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“Yes, sir,” I reply in a dramatic tone of voice.
Gradually, I can sense a delicate balance forming between us. He’s less tense than when we first started, and his gaze is intensely fixed upon me. It’s enough to send my blood pumping as I do the treadmill under his watchful eye. He plays with the controls, changing my speed and incline to keep my breath short at all times but he also keeps the conversation going—though I’m sometimes too focused on not flying off the treadmill and fail to register the depth and meaning of his questions.
“So, how come you’ve never been kissed before?” he asks at one point.
I almost trip but manage to keep my chin up and my dignity in one piece. “You know how I’ve been focused on everything else but myself. We’ve already had that conversation,” I remind him.
“Yeah, but still. It does boggle the mind a little bit. Not even like a little kiss? A peck? Wasn’t there at least one guy in college that you had the hots for?”
There was, and his name is Noah. Then again, he’s my neighbor, not my college sweetheart, so I’m not exactly lying here. “Nope. No one in college. I just never had enough focus for any kind of romantic endeavor, which is why I need to catch up now.”
“Don’t worry about that. Catching up is easy,” Alex replies, his gaze dropping on my breasts. I suppose they’re bouncier than usual, considering the speed he’s having me keep up with.
“It’s not just the physical side of things that I want, Alex. I want romance and candlelight dinners, I want to settle into my feminine energy for once and have someone take care of me instead of—”
“Instead of you taking care of everybody else. Yeah, I get it.”
He glances to the side, somewhere behind me, and frowns slightly. I follow his gaze in the wall mirror that’s in front of the treadmill and notice a couple of guys lifting dumbbells and watching me at the same time. Alex doesn’t seem too happy about it, though I certainly don’t mind a smidge of external validation, especially now, at a time when I’m coming into my womanhood, so to speak. I actually think it’s kind of cute, especially when Alex moves around and blocks their view for about twenty seconds before he comes over to the other side of the treadmill and fiddles with my speed settings again.
“Well, at least I know my ass looks good in these tights,” I giggle, trying to lift some of the tension still gathered in his furrowed brows.
“Can’t blame the guys, can I?”
I shake my head, feeling my cheeks heat up under his intense gaze. “Thank you for being here with me, Alex, for helping me through this. It’s really hard to get started, though, isn’t it?”
“Oh, it’ll get worse before it gets better,” he says.
I like how his gaze subconsciously lingers on my behind and thighs. He’s not aware of it, and when he realizes what he’s doing, he quickly looks away and then back up at my face, smiling softly. But I spot the smoldering embers in his eyes and the subtle biting of his lower lip. His body speaks for him, I suppose, and I need to start paying attention to these microlessons, too, even though he’s not aware that he’s already teaching me more than he had originally planned.
The rest of the cooldown is mostly casual conversation, and I love every second of it. It’s the first time that Alex and I get to spend time alone. We’re getting to know each other, slowly but surely, and I am fascinated by the multiple layers that build him up. There’s more beneath the surface that I’m tempted to get through to. I can see the doubt in his expression whenever he talks about his knee surgery and the recovery process. It’s a sensitive subject so I don’t push him, but I am getting curious.
The drive back home is relatively quiet.
He keeps stealing glances at me more frequently than before, and my heart keeps jumping and trudging around in my chest like it’s somehow suddenly loose. I notice the fullness of his lower lip and the dark red tinge in the middle—he’s been biting it a lot, especially during our gym session. Whenever he sees me looking at him, however, he holds my gaze for a second before going back to the road ahead. Fortunately, there’s not much traffic to deal with but we keep hitting every red light along the way.
“You were talking about your recovery earlier,” I say when he pulls up outside my house. “And you seemed kind of down… Is there anything I could possibly help you with?”
He takes a deep breath and lets it out slowly as he carefully chooses his words. “Maeve, you’re a kind woman, a good-hearted woman. If your nature were enough to heal me, I’d be skating circles around Kyle without a single hiccup. Unfortunately, the body tends to start working against us after a certain age.”
“A certain age? You’re still in your prime.”
“Not for hockey, I’m not. Not for the league, anyway,” he turns the engine off and leans back into his seat as he looks at me. “I’m getting closer to my expiration date, and the coach and I… well, we both know it.”
“It’s a slow recovery, then.”
“Excruciatingly slow. It was a torn ligament, it required surgery. I just thought I’d bounce right back. But it’s been two months since I’ve hit the ice again, and I’m still slow. There’s this nagging pain just underneath my kneecap; I usually ignore it, but the more weight I apply, the worse it gets.”
I give him a long, thoughtful look, my mind firing in every which way. “Have you considered that maybe you could’ve used a couple more months off before going back on the ice?”
“Yeah. But we have a real shot at the playoffs this year. I don’t want to miss any of it.”
“You’re ambitious, I’ll give you that.”
“And you’re one of the youngest and brightest anthropologists in the state. Don’t think I didn’t look you up from the moment we met,” Alex replies, smiling broadly.
Laughing lightly, I get out of the car and grab my gym bag from the backseat. It’s such a beautiful and warm night. There’s a timid moon rising in the east, almost full and pearlescent against the darkening sky. “You did your homework, huh?” I remark.
“How else am I going to get to know a woman like you, Maeve? Your brother is one of my closest friends. It’s not like I could just… come up to you,” he replies, barely able to look me in the eyes. It’s an interesting and surprising shift from earlier, and it speaks volumes.
