Tyson Page 2

At the end of the session, as people pack their bags with gloves and focus mitts, Hunter looks at me. ‘Well?’ he asks, wiping a bead of sweat away from his lips. ‘What do you reckon?’ I can’t tell from the glint in his eye whether he loved it or hated it.

  I look over at the instructor, as he packs up some kick pads at the side of the room. His triceps bulge as he bends to pick things up, and I find myself daydreaming about what it might feel like for him to pick me up. He looks like a Viking warrior — so fierce and controlled and scary. I bet he could lift me right off the floor, easy. I shake my head to dispel the image. ‘It was okay,’ I eventually reply to Hunter, in my most carefully measured tone.

  I had been so sure, when we arrived late, and the whole class had been given the punishment of a plank and press-ups because of us, that I’d never dare set foot in this place again. But right now, I’m not so sure. I feel like the experience has filled me with a strange sort of adrenaline. An adrenaline you just can’t get from selling paper all day at work. This was what it means to feel alive. This is carnal.

  ‘Yeah, it was alright, wasn’t it?’ says Hunter. ‘Shame the instructor’s such an asshole, though. Bit unnecessary, having a go at us for being late like that. When did being late ever hurt anyone?’ I think he knows it’s his fault we are late and feels guilty.

  I’m surprised that Hunter doesn’t mention how hot the instructor is. I guess his mind’s elsewhere right now. Obviously, because Hunter doesn’t mention it, I find myself focusing on just how inhumanly hot this guy is.

  I look away for a moment, feeling myself flushing at Hunter’s mention of the ‘instructor’, desperate for him not to notice the powerful effect this man has had on me.

  ‘Anyway, listen,’ he says. ‘I’ll go and pay him for today then we’ve got to shoot off I’m afraid. I’m meant to be sorting through Neil's stuff tonight. He’s coming to collect it tomorrow morning, although I’ll probably have burnt it all by then.’

  ‘Hey,’ I find myself saying, ‘why don’t you just go and get on with that? I’ll pay, and then I fancy walking home tonight. It’s a nice enough evening, and I’m boiling. Fancy a bit of fresh air.’

  ‘You’ll be okay walking in that?’ he asks, looking at my outfit.

  I glance down at myself, covered in sweat, which, now that I’ve cooled down, is making the fabric cling to my body even more tightly, leaving very, very little to the imagination. ‘It’s only a twenty-minute walk,’ I say. ‘And I’d be too hot to wear a jacket, even if I had one with me.’

  ‘Okay,’ Hunter smiles. He gives me a quick hug, and I smell his saltiness from working out. It’s not altogether unpleasant. I feel my cheek tingle where his skin touches it, and I think for a moment about how glad I am Hunter brought me here. He’s a good guy. ‘Listen, thank you for this. It means a lot.’ He pushes a ten pound note into my hand. ’Tonight was on me.’

  I smile back at him, and he backs off, mumbling something about what a prick Neil is.

  It suddenly strikes me that the room is now empty, apart from me and the instructor. I walk over to him with my ten pound note, checking my cheeks briefly in the mirror, hoping they aren’t scarlet, that I didn’t look too tragic. In actual fact, I’m kinda glowing, with a healthy pink flush spreading up my neck and onto my face, that makes my delicate features look more robust, somehow. My lips look red and full. My jaw looks sharp and chiseled. My eyes bright and deep brown. I look, more than anything, like I’ve just been making love.

  The instructor is bending down over a punching bag when I cough. ‘Excuse me,’ I say. ‘My friend and I still need to pay you.’

  He stops whatever he was doing and looks up at me. I feel guilty, weirdly, like I’ve just disturbed him. He looks deep into my eyes, holding my gaze for so long it almost feels like he’s testing me. Then he straightens up, his muscular body stretching out magnificently out to its full height.

  ‘First lesson is free,’ he says gruffly, in that strange accent.

  ‘Oh,’ I reply, holding the ten pound note, a useless offering, then I let my hand fall to my side. I’m still a little out of breath after the session — I’m gonna be aching tomorrow.

  ‘I need your names though,’ he says. ‘For my sheet.’ He points to a sheet on a clipboard on his sports bag.

  ‘Ah,’ I say, trying to regulate my breath. For some reason, even though I know I’ve got at least a reasonable level of fitness, my heart rate won’t go back to normal. ‘My friend is Hunter,’ I said.

  ‘And you?’ he asks, twisting his chest around a little, so that he was facing me head-on, his blue eyes piercing me.

  ‘I’m Giles,’ I breathe, almost in a whisper.

  ‘Giles,’ he says. ‘How unusual.’

  He couldn’t have sounded more insulting if he’d tried. It’s not the first time I’ve felt embarrassed of my name. It’s effeminate, I know that much. And it makes you think of dusty librarians and wimpy clerks.

  But it’s strange. Being around this strong, focused man. For some reason, it’s making me want to play up to my feminine side. To not worry about hiding that side of myself. My voice. My posture. The things I would normally try to cover up. ‘What’s your name?’ I ask suddenly. ‘If you don’t mind me asking.’

  ‘I don’t mind,’ he says. ‘It’s Tyson.’ He pronounces the consonants with a strange, guttural depth, lingering over the ‘s’ in the middle, as if enjoying the sensation of the air rushing through his lips. Ty-son. All that exhalation of breath. It was so sexy.

  ‘I like your name,’ I say, full of wonder. ‘It’s fitting for a fighter.’

  He raises an eyebrow. ‘It comes from the French for “firebrand”,’ he replies, and narrows his ice-blue eyes at me.

  ‘Firebrand,’ I echo, feeling my legs go weak. Must be from all that standing and punching. I must have exhausted my muscles. I feel like I could drop to the floor. ‘Are you French?’ I ask.

  ‘No,’ he replies, giving me no more information than that.

  I feel his eyes, which, up until now, have been looking steadily into mine, wander a little lower, resting for a moment on my chest, rising and falling heavily with my big breaths, and then they wander lower still, to my tiny waist, my lean hips, my tight shorts.

  ‘I’ve got to pack up now,’ he says, running a hand over his short, golden-brown hair, and turning back to his sports bag, before I’ve even had a chance to say goodbye to him. ‘Don’t be late next week,’ he says gruffly.

  Well. What an arse. I’ve never come across such a bad-mannered teacher in all my life.

  I turn to walk out.

  Why is my heart still beating so fast?

  I walk out of the garage, burning with rage - and something else.

  FOUR

  * * *

  I am so angry and confused, as I walk home, that I’m barely looking where I’m going — I just stride across the pavements and roads, not even watching the traffic carefully, muttering under my breath.

  How have I let someone make me feel like this? I’ve always been so in control in the past. People rarely ruffle my feathers, and when they do, it’s generally over something important, like work. Not this - a night-time exercise class I’d only gone along to to help out a friend.

  It’s not like I fancy him or anything. I could never be attracted to a man like that. I’m attracted to smart men, in suits. I like my boyfriends to be successful and driven businessmen; real go-getters, guys who like eating out, who like culture, guys who buy me presents and treat me right.

  Or at least, I thought that was what I was attracted to.

  So why have I rejected almost every man that has asked me out in over a year? I’ve only dated two people since I was promoted to manager. One of them, by chance, was the manager of a rival company. It felt good at first, to date someone at my level. A man that knew how to manage his team would surely know how to manage me, right?

  At first it was fine. Pleasant, even. We went out to a few restaurants, to the theatre… we even had a weekend away in the Cotswolds. But soon enough, I got bored of it. Even the sex, which was alright sex as far as it went, began to bore me. It felt like a distraction, something I just had to get through so that I could make my excuses and leave, get back to my spreadsheets and my work.

  And then there had been the man who came to fix the computers. I don’t normally do things like this, but I’d had a bad day and I was feeling harassed and horny, and he was trying so hard to impress me, while we were left alone in the office that evening.

  I knew he wanted me. The way he kept leaning over me to touch keys on my keyboard, putting his hand over mine to click the mouse, bending down over my desk, wiggling his ass at me. We did it there and then, over my desk, just like the old cliché. But I don’t know what it was; I just couldn’t get properly excited about it, even though it was so different from the smooth, wining and dining approach I’d stood by resolutely for the rest of my life. I think the IT guy had maybe just wanted me too much. It’s really unattractive to see someone trying so hard. Maybe that’s what it was.

  I cross the road, barely looking at the lights to check the green man is lit up, and then I pass some office blocks.

  The city’s beautiful in the evening. London’s always an amazing place, but the way the light changes in the summer is phenomenal. For a moment, I wish I was in a better mood so that I could really enjoy the salmon pink of the sunset. But I’m lost in thought, so I go back to that internal place I always seem to end up.

  I’m not just in a relationship with my work, I’m fricking married to it. That’s my problem. If only something could take me away from that a little, help me let off some steam.

  I walk towards the underpass, barely noticing how dark it’s getting.

  Maybe that’s what I’m
feeling now. Getting out some of that aggression has opened something up inside me. But what’s inside this space I’ve opened up? Is it just an empty hole, gaping like an open wound?

  Suddenly I feel a sharp jab in my chest, and for a terrifying moment I think maybe I’m having a heart attack, but then I become aware of two big guys with shaved heads, tackling me to the ground.

  ‘How much you got, pretty boy?’ snarls one of them, grabbing the ten pound note I hadn’t realised I was still holding in my fist.

  The other guy puts his hand over my mouth and pins me down to the ground. ‘What’s a delicate thing like you doing out here alone, dressed like this?’ he asks, pushing me harder into the rough concrete. I try to scream but all that comes out is a muffled, garbled noise.

  I need to do something. Fast. But I don’t know what.

  ‘Fucking poofter,’ says the other man. ‘Only a poof would dress like this.’ His words hurt more than their hands, more than the shame I feel at not being able to defend myself.

  I try to bite down on the fingers in front of my mouth, but the hand is clamped down too hard for me to open my lips.

  Behind me comes another shout, and I brace myself. There are even more of them. This is it: I’m going to die.

  As I lie on my back, looking up at the sky in terror, I see a silhouette move over me, hear the heavy thwack of flesh on flesh, and see the guy who took my ten pound note fall back onto the ground.

  I see the dark shadow of a muscular leg, flicking out, and then another thwack, and the hand flies off my mouth and the other guy is on the ground as well.

  ‘Come on,’ says a low voice, giving me my ten pound note back, and then taking my hand and lifting me to my feet. Two strong, impossibly think arms pick me up, right off the ground, and carry me, with ease, away from the thugs, who lie groaning on the ground, grabbing their limbs, shocked and in pain.

  It’s not until we reach a line of cars under the safety of some street lamps that I dare look up at my rescuer.

  ‘Are you okay?’ asks that same gruff voice I was cursing just a few minutes ago: Tyson.

  ‘I… I think so,’ I say, suddenly feeling the cold upon my skin, shivering.

  Tyson lowers me to the ground, checks I am steady enough on my feet, and then takes off his black sports jacket and puts it around my shoulders. ‘Those guys won’t be bothering anyone again for a while,’ he says.

  I look back towards the underpass, see that they’re still lying there, groaning. ‘That was amazing,’ I say, breathlessly. ‘The way you took them both down like that. Like something from a movie. Thank you.’

  Tyson nods and puts a heavy hand on my shoulder. I feel electricity fizzle where his palm touches me. ‘I was driving past and saw it happen. Didn’t realise it was you, though.’

  Something about the way he says that sounds dodgy. Was he following me home? Surely not. Why have I even got it into my head that this man would be interested in me in any way? It’s not like he’s giving off any gay signals, is it?

  ‘You look shaken,’ he says, giving my shoulder a squeeze. ‘Let me drive you home.’

  FIVE

  * * *

  Tyson follows me up the small concrete steps leading up to my apartment building. I sense that he’s keen to check I get into my flat okay. I feel like I’ve been rambling in the car, like I’ve shaking slightly and I’m still in shock. I must’ve been a sorry sight.

  I find my key and, trembling, manage to get it in the lock. ‘I’ve never been mugged before,’ I say quietly, ‘and certainly not attacked like that.’

  Tyson doesn’t reply, but follows me into the building and waits beside me as I press the button for the lift.

  ‘It really makes you realise how vulnerable you are,’ I continue. Then I stop, and look at his razor-sharp cheekbones, his strong, stubbled jaw, his hard stomach. ‘I guess that’s not something you feel very often: vulnerability,’ I say, as the lift pings and the doors open.

  I get into the lift and press the number two, and, silently, Tyson follows behind me. It’s strange. His gaze was so sure of itself earlier, when he had stared intently into my eyes back at the gym, when they had trailed down my neck, onto my stomach, and down… But now, it’s like he doesn’t know where to look. Or like he desperately wants to look somewhere in particular, but feels it’s inappropriate. Like he won’t let himself.

  I catch sight of myself in the lift mirror, and recoil. My face is streaked with dark mud from where I’ve been pressed into the dirt. My hair is matted and slick with filth, and I have sweat patches under my arms, even though I’m shivering. What a damn mess.

  For a moment, I catch Tyson's reflection regarding my own, and I feel it, the intensity of that look between us, in the silence of that small space. ‘I-,’ I begin to say, unsure what words are about to topple out next. ‘I-,’

  Fortunately, before I have time to make even more of a fool of myself, the lift doors slide open.

  Thank God. I’ve no doubt I would’ve embarrassed myself had I continued to speak.

  We walk towards my front door in silence, and then I open the entrance to my flat. ‘Let me get you a cup of or something,’ I say, in that terribly effete, British way of mine, aware that Tyson probably isn’t the sort of person that drinks cups of tea. ‘Or I could get you a coffee or a beer, or…’

  I lead Tyson into my living room, ashamed of the mess I’ve left it in. There are files from work spread out all over the coffee table, a coat flung over the sofa - and - horror of horrors - there are a pair of my briefs drying on top of the radiator. Not my best briefs either. Just my plain old white cotton undies, with a thin, white waistband. No designer undies for me. Why couldn’t I at least have left a pair of Calvin Kleins out to dry?

  I guess the answer is this: because I never go on any dates any more, and I never have any reason to wear impressive underwear. Comfort is all I ever think about these days.

  Thinking about my underwear makes me aware of how little I’m wearing right now. That I’m was standing in my living room with someone I only met for the first time that evening, a man who’d been ordering around forty well-built people in a rough old garage, shouting at us to throw punches this way and that, telling us we weren’t punching hard enough, that we didn’t have enough intention behind our shots.

  Here he is now, a fighter, in my living room, and I’m half-naked. At least I have his jacket over my shoulders, wearing it like some kind of cape.

  And he - why is he keeping so damn quiet?

  ‘Giles,’ he says suddenly. Hearing my name said out loud like that, with that foreign accent of hers, makes me weak at the knees.

  ‘Yes, Tyson?’ Two can play at that game. I’ll say his name back to him. Pronouncing those consonants just how he likes it. See if that has any effect on him. Imagine if I could make a man like him weak at the knees!

  He looks down at me, then lay his hands on my shoulders. He opens his mouth, runs his tongue slowly across his lips, as if he’s was about to say something, then he pauses. He whips the jacket off my back, leaving the chill of the cool air suddenly on my body. He opens his mouth again. ‘I’ve got to go.’

  Without another word, he turns around and walks out of my apartment. The door slams moodily behind him.

  That man really isn’t one for goodbyes.

  SIX

  * * *

  After exercizing in a sweaty gym, and then being pushed into filthy mud by thugs, it’s hardly an understatement to say that it’s a relief to get in the shower. There’s something oddly reassuring about seeing all my shower cremes, neatly lined up. The expensive, rosewater one, for my face. The sandalwood shower gel, and zingy grapefruit and salt scrub for my body. The ylang-ylang shampoo and conditioner. All the smells I associate with being clean, refreshed, ready to face the world again.

  I wash the mud off my face first, relieved to rid myself of the marks of the assault, wondering whether I should’ve gone to the police about it tonight. Or at least called in the attack. I was so wrapped up in the fact Tyson had rescued me, I hadn’t even thought about it.

  I’ll call the police in the morning. The memory of the homophobic slurs those bastards shouted at me ring in my ears. Guys like that never deserve to get away with it. I know they’re not going to be doing anything like the attack again for a while - not if those blows I’d heard were anything to go by. They’ll be limping for days.