Gym Girl
Glutes, glutes, glute raises, glutes, oh, look, someone’s doing arm day. That’s new.
She tried never to make eye-contact with the other women, but she was always curious as to what they were up to. It was funny because she could remember every exercise she saw someone doing, but she wouldn’t have been able to point out their faces in a line-up had one of them taken out an axe and tore the building apart.
That was the etiquette of gym culture, though. Don’t look at me and I won’t look at you. The only person she ever looked in the eye was the greeter at the front. She was so pretty, it was hard to look away. She had grown a small crush on her over the months, but that crush just led to her being even more shy in her presence. She would never be normal enough to find a date, would she?
Back to watching the old women attempt leg-curls. Today, she had her head up more than usual. She needed a warm-up run before she went to her favorite lifting machine. Her usual MO was to warm up quickly if no one was on her machine, then sprint over to it after about 5 minutes so she could take it for herself. On this particular day, there was a girl on it when she arrived, so she decided to run until the girl got off.
She understood that some sets were longer and more grueling than others. On a heavy day, she might use that particular machine for up to 20 minutes before she moved on to a new section of her workout. Even then, those days were rare. It was the only machine of its kind in this particular gym, and she knew it was a hot commodity. You didnt hog a good machine, and everyone seemed to understand this unspoken rule. That is, everyone but this new girl.
The girl was tall and thin. She had on spandex shorts and a sports bra with no shirt. That was a bold move. Even she wasn’t confident enough to pull that off. The girl had short, bright blond hair in a high ponytail. Her skin was so pale, it was almost translucent. She couldn’t have been more than 19 years-old.
Her run went from a 10-minute warm-up, to a 20-minute warm-up, to a 30-minute warm-up. Soon, her muscles would be too worn to take on heavy weights safely. She couldn’t risk hurting herself by spending too much more time on this treadmill. She had real work to do, and this was the only day this week she would have the time to do it. She succumbed to her own pressure, and she got off the machine.
It seemed wild to her that that girl could still be on the same bar machine for 30 minutes. That’s not even including the time the girl could have been on it prior to her walking in. Benefit of the doubt says its only been 30 minutes, but 30 minutes of the same 3 workouts was a lot. At the time she had gotten off of the treadmill, she had already counted the girl do 6 sets of SAME exercises. Clearly, this girl does not follow the same gym-bro social media accounts that she did because THAT was a big no-no.
It wasn’t until she made her way over to the weights section that she got a good look at the girl. That’s when she really knew that something was actually wrong. The girl was not just pale, she was almost yellow. She was also dangerously thin. Her iliac crest stuck out of the top of her spandex like two wings opening up to take flight. Her arms and legs would be the perfect example of the anatomical structure of peripheral bones and ligaments. She was frail and emaciated like no one she’s every seen. How this girl could even lift a single one of the weights she had at her station was beyond understanding.
She went ahead and grabbed a few weights of her own while keeping an eye on this girl. No one else seemed to notice her, but that was probably out of being the polite gym-goers they were silently trained to be, right? Either way, she didn’t think this was the time to be polite. She watched her clearly, and not just to put an invisible pressure on her to finally give up the machine (okay, maybe a little bit), but she also wanted to make sure that she would be there to catch this girl when she inevitably fell.
She hoisted the kettlebell into position in front of her, and began to squat down. She jumped up, brought both feet to the center of her stance, jumped back into squat position, and squatted again. She did this 10 times before dropping the 50lb weight and grabbing her towel. Her heart was racing. She looked back over at the girl who was on round number 8 of the same 3-workout sets.
The girl gave up using weights, at this point, probably because her baton-sized arms didn’t have the strength to begin with to hold a carrot. The thing girls like this don’t realize about weight lifting is it is not for calorie burning. It is possible to lose weight by growing muscle, but it’s not easy. It takes a lot of dedication and a high protein, calorie deficit diet. Otherwise, if you want to grow muscle, you do it for the muscle growth, not for the weight loss. You need to EAT. You need to feed those glycogen stores and re-build those muscles. This girl was doing, what, 10 sets of the same workouts only to go home and clearly starve herself? Her effort was for nothing if she wasn’t going to fuel her muscles after-the-fact.
She had read about various eating disorders in her studies on nutrition and personal training. It’s one thing to read about it, but it’s another thing entirely to have someone suffering from it all but scream it into your face on a Tuesday morning at 9am. Some people can hide their disorders, but if a psychologist walked into this gym right now, they’d be able to make the diagnosis with a single glace. THAT, she was sure of.
She did another set of her jump squats while silently counting the girl’s reps. She only did 3 split squats and with no weight, this time. What the hell was she doing?
It wasn’t until the girl got to the Romanian Deadlifts that she became concerned. The girl bent over with shaking legs, and before she could raise back up, she dropped both of her weights to the ground and vomited.
Did she just see what she thinks she saw? She had been watching the girl in the mirror, but this time, she whipped her head around and stared directly at her. The girl didn’t look up. She ran off, presumably to the bathroom, and was gone for several minutes.
Do I call someone? What do I do? She thought. Surely, the machine would be hers, now, since this girl clearly cannot go on. She was sad and scared for the girl, but she had put in good time being patient for that machine; she couldn’t help but feel a little excited for herself in all of this.
The girl came back with a towel and cleaned up her mess. Gross, she thought while turning back to the mirror. She did her final jump-squat set while the girl finished cleaning, and, no… no she’s not. Amazed, she watched as the girl picked the weights back up, and began working out again.
She was never getting a chance at that machine.
More importantly, that girl was not okay. This needs to be reported or something. This girl clearly needs medical and psychiatric help. Her body physically could not handle the stress she was putting on it. Even someone who did eat enough to fuel themselves would never put their muscles through this non-sense. They would know better than to overwork them to a point beyond failure. This girl was not living in reality.
Who do you talk to in situations like this? Why was no one else concerned for her well-being? No one else seemed to notice the vomiting, either, and that was impossible with how packed the gym was at this time.
She moved closer to the girl for her next workout. She was not going to let this girl out of her sight, now. She got her own dumb-bells and began her own set of RDLs. If these were going to make her vomit, it was from the liquor the night before, not because her body couldn’t handle it.
The girl went back to her split squats….again. This was round 11? Maybe? It was becoming hard to keep track of. The girl went to bend her right knee with her left foot propped up on the bench. As soon as she started to lower down, her left knee bowed out to the side as if it couldn’t even handle simply existing on her body anymore. It wasn’t even the leg she was working, and it still gave out. She stumbled over, luckily, with no weights in her hands, and she caught herself just before falling to the floor.
Okay, this has to be it. For real, now. This girl needs to go. She needs water, she needs a big, fatty meal, and she needs therapy. She felt that she could at least help her get some of those things.
She walked over to the girl after she had collected herself from her fall.
“Hey, are you okay?” She asked, not exactly knowing where she would go next if the girl said “no.”
The girl didn’t look at her. She got back into split-squat position, and attempted to bend that right knee once more.
Maybe she didn’t hear me, she thought.
“Hey.” She said once more, this time waving a hand in front of the girl’s face.
The girl ignored her, again, and kept on going.
Alright, well, she tried, right? What else could she do? At least she could go home and rest easy knowing she didn’t just ignore this girl like everyone else. Besides, she could understand why maybe this girl was too embarrassed to say anything after the many incidents she had had in a matter of minutes. And if this girl was paying even the smallest amount of attention, she would have seen her overtly staring at her for the past 45 minutes. Maybe this girl just wanted her and her gaze to go away. Fine, she thought. You do you, girl.
She did her second set of RDLS while the girl wobbled her way through a weightless bar-bell squat. The girl seemed to be disintegrating before her very eyes. She swears the girl looked thinner and paler than when she first walked up. Does your body burn your calories that quickly?
On the girl’s third or fourth squat—she didn’t know, she lost track of time thinking about the calorie burning—the girl hooked the bar back on the rack before collapsing to the floor.
Holy shit, she thought.
She looked around in a panic but didn’t catch anyone else’s eyes. There was no way no one saw that. She put her weights down and sprinted to the front desk. THAT people did see. Everyone looked up from their phones and treadmill screens to see her leap across the gym like a gazelle being hunted.
The only person at the front desk was the cute greeter. Great. Now she has to tell this girl through huffing adrenaline to call an ambulance while also blushing hard enough to turn into an actual tomato.
“Hey, there’s a girl back there who collapsed. She has been working out way too hard, I’ve been watching her, she needs water or something, I don’t know, please call for help. We probably need an ambulance.” She flung out her thoughts rapid-fire while the girl stared back at her, puzzled.
“Where is the collapsed girl?” She asked.
“On the Smith Machine. Do you have a phone? I can use my phone to call 911, we just need people down there with her.” She whipped out her phone while leading the woman to the area she had just come from.
The 911 operator had just picked up when she pointed to the machine where the girl had been, only, the girl was gone.
She hung up the 911 call in a panic. Where was the girl?
“She was right there.” She said, pointing to the machine. It was empty. No signs of any disturbance or recent use. It was even racked in a different spot than the girl had left it when she fell.
The spot on the floor where the girl had, just moments ago, cleaned up vomit was clean and dry.
“Did you guys see where that girl went?” She asked some girls stretching on yoga mats only feet away from the machine.
“What girl?” One of them asked.
“The girl who threw up and then passed out on the Smith machine. She was super skinny with blond hair. She was wearing blue spandex and a matching sports bra. I’m telling you, you couldn’t miss her. She’s been on this machine for an hour, now.”
The girls looked at each other.
“Um…I used that machine like 10 minutes ago.” The other girl said. “Before that, no one was on it, and no one has been on it since.”
She looked up at the cute front desk girl in utter embarrassment and shock. “I am so sorry,” She said, “I thought I saw… I don’t know. I’m going crazy, I guess.”
The girl smiled and said it was alright. She returned to the front desk.
I am literally going to die of embarrassment, she thought. Maybe they should have gotten that ambulance over here.
She stared at the ground for minutes on end while the other girls got back to stretching. The onlookers eventually shifted their gazes back to their phones and restarted their workouts. What just happened? What is she missing? Where was that girl? Was she okay? WHAT WAS HAPPENING?
She finally went back to the spot where she had left her stuff only minutes before. She grabbed her bag, put her weights away, and began her stroll to the front on the same walkway she had just been sprinting down.
She would have to pass the cute girl again, and, as always, the girl would look her in the eye and tell her thanks for coming in. Only, this time, she was sure the girl would add “lunatic” silently to the end of her goodbye.
She made herself as small as possible as she approached the front desk to leave. The cute girl stopped her with a, “Come here for a second.”
God, no. She thought. Please don’t make me talk to you again.
She slumped over to the desk and looked sheepishly up at the girl.
“I’ve been working here for 8 years,” She whispered, “I know the girl you’re talking about.”
She looked up at the cute girl in amazement. She wasn’t crazy! She knew it!
“I was actually the one to call 911 on her when she collapsed. It was my first shift. Her name was Alyssa.”
“Was?” She looked at her confused.
“Yeah. Unfortunately, she didn’t survive the ambulance ride. It has haunted me every day that I’ve worked here, but when you described the girl you had seen, I knew exactly who it was. I just didnt want to say it im front of everyone else.”
Yeah, no point in us both looking insane, right? She thought. I’ll take one for the team today.
“I don’t want to say I’m comforted to know that she’s here, but it’s definitely nice to know that someone else was looking out for her.”
She stared at this girl in amazement for the umpteenth time today. Okay, so, she saw a ghost. Was that somehow more insane than what she thought she saw? She didn’t even know anymore.
“My name is Ellen, by the way.” She stuck out her hand. “We should get together some time to talk more.”
I see you, Alyssa, she thought. I see you.
“I am so sorry, I don’t even know what to say right now, but, um, yes. Yeah, we definitely should get together. Do you have your phone? I can give you my number.”
They exchanged digits, then, Ellen said, “It was really great to meet you today. I feel like you gave me a gift of sorts. Thank you.”
Her face had run through so many different expressions in one day, that it seemed to be glitching at this point. She eventually landed on a smile before saying,
“Rest in peace, Alyssa, just not on the smith machine on Tuesdays and Fridays.”
Ellen snorted and covered her laugh with her hand. Was that taking something serious a little too far? Whatever, it wasn’t the craziest thing she had done today.
