Pride and Pucks and Prejudice - 10. Chapter 10

Jackson

I arrived before sunrise expecting to have the gym to myself. I liked the quiet. No coaches. No whistles. No music battling against someone's questionable taste, just the low hum of the ventilation system and an hour where hockey felt uncomplicated.

The lights were already on. That gave me pause. As I pushed through the door I found Noah halfway through a mobility routine, one knee on a mat, resistance band looped around his boot as he worked patiently through his hips.

He glanced up. "...Morning."

"Morning."

I looked automatically at the clock. Six thirteen.

Noah caught the movement. "What?"

"Nothing."

He narrowed his eyes slightly. I looked away before he could decide I was timing him.

He really is here every morning.

Not just most mornings. Every morning. I'd begun arriving earlier almost by accident. Five minutes one day. Ten the next. Mostly because I enjoyed the silence before the building woke up. It hadn't made any difference. Noah was always already here.

He set the resistance band aside and stood. "Couldn't sleep?"

I smiled. "I was going to ask you the same thing."

"I sleep fine."

"So do I."

Another brief silence settled between us. He picked up his foam roller.

"I just like getting started before everyone else."

"Me too."

He folded his arms. "...Right."

Something about his expression changed. Not unfriendly. Suspicious. As though I'd just admitted to stealing his routine.

"I usually get here around this time," he said.

"I know."

The words slipped out before I could stop them.

He blinked. "...You know?"

"We've been on the same schedule for a couple of weeks."

"I hadn't noticed."

"I had."

Another pause. "I mean..." I rubbed the back of my neck. "I've noticed the gym's occupied."

His eyebrows lifted. "Occupied."

"Yes."

"By me."

"...Yes."

"Hm."

He seemed to consider that. "I'm not trying to beat you here."

"I didn't think you were."

He looked unconvinced. "I've always trained early."

"I believe you."

"You sound like you don't."

"I do."

He held my gaze another second before giving a small shrug. "Fine."

He walked over to the rowing machine. I headed towards the exercise bikes. For the next twenty minutes we barely spoke. The room filled instead with familiar sounds. The steady rhythm of Noah's rowing. The quiet whir of my bike. Weights clinking somewhere in the corner. Every so often one of us crossed the room for a different exercise while the other shifted without discussion to stay out of the way. Neither of us got in the other's path. Somehow we never did.

When I finished my warm-up I looked across the gym. Noah was already moving to the squat rack.

Of course he was.

He'd planned the whole session before he'd walked through the door.

I found myself smiling.

"What?" he asked immediately.

"Nothing."

"You smiled."

"I did."

"Why?"

"No reason."

He looked thoroughly unconvinced. "You're being weird again."

"Probably."

He shook his head as he ducked under the bar. "I don't know why everyone thinks you're so normal."

I laughed. "Do they?"

"I assume somebody does."

"I wouldn't count on it."

He snorted despite himself. For some reason that felt like winning.

Not because I'd made him laugh.

Just because, for a few seconds, neither of us had been trying to beat the other at anything.