Twenty minutes on the tread mill, one hundred arm curls each with five pound weights, fifty sit-ups, and still my head was fogged. My work outs were getting longer and longer to get to the serene body experience-- that buzz of excessive satisfaction.
Tonight it will take an additional run of the track, swim, and then sauna. Perfect!

Slowly, each leg launches-- propelling my body to keep up. One more lap, and
my shadow will energize and ignite. I pass everyone. Something I think should have happened at Tigre Designs.

"No L'Atrice, I have no idea."

"I can't figure out what happened. Only three people had seen that design. Me,
Stan Simon, and the designer. Why would they leak it? Now they're screwed, too. And there were no copies, only the originals in my locked desk. Are you sure you haven't seen anyone snooping around my office, anything suspicious?"

"No, this is amazing. I didn't think things like this actually happened. MaybeFuture Designs came up with the same thing, just coincidence? You know?"

"Oh please, Fran, get real. Somebody sold that design to them and it's going to be my ass unless I figure out what happened. Someone's going to have to pay and I'm the most expendable." She fell in her executive chair with a look of
despair-- suddenly resembling some crooked politician. But L'Atrice wasn't guilty, at least not this time. Could I blame it on karma? No, it was a direct result of my actions. I was responsible for whatever was about to occur, and that I would have to accept.

*****

Lap four and I stop to catch my breath. I tell myself I will do twenty, maybe I'll stop at ten. What happened to the day that nothing would interfere with my work out?
When my work outs were for my body's sake, and now they're for my mind.

*****

"Thea, I can't let L'Atrice lose her job."

"You think she would protect you?"

"She did."

"With my insistence."

"It's changed Thea. L'Atrice is not so bad. I think she's genuinely supportive of me."

Thea's condescension in her laugh made me feel stupid. My mother was right, I was stupid. Stupid for getting myself in this situation. Damn! What the hell was I going to do?

"Fran, don't worry. L'Atrice will be gone leaving an empty space for you to move up, where you should be. You'll be able to do what you want to do. Go for it."

*****

I lay naked, my knees bent and heels against my tight ass cheeks, on the heated red wood slatted shelf with my white towel absorbing my sweat. I am alone and about 107 degrees.

I watch the coals glow and hear the energy move among them. I suck in the heavy air and try to breathe out the anxiety and guilt, but it doesn't leave me. Have I become the antithesis of who I wanted to be?