Coming to Terms ✔️

8: Lady and the Director Guy

"Leg day, my favorite."

It was Wednesday afternoon and Xavier insisted we get some footage at the gym. I talked to the manager and got him to agree to let Xavier in to film me without a membership, so long as he didn't touch any of the equipment and stayed out of the way.

I lugged my water bottle with me to the barbells and placed it on the floor, waiting for Xavier's cue to start talking. "Everyone has preferences for gym routines. A popular way to go about it without overwhelming yourself at every session is to split it up among days. I like to do full body, upper body, and lower body splits. You can just dedicate a day to your back, legs, arms, et cetera. It's all however you feel comfortable working out," I explained carefully, gesturing wildly.

Xavier followed me around as I demonstrated different lifting techniques including squats and curls, all centered around my core and legs. He nodded along behind the camera and bit at his bottom lip the whole time.

I couldn't let it distract me. My dream kept coming back to me over and over like a broken DVD. I imagined his hands on me again. Or his warm body pressed against my back–

For God's sake.

He laughed when I accidentally dropped a weight, making the obnoxious alarm go off when a noise too loud triggered it. I gave him an excellent shot of my ass while doing barbell squats, and made sure to tell him it would be worth millions one day.

As we walked out, I side eyed him. He was oblivious, thankfully, so I let my eyes trail down his profile, to his chest and arms, then back up. I tried to imagine this same Xavier, who I thought I despised with every fiber of my body, as the one in my dream. Then I stopped immediately because I needed to stop thinking about it for my mental health. He glanced over at me just in time for me to avert my eyes to the pavement.

"You know, for the recipes or whatever I could probably just borrow your camera and film it myself," I began, stopping at the hood of my Jeep. "So we don't have to spend so much time together."

Xavier frowned. "That's not really how this works."

I furrowed my eyebrows, avoiding eye contact. "Oh."

He played with the lens cover, clicking it on and off a dozen times before breaking the silence between us. "I have work tonight but if you want to come over after, we can do a cooking segment," he suggested, and I hummed to myself. "Dayla keeps the fridge stocked so you can just bullshit some kind of chicken recipe or something."

"Sounds good," I said, then a lightbulb lit over my head. "Can Georgia come?"

Surely having someone else in our company would keep these devilish thoughts out of my head. Xavier looked hesitant, but nodded anyways. "Uh, yeah. That's fine."

We bid our goodbyes and when I got in the car I dialed Georgia's number, already planning my apology and begging speech.

"Hello–"

"Hi, my sweet love. Before you say anything, I just want you to know you look beautiful today and I'm so lucky to have you as a best friend."

Georgia cackled on the other end. "What do you want from me?"

"I told Xavier that you would come with me tonight to his house to film a cooking segment and I really need you there because I can't be alone with him right now for a very secret reason that I can't tell you."

I waited for a second, staring at my steering wheel. Georgia hummed on the other end. It's not like she could say no to me. I'd third wheeled and blind dates for her more times than I could count on one hand. It was in our obligations according to our best friend handbook.