Chapter Five - Lucas

The inside of the Lakeview Community Fitness Center is dingy. It doesn’t look dirty and nothing is broken, but it’s still got a rundown quality to it. It looks shabby and in disrepair. I wonder if there are coats of paint hiding structural issues or rugs strategically placed over stained floors. Even if there aren’t, the whole place looks like it could use a serious facelift.

I wonder if it’s one of those places from before the cleanup of the area but after the factory and most people had left. There had been a few years when it was something of a hangout for artistic types. There had been music venues and art spaces in barely-converted warehouses. Several years ago, an old girlfriend had dragged me to a performance in one of them, some band a friend of hers from college was in. It was an awful night – the floors had been sticky with alcohol and the whole place had smelled of smoke. A fitness center that looks like they’re also the kind of place that would offer meditation and pottery wheels would have been a hit with that crowd.

The owner, Samantha, is really pretty, though, and she’s humoring me by answering my questions. She’s obviously passionate about whatever it is she’s doing here, but it all sounds like a lot of nonsense to me. I keep picturing these classes she’s talking about as full of ridiculously out-of-shape people. People who come to a class once a week and move slowly to music for half an hour and delude themselves into thinking it’s helping their health. It sounds like a crowd who’d be stunned at what being in shape really means after just one session with one of my personal trainers.

“Our classes have a maximum of thirty, but we won’t cancel the class if only two or three people show up, so it varies,” Samantha says, answering my earlier question. She’s got a hand on one of her slim hips and keeps glancing at her watch a little. I assume she’s got a class starting soon.

“Is there a fee for cancellation?” I ask, trying to figure out her business model. Her clientele doesn’t sound very reliable.

“Only if you’re paying by the class. Most of our clients are members of one of our package plans,” Samantha says. She reaches over to a small table and picks up a flyer with package price breakdowns on it and hands it to me. “If you’re interested.”

“Thanks,” I say, scanning the information. It’s hard to believe she keeps her doors open with prices like these, and I can’t imagine she’ll be able to keep doing so once I’m in across the street. Looking around the place, I bet it will be six months, tops, after my opening, before she’s closing up shop. I’m already thinking of marketing to draw up. I’m thinking of making a complete list of every service we offer, every amenity and every benefit, something to show just how much more you get from the membership at Invigoration.

“How long have you been in the neighborhood?” I ask Samantha, looking up from the flyer.

“Me? Or the center?” Samantha asks with a laugh. I raise my eyebrow, and she presses on. “I’ve lived here my whole life. My parents moved out a few years after the factory closed down, but I came back to start the center. I thought the neighborhood could use it. That was about ten years ago.”

“You must have seen it change a lot, then,” I say, surprised by her answer. I wasn’t expecting her to be someone who’d spent her whole life here.

She shrugs. “I guess I have,” she says. “Are you new to the neighborhood?”

“Very new,” I say. She nods, then looks at her watch again. I keep noticing how pretty she is and how gracefully she moves. I know I’m also thinking of ways to put her out of business, but it’s hard not to notice her beauty. Her figure is slim and her skin has a glow to it. Her eyes are wide and intelligent and her dark hair is full and shining.

“Well, welcome,” Samantha says with a smile. “I’ve got to go, but please come back and check us out. If you sign up for our mailing list with Cheryl at the desk on your way out, we’ll email you a promo code for a discount on your first class.”

“Thanks, it was nice to meet you,” I say, reaching out my hand again. She shakes it, looking at me curiously. I don’t blame her. I know my questions and behavior have been a little bizarre.

“You too,” she says, turning around. I watch for a minute as kids come through the lobby, talking excitedly before I turn to go myself.

I don’t sign up for the mailing list, but I do spend some time researching the fitness center when I get back to the office. I pull up images of smiling children, of families working out together, and of a younger Samantha in the early days of the center. She looks almost exactly the same. If anything, she’s more attractive now than in the older images. The center seems to be popular in the community: there are quotes from clients about how much they love having it in the neighborhood. There are also articles about the center doing a lot of community outreach, collecting for charities, hosting benefit events, and offering free classes for families in need.

I run a hand through my hair, feeling frustrated and a little uneasy about it all. I still feel like this is all information my real estate agent should have told me.

It doesn’t matter, I tell myself, shoving my distraction aside. We’ll go in and the center will probably close and that’s business. It will probably be better for all of her clients to get a real workout, anyway. Still, something about it all makes me feel a little wrong-footed, somehow.