Then I find out just how short, conversely, ten seconds is. When you’re out of breath and having to go to another workstation. I’ve barely grabbed the rope when the automated voice says, “Go!”
Pulling a rope is hard work. I would be worthless in a boatyard or a warehouse or wherever it is that people pull ropes for a living. This is not exactly a surprise to me, but nonetheless it sucks for the fifty hours it takes for twenty seconds to go by.
But it’s nothing compared to the burpees. Who the hell would have guessed that a simple five-step exercise could be so awful? I do three of them and my lungs are screaming for relief. Another one, and I consider staying down until the beeps start. And when they don’t, I wobble to my feet and do a fifth, cursing out Max for throwing me into the deep end of exercise.
The second set is awful. By the third set, I feel like I might have a heart attack. And when it’s time to slam the ball for the fourth time, some six minutes into the eight-minute drill, I squat down, try to pick up the ball, and fail. I collapse onto the scratchy purple rug, hoping to die.
Max doesn’t stop, and when it’s his turn to slam the ball, he does it so close to my head that I wince. And I hate him for it. For being so insensitive to what it feels like to be knocked out. For not giving a shit that I am a hard-core failure at this and every other thing in my life.
Some silly trumpet horns sound when the eight minutes is up, and Max crouches down next to me.
“You okay?”
I’m still trying to catch my breath. “Uh-huh,” I say.
He laughs and shoots me a Guy Smiley smile. “I promise. This gets more fun when you do it more often.”
Fuck you too, I think. A couple hours ago, we were so connected. Reading poems and him drawing on the sidewalk. This Max feels like a stranger.
He takes me to this thing he calls a leg press next. You sit back with your legs angled up and your feet against this platform, and you load weights on a bar on top of it. Max adds two really heavy-looking round weights to each side. “Forty-fives,” he explains, and I’m good enough at math to realize he’s about to lift a hundred and eighty pounds in the air with his legs. My throat tightens. I definitely can’t do this, and I’m going to have to tell Max.
But he’s busy grabbing different accoutrements. He brings over these huge flat rubber bands, and he attaches them, one to the chair apparatus where you sit, and one to the bar on top of the platform.
“This makes it really burn,” he says, looking all excited, and I try to match his excitement but I fail. This is just not … me. Not my thing.
He sits down, grabs the handles near his hands, twists them, and I guess that releases what the platform is resting on. His large quads tighten and pulse, and he lowers the platform until his knees are pushed up against his chest. Then he exhales with a grunt and pushes hard, and his legs straighten out.
Max is … impressive. But of course he is. He’s perfect. And that’s annoying. The rubber bands expand as he stretches his legs out, and contract as he allows the weight to fall close to his body.
“This would be a great rubber band flick trick,” I say, imagining flinging a big rubber band across the room. He gives a charity grunt without looking at me, and keeps pushing. He does nine, then ten, then eleven, and finally twelve, and for the final three, his growls like a bear. A bead of sweat drips down his forehead, barely missing his eye.
“Yes,” he shouts as he twists the handles back to catch the hundred-and-eighty-pound platform.
He stands and I curl into myself, afraid.
He puts a hand on my shoulder and squeezes. “We’ll start you real light. I started light too.”
I don’t say anything, because the voices in my head are not nice ones. Not toward me, and not toward Max. I could be asleep now. I could be anywhere but here, proving to my first boyfriend that I am utterly unworthy of boyfriend status because I am the Wimpy Kid from the Diary of.
He pulls the big circle weights off and stacks smaller weights on each side. He tells me they are twenty-five pounds each, and I am entirely uncertain that he understands who and what he is dealing with. Still, I sit down and mimic what he did, well aware that the platform is likely to fall on me when my legs collapse.
Instead, when I push up after twisting the handles, I find I can do it.
“Oh!” I say, like someone pinched my butt.
He laughs. “There ya go,” he says.
Bringing the weights down is easy, and from the scrunched-up position, I figure out that the rubber bands probably make this about twice as hard. And I don’t mind. My legs can lift the weight, and when they start to burn after number eight, I smile a bit, because I am lifting weights. Me.
“Come on,” he says, as I push a ninth time.
I grunt and push.
“Go go go,” he says, staring down at me.
I meet his eyes and I push and it’s a little embarrassing because it’s so … intimate. Me trying hard and staring into his eyes. Also it’s a little sexual.
“Push, push, push,” he chants on number twelve, and I feel the sweat dripping down my face, and I feel the tent forming in my red gym shorts.
When I stand up on my tired legs, I linger close to him because something has changed in me. I feel … different. Like even though it’s light weight, nothing like what he lifted, I did it. I finished the set. It feels awesome.
He loads more weight for my second set, and for my third, he goes with the big forty-fives on each side. I start to say something but he interrupts me.
“You can do this, Jordan,” he says. “I saw how easy the fifty was. The seventy wasn’t that hard either. You can do ninety, I promise.”
I’m not sure, and I avert my eyes, once again afraid I’ll let him down. But I get into the position, twist the handles, and jump into the deep end before I’m ready.
My legs burn right away. It’s intense. A growl comes out of me followed by a whimper, while he tells me to push push push. By the sixth push, I can barely feel my legs anymore, and it feels blissful.
I can do this. I can do this. I can do this. These are words I’ve never said to myself before, and they make me feel like crying I am so happy. He sees it in my face, because he breaks into a sexy smile.
“Adrenaline,” he mutters, and I don’t give a fuck what it is. I just feel … different. Awake. Powerful. I want more of this, now. I hold his eye contact and keep up my pushing rhythm.
“Come on, come on,” he shouts as I strain with everything I’ve got on nine.
“Ahhh!” I whimper involuntarily, and then I close my eyes and give it everything I’ve got.
It comes with a grunt that sounds like it comes from some other boy. Some boy with a shred of confidence. A kid who finishes what he starts and is capable of stuff. I straighten my legs and find myself nearly hyperventilating. Max grabs the platform like he’s going to put it into place, like I’m done.
I’m not. I take my knees down to my chest, all the way. My skinny legs are shaking something fierce. I squeeze my eyes shut, I feel the sweat dripping like my forehead is crying, and I push like my life depends on it.
My legs straighten. All the way. It’s a little bit beyond what I can do, but I straighten my legs, I twist the handles, and the platform drops with a metallic thump.
I laugh and roll off onto the ground, totally spent.
“All right!” he says, and I know he’s not patronizing me. He bends and leans over me, and when I open my eyes, his dark eyes are smiling into mine. “That was amazing!” he says. “Amazing!”