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“Don't worry about it. We've all been there.”
“Fucking hell, the old Dozer would have punched me in the gut and made me clean it up myself.”
“Yeah, well, new Dozer”—he laughs—“has a fucking horny as fuck wife since those babies came along and, well, let’s just say I don’t have time to be grumpy much anymore if you know what I mean?”
“Ew, Dozer TMI.” I shake my head and walk behind Dane and Dice, who have the pram, and I can hear Dozer whistling while he cleans up my puke. “Hey, Dozer.” He looks up at me, “Two weeks, yeah, and I will be back at work. Give me two weeks.”
“You sure, Ray?”
“Yep, two weeks, but if you fucking whistle near me, I will cut your dick off!” I laugh as I turn and jog back towards Dice and Dane, pulling my phone out. “Hey, can you guys watch the twins to—”
“Yep,” Dice cuts me off.
“I was gonna say tonight, I wanna start back at the gym and see if that helps too. I’ll do bath and be—”
“We’ll do it,” Dane cuts in.
So I send a text to the group chat asking for a gym buddy, and Priest answers straight away.
Ray: Need a gym buddy tonight, who's free?
Priest: 6 p.m. work?
Ray: Bring it on!
Priest: ‘laughing emoji’ ‘thumbs up emoji’
As I get ready, I grab my bag and head up to the gym. Priest is already up there as I push through the door, and he's warming up. “Well, aren't you a sight for sore eyes?”
I grin, walk up to him, hug him and sigh in his arms.
“Hey, you okay?”
“Yeah, I just kinda… miss it, ya know?”
“Yeah I know what you mean.” As I pull away, he grabs my arm. “What happened?”
“Nothing, come on let's get going. Gloves?”
“Come on, show me what you got.” He laughs.
“At the minute, nothing.” I laugh after gently sparing to warm up. We ramp it up a bit. “Fuck, I’m gonna hurt tomorrow.” I laugh, and he grins. “Let’s see if we can make it hurt everywhere.”
I groan. “Do we have to?”
“Baby.” He laughs, but I freeze for a split second.
I feel his hand rest on my arm. “Hey, where did you go?”
“Sorry.” I shake myself out. “Come on, let's do this.”
“Hey, you good?”
“Yeah, just… nothing. Come on.”
“Ray?”
“Hey, it's nothing, just a small trigger, that's all. He… Steel used to call me baby. I know it wasn’t in the same context. Sometimes, I'm okay with the word. Other times, I space and get lost. I’m good, though. Please just treat me like you normally would. I need things to go back to normal.” Things aren’t normal, though, are they? I’m not the same person anymore. I’m damaged goods now, no fucker’s gonna want me. I look like a fucking two-year-old tried to do dot to dot, for fuck’s sake, and failed miserably.
