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Show Motherlunge a novel 171 26. A Sometimes Colorful Idea Two weeks after I kissed Jack on the mouth I was at work when Pavia called me from her work. She was talking from the ladies' lounge/supply closet, pumping breastmilk for Xavier, and so in the background Uruguay/ Barry White when she said with uncharacteristic urgency, "Jack has a girlfriend." For a week or more, from her office window, Pavia had seen Jack doing the half-mile, bark-chip Fitness Loop with a woman. "She's young and pretty," Pavia said. "They laugh. I don't know her; I think she's got to be from Marketing." "Marketing," I repeated ominously. "I know. They started off, you know, power walking. But today..." Pavia stopped, shifted the receiver, came back on the line, "Today, they were doing all the fitness challenge stuff." "She can do a pull up?" Station 5 had a high bar. At other stations on the Loop: a balance beam, a berm of half-buried tires (agility), slanted tables for more-challenging situps. There were signs with hints on healthy eating, calculations for target heart rates, and a treatise on the importance of weight-bearing exercise to bone health. From my three days of temp work at the company the previous fall, Tknew the Fitness Loop; it |