It was the middle of a Wednesday in June in Florence, South Carolina. 23 year old Taylor Collins spent the morning at the gym running a few miles to train for the half marathon she was doing in October. She was 5'5 and lean, and loved showing off her toned abdomen whenever she could. She was not lacking in the attention department, but wasn't looking for anything serious relationship wise. You're supposed to have fun in your 20s, right? What the hell!
While running, Taylor was wearing a sports bra and leggings set from Lululemon while her hair was pulled back in a high ponytail. She had her earbuds in and was listening to her rock music playlist to keep her heart rate up. 6 miles isn't an easy thing to do, but music helped distract her brain from what her feet were doing.
As she was nearing the halfway point of her workout, she saw someone jump onto the treadmill right next to hers. Usually not many people were at the gym during this time, since it was a workday. She had purposefully picked a machine at the end of the row so she could charge her phone, which seemed to always have low battery. Not her fault that she had the world's knowledge at her fingertips- everything from trending TikToks to online shopping and especially her favorite adult videos. The point being, there were lots of other treadmills available but this guy purposefully chose the one right next to hers.
She turned her head slightly and glanced over, thinking she would just give a cordial head nod and keep going with her workout. To her surprise the guy next to her looked like he had just stepped off the pages of a magazine with his sculpted jaw, elegantly styled hair, and muscled arms. Just thinking about what those arms and hopefully equally as strong fingers could do to her made her shiver. She was not subtle at all and felt his eyes on her as she finished checking him out. Without stopping her workout she turned back to her machine and ran the last 2 miles with extra vigor. She was glad she wore these shorts today because they really made her ass pop.
Finally finished, she stepped off the machine and decided to give him a bit of a show by taking down her hair and shaking it back like that classic scene they do in romcoms. She walked off with a smile on her face and sauntered off to the locker room, knowing full well his eyes were glued to her ass in those shorts.
She took her time in the shower and changed into her comfy clothes, a tank top and some soft jersey shorts. She was lucky in the boob department that she didn't always need to wear a bra, and it was so hot anyways that she wanted to avoid wearing more.
She walked out of the gym and made it to her car. Drank what was left in her water bottle from the workout and played her favorite playlist to get ready to run some errands. As she went to go start the car, she heard it sputter forcefully for a couple of seconds, and then stop completely. Her baby Honda Civic was pretty old, but usually got her where she needed to be. It was well loved from years of being driven by her mom and then was passed down to her after college graduation. But this was the first time something like this happened. Panicking, she tried to start again and the same thing happened. Cursing, she stepped out and popped the hood. That's what people do when their car has problems, right? She went and stood in front of the open hood for a minute, and then remembered that she had no fucking clue what it looked like normally, let alone now in the middle of a crisis. Rolling her eyes at her own stupidity, she went over to the passenger door side and tried to root around for the manual she had stashed in there somewhere.
Her car was a mess as she had thrown stuff in there over the last few weeks since work was pretty stressful and she hadn't had time to clear it out. It had also been years since she used the manual so she wasn't even sure it was down there. Suddenly she heard someone clear their throat behind her.
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