Alice Adams - Invincible Summer

‘No, it’s bloody not,’ she snapped back. ‘I’ve got a bloody physics degree and I’m telling you that my matter is utterly impervious to my mind. You can yell at me as much as you want but it won’t change the fact that I can’t bloody do it.’

‘Oh.’ Julian stopped and looked crestfallen and she felt her anger dissipating and being replaced by the urge to ruffle his light brown hair. ‘Too much? Am I pushing you too hard? I was just trying to be motivational. And I don’t get many clients who can’t do a bit more than that, if I’m honest. Well, maybe the odd pensioner.’

She laughed at his cheek. ‘Look, it’s not you, it’s me. I’ve spent the last five years working on a trading floor in the conditions of a battery chicken and my body has withered. And I wasn’t exactly Linda Hamilton in Terminator II to begin with. I think this whole thing may have been a mistake.’

‘Please don’t give up,’ he begged. ‘We can take it more slowly. Your pace, I promise. The first session’s always the hardest. I have to push you to establish your limits, and now that I know them I can ease up on you. Let’s wind down with some assisted stretching and massage, then you’ll see it’s not all misery.’

At that point she’d have agreed to gnaw off her own limbs if it meant she could stop, so she meekly allowed herself to be led to a mat in an alcove at the rear of the gym, where he ground his elbows into her buttocks ‘to release trapped nerves’ and then practically lay on top of her to pull and stretch her leg muscles into a sort of agonizing bliss. She had to admit that some of it felt good, but she was far too tense to enjoy it. Lying on the floor sweating profusely under the most attractive man she had ever been within ten metres of was a lot less sexy than she would have imagined. Finally the clock ticked round to the hour and he released her to limp towards the showers. Apparently his day was over too, because he followed her down the stairs to the changing rooms, chatting about the triathlon he had coming up. She was about to scuttle into the ladies’ changing room when he put a hand on her arm and said, ‘You’re not coming back, are you?’

‘Um, no. Probably not. I think maybe I’m cut out for more cerebral pursuits. Life of the mind, and all that.’

Julian looked mortified. ‘Look what I’ve done. My job is to make people love exercise and instead I’ve put you off for life. You must think I’m a total sadist.’

‘No, really, it’s fine,’ Eva stuttered, embarrassed.

‘At least let me take you for a drink to make up for it. You’re my last client today. Are you free after we shower?’

‘You mean like an alcoholic drink? Do you fitness freaks actually do that?’

‘Well, not that often, to be honest,’ he admitted. ‘But I can make an exception this once. You’ll come then? That’s great! I’ll see you out the front in ten, okay?’ He bounded away without waiting for her answer.

‘Actually, do you mind if we go to Pizza Express instead?’

Eva and Benedict both turned to look at Lydia in bemusement. They were standing at the entrance to Hampstead tube station, where they had arranged to meet. As Eva had pushed her way out of the lift and through the turnstiles her initial cheer at spotting Benedict’s face had turned to surprise as she panned down to the baby snuggled in a carrier against his chest, then finally dissolved into horror as she’d spotted Lydia a few metres away grappling with an enraged toddler, who seemed extremely unhappy about being impeded from hurling himself under the feet of the crowd marching towards the exit. With a show of force from Benedict, the group managed to assemble in front of the ticket machine, shuffling uncomfortably close together each time a glaring traveller needed to purchase a fare.

‘Though maybe Giraffe would be better,’ Lydia continued. ‘They’ll have crayons and stickers for Josh. And a kids’ menu. Trust me, we’ll be in a world of pain if we go to Jin Kichi, there’s nothing for little ones and nowhere to put the buggy. We can hardly expect Josh to eat raw fish.’

‘I don’t eat raw fish either, remember?’ parried Eva. Judging by the last thirty seconds, during which Josh had turned his demonic attentions to battering her shins with a plastic digger, they were going to be in a world of pain wherever they went. ‘There’s plenty of vegetarian stuff on the menu at Jin Kichi.’

Maybe if she stood firm and insisted they go somewhere unsuitable for children Lydia would get the message and decide to take the kids back to Benedict’s parents’ instead.

Benedict shot her a pleading look. She knew that he hadn’t planned this but it still rankled. When he’d suggested lunch she’d assumed he meant the two of them, and had pictured a leisurely afternoon lingering over coffee and catching up with everything that had been happening since they last saw each other almost a year ago. She’d imagined telling him how well her job was going, mentioning the very handsome personal trainer she’d been seeing, flirting a little, making him laugh, and generally savouring the bittersweetness of a love affair that never was. She’d hoped it would be. . was healing too strong a word?

Eva had wondered after the wedding whether a clean break might not be best but time had softened the sense of shame and rejection she felt until it was an almost pleasurable sore spot, like pressing a bruise. She and Benedict hadn’t spoken for several months afterwards and the first time he’d called it had been a bit strained, but after that he had diligently emailed and phoned every week or two and it hadn’t taken long for them to slip back into their old friendship and for her to conclude that her life was the better for having him in it in whatever capacity he could manage.

‘I suppose we could go somewhere else,’ Eva relented after another pleading look from Benedict, who, she couldn’t help noticing, appeared tired and rumpled and generally deserving of pity.

They shuffled out of the station and made their way down the high street towards Giraffe, a chain restaurant that Eva normally made a point of avoiding because of the unpleasant preponderance of children. It was a short walk, during which Josh nevertheless managed a couple of passable attempts at hara-kiri by wriggling free and charging towards the traffic at random intervals. They’d only just sat down at a sticky table in the heaving restaurant when Benedict announced that he needed the loo.

‘Do you fancy holding Will for a minute?’ he asked Eva, not waiting for a response before unfastening the sling and depositing ten pounds of squishy, drooling infant onto her lap. Eva held the baby awkwardly under the arms and looked at it. The baby looked back. He had deep blue eyes and a solemn expression on his face. She forced her face into a smile.

‘Well, hello there,’ she tried.

Will gazed up at her intently and then broke into a huge gummy smile. Emboldened by this early success, Eva poked out her tongue at the baby, who looked appalled and promptly screwed his face up into a ball of angry wrinkles before turning an improbable shade of puce and emitting a piercing wail.

‘How about you, Eva? Getting broody yet?’ Lydia shouted above the continuing screams, which by now were competing with the noise of Josh’s concerted efforts to demolish his high chair with his truck.

‘Strangely not,’ Eva shouted back, holding the writhing infant at arm’s length. A pungent smell was now wafting upwards.

‘It’ll hit you, don’t you worry. What are you now, twenty-eight? I give you another two years. So many of my friends said a few years ago when we were having Josh that they didn’t want their own, and now they’re all procreating like mad.’