Not So Nice Guy(8)

“Hi!” she mouths.

The guys hovering near the bicep machine jerk their gaze in my direction, and when Sam turns away, I wave them off. They scatter like cockroaches.

I’m in the middle of leg presses when she finds me later. I have headphones in so I don’t notice her until she’s right there, a few inches away, sweaty and breathing hard.

I reach up and cut my music, but I continue with my set. She watches, eyes studying my legs like they’re wild animals, about to pounce.

“How was the class?” I ask, dragging my gaze slowly down her flushed cheeks and neck, down the front of her tight black top. She looks up and I jerk my gaze away before she catches me.

“Really fun, actually. Did you watch?”

Was I that obvious?

“I think I might’ve seen some in passing.”

She tries to hide a little smile. “So you saw when we did the cardio dance stuff in the beginning?”

Yes.

“No, must have missed it.”

“Ugh! It was my favorite part! Anyway, I’ll definitely go back. I hate doing the machines out here, but that class didn’t even feel like a workout. I mean, obviously it was…” She pinches her sweaty tank top for proof.

I pause my leg presses and reach for my water.

“See, feel. I think I got stronger just in that one class.”

She’s holding up her flexed bicep. I don’t think it’s a good idea to touch her right now.

“Ian! Appreciate my gains!”

“I can appreciate them from here, macho man.”

She reaches out for my hand and places it on her bicep. She feels delicate and warm. My hand closes around her upper arm, not tightly, but it feels strange…intimate. I watch her smile waver and I nearly say, You asked for this, remember?

She jerks away and rubs her arm like she’s trying to expel cooties from her skin. “Swole, right?”

I humor her. “You better watch where you aim those things.”

“How much longer do you have?”

“Just one set of these.”

“Okay, continue. I’ll just stand here and watch.”

I arch a brow, but true to her word, she watches quietly as I finish out my last round of leg presses. In fact, she’s staring so intently I have to grind my molars together to keep from pulling her down on top of me.

Apparently, I’m not the only one struggling. She fans her face and I aim a mocking smile in her direction.

“What?” she groans. “I’m overheated from the class!”

“I didn’t say anything.”

She doesn’t buy it. She throws her hands in the air and turns away, offering me another glimpse of the rear view that’s been killing me all night.

“I’m waiting in the car!”

“You’ll need the keys. They’re over here in my bag.”

She doesn’t turn around as she sends a wave over her shoulder. “I’ll just wait outside then!”

Like hell.

I cut my last set short and take off after her.

On the way home, she’s silent until we pass her favorite ice cream shop and she insists we go in. While we’re sampling flavors she turns to me, blue eyes staring straight at my chest. “Just to be clear, I wasn’t checking you out back there. I was considering the possibility of moonlighting as a personal trainer, now that I’m a gym rat.”

“Noted.”

“And sure, I was sort of impressed by you, that’s all. You’re an impressive guy.”

Still, her gaze won’t meet mine.

“Sam?” I say, trying to ease whatever weirdness is happening between us. “You’re impressive too—so impressive. Really, how’d you get so impressively…impressive?”

She pushes me playfully, turns to the kid on duty, and tells him I’ll be buying her three scoops of chocolate-chocolate-chip ice cream with rainbow sprinkles on top.

“In a waffle cone—oh, and with a cherry on top!” she adds, turning to face me. “Impressed?”



The next morning, I wait for Sam outside the main conference room. We have a staff meeting with the rest of the upperclassmen teachers. Today, Sam’s wearing a delicate yellow dress. I flick the lapel.

“Very prim and proper.”

“Uh huh, save it. You hate this dress. The last time I wore it, you told me I looked like I was headed to my first day of kindergarten.”

I did tell her that, but it was because it looked so good I needed to keep her from wearing it again, for my sake, and that of all of Oak Hill’s male staff members.

These staff meetings are brutal, and Sam and I usually end up passing the time by playing tic-tac-toe underneath the table. We’ve only been caught twice. Now we’re more careful.

Today, George, our vice principal, is running the show, and it takes him 15 minutes to get everyone to quiet down. He started teaching the same time we did, but he turned administrative when a well-paying position opened up. Deep down we all know he’s just one of us, though. As a result, he’s never really commanded the respect he deserves.

Like right now, he’s trying to get volunteers to run a sex-ed course. They usually do this sort of thing in middle school, but apparently the district thinks our upperclassmen are in need of a refresher course.