I stop just short of walking onto the red mats, and instead stand by the wall while my mom moves around in quiet contemplation.
She wears yoga pants much like mine, and a tank, but no sneakers. Her feet are bare, her hair is tied up in a midnight black, silky smooth mass at the top of her head. She walks laps on the rubber flooring, moves her hands the way Ben does when he’s being extra exuberant. But Mom’s lips remain closed. She’s telling a story, but it’s in her head, it’s for her. And later, when her class arrives, she’ll tell them. And maybe she’ll save a life.
“Oh!” She stops with a jump, presses a hand to her chest, and another to her cheek. “Livi!”
“Hey.” Smiling and toeing my shoes off, I move onto the mats and make my way to the woman who risked, and almost lost, her life, to save mine and my brother’s when our biological father decided if he couldn’t have us, no one could. Thankfully, I favor her a hell of a lot more than I favor him.
Lindsi Franks and I have the same raven hair, straight and smooth even after a shower or sleep. We each have what people call porcelain skin, but what I more accurately describe as hopelessly pale. The summer sun is not our friend, because tanning just isn’t something we can do. I start each summer with pale skin, I work through my lobster phase, and then by the end of September, I go straight back to pale. There’s no inbetween for me, no luxury of a tan – except for one I might get from a can.
Mom and I stand about the same height, now that I’m a grown woman and my growth spurts have ended. Five feet and six and a bit inches for my mom, five-seven for me. We both boast a pair of bright blue eyes that, despite my need to remain, for the most part, unnoticed, even I can admit are beautiful.
Many men smile when they see me. That has nothing to do with beauty or who my family is, and everything to do with the fact I’ve spent half of my life inside this gym, first learning, and later, teaching yoga. My body is typical of a woman who spends her time working a physical job. Add in a pair of wide-set hips, a narrow waist, and slightly-thicker-than-is-typical-for-my-weight thighs, and men often enjoy watching me walk.
Pear-shaped. That’s what they call it.
And since I often prefer to be alone – because everyone knows book boyfriends are infinitely better than real-life idiots – men tend to try to pull me out of my hobbies, and into their beds.
If people truly knew me, if they truly knew my heart and soul, they would never call me a prude. But there has only been one man who has ever asked me questions that are real.
Oh, the things my brother has no clue go on behind his back.
“Livi?” Mom asks again as I move toward her.
“Sorry.” I shake away my straying thoughts and smile for her. “Did I disturb you?”
“No.” She reaches forward when I arrive in the middle of the mats, and takes my hand in hers. “I was working through a class for tomorrow. You caught me by surprise, but I’m done here.” She leads me toward the edge of the mats. “Are you finished for today?”
“Yeah. Ben just grabbed me in the hallway and demanded I come to dinner.”
She snickers and releases me when we step off rubber and onto concrete. Like we’ve done a million times before, we slide our feet back into our sneakers, and groan about how inconvenient it is to have to do it a dozen times a day. “Guess you’re going to Ben’s for dinner, then, huh? What did he ask you to bring?”
“Dessert.” I stand tall and wait for Mom to finish, then taking her hand again, I follow her into the hall and flip the training room lights out as we leave.
“Are you swinging by the store to buy ice cream, or do you want to make something?”
“Are you busy?”
“No.” She leads me into the ladies’ locker room and yanks one of the metal storage units open to grab her bag. “Get your purse, honey. Then we’ll go home and bake something for Ben. You know that’s why he put you on dessert duty anyway.”
“He figured I’d ask Ma.”
She snorts and slams her locker as I open mine and collect my things. Purse, keys, phone. I close the door again, and head across the room to meet her at the doorway.
“He always prefers something homemade over store-bought,” I grumble. “Pretty sure that makes him a spoiled brat.”
“I’m not saying you’re wrong.” Mom waves at people as we pass – my Aunt Andi, Andi’s husband, Riley, some of the men we affectionately call the Rollers. We pass through the long hall, past the octagon, past the boxing ring, and then into reception. “Ben is a brat, honey. We’ve known that since he was, what?” She taps a finger to her bottom lip. “Four?”
“About that,” I agree on a laugh. “Then he went ultra-brat somewhere about fourteen.”
“We seem to have passed twenty-four with mild damage,” she snickers. “So maybe by thirty-four, he’ll stop trying to dictate your whereabouts and chaperoning your dates.”
“He doesn’t know about my date last night,” I singsong. “He has no clue that Brenten is sliding in and shoving him to the side.”
“God help us all.” Mom rolls her eyes to the sky. Stopping between her car and mine in the parking lot, she grabs her keys and grins. “Want to share a ride?”
“Nah, I’ll follow you out, that way you don’t have to bring me back later.”
“Oz can bring your car. You know he would if we asked.”
“I know,” I admit, “but he’s always so busy lately.”
“Work’s really bugging him right now,” she explains, and opens her car door when I reach for mine. “There’s too much work, too few hours, and Uncle Alex is riding them all because of it. So until they can get ahead again…” she shrugs. “He said he’ll be home early tonight, though, so you might catch him before you leave again with the pineapple upside down cake that Ben totally hustled you for.”
“Ha.” I snort and slide into my car.
It’s hardly hustling if I knew all along that I would come to dinner and bring the cake. Ben ‘The Sasquatch’ Conner isn’t nearly as slick as he thinks he is.
Waving Mom off, I close my door, and back out of my parking space at the same time she does. Two similar cars, two similar-looking women, we leave the gym at the same time, and arrive at the home that borders on the forest within ten minutes of starting our engines.
Back when I was a child, my mom was married to a man who… let’s say he enjoyed abusing and attempting to murder his wife.
My good ol’ dad sure was the catch of the county.
It’s pure, blind luck that Ben and I take after our mom so much, because the genes that come from my father aren’t all that special. When I was a toddler, Mom left him, she took Ben and I, and she ran away to the safety of those same men who own the gym we just left.
The Rollers.
They took us in, kept us safe, provided a newly single mom with shelter for a little while so she could catch her breath and figure out her next step. Then, ten years later, after leaving this town and coming back again, Mom met the man she was always supposed to love.
A cop, a good man. The man I call ‘Daddy’ sometimes when I want to make him putty. Oscar – Oz – Franks set the bar high a long time ago, and though Ben annoys me on a daily basis, between them, they made sure I knew what to expect of any man that would like to smile my way.