More to Us (10 page)

"It's fine."

"She's just worried because I've never lived away from home like this. She calls at least a couple times a day."

"Do you guys get along?"

"For the most part, yeah, but there's stuff we disagree on. But that's true for everyone, right?" When I don't answer, she says, "Oh, God, I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said that."

"It's okay. I know what you meant."

The waiter returns with my change. "Have a good night," he says, then walks away.

"You already paid?" Kira asks.

"When you were on the phone."

"But it was supposed to be separate checks."

"It was, but I paid for both of them. You were busy. I didn't want to interrupt you."

"Let me give you some money." She reaches for her wallet.

I hold her arm. "No. Really. Don't worry about it. Consider it a welcome to Chicago dinner. From your new friend."

She puts her wallet away. "And trainer. Hey, we forgot to talk about my workout plan."

"I've got it in my truck. Let's go somewhere else and go over it. There's a coffee shop close to your apartment. You want to go there?"

"I don't drink coffee but yeah, we can go there."

"I don't drink coffee either." I smile. "Another thing we have in common. But they have juice drinks and other stuff."

"Sounds good."

At the coffee shop, we get some drinks, then find a table. But as soon as we sit down, a girl comes up to me.

"Austin, can I get a photo with you?" She holds her phone up.

"Sure," I say, then mouth 'sorry' to Kira.

She just nods.

The girl takes the photo and then another girl comes up to me. "Can I get one too?"

I agree to it, and as she leaves, I check to make sure no one else is coming.

"Sorry," I say to Kira. "I've been getting a lot of attention because the band played so much last summer. And we were part of a big Fourth of July concert with other bands that got us to be even more recognized."

"It's fine. Really." She points to the paper in my hand, which has the workout plan I created for her. "So what'd you come up with?"

"I made two versions." I hold out the piece of paper so she can see it. "The first one is a more aggressive plan. Heavier weights. Extreme cardio. Less rest. Basically this plan will kick your ass but you'll get results faster." I flip the paper over. "This plan is more traditional. A gradual increase in weights and reps. Standard cardio alternating with high intensity interval training. You'll still get results. It'll just take longer."

"Can I see it?" She points to the sheet of paper.

"Yeah, go ahead."

She looks at both plans, studying them. Then she takes a pen from her purse.

"What are you doing?"

"I like what you did but I have some adjustments." She crosses out one of the lower body exercises.

"You don't want to do the leg press?"

"No. I don't like that machine." She crosses out the reps on the exercise below it and writes something else in.

"You may not like it, but the leg press is really good for lower body strength."

"I don't want to do it."

"You could just try it. We'll start with lower weights and work up to—"

"I'm not doing it, okay?" She slams her pen down on the table between us.

What the hell? Why is she getting so angry?

"Um, yeah, okay. We'll take it off the plan."

She takes a breath. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to react that way."

"Is it your leg?"

"What do you mean?"

"You said you hurt your leg. I'm guessing that's why you're avoiding the leg press?"

"It's not that. I just don't like that machine." She puts her pen in her purse and gives the piece of paper back to me. "The rest of the plan is fine. I just lowered the reps on a few of them."

"Which plan do you want to do?"

"The aggressive one."

"You sure? Because if you're still recovering from an injury, we should probably—"

"I'm not still recovering. I got hurt a year ago and it was just a minor injury. I'm fine now."

She's not very convincing. She wouldn't even look at me when she said it.

"You know, maybe we should forget this. I'm not really qualified to train anyone and I don't want to push you to do something that might end up hurting you."

"I told you. I'm fine. But if you don't want to be my trainer than I'll just go back to working out by myself." She sounds angry again. And defensive. But why?

She stands up. "I really need to go."

"But we just got here."

"I know, but I have to call my mom. If I don't, she'll just keep calling me and interrupting us."

"Yeah, okay." I wasn't ready to say goodbye to her but she seems anxious to leave.

On the drive back to her apartment, she's quiet. I try to make conversation but she doesn't really participate so I just leave her alone. When we get to her building, I pull up in front of the door and leave the truck running, assuming she doesn't want me coming upstairs. She's in a weird mood right now and I'm getting the feeling she just wants me to go.

"So when do you want to start?" I ask.

"How about tomorrow? I could do whatever time works for you. I'm free all day."

"I can only do the morning. I'll get there at six to do my own workout and then we can do yours at seven. Does that work?"

"Yeah, that's fine."

"But you don't have a car. Do you want me to pick you up?"

"I'll just take the bus."

"You sure? Because I don't mind picking you up."

"The bus is fine. And if I take the bus I get to sleep a little later." She smiles, which she hasn't done since she got mad about the leg press.

"Then I'll see you at seven."

She goes to leave, but then stops and turns back to me. "Thank you for offering to do this for me. And taking the time to write up those plans."

"No problem." I smile.

She looks down, then back up at me. "I had a really good time tonight."

"Me too."

She waits there, looking at me, and I finally wake up and realize she's waiting for me to kiss her. So she's letting me kiss her? What happened to this not being a date? She reminded me of that at least five times tonight. I don't get it, but I'm not going to argue. I've wanted to kiss her all night. But just as I'm about to, she turns and opens the door and steps out of the truck.

"I'll see you tomorrow," she says. Then she races into the building and I'm left there, completely confused.

I don't understand this girl, but hell, I don't understand any girl so that's nothing new. But what IS new is that I already want to see her again. She just left and I already can't wait to see her again.

Kira

"How was your date?" Amber asks as she sits sideways on the pink recliner, dangling her legs over the armrest.

"It wasn't a date. We just went for dinner."

"Where'd you go?"

"This place where they let you create your own stir-fry."

"Is Austin one of those health food freaks?"

"Hey." I swat her feet as I go past her to sit on the couch. "Just because someone eats healthy doesn't make them a freak."

"Says the health food freak." She smiles. "You two are made for each other."

"I don't always eat healthy. And I'm sure he doesn't either."

"He'd
have
to in order to look that way." She pats her stomach. "I'd rather eat what I want and be pudgy."

"Oh, please. You are not fat. Don't even start."

"I'm just kidding. But compared to how I used to look, I do feel pudgy sometimes."

She means compared to how she looked when she was competing. As a gymnast, she was all muscle. There wasn't an ounce of fat on her, and the annoying thing is, she didn't have to work that hard to be that way.

I, on the other hand, have to work my ass off to stay lean. I inherited my mom's curves, including her big breasts, which doesn't make for a good gymnast's body. But it's the body I was given so I just accept it. But I do watch what I eat. Too many carbs goes straight to my ass, which is not what I want, despite the big booty trend everyone's so crazy about now.

"Why are you home so early?" I ask. "Matt didn't invite you to sleep over?"

"We're not at that point in our relationship."

"Are you saying you two haven't had sex?"

"Why are you so surprised? We've only been dating a month."

"It's been over a month. And I'm surprised because you acted like you've been doing it for weeks."

"I never said that."

"You implied it. So what's the deal? Why are you waiting?"

"I don't know. It just...it doesn't feel like the right time."

"Meaning you don't really like him."

"Of course I like him. I'm just not ready to do it with him."

"Is this because you're still hung up on Dylan?"

She huffs. "No." She gets up from her chair and walks to the kitchen. "That's crazy. Completely crazy."

I meet her at the fridge. "Then why won't you do it with Matt? I'm sure he wants to."

"I told you, it's not the right time." She has the fridge open, staring blankly at the shelves.

"Are you hungry?"

"No. Why?"

"Because you have the fridge open like you plan to eat something."

She quickly closes it. "I'm not eating anything. You're just confusing me with your wacky theories. Let's talk about you." She wraps her arm around mine and walks me to the kitchen table to sit down. "Why won't you date Austin?"

I sigh. "Because I don't have time for a boyfriend. I have too much going on. This is my first semester at college and I'm freaking out. I haven't had to study and take tests for years."

"School is easy. I mean, it's not easy, but compared to other things in life, it's easy. But it can be stressful sometimes, which is why you need a boyfriend to help you de-stress." She grins.

"Guys make things
more
stressful, not less."

"Some guys, but not all." She puts her elbow on the table and rests her chin on her palm, staring at the wall behind me.

"Amber?" I wave my hand over her face. "You awake over there?"

She blinks a few times. "Yeah. I was just thinking."

"About what?"

Her hand drops to the table and she sits up straight. "You can't date Austin."

"What? You just told me to."

"I changed my mind. It's a bad idea. Horrible. Worst idea ever."

"Why?"

"Because he's friends with Dylan. I wasn't even considering that before, but now that I have, I don't know what I was thinking. If you date Austin, there's a good chance you'll meet Dylan, maybe even hang out with him, and then what? What if they were over here and he saw me?"

I shrug. "He'd say hi and you'd go on with your life?"

"No!" She throws her hands in the air and stands up. "It'd be a total disaster!" She points at me. "It can never happen, you hear me? Never. You can't date Austin. Don't bring him over here. Don't be friends with him. Don't even talk to him."

I laugh, which riles her up even more.

"What's so funny?"

"You know that when people tell me I can't do something it makes me want to do it all the more."

She sighs heavily. "I'm serious, Kira. Don't do it. I can't risk seeing Dylan again. I told him I moved to New York."

"I'm not promising you I won't date Austin. And I AM going to be friends with him. Like you said, he and I have a lot in common, and after getting to know him tonight, I really like him."

"Kira, please? Just find someone else."

My phone rings. "It's my mom. I have to talk to her." I answer the call as I walk to my room. "Hey, Mom. I was just about to call you."

"Hi, honey. How was your night?"

"Good. I just got home. I was talking to Amber when you called."

"So who's this new friend of yours you had dinner with?"

"Just someone I met when Amber and I went out the other night."

"A boy?" she asks in a hopeful tone. She wants me to get a boyfriend because she thinks that'll distract me from gymnastics.

"Yes, but it's not like that. I'm not interested in him that way." It's so not true but I'm not telling my mom that.

"Then why did you go out with him?"

"He offered to show me around Chicago. He's from here so he knows all the good places to go."

"Oh. Well, that's nice of him. So what else is new?"

"Not much. We just talked this morning so there's not much to say. Maybe we should cut our calls down to once a day, or once every few days."

"Honey, I need to check in with you more than that. You know how I worry. This is the first time you've been away from home."

"I know, but I'm fine. I'm 21 years old. I don't need you to check on me all the time."

"What if something happened to you? I wouldn't know unless I called."

"Amber would you let you know. She's constantly keeping an eye on me, asking where I'm going. She's almost as bad as you." I say it jokingly.
 

"She's being a good friend. And you should do the same for her. A city as big as Chicago can be dangerous. You two need to keep an eye on each other."

"We will. I should go. I have some things to do before bed."

"Before you go...how's your leg?"

I sigh. "Mom. Don't ask. Please."

"Of course I'm going to ask. Just last week you were limping around the house."

"Because I tripped on one of Luke's toys. It had nothing to do with my injury."

"And if it did, you wouldn't tell me."

"Do we have to do this now? I don't want to fight with you."

"Kira, your father and I need to know if your leg is bothering you. If it is, it could be something serious, which means you'll need to see a doctor there."

"There's nothing wrong with my leg," I say, tensing up. I get so mad when she does this. She makes me feel like I'm five years old and can't take care of myself.

"Honey, I just—"

"Mom, I can't do this. Let's just talk later. I love you. Bye." I end the call, then wait, knowing she'll call back, but then she doesn't.

"Shit," I mutter, tossing the phone on my bed as I lie down. I don't want to fight with my mom but I can't listen to her go on and on about my leg. I'm trying to forget it even happened but I can't do that when everyone keeps reminding me of it.