The shower helped. Not a lot, but feeling like I was washing the grime and the grease and the smell and the feeling of his hands on me all off was kind of cathartic and even though I didn't feel human afterwards, I felt closer to it.
'You look better,' Josh commented when I emerged. He had put some of my clothes on the dresser and I got dressed quickly, feeling like the clothes were giving me an extra armour.
'What do you feel like watching?' Rachel asked. She was sitting up on the bed with the TV remote in her hands, flicking through the channels noncommittally.
'Something mindless,' I said, crawling up to sit beside her. 'Reality TV or something.'
We settled in for a couple of hours of TLC until around quarter past nine, when my phone started ringing. Feeling my stomach drop rapidly, I looked at the screen, worrying that it would somehow be Jerry or Ronnie, or, possibly worse, Conor.
It was Chloe.
'Hello?'
'Hey. I'm outside.'
'Outside the hotel?'
'Yeah. Come on. We're going to be late.'
'Late for what?'
'Your meeting with Piaf,' she said firmly.
'Oh,' I mumbled, hoping Josh and Rachel couldn't hear her end of the conversation. 'Um. I'm not sure, Chlo. I don't think-'
'No,' she said firmly. 'I'm sorry, I know it feels like I'm being a bully and I agree that the timing sucks but I'm not letting you throw away your whole career over this. I said I was going to do everything I could to help you, and I am. I'm getting you to this meeting, you're going to sign those papers, it will take fifteen minutes. And then I'm taking you for frozen yogurt and then I'll bring you back here, if that's what you want.'
It was starting to seem like it would take more energy to argue with her than it would to just do what she said, so I relented and told her I'd be down in a minute.
'What's going on?' Josh asked.
'My meeting with Piaf is today,' I muttered, heaving myself off the bed and slipping on the shoes Josh had brought for me from my room.
'Oh, shit, of course. I can't believe I forgot. What time will you be finished? We'll come and meet you and go do something to celebrate.'
'No, that's okay,' I said. 'I'm just going to come straight back here after. I'm not feeling well,' I said, which wasn't a lie. 'I think it's gonna be a couple of days before I can really do anything.' At least I was buying myself some time, I figured, as Josh looked displeased but nodded.
'Okay,' he said. 'Well, we can celebrate here tonight in that case. We'll order tonnes of room service and watch shitty TV all day.'
I managed another smile. 'Sounds good.'
I made my way through the suite with my hands stuffed deep in my pockets, keeping my head down and trying to just get out of there without attracting any attention, but everybody was more or less up and awake now and a bunch of them were sitting around the island in the kitchen, eating breakfast, and there was no way I could avoid passing them.
I tried to move quickly but of course they spotted me and Conor jumped up, coming towards me even as I continued moving away from him.
'Tyler,' he said, looking guilty. 'Hey, look, I'm sorry, I was being an asshole, it's not-'
'I have to go,' I muttered, skipping out and making sure the door closed behind me. Again, he didn't follow me.
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'How high energy is this going to be?' I asked Chloe as I followed her through the Manhattan foot traffic to the nearest subway station.
'Not very,' she assured me. 'Scoring you is a pretty big deal but they'll be professional about it. I called ahead and let them know that we're in a rush - no tea, no champagne, just straight down to business. There's plenty of time for them to get to know you when this is all... Well. When it's not the day after.'
'Thanks,' I muttered as she bought us some tickets and we made our way through the turnstiles and onto the platform.
We got to Piaf a few minutes early and sat in the waiting area quietly. Chloe flipped through a magazine boredly.
'This is just like when we first met,' she commented after a couple of moments. 'Can you believe that was only a few weeks ago?'
'No, I feel like I have a whole lifetime worth of annoying anecdotes about you.'
She grinned and slid her gaze towards me slyly. 'There he is,' she said, and I managed a weak smile.
An assistant appeared and called my name, and I got up, following her down a white corridor while Chloe waited with her magazine. I knew I still looked like shit; I had dark circles under my eyes from not having slept enough, my hair was a mess, and I looked gaunt and sick, because I felt gaunt and sick. I felt a twinge of frustration that this huge thing that I was doing today, this awesome, incredible, exciting thing that was supposed to be the start of something really important and significant for me was being overshadowed by the fucking trainwreck the previous night had been. I should have been excited, I should have wanted to celebrate with my friends, I should have been able to to share this with my boyfriend.
The assistant showed me into a clean white office room, which had a plant and a desk and a Mac and not much more. I sat in one of the two chairs and waited; after a moment a flustered but stylish looking woman appeared and around a flurry of apologies and greetings sat herself down on the other side of the desk. She introduced herself as Elena.
'Sorry if it seems a little chaotic,' she said, opening a drawer and moving some papers around. 'Fashion season is coming up, you know how it is. Ah, here we are. She pushed the papers across the desk towards me and I looked at them, trying to seem interested.
'Now you're welcome to take them with you and have a lawyer look them over, but Chloe made it sound like you were quite anxious to get this all done and dusted today?'
I nodded. 'If she trusts you, I do,' I said by way of explanation, and Elena smiled.
'Good to know,' she said. She handed me a pen and I flipped through the contract, signing wherever I saw an X and initialling wherever there was a Y. It took about thirty seconds.
'Welcome to Piaf Model Management,' Elena said warmly when I was finished, standing up to come around the desk and shake my hand.
'That was fast,' Chloe said encouragingly when I re-emerged.
'All done,' I said. 'We're officially colleagues.'
Chloe smiled, but she looked sad. 'This was a lot more exciting in my head,' she admitted.
'For me too,' I told her as we got in the elevator alone. I sighed. 'Most of the time I just feel numb but every now and then I just get these bursts of anger. Like I'm so furious I don't get to enjoy this. It's so unfair. Today was supposed to be special. Instead it feels like climbing a mountain of shit.'
Chloe shook her head, frowning and trying to repress whatever emotions she was feeling. 'He's a monster,' she muttered eventually.
True to her word, she took me to get frozen yogurt, perking up and grinningly explaining that it was "ice cream for models", then perking down again when it became clear I wasn't going to be able to eat it. I still felt sick and anything I put in my mouth that wasn't coffee felt like lumps of lead in my throat.
She took me back to the hotel and once we were in the lobby I figured she may as well come all the way up.
'The band should have gone to work by now,' I told her, glancing at the time to make sure. 'Can you stick around for a while?'
'I had meetings all morning but I'm free for the rest of the day,' she said, following me into the elevator.
I unlocked the suite and lead her inside carefully, not putting it past Conor to blow off all his responsibilities that day to camp out in our room and ambush me. I was safe though; only Jackson was sitting in the main living area with his laptop, writing.
'Hey,' he said, looking up and smiling when he heard us come in. 'How did it go?'
'Okay,' I said, then, catching myself, 'good. Great. Everything is signed.'
'Congratulations, dude,' he said, grinning. 'I'll put it in my next article. Get some of the sex mania heat off of you,' he teased gently, but I cringed, and Chloe swiftly changed the subject.
'Where is everyone?' she asked breezily, collapsing her willowy limbs into an armchair gracefully.
'Well, the band are at the arena already,' he said. 'They won't be back until this evening. And Josh and Rachel haven't gotten up yet.'
'They're waiting for me,' I said. 'We were gonna spend the day in bed watching My 600lb Life.'
'As somebody who literally just officially joined an industry riddled with eating disorders, that is concerning,' he told me mildly.
'I'll go get them,' I said, shrugging off my jacket and making my way to their room. I knocked and opened the door to find them sitting up in bed still in moderate states of undress, watching TV with the remains of everything that had been in their mini bar scattered all over the duvet. They looked up at me guiltily, Rachel pausing with a Butterfinger bar halfway to her mouth. I don't even know what was so funny about seeing them half-naked sitting in a pile of candy trash and looking so ashamed that they'd been caught but for some reason, and against every weird and negative feeling I'd had so far that day, I started laughing.
Josh joined in and after a second Rachel did too, but I could still tell she was watching me carefully.
'There's just something about eating all this crap and watching this show,' Rachel explained breathlessly. 'Did you know that there are four seasons of this stuff? And the TV keeps suggesting other shows that are like it. I'm gonna be as big as them by the time we leave New York.'
Josh patted the middle of the bed invitingly. 'Join us,' he said. 'There are still some Hershey's bars around here somewhere,' he added, lifting the duvet and shifting around to try and find them.
'Chloe's here,' I said by way of response. 'I propose we continue with whatever this is, but in the living room. Jackson and I will raid our mini bars for fuel.'
'Deal,' Rachel agreed, hopping out of bed and pulling one of Josh's flannels on over the butt-length t-shirt she'd slept in, while Josh grabbed a top to add to his nothing-but-underwear ensemble. I lead them back out to the living room where Chloe and Jackson were whispering about something and explained the plan to them.
'Oh my god, yes,' Chloe agreed immediately. 'Go, both of you, bring the candy,' she told Jackson and I, while she jumped up and started rearranging the furniture with Josh and Rachel. When we reemerged with armfuls of chocolate they had pushed all the couches together to form a makeshift bed big enough for the five of us, and covered it in duvets from some of the bedrooms. Josh closed all the curtains while Rachel turned on the TV and found the show, and I settled between her and Chloe for a few contented hours of just hanging out with my friends.
I felt almost human. The others were joking around and having a good time and I felt safe in the cocoon of their normalcy.
That was until around four pm, when the sound of the door unlocking interrupted our fun and the band and Sarah spilled back into the suite. I shifted uncomfortably as they started laughing and joined us on our couch-bed, looking down at my hands to avoid making eye contact with Conor.
'I feel so sick,' Rachel complained. They had worked their way through most of the chocolate. 'But also weirdly satisfied.'
'I'm going to have to spend the whole day in the gym tomorrow,' Chloe groaned, looking at the sweet wrappers laid out on her lap. 'But I think it was probably worth it.'
'I don't know if I'm going to be able to make it to the gig,' Josh muttered, clutching his stomach. 'Like I legitimately am not sure if I can walk.'
'You can chill with me,' Chloe offered jokingly.
'You're not coming?' I asked quietly, looking at her sharply. I hadn't realised until that second that I had been using her as a crutch all day and felt a twist of panic in my stomach that I was going to have to survive without her for a few hours.
Her gaze flickered almost imperceptibly in Daniel's direction before she said, 'I'm not sure that's a good-'
'You should come,' Daniel said evenly, and we both looked up at him. 'You're already on the list. Freya will be there,' he nodded his head at a very happy looking Philip, and repeated, 'You should come.'
Chloe looked at him carefully before slowly nodding and saying, 'Okay.' Then, to lighten the mood, she turned back to Josh and said, 'Sorry buddy, you're on your own.'
'Tarquin?' Josh asked hopefully, tilting his head and looking pathetic, causing everyone to laugh.
Sarah ordered a room service dinner for everyone but me to quickly scarf down before making our way back to the arena, and I managed to successfully avoid being alone with Conor or anywhere near him by busying myself with other people. I was suddenly the most social butterfly in the room; I had something to talk about with pretty much everyone except him. I knew it wasn't going unnoticed but it was all I had.
'What's going on with you?' Chloe asked quietly as we sat in the green room while the band separated themselves like they usually do to psych themselves up. I had Jackson's polaroid camera on my lap but I hadn't done anything with it yet so far. It felt very uncomfortable to try and take pictures of Conor when I wasn't talking to him. 'You're being very weird with your boy.'
'We had a fight,' I muttered.
'About what happened?' she asked, horrified.
'No. I haven't told him. About that article from this morning.'
'Oh. You believe that it wasn't me, right?'
'Of course.'
'I'm going to find out who it was,' she said darkly. 'Though I think I already have an idea.'
I shrugged. 'Doesn't matter. The damage is done. I woke up this morning to Conor yelling at me about sex. This morning. Of all mornings.'
Chloe shook her head, her jaw clenched. 'I know he didn't know,' she said, 'but...'
'It didn't help.'
'Have you talked to anyone about this besides me?' she asked quietly. There wasn't anybody close enough to overhear us but I still felt uncomfortable talking about it in public. Or at all.
'Rachel sort of knows,' I admitted. 'Something happened to her... She gets it.'
Chloe nodded, not asking. 'Good,' she said slowly. 'That's good. Talking about it will help.' She put her hand on my leg and squeezed. 'Whenever you're ready.'
I tried to shoot her a grateful smile but I'm pretty sure it just looked like a grimace. Starting to stand up, I changed the subject. 'You wanna come to work with me?' I asked jokingly, waving the camera at her.
She grinned. 'Sure,' and stood up as well, but before we could take more than a couple of steps Conor appeared out of nowhere, walking straight towards me. He looked a mixture of worried, upset, determined, and just sad.
'Hey,' he said, looking right at me, and I froze. I started to feel sick, and that same panic and fear I'd been experiencing so much of that day started to twist and dance in my stomach again. 'Can I talk to-'
Chloe stepped in front of me protectively, facing Conor. 'Not now,' she said gently, crossing her arms over her chest to make a point.
'Excuse me?' Conor asked blankly, landing somewhere between shocked and confused.
'Not now,' Chloe repeated, obviously not intending to give him any more than that.
'Okay,' Conor said dismissively, trying to sidestep her, clearly thinking she had lost her mind. I could understand why; if the roles had been reversed and somebody had tried to tell me that I couldn't talk to Conor I would have felt the exact same way. We were a team; a unit; we were always on each other's side and hadn't fought one another like this in years.
Chloe moved again so she was still between us, and Conor looked at her like she was crazy before sliding his gaze past her to me, waiting for me to do or say something.
'I have work to do,' I muttered, gesturing at him with the camera and turning around, walking away in the other direction.
'Thanks,' I mumbled, when Chloe caught up with me and fell into step beside me.
'I think you should come clean with him,' she said firmly, and I looked up at her, surprised.
'What?'
'You need to tell him. He doesn't know what he did wrong. I mean he knows, but he doesn't know how wrong it was, or why. That's not fair. You're hurting and you have every right to deal with this shit in any way you want, but it's not fair to punish Conor for it. It's not his fault.'
I looked down and fumed silently. 'I'm not punishing him. I just can't be around him right now. It has nothing to do with him.'
'He doesn't know that,' she reminded me. I didn't say anything else and she dropped it, changing the subject while I took a few cursory shots of Sally and the others with their heads together while the support act finished up their set.
'I have to go to the bathroom,' I muttered quickly to Chloe when I realised Name Withheld were about to make their way onstage, ducking away for fifteen minutes so I would have some excuse for not letting Conor kiss me before he went on.
Not that he would probably have wanted to, I reflected. He had started out the day being an asshole, but I was the one being the asshole now. I sat on a closed toilet lid and dropped my head into my hands, kneading my eyelids with my knuckles and trying to... I don't know. I felt like there was a huge ball of something in my chest that I needed to get out but I couldn't. I didn't know how to. I couldn't cry, I couldn't scream, I could barely move. I wanted to shout and break things and beat my fists against anything and anyone in reaching distance, but I also wanted to crawl into a dark hole and curl up there quietly forever. I felt like I was on a tightrope between all of these conflicting emotions and that if I actually let one take hold and pull me, I'd fall.
After a little while I took a deep breath and forced myself to leave the quiet safety of the bathroom, emerging to the thundering sounds of the music onstage and the fans.
'You look like shit again,' Josh observed when I rejoined them by the stage. Rachel and Chloe were both chatting with Freya by the edge of the stage and Jackson was watching the show.
'Thanks,' I mumbled.
Josh lifted a hand and pressed it forcefully to my forehead, narrowing his eyes as he looked into mine suspiciously.
'Maybe you're coming down with something,' he said warily. 'You look like you've got seven different kinds of the flu or some shit. Do you wanna just go back to the hotel? They'll understand,' he added, jerking his head towards the stage.
Getting the hell out of there sounded like a pretty tempting proposition right then so I nodded.
'I'll take him,' Chloe piped up, appearing beside us like she had bionic hearing or something. 'Come on, sick puppy,' she said, linking her arm through mine. 'Are you okay?' she asked quietly, once we were outside. I was quickly getting tired of these Manhattan summer nights; all sticky, close, hot air and no cold relief.
'I don't know how to answer that question,' I admitted. 'I can't even answer it to myself. I don't know what's going on inside my head. My body feels like it doesn't even belong to me anymore.'
I guess there wasn't really any response to that other than silent sympathy, and that was what I got. Chloe put her arm around my shoulders and bundled me into an Uber.
'Will you stay here tonight?' I asked when we arrived at the hotel. I felt raw and stupid asking her to be my safety blanket but it didn't really feel like I had a lot of dignity left to lose so I went for it. 'We have a spare room in our suite. Two actually, you can choose whichever you prefer.'
Chloe squinted at me thoughtfully but then nodded. 'Okay,' she said. 'I'll have my hotel messenger over some stuff.'
We got out of the car and made our way inside, and Chloe made a show of inspecting both spare rooms closely, comparing the size of the beds (the same) and the thread count of the sheets (the same) and the contents of the mini bar (the same), obviously trying to cheer me up and make me laugh. I appreciated the effort but it was wasted energy.
'Um' Chloe asked, after she had changed into a borrowed t-shirt of mine to sleep in, as we sat on the couch in the living area drinking hot chocolates, 'I don't know if you've thought about this, but where are you... Gonna sleep tonight?'
I looked down into my drink, biting my lip and wishing there was something stronger in the cup.
'There's the inferior spare room,' she said lightly, trying to make a joke of it.
'I know,' I mumbled. 'It would probably be fairer to him to take it. But... I can't sleep if he's not there.'
Chloe smiled. 'I get it. Think about what I said though. About talking to him.'
I shook my head. 'I'm not going to do that,' I said quietly. 'Things are weird for us right now but I'll figure out how to be normal soon and then it won't be an issue. He doesn't ever need to know about what happened.'
Chloe put her cup down and twisted around to face me properly. 'Why?' she asked bluntly. 'You guys are rock solid most of the time - why can't you tell him about this horrible thing that happened to you? Why won't you let him help you? Don't you think he'd want to be there for you? Wouldn't you want to be there for him if the roles were reversed?'
I nodded evenly. 'Of course. Of course I would want to be there for him. And I know he'd want to help me, if he knew. But you're fucking nuts if you think I haven't noticed the way you and Rachel have been looking at me all day. Like I'm some sort of delicate glass doll that somebody left too close to the edge of the shelf. Like any second I'll fall and break apart. I can't deal with that from him. I've only just started to feel like I'm on the same level as Conor and this would destroy all of that. We can't be equals if he pities me.'
Chloe looked at me quietly for what felt like a long time before simply saying, 'There's a difference between pity and empathy.' Then, like she always does when she's had the last word, she dropped it and changed the subject, until, yawning, she excused herself to bed.
For lack of anything better to do I followed her lead and curled up into a tight ball on my side of the bed, wondering whether sleep would take me like it had the night before. After a couple of hours of laying motionless and dreamless I heard the commotion of everyone else arriving back at the suite, and a few minutes later a slice of light cut the room in half and Conor opened the door and slipped inside.
'Tyler?' he whispered, but I didn't say anything, and I heard him moving quietly around to my side of the bed. He crouched down so his head was level with mine, so I could feel him and smell him, and I tried to focus on keeping my breathing slow and even, keeping my eyes closed, keeping my face relaxed. 'You awake?' I remained still, pretending to sleep. 'I love you,' he whispered, and I felt my mouth start to shape out the response; I never don't say it back. Curling my lips in on themselves and biting, I managed to keep my mouth shut and after second he stood up and moved away, undressing quietly before getting into bed and laying, still, a few feet away from me.
————————————
I woke the next morning when I felt him moving, sitting up and trudging into the bathroom to shower. I took that opportunity to quickly get dressed and leave the room so I wouldn't have to face him. I could feel the chasm between us growing and I knew it was up to me to bridge it, but I didn't even know where to start. Drifting away from him felt easier right now than making the herculean effort of trying to fix things without telling him why I was such a mess.
Nobody else had emerged from their rooms yet and I settled back onto one of the couches with my book, taking a cursory glance at my phone and noticing that Chloe had already been Instagramming. I opened the notification and was greeted with a photo of a hard-copy picture of Chloe, Poppy, and Georgia; an over-exposed image of the three of them at a club, all lanky limbs and laughter. However, Chloe had taken a black Sharpie to Georgia, drawing two crosses over her eyes. The post was captioned, "Never trust a hoe." I took this to mean that Georgia had been the one to spill the beans to the press about how rough I apparently liked to be in bed.
Not really sure what to do about that, I put the phone down and tried to fall into my book, steadfastly ignoring the members of the band as they appeared, tired and grumpy, for breakfast.
'Morning,' Chloe sang, skipping out of her room and coming to join me on the couch. The others all looked up from where they were sitting in the kitchen with surprise, not having realised she was there. I saw Conor's eyes narrow slightly when he saw her, and what she was wearing. She dropped down beside me, one of her legs thrown casually over mine. He looked away. 'Are you having breakfast?' Chloe asked me quietly, and I shook my head.
'I don't think I can. What was that Instagram post about?'
Chloe scowled. 'Poppy confirmed it this morning. That drunk slut Georgia lost all of her paltry cool at her stupid birthday party when a couple of journalists turned up - who only bothered because they thought I was going to be there! I'd already left, I needed to get on my flight. Anyway in order to get them to stay she started talking. Don't worry, Poppy and I are both 100% done with her. She'll be on the Z-list by the end of the week.'
I glanced across the kitchen at Conor, wondering if he'd heard. He was staring down at his cereal with intense focus so I assumed he had. At least now he'd know it wasn't directly my fault.
'Thanks,' I muttered, as Josh, Rachel, and Jackson finally materialised and, clocking the obvious divide in the room, paused for a second before coming to sit on the couches with Chloe and I.
'How are you feeling?' Josh asked, looking me up and down.
I forced a smile. 'Much better,' I said. 'Just needed a good night's sleep, I think.' Josh gave me a weird look - he always knows when I'm lying - but didn't push it. The others helped themselves to some of the breakfast food Sarah had had delivered to the room while the band sat sullenly around the kitchen island, barely speaking. It seemed like my bad mood was catching.
When they finally left the suite to go to work, Chloe turned her attention to the others and demanded, 'What's wrong with them?'
'Last night was...' Rachel trailed off. 'Not good,' she finished after a second.
'What happened?'
'Conor had an off night,' Josh said lightly.
I couldn't stop myself from interjecting. 'So? Conor on a bad night is still better than most people on a good one.'
'Not last night,' he said.
'They sucked,' Jackson summed up succinctly.
'On their first night in New York City,' Rachel added.
'I was not the only music journalist there,' Jackson clarified.
'What was wrong with him?' Chloe asked, her gaze flickering to me briefly.
Josh shrugged. 'He was just... Flat. Like he had no energy. It's so weird, because everyone was expecting him to work his shitty week out on stage, but it didn't happen.'
'Today they're gonna be releasing a statement saying he was sick last night,' Jackson added. '"Sorry for the lacklustre performance you all paid hundreds of dollars to attend but Conor's heart is breaking so he wasn't up to par.'"
'Jackson,' Rachel snapped furiously, turning her icy hot glare on him.
He stood up and held his hands out in surrender. 'I have an article to write,' he said, taking his laptop from the coffee table and going back into his room.
Chloe and Rachel looked at me warily, while Josh shrugged. 'He's not wrong,' he said flatly, looking at me. 'I know he upset you, but Conor's been slouching around like a kicked puppy for two days now. I think he knows he fucked up dude, you could throw him a bone.'
I shifted uncomfortably, unable to say anything. I couldn't tell Josh the real reason I was so fucked up and from his perspective I was dragging out my fight with Conor for no reason. He'd already tried to apologise twice. I was starting to look and feel like the worst kind of boyfriend.
'Anyway,' Chloe said brightly, mercifully changing the subject. 'What are you two getting up to for the day?'
Catching on quick, Rachel rallied and slipped her arm through Josh's. 'Josh is taking me shopping,' she said happily.
'I am?' he asked.
'You are,' she said firmly. 'What about you?'
'I have meetings late in the evening,' Chloe told them. 'And until then I'm gonna be in the gym.'
Rachel looked at the time, mildly horrified. 'But that will be like five hours,' she said.
Chloe laughed. 'Did you think I was joking when I said I'd have to spend the day there? Maintaining this body is literally my livelihood.'
'Can I come with you?' I blurted. I don't know why I asked. It wasn't because I needed her to be my safety blanket this time; as long as I didn't have to be around Conor I could deal. But for some reason I suddenly wanted to... work out.
Chloe looked at me carefully for a second before smiling. 'Yeah,' she said softly. 'I think that would be a really good idea.'
Which was how I found myself following her to the hotel's fitness centre less than an hour later, looking around me at the vast expanse of treadmills, ellipticals, bikes, rowing machines, stepping machines, weights, and a lap pool.
'Where do you want to start?' Chloe asked, her hands on her hips, looking like what she was in her yoga pants and sports bra - a supermodel.
I looked around, feeling wisps of discomfort force their way through my newfound general apathy. I had not spent a lot of time in the gym before this and poured a lot of my creativity in school into coming up with reasons not to participate in PE.
'I think I just want to run,' I said, and she nodded, gesturing towards one of the treadmills. She set herself up at one of the rowing machines a few feet away and I put my earbuds in my ears, scrolling through my music library to try and figure out what to listen to. There was only one real choice though and I hit play on Name Withheld's second album, Headphones and Reveries, falling into Conor's voice as I amped up the speed and incline on the treadmill and started running.
I ran for what felt like forever. I shouldn't have been able to; considering what little food and and sleep I'd had over the past couple of days I should have been weak, but there was something in me that need to be exhausted and I turned the volume on the music up to eleven, losing myself. I was vaguely aware of Chloe moving around the gym, spending some time on a bunch of different machines, but I just kept running. I ran through the album five times. I ran through my legs starting to feel like they would give out. I ran through my heart feeling like it was going to explode. Blood and adrenaline and endorphins flooded my system.
I broke out of my trance when a movement in the corner of my eye caused me to look up, and I saw what was unmistakably Conor leaving the gym. I pulled my earbuds out and hit Pause on the treadmill, jumping off and walking over to Chloe, who was standing beside the stationary bike she'd been using and looking after him.
'What did he want?' I asked, panting and sweating.
Chloe was covered in a thin sheen of sweat and looked more like she was in an advertisement for a workout class than actually taking one. 'He asked how long you'd been doing that.'
'What did you tell him?'
'The truth. Over two hours.'
'Is that it?'
She shrugged. 'He's a super intense dude sometimes.'
'Yeah,' I said. 'I know.'
'He knew you were listening to him,' she said, gesturing to the earbuds hanging around my neck. 'It was so loud he could hear it'.
I couldn't really think of anything to say to that, so I said nothing.
'Come on,' Chloe said, turning and grabbing her phone and water bottle from the bike. 'Let's go shower and change. We've done enough for today, I think.'