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It went on just long enough for Carly to regret the wording, the honesty, and the fact that Beth was absolutely still in the room.
Then Lauren gave her a smaller smile than usual. Not the one she threw around for effect.
“Yeah?”
“Yes.”
Beth, mercifully, chose that moment to get loud. “Excellent. Emotional breakthrough achieved.”
Lauren laughed. Something in the room had shifted, though. Not enough to name, and not enough for Carly to do anything stupid with. But when Lauren glanced back at her, she no longer looked like she was waiting to be corrected.
Carly’s phone buzzed against her hip. Samantha, impatient and familiar.
Carly put it in her bag and left it there.
Across the mat, Lauren was talking Beth through the camera angle with one hand braced behind her, making the gym sound less like something to conquer and more like somewhere you were allowed to start. That was the part Carly couldn’t spreadsheet.
“Shall I stop?” Beth asked.
Carly kept her eyes on the mat. “No. Keep recording.”
19
Lauren
“That was good.”
Lauren had heard the phrase before, usually followed by but, or for you, or considering. Carly said it like a conclusion, and Lauren had no idea what to do with that.
She crouched by the mat and swapped the resistance band for a foam roller, giving herself something to look at that wasn’t Carly’s face. Not usable. Not fine. Good.
Beth, naturally, was making it worse by watching from behind the camera with the smug caution of someone who had expected disaster and was mildly put out not to be getting one.
“Can we do the hip one next?” she asked. “I feel like the people deserve hips.”
“The people can have hips,” Lauren said, rolling onto her side and propping herself on an elbow.
Carly checked her clipboard. “Hips, then the basic warm-up. After that, I want one shorter piece for the relaunch.”
Lauren paused with one knee bent. “Shorter piece?”
“Thirty seconds. Direct to camera. You, not the movements.”
“No, thank you.”
Beth peered round the camera. “That was quick.”
“I’m efficient.”
Carly looked up. “Why not?”
“Because the whole point of this was useful content. Actual professional advice from an actual professional. Not me standing around going, please come to the gym, I promise it’s nice and nobody will make you cry in a mirror.”
“That’s exactly the point,” Carly said.
“Making people cry in mirrors?”
“Making people believe they can come here.”
