Flirting with the Personal Trainer: A love at the Gym Novel Read online

  Flirting with the Personal Trainer

  A love at the Gym Novel

  Amy Sparling

  Contents

  1. Brent

  2. Dani

  3. Brent

  4. Dani

  5. Brent

  6. Dani

  7. Brent

  8. Dani

  9. Brent

  10. Dani

  11. Brent

  12. Dani

  13. Brent

  14. Dani

  15. Brent

  16. Dani

  17. Brent

  18. Dani

  19. Brent

  20. Dani

  21. Brent

  22. Dani

  23. Brent

  24. Dani

  Epilogue

  Also by Amy Sparling

  About the Author

  1

  Brent

  Everyone complains about Monday mornings, but I don’t think they’re so bad. When you work a job you love, getting up each morning and going to work is more of a fun thing than a bad thing. For the longest time I saw myself as a suit-wearing businessman. I saw myself in finance, maybe in some high rise in the city, carrying a briefcase and making tons of money. That was the plan ever since high school, when I had decided I wanted to make enough money to live a comfortable life. I thought money was only found in suits and briefcases.

  But college taught me something different. It taught me that happiness isn’t just money. It’s a whole lot more than that. And being stuck somewhere you don’t want to be just because you think you should be there is the worst way to live.

  Somewhere along the line, I stopped having that original dream, but I stayed in college and graduated with my degree in finance. Luckily, my degree came in handy when, on a whim, I decided to open up a gym with Noah and Kris, my two best friends from college.

  We’ve been up and running for a few months now, and things are going really well. It took us a few weeks to settle on the location, finally finding a storefront in the busiest part of Roca Springs, right off the main road. We have great visibility and a huge parking lot because we share a building in a large shopping center. After signing our lease, Noah and Kris and I debated hiring some kind of interior designer, or a gym architect to put our vision into place. In the end, we decided to do it ourselves. It was cheaper that way, and it would make the gym something we could be proud of. We spent a few weeks painting and remodeling and setting up Roca Springs Fitness.

  Now it’s like a second home to me. And I love going into work every morning. I’m a bit of a fitness buff from having spent most of my life racing dirt bikes, and over last summer I got certified to be a personal trainer. Now I’m a trainer and a part-owner of the gym. People think it’s ambitious, or that I’m some kind of energetic weirdo, but the truth is that I have to stay busy.

  Staying busy is the only thing that keeps my mind settled. I’m finally over the heartache of my past, but my lack of a dating life has taken a toll on me. It’s not that I can’t find anyone to date—I get hit on constantly, both in person and from my Instagram account—but I can’t seem to find anyone I click with. Most girls just want to flirt with me because I have a slight bit of notoriety on Instagram. Or they see me out in public and think they can flirt with me to get free drinks. They don’t want commitment. They don’t want anything real.

  Girls see a buff guy like me and think I don’t want anything real, either. Well, they’re wrong. Real is exactly what I want.

  I gaze up at the Roca Springs Fitness sign, glad that we went with the modern black and red logo. It looks really good. The sign matches the interior of the gym, which is still new and sleek, with black floors and all new gym equipment. It almost smells like a new car in here, with all the new stuff. I’m sure one day it’ll smell like a sweaty gym, but for now it’s still pretty nice.

  I slide my key into the door only to discover that it’s already unlocked. I know I locked it up before I left last night, so there’s only one culprit—Noah.

  “Dude,” I call out as I enter the gym and turn on the open light by the door. “I’m supposed to open today.”

  “Yeah, yeah,” he calls out from the back office. “I just had some paperwork to do.”

  I turn down the Employees Only hallway and stop in front of his office. Noah, my old college roommate and current business partner, is sitting behind his desk pouring over papers. We call him the boss, because although we’re all equal owners, Noah is the numbers guy. The serious one. He has the most boss-like personality of all of us. He runs the books and the paperwork, while I mostly handle the clients and personal training. Our other partner Kris, well, he’s just there. He works night shift. He’s always been a little wild, and while we trust him, he’s not one for settling down at a desk and working a specific job. He’s the handyman. The guy who does all the random stuff around here that needs doing. Together, we all make it work.

  Noah’s desk is a total mess today. Usually it’s annoyingly organized, but he’s up to something. I walk into his office, which is right next to mine and sit in the chair across from his desk.

  “What’s going on?” With all this paperwork, and the crease in Noah’s brow I’m a little concerned that he’s about to share some bad news about the business.

  Noah runs a hand through his hair and heaves a sigh. “I feel like we need a bookkeeper.”

  “You’re the bookkeeper,” I say, lifting a brow. “You kind of insisted on it.”

  He nods, his hand going right back through his dirty blonde hair again. That’s his signature move when he’s stressed. I’m surprised he still has a head full of hair with how much he touched it after his last break up. That girl did a number on him, but I can’t blame him. I’ve been in the same position before.

  “Yeah, I know, but it’s a lot. Payroll taxes, deductions, insurance. I mean, I know how to do it but it’s a lot. I talked to Mrs. Kline next door at the hair salon and she said she uses JR Bookkeeping. They’re pretty cheap, and they’ll handle payroll for us so all we’d have to do is send in our timesheets each week.”

  “That’s the place just down the way?” I say, gesturing toward my left. Roca Springs Fitness is located in a shopping center. To our right is the hair salon, and then to the left are a few other stores.

  He nods. “I’m thinking we should try them out. Just for payroll at first, and then we can see if my work load feels better or if I want them to do more stuff. What do you think? The price isn’t too bad, actually.”

  “Sounds good to me,” I say. “It’s your call.”

  Noah and I graduated with the same degree, and I know that between the two of us, we could probably handle all the business stuff ourselves. But I’m booked solid with training clients and Noah also doubles as the social media manager and publicist, among other things.

  “Outsourcing it seems like a good idea,” I say after looking at the numbers he’s written down. It really doesn’t cost much at all to have someone do our payroll for us.

  He nods, exhaling like he’s finally able to release some stress he’s been holding onto. “Cool, man.”

  “Dude, you okay?” I ask, standing up.

  He nods, but it’s too quick, too much of a brush off because Noah is never one to reveal his true feelings. I get it. We’re guys, and all that. We’re not supposed to have feelings. But this guy is a nervous wreck. I lived with him in college and I know him better than most people.

  “Hey man,” I say, putting my hand on his desk. “Why are you so stressed?”

  He shrugs, his hand going through his hair again. “I’m just worr
ied I’ll screw this whole thing up.”

  “You can’t single-handedly screw it up,” I say. “You’re just one-third of this business. Even if you screw up your third, there’s sixty-six percent left. We’ll still be good.” I snort at my joke and he grins. Back in college, Noah was the type to stress out until he couldn’t eat or sleep. Whether it was finals or a girl or some problem his parents had at home. He’d worry way too much about it. He’s a perfectionist. He’s smart too, so he shouldn’t worry, but he does.

  “I’ll go talk to the bookkeeping place today,” Noah says. “When Kris bothers to show up, can you ask him to go get more sports drinks? We’re almost out.”

  “Sounds good, boss,” I say, tapping the doorframe as I leave.

  “Ugh, don’t call me that,” he says.

  “Bye, boss!” I call out from the hallway.

  We are all technically the bosses, but Noah is the only one who acts like it.

  In my office, I power up my laptop and check my emails. I have three new client requests, which is awesome. I’ve almost filled up my personal training schedule for the entire week, and most of my clients come back a couple times a week. As part owner, we split the profits three ways, but I keep all of my personal training income, which has started to match my normal salary, which makes me earn twice as much. I’ve been stockpiling money, hoping to buy a house one day. Of course, every time I think about buying a house, I’ll feel that painful tug in my chest, the one that feels a lot like disappointment.

  I start wondering if I even need a house, as a single twenty-three year old. What’s the point? My one-bedroom apartment works just fine. A house would be too much space, too much emptiness with only me to fill it. And there’s nothing wrong with being single, I tell myself. It’s fine. I’m still young.

  I know all the excuses, all the lies I tell myself about how it’s great to be single. But that doesn’t really help. I hate being single.

  I hate living alone. I hate sleeping in my apartment all alone each night. I hope to find some perfect woman out there one day, but I don’t know when that day will come. Until it does, I just keep saving money, going to work, and hoping for the future.

  I sit up straight at my desk and focus on taking a deep breath, like the kind I get my clients to take when they’re stressing out about doing another rep or saying the workout is too hard when I know it’s not. I concentrate on my breathing. It’s only Monday, and work just barely started, and already I am entirely too stressed out. I love my job, and this is supposed to be fun.

  I will not think of girlfriends.

  Nope.

  I will put on a happy, confident façade and go out there and train my clients and have a great day at work. But before I do that, there’s still five minutes until my first client arrives, so I kick back in my desk chair and pull up Instagram on my phone. My little sister Bella makes fun of me for this profile. Somewhere deep down in my subconscious, I make fun of myself too. It’s shallow to maintain a fitness account that’s mostly photos of my body, I know. And kind of pathetic. But I do it anyway.

  My name is Brent Castro and I am an Instagram fitness celebrity.

  Okay, maybe celebrity isn’t exactly the right word. I only have fifty thousand followers, and on the whole scale of online celebrities, that isn’t very much. I started the account back in college, posting pictures of my workout progress in an effort to feel attractive. Desired. Wanted. I did it just because I was heartbroken from an ex that treated me like crap, cheated on me, and then somehow made me feel like it was my fault. Even though it’s shallow and lame, I liked the attention I got from posting shirtless pictures of myself online. Then, before I knew it, my follower count grew by the thousands. I started giving fitness advice, and then it felt like my account was more legitimate. I wasn’t just some attention-grabbing Instagrammer. I was helping people get into shape as well.

  I’ve inspired a ton of people to get fit, and that’s pretty cool. But lately, the attention doesn’t make me feel any better. Back when I was deep in the middle of being heartbroken, seeing all the comments talking about how attractive I was (usually said in much cruder words than that) made me feel better.

  Now, it’s just kind of a chore. These women online mean nothing to me. I no longer get the high I used to get when I’d check my account and see all my adoring followers leaving me comments. Now I feel like a sellout. And kind of objectified, too.

  Life isn’t about looking good. I work out because it’s addicting. Because it takes my mind off the things I wish I had in this life. I don’t just want a girlfriend. It would be easy to get one of those.

  I want a soul mate.

  And I’m pretty sure you don’t find those from an Instagram post.

  2

  Dani

  The smell of coffee fills the air and it’s the world’s greatest smell. Well, maybe it comes in a close second, right after the smell of this delicious apple turnover pastry. Café Marese sure knows how to make pastries, and they make them fresh every morning. I’m staring at the golden, sugary, apple-filled piece of heaven through the glass counter and trying to decide if I want it.

  I mean, of course I do.

  It’s freaking delicious.

  But I know very well that over on the counter near the cash register is a bowl of bananas and I should be ordering one of those to go with my morning coffee, not this delicious pastry. I should be good today.

  I should be good every day.

  If I say it enough, maybe I will actually order that banana.

  I step forward in line, and now there are only two people in front of me. Just two more people before I have to make my choice. Choose the banana, Dani. Be healthy.

  The pastry will only make me fatter. I don’t need to see myself in the reflection of this glass display case to know I’m fat. I’ve been getting fatter every year since high school. My BMI is officially in the obese range. I tried telling myself it wasn’t so bad because I don’t feel obese, but that didn’t help.

  I am overweight and it is all my fault. I can’t blame anyone. I can’t blame the good people at Café Marese because it’s not their fault I can’t resist their pastries. I can’t blame my last boyfriend who dumped me over text saying: sorry but you gained too much weight and I’m just not into it anymore.

  I can only blame myself.

  The woman in front of me gets her coffee and steps away, and now it’s my turn. I step forward and smile at the barista, a woman about my age with bright purple hair and a nose ring. Her name is Max and she’s worked in this shopping center as long as I’ve worked here.

  “Morning,” she says cheerfully. “Did they let you keep the cat?”

  I stick out my bottom lip in a pout. Last Friday, we found a small kitten huddled up near the bushes in front of my work. My boss let me bring her into the office and care for her all day, and I had told Max that it would be cool to keep the kitten as an office cat.

  “Nope,” I say. My boss was cool with it, but the other partners said no. They thought having an office cat would ruin their business-like reputation.

  Max rolls her eyes. “Lame.”

  “Tell me about it. But I did find her a good home. My friend Angela adopted her.”

  Max smiles. “That’s great! So what will you have today? I just made the dark roast so it’s the freshest.”

  While I love my coffee, I’m not much of a coffee snob when it comes to flavor, just freshness. I always ask for whatever drip coffee is the newest. “Sounds good,” I say. “And…”

  My eyes wander over to the basket of fruit. There are bananas and apples and oranges and they’re all fresh and colorful and healthy. I need to choose one.

  “I’ll have an apple turnover.”

  The words are out of my mouth just like that. Just like that, I’ve betrayed myself. Max is a nice person and she doesn’t even look the least bit judgmental as she happily grabs the pastry and puts it in a bag for me. She rings me up, giving me the employee discount like always
, which she says is a perk she gives out to daily customers, and then I’m on my way with my evil, high calorie sugary breakfast and a fresh coffee.

  The café is three shops down from my job at JR Bookkeeping. It’s a very, very short walk, and yet, by the time I’ve reached the door to my work, the pastry is gone. I’ve scarfed it down like always, and now the memory of it lives in shame inside of me. I crumple the wrapper and toss it in the outside trashcan on the sidewalk because if I bring it inside and put it in the little trashcan under my desk, I’ll be haunted by my bad choices all day. I don’t want to see the wrapper. I don’t want to think about it. I’m so tired of being fat and having no way to make it better. My step-mom Linda, who is a total saint, always tells me I’m fine the way I am. She tells me I’m beautiful, and that I should feel happy in my skin. Sometimes I think she truly means it. She’s always been a little overweight herself and she seems totally fine with it.

  Maybe that’s because she already had her happily ever after. Her true love. She had my dad. They met after my mom left him and he and Linda fell in love, hard. It was the most romantic thing I’ve ever seen. Their love was so pure and so sweet, and it made me long for a future where I’d have the same type of relationship as they did. But good things don’t always last.

  My dad died when I was in high school. A sudden heart attack took away my father and Linda’s true love. Just like that, he was gone.

  And I started gaining weight. I barely passed my senior year because schoolwork was the last thing on my mind, and I don’t know how I managed to get into college. I missed my dad so much but seeing Linda’s heartbroken shell of herself after she buried my dad was the worst. We were both in mourning over the passing of a wonderful person. We both gained weight. My biological mom wanted me to move back in with her in Florida, but I stayed with Linda here in Texas. She’s always felt more like a mom to me than my own mom, who is flighty and known for being someone who loves a good party more than she loves her family. My mom was mad that I chose Linda over her when I was seventeen, and now we don’t talk much.