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“None of your fucking business,” I replied. “Now do you mind if I get my workout in here? I’m a little out of shape after my hiatus, and I’d like to be able to concentrate.”
She looked me over carefully as I spun my legs in circles and moved my arms back and forth. I must not have looked like I gained any weight because she didn’t continue to badger me. I went through the rest of my usual routine and then weighed in at two-oh-three.
“See?” I said with a smile. “All good.”
“What have you been eating?” she asked.
“Whatever Tria cooks,” I told her. I grinned when she actually growled under her breath. “She’s been doing a lot of vegetables lately. No pancakes on fight night.”
“Good,” she said.
She looked up at me and eyed me closely. I gave her another big grin.
“You’ve started fucking her,” she announced.
“Nope,” I replied.
“Bullshit.”
“Swear to God,” I replied. “But I’m working on it.”
Yolanda looked at me, rolled her eyes and started to laugh. She followed me into the locker room and hung out by the door while I yanked off all my clothes and stepped into the shower for a second. I had forgotten soap, so I just went with a quick rinse.
“I don’t know if I should hug you or punch you for waiting so long.”
“If you hug me,” I yelled at her over the noise from the water, “you’re the one getting punched.”
Yolanda’s smile faltered a bit as she looked at me. I tried to ignore her stares and stepped out and rubbed the back of my neck with a towel. I fumbled around in my gym bag and sighed when I realized I didn’t have any boxers in there. I had to laugh at myself.
“You look happy,” Yolanda said.
I glanced at her and shrugged without comment.
“How much does she know?” Yolanda asked quietly.
I swallowed a couple of times as I shoved stuff into my gym bag. I pulled out a crumpled sweatshirt, saw how nasty it was, and then shoved it back into the bag. I pulled on a pair of black track pants, commando-style, and tied the string low on my hips.
“A little,” I eventually answered. “She knows who my family is, and she knows you got me off the shit.”
Yolanda nodded.
“That’s a pretty good start,” she said. “You going to tell her the rest?”
“Not planning to.”
Yolanda gathered up her stuff and followed me outside. She gave me a few nasty looks as I lit up a cigarette but still offered to drive me home once I was done with the smoke. I leaned against her old Honda Civic, blew smoke into the air, and wondered what Tria was doing and if she was ever going to let me get any further with her. It occurred to me that there was one woman I could ask about such things.
“Hey, Yolanda?”
“Yeah?” She looked up from her phone and eyed me.
“It’s not because I don’t want to,” I told her.
“Don’t want to what?” she asked.
“You know…fuck her.”
She narrowed her eyes a little.
