Returning penitents
Jeremy Clarke
I’m back in the gym. I put it down to the lighter evenings and the rising sap. It’s been so long since I last worked out that I had forgotten what the gym card in my wallet looked like. ‘Sorry, sir, we don’t take library cards,’ said the woman on the reception desk. ‘Where’ve you been, anyway?’ Looking around the gym I wasn’t the only returning penitent. Bikes, treadmills, steppers, rowers and cross-country ski machines were all occupied and flat out and there were loads of unfamiliar backsides. The combined noise from the treadmills and rowers was deafening.
Someone I hadn’t seen there before was a pal called Dave. Dave is a drug dealer (est. 1999) and a heavy drinker and smoker. He was the last person I expected to see in a place dedicated to improving one’s health. I could only assume that he was dipping his toe in the steroid market. Dressed in loose jog pants, a knitted cardigan and a white lawn bowling cap, he was wandering around in a relaxed and confident manner, whistling. ‘Dave! What are you doing here?’ I said. ‘I’m always here, working out,’ he said, slightly affronted by the question. ‘If you haven’t seen me before it’s because I’m normally downstairs.’ Our council-run gym has two floors. Upstairs for cardiovascular exercise machines, fixed weight machines designed for toning arse and thighs, plus an area of thick blue mats for stretching and general warm-up exercises. Downstairs for bodybuilding with free weights and the fixed weight machines concentrating on the upper body. So the sexes are more or less segregated, except that the men use the water fountain and scales upstairs as an excuse to pop up and show off their expanding physiques to the ladies. The narcissism of the men working out downstairs is developed to such a high degree that Sigmund Freud, with his eagle eye for such things, would have given it the significance of what he was unashamed to call a sexual perversion. (How about, for instance, kissing your own biceps with each raise of the dumbbell? Downstairs in our gym bicep-kissing is part of the culture.) Upstairs among the ladies, where I go — I’m skinny and it’s virtually impossible for a person of my body type to develop great bulging muscles, I’m told — that kind of narcissism is either extremely well concealed or entirely absent.
‘I’m here at least twice a week,’ he lied. ‘You’ve got to, haven’t you, if you want to keep in shape for the shagging.’ To illustrate the progress he was making in this respect, he placed his hand across his sternum, to steady his upper body, and rhythmically thrust his pelvis at me. To be fair, the control, power and accuracy of his pelvic thrusting, which was directed slightly upward as well as outward, was surprising in such an otherwise flaccid individual. And there is much to be said for the idea that Nature has dictated that a young man’s core strength lies in the pelvis rather than in his shoulders or chest. ‘Shagging, Viagra and Rohypnol — that’s all there is to life, isn’t it?’ said Dave, directing this at a pert young party with bare midriff tiptoeing modestly between us on the balls of her pretty little feet. ‘So what are you doing up here with all us ladies, then?’ I said. ‘I’ve just popped up to take in the scenery, Jer — you know how it is,’ he said, thrusting his pelvis in and out again, as if it were an involuntary action that broke out the moment he slackened his guard.
Dave wandered away, whistling tunefully, and I got down on the mat to do my stretching routine. There are three blue mats in a row. On either side of me, two women were also stretching — both middle-aged, neither as flexible as they once were. They were on their backs trying to get alternate knees to touch their chests. One said, ‘So how’s Dennis? It’s such a long time since I’ve seen him.’ ‘What do you mean, “long time since I’ve seen him”?’ said the other. ‘You only saw him yesterday!’ ‘Did I?’ ‘Yes! We were waiting for the bus. Outside Morrison’s. You were in Jim’s car. You waved.’ ‘Did I?’ ‘And you saw him on Friday. You were in the Post Office and Den came in for his Mirror. You had a long chat, he told me.’ ‘I don’t remember that!’ ‘And we both saw you in the club on Thursday night. We were talking to you and Michael for ages!’ ‘My God. I don’t remember that, either. Well, how is Dennis, anyway?’ I leaned forward, legs straight, and touched the tips of my new trainers. ‘About time,’ said my poor neglected body. ‘Sorry about that,’ I replied.
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