September 1, 2012
3:04pm


Annabelle wanted to work out. She was so frustrated with her life right now and jogging and biking hadnt done anything for her, when she had lived in New York whenever she got upset or frustrated or angry she'd go to the gym – day or night, any hour – and work out until she was too tired to feel anything. That was what she needed now, she needed to work out until she couldn't feel anything. The walk to the gym wouldn't have taken long but with how much emotion she had to work out she decided to drive instead just in case she was too tired to walk home when she was done.

The gym was surrounded by parking and she pulled into a spot before walking into the building. The young woman was so distracted looking around at the inside of the gym and thinking about how different it was compared to her favourite one back in New York that she nearly walked into the guy sitting on the counter. “Oh... I'm sorry. Hi my name's Annabelle, I'm looking to sign up...” She said to him, watching him closely before asking him a question with a little giggle of disbelief. “Is... is that a popsicle you're eating?” She recovered and cleared her throat. “Uhm sorry... do you work here? I wanted to get a membership since I ended my one in New York when I moved here.” It amazed her that she had even gotten this far without one, considering how much time she had spent hanging out there back home; with her it was either the gym or the dance studio when her emotions got to her.

She wouldn't think about it, the reason she felt like this. Really it wasn’t something she needed in her mind right now. As long as she didn't think about it she didn't feel too bad about it and she could pretend everything was okay.

So maybe Joe wasn't the most practical of gym owners, and maybe he was sitting on top of the front desk eating a popsicle, but it was a hot day and he wanted one, but his front desk person was on her lunch break, so he couldn't take the popsicle into his office and eat it there, someone had to be at the front desk, so there he was, sat up there perched as though he were the king of the world, enjoying his strawberry popsicle - really, it was TWO popsicles, because they were connected to each other - in Joe's mind, that was one hell of a score. He liked twinsicles.

He hadn't really been paying attention to the people coming and going all that much, because mostly they just swiped their card when they came and they left whenever they wanted. They just kept a log of who all was around, and when they left, they let. It was a fun place, and honestly, most of the time, it wasn't that hard to run at all. Still, Joe was trying, he was trying really hard to make it work, and he wanted it to be a success since now that his gymnastics career was over, it was really all that he had going for him in terms of career.

"Oh, yeah, high!" He smiled brightly at Annabelle, beginning instantly to chew the popsicle, trying to finish it quickly, and finish it quickly he did, but at a cost. "oh, crap, brainfreeze, one sec." He pressed his tongue to the roof of his mouth, his eyes squeezed shut, as it was fairly painful, but it did pass, and he turned back to her, smiling brightly. "Hey, I'm Joe Bailor, I own the place, let's get you set up - what kind of membership were you looking for?" He tilted his head to the side as he hopped behind the computer, opening up the new member forms. "Oh, and uh, yeah, that was a popsicle. Want one? I have a whole box in my office."

Annabelle gave him a confused look then an amused smile, as he got a brain freeze. "I'm not really sure, what's available here?" She asks after thinking for a moment. Really she didn't know anything about the gym here except that it was the only one in town and she didn't want to have to drive an hour every time she wanted to go to the gym so this was her only real choice. The gym was nice, new looking and had an open space feeling to it. She liked the looks of what she could see, she'd honestly rather a twenty-four hour gym that she could go to whenever she felt like it but here in such a little town she couldn't expect to find one. 

"Sure, a popsicle would be great." She told him with a little laugh. It had been a while since she had eaten one - probably since she had been dating Eric and had taken the role of being the little girl's step-mother with the man being a part-time father. It had been weird when she first had to care for the girl but had learned quickly, it was different to be a mother to someone - even part time - rather than just being their teacher and spending a few hours a day with a child while teaching. She had admittedly enjoyed caring for her and had been very sad to say goodbye to her when they finally broke up.

Ah, this was time for him to sell the gym. However, he thought that it would be an easier sell if he went and got her that popsicle right away, so that was what he decided to do - besides, wasn't everything an easier sell if the person you were trying to sell to was eating a popsicle? They made everything better, including trying to pick out a gym membership. "Hold right on, I'll just go grab you one, be back in a jiff." He tossed his own popsicle sticks and hopped down from the counter, waiting until he had enough space on his way to do a backflip - yes, he was a show off, but he had the skills and he didn't want to lose them. He loved his gymnastics-ing about.

He returned from the office about a minute later with a twinsicle for her. "Here you go." He smiled as he held out the frozen treat,then he moved back behind the desk to open up the membership options. "Okay, well we have monthly memberships, six month memberships and yearly memberships, and within that, we have single, single with guest passes, family and family with guest passes." He looked back up at her. "All memberships are good for all facilities, and that includes weights, cardio machines, weights, running track, weights, those ball things you sit on to lift weights...and more weights." Yes, he was largely joking, but he didn't like it when work got boring, so he did everything that he could to keep it interesting.

Annabelle laughed and clapped her hands at his flip. She glanced around while he was gone at everything and sighed, it was nothing like her gym back in NYC but it was the best this town had to offer. She gave him a bright grateful smile before taking the Popsicle from him and unwrapping it carefully so that the wrapper still clung to the part she wasn't eating - the last thing she wanted was Popsicle dripping all over the floor. She bit into the end of it delicately as he played around with something behind the counter and munched carefully on the cold grape flavoured ice. 

She thought about the options presented to her for a moment before she answered, "if I chose to get the monthly single membership, since I don't know how long I'm going to be staying in town just yet, would I be able to change it to a different type later? I mean if I'll be living here for a long time and especially if I get married to my match I might want to change it to something a bit more fitting." Did Freya like to exercise? She didn't know but she was sure dragging the girl with her to the gym might be good for bonding especially if it helped her keep up with her fitness plan while she did it - besides she was not about to let her step-daughter sit around at home and watch tv all day after all. And even if Freya didn't want to go with her she was sure to be able to drag some friend along. She had finished about half of her Popsicle and had managed not to get any on her dress or anything else and was feeling pretty proud right then for not mucking up the place during her first visit.

Joe knew that it probably wasn't practical to just give out popsicles to everyone who walked in, because he didn't have enough, and if you don't have enough for everyone, well...but they weren't 12 and in grade school anymore, so he didn't really think it was going to be that much of a problem. Besides, she was debating joining, and sure, this might have been considered some sort of bribery if there was a competing gym anywhere near them, but there wasn't, at least not in Evergreen. It was kind of this, or drive to the next town over, and he felt that this was a better place, so really, the popsicle offering had just been good customer relations. He was proud of himself and happy at the same time. He liked being happy, and he liked it when other people were happy, too. Especially if he directly contributed to their joy.

He listened to her question, hearing her out, and then nodded. "Of course! The monthly thing is like...you have to renew it every month, so I mean, if you want to extend to 6 months, or two a year or something like that, you have to wait until the last month tapped out, or you'd pay double for the rest of the month, which...good for me, but bad for you, and since I'm not a total jag, no scams here." He nodded. "It's really easy to switch - well, unless you have no hands, because there's paperwork involved, but you have hands, so you're good to go!" He shot her the thumbs up and ducked back behind the desk, getting the month-by-month forms out, just in case she decided that she did want to join. "And no pressure, you can take your time and think about it, forms don't have to be filled out here. They can be taken home and stuff."

"Well its just that I don't know how long I'll be in town and if it only ends up being a few weeks I don't want to be stuck with a membership I can't use in a city I will probably never visit again." Annabelle explained as she finished her popsicles and set the sticks down on the counter wrapped in the packaging. Hopefully everything would work out and shed wind up staying here in town, but if it didn't a six-month or year relationship wouldn't do her any good when she went back home.

And besides if she stayed in town she might want to be able to get her family to sign up with her too - unless Seb and Freya already had memberships. And even if she did only wind up staying a week or so she'd rather have the membership for the little time she was here instead of just waiting to see how things went, she couldn't spend all of her time jogging - and definitely not jogging outside - so this was obviously the best solution for her. She smiled at him, "I think I'd rather just figure it out now - my hedgehog might eat it if I take it home and that would be bad."

This really was the sort of town where people came and went, so Joe wasn't going to make a big deal out of the fact that she might not be here long. Evergreen was the sort of place where people came to fall in love, and if they didn't, they often left...and sometimes, they left when they did, because they wanted to live somewhere else with their new mates. Joe hadn't really planned on staying here forever, but now that he had the Gym, and friends, he was happy, and he felt like he might be in for the long haul. He was really starting to like Evergreen, and he got the feeling that he was going to be here for awhile. "That's fine, totally understandable, people come and go all the time, so don't worry about it." He shot her a wide grin, hoping that she stayed, because she seemed nice.

When she mentioned that her hedgehog might eat it if she took it home, he tilted his head to the side, because that was really weird. He had heard of the dog eating homework, but never of a hedgehog doing it! His weird little mind began to wander, and he pictured, instead of a shredder in the copy room, having a little side-room full of hedgehogs to eat all of the things that needed to be shredded. It would use less electricity, and be exponentially more adorable! He grinned, which he was sure was odd, seeing as no one had said anything entertaining, and he shook his head. "Sorry, I was picturing a room of hedgehogs eating paper replacing a shredder...I have a weird train of thought, I hope that doesn't impact your decision to join the gym, because my employees are great, I'm the only crazy one."