For the next three days, I focused on recovering my strength. While I understood Sophie's admonition that I try to take a week for recovery before going back to work, I doubted I'd be able to do it. First off, while I was the new council member, I was still expected to show up. If I was gone for so long, there'd be questions asked about where I was, especially since I wasn't at home or in any of the local hospitals. I couldn't risk that leading back to Tabby or my new friends.
For the rest of Saturday and Sunday, I was able to relax, slowly walking around the ground floor on Mount Zion when I had the energy, and sitting down with Tabby when I didn't. In a lot of ways, it was mundane. We didn't do much, a lot of her showing me around the inside of the house and such mostly. I was amazed as we did the tour, and I found all the ways they had hidden high tech devices for Mark to use in daily living and working areas. The most impressive had to be Mark's pocket sized computers, which could be plugged into any of a half dozen monitors around the house.
"So MJT really is a three person operation," I said after dinner on Saturday. "So what's your super power?"
"What do you mean?" Tabby asked, a small smile on her face. I found that I had spent most of the day smiling too, a condition that was quite common around her. Maybe it was the hair, or the beautiful eyes, but I doubted it. I think it was Tabby as a whole that had that affect on me.
"Well, Mark's the super warrior, Sophie's the doctor and from what I guess, a sniper too, so what's your super power?" I replied.
"I don't really have one," she said, blushing. "I guess every team needs a plain old Jane””
"You’re hardly plain or regular," I countered, causing her to blush. "In fact, I think you're special in a lot of ways."
"Patrick," Tabby said, her voice trembling. "This.... this is hard for me. My last relationship didn't end so well."
I knew more about it than what Tabby knew, but I didn't think it was the time to talk about that just yet. Instead, I answered from my heart. "Tabby... I'm here. I'm not saying you have to rush into anything. I was honestly surprised about the other night. Wonderfully so. It's not that I'm saying I want to sit around twiddling my thumbs, but you are special, and if it means we go slow on certain things, then I'm okay with that."
My face felt hot as I finished my statement, and I heaved myself to my feet. The wound in my back ached, but held. Sophie had done a good job. "Uhm, I'm going to walk around some. Sophie said I should do that often."
Leaving her, I turned right down the hallway, not really caring where I was going. I soon heard the sound of music coming from the gym, and entered slowly. I needed to clear my mind, and I figured nothing I saw there would be in any way challenging to my thought processes. I in for a surprise.
I had first thought, from the sounds that came out as I opened the door, that I'd find Mark alone. There were some pretty impressive weights being lifted by the sounds of things. Instead, when I opened the door I found Mark and Sophie both working out. Mark was stripped down to only some compression shorts, while Sophie was dressed in running shorts and a sports bra.
They were doing circuit training, although Mark was using weights that most men, well, I guess what you could call most normal men, would have considered heavy. He was practically jumping up and down with two hundred and twenty five pounds on his back, while Sophie was doing the same with a hundred and thirty five. They would go from there to swinging a kettle bell, to pushups, to pull-ups, and back to the squats with barely enough of a rest to move from one station to the next. I was tired just watching them.
Sophie noticed me first, dropping down from the pull-up bar and coming over. "I think I've hit my limit for today," she said, barely audible over the music. "After all, I'm in my second trimester. Mark's about halfway done."
I nodded and she left, patting me on the shoulder as she did. I found an empty box against the wall and sat down. My bullet wound ached, so I leaned back against the plaster behind me and watched as Mark finished his circuits. From there he moved on to rope climbing, which was pretty impressive considering they had set the gym up in the main sanctuary of what had been the church. The vaulted beam ceiling went all the way up to about twenty, maybe twenty-five feet, and Mark climbed it over and over again using just his arms.
As he climbed, I could sense that he noticed me, even though he never looked my way or said a word. As he finished up, he went over and grabbed his towel and bottle of water. Still facing away from me, he started speaking.