5 stages of an unrequited crush

Stage 1: Starry eyed

It started with a gaze. She look directly across the room cluttered with cable machines and TRX ropes and locked eyes with a face. She recollected it, it was a familiar one. She had seen that face many times before but never really noticed it. The fluorescent lights illuminated his features perfectly. The tawny complexion, lanky arms that buckled under dumb bells that seemed too heavy for him and stray curl that fell over his forehead. Like seat fillers at the Oscars or the supporting cast of Riverdale, he had always been present but barely ever seen. Suddenly, it was like a spotlight was switched on and all it lit up was him.

Stage 2: Suddenly I see

And just like that, her mind swirled with his presence everywhere she went. Sometimes, it was his laughter ringing in the room when he wasn't around. Other times, she willed him to appear at sight; as if staring at the door would make it happen, even though she knew well enough it wasn't his scheduled day to come in.

Stage 3: It can't just be me...can it?

Then a spark lights. She begins to actually see him all the time - on the treadmill next to her, on entering the locker room and even outside when getting in some stretches. And she isn't even hallucinating. Did she will him to appear hard enough that it actually worked? No, that couldn't be it. So could something actually be there? Suddenly, the spark burned brighter and hope grew a little more.


Stage 4: This is it

After weeks of nervous sweating before she even started working out and he being the only thing her mind could wrap itself around, it looked like things were finally turning in her favour. Literally, turning. During a mid-evening cardio session, she thought she caught his eye in the mirror. He turned in her direction, gorgeous curls falling the same way. He briefly brushed them away with a towel, patted the perspiration from his brow and began walking in her direction. It felt like all the air had been sucked out of the room. She shrugged thoughts about how this was the worst possible time for him to approach her; right in the middle of the floor, mid-squat. She steadied herself, took a deep breath and waited for him to make the walk across the floor.

Stage 5: Or not

It felt like everyone and everything else had come to a standstill. He took large strides, his tall frame steadily crossing the rubberised flooring. She paced herself and decided to play it cool; effortlessly unaware of what had been brewing between them for weeks. The seconds felt like hours. He was a foot away. Her breath stalled. He took another step and another, and then a few more and breezed right past her...to the girl a few paces behind her. She's in fitted tights, a crop top and high ponytail; looking so unfairly stunning, it's almost unconvincing that she's exercising. He tapped athletic Barbie's shoulder, waved at her and she proceeds to give him a coy smile.

Poor girl, she didn't know that her budding crush was a whole other love triangle.

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