five minutes, watching his reflection surreptitiously in the glass opposite us. His sweat was really starting to pour. He had taken off the long-sleeved top. I finished and walked out the door behind him, caught a glance of his back squeezing together at the end of each stroke. The droplets sliding down the crevice of his spine.
I was alone in the hall leading to the changing rooms. Wait a few minutes, I thought. He’ll come out and you can say something.
Don’t. He’ll know you waited.
Coward.
Tart.
What would I say, anyway? “Oh, to be the person who gets to lick that sweat off you,” then walk away? The door cracked. I didn’t wait to see who it was. I ducked in the ladies’ faster than a greased goose. mardi, le 6 avril
N and I went out for Italian and beer. We sat outside waiting for the food. It was a mild evening, I was a little tired from a long session of working out frustrations in the gym, and the drink went straight to my head. We talked about the coming month, what he was doing with work, a bit about women he was interested in. I confessed that I’d been doing a little Internet snooping on the Boy.
We must be in sync-N, who has been so good about not obsessing on his own ex, revealed that he’d been doing the same. “So did you find anything?” I asked first. Nothing, he said. Maybe she was married. Maybe she moved. I thought it was too soon. She was an impulsive girl, a bit dappy, but settling down already would beggar belief even for her. He asked if I had found anything.
“A little,” I said. “Enough.” He’s moved, he’s probably single. Nothing earth-shattering. We sipped at our drinks. The food came. The first course was bigger than we expected, he finished mine off. The second course came, I just had a salad. I suppose I feel I’ve violated the Boy’s privacy by looking, but couldn’t stop myself.
“Mutual inability to let go,” N said.
“Yes.” We sat in silence a bit longer, chewing, waving off the ubiquitous fresh-ground-pepper boys with their porn-sized grinders.
“So, meet any nice girls with big tits lately?” he asked suddenly. I laughed so hard I almost choked on a mouthful of arugula. mercredi,
CHILD
Etymology: from Old English cild, akin to Gothic kilthei (womb), Sanskrit jathara (belly).
Function: noun
1: a young person of either sex between infancy and youth
2: one strongly influenced by another or by a place or state of affairs
3: a product or result
4: anyone born in a year I had a double-digit birthday in
“Guess what,” N smirked.
“What.” I was in no mood for guessing games.
“I’ve been talking to your little friend,” he said.
“Which little friend?” N meant 10-Pence Bet. “So what do you know?” I asked.
“He’s a student.”
“Loads of people are students these days. Your point?”
“He’s eighteen.”
Oh no, you must be joking. No one looks like that at eighteen. “You’re having me on.”
“First year at university, engineering something.”
I frowned. I thought of 10-Pence Bet, how smooth and unlined his face was. And how polite. Bells started going off in my head: good-looking men don’t stay nice for long. “Figures. There ought to be a law.” I sighed. “They shouldn’t build teenagers to adult spec. It’s just not fair.” samedi, le 10 avril
“Have fun last night?” N asked. We were at the gym. I leant against the wall just outside the door of the men’s changing room while he laced up a pair of sneakers. The announcement boards were crowded with fliers. Yoga, physiotherapy, five-a-side football. Something called Ultimate. Ultimate what? I wondered. Ultimate stretching? Ultimate watersports? Ooo, get the rubber mat.
“Okay,” I said. Friday was A3’s birthday. I wasn’t going to go because I was afraid of the Boy turning up. When I had told N this, he said I’d be silly to let that stop me. So I fretted about what to wear, flirted with the idea of not going, then went anyway.
N started warming up on the treadmill. The machines on that side of the gym face a window. I can’t imagine who thought the vista of illegally parked cars and staggering teenagers in the street below would be an inspirational view. “Was your ex there?”
“He was.” The Boy turned up late, before the birthday party left the bar and went on to the club. I was talking to A3, we were eyeing up various people in the room and rating them on shaggability.
“Guy in the red shirt?”
“Only if drunk.”
“Him or you?”
“Both.”
Then A3, who was facing the door, caught sight of the Boy.
“Bloke in the blue checked shirt?” he asked.
I turned round, saw who it was, and shuddered involuntarily. “Fuck off,” I said.
“Sorry, that was unfair,” he said.
“No, it’s okay.”
“Did he say anything?” N upped his speed and broke into a jog.
“No, he kept a good distance.” Not knowing whether or not the Boy would be there was by far the worst part of the evening. I found it difficult to keep up conversation with anyone, my eyes were scanning the room for him constantly. If I saw someone who resembled him, my mouth went dry and my words jumbled. But once I knew he was there, I relaxed.
The Boy didn’t look at me, I didn’t look at him. He hovered around the fringes of the large group talking to people we knew.
