CHAPTER 3
Maurice was a good resource and a good friend, but he hadn’t been much help to Reginald as a mentor on the physical aspects of being undead. It wasn’t Maurice’s fault. Reginald couldn’t run like a vampire, so Maurice didn’t need to show him how to corner without falling and how to move without knocking things over. Reginald couldn’t lift big objects like cars, so Maurice didn’t need to show him how to manage heavy loads. Reginald couldn’t jump high, so Maurice didn’t need to show him how to land softly. Maurice suggested that Reginald hire a human physical trainer, but Reginald said that sounded a lot of work with no discernible benefit.
So Maurice made a strange suggestion. He told Reginald to take a gymnastics class.
Reginald asked why, already shaking his head No.
“Because,” Maurice explained, “when you don’t have much, you need to learn to make the most of what you have.”
Besides, Reginald had exhibited amazing mental gifts as a vampire. He could pick up languages almost instantly. He could calculate huge numbers in his head. He had photographic recall of everything he’d ever experienced, both as a human and as a vampire.
“Those are nervous system functions,” he said. “You know what else are nervous system functions? Things like balance. Coordination. Neural efficiency.”
“I’m six feet tall and weigh three hundred and fifty pounds, and you want me to be a gymnast,” said Reginald. “Perhaps you don’t understand physics.”
“I don’t expect you to be a gymnast. I expect you to teach your nerves how to get the most out of the abilities you have. Did you read Dune? It’s like what those witch ladies did in Dune. They weren’t strong, but they could do amazing things because they’d trained their nervous systems to control every single muscle, including the ones most people don’t have voluntary control over. They weren’t supernatural; they’d just trained normal bodies to do things that most people could never do.”
“I understand the concept. But I am not the Kwisatz Haderach.”
“The what?” said Maurice.
“Never mind.”
Reginald had mulled the idea for two weeks. Maurice kept bugging him, but Reginald was sublimely unmotivated to do anything physical. It was Claire that finally got him to do it.
“Come on, Reginald,” she told him over the phone. “I’ll bet you’d be really good at it.”
Reginald, who’d never been good at anything physical, said nothing. He let silence hang on the phone until Claire got impatient and yelled at him to stop being so self-loathing. That was the phrase she used.
“I’m not self-loathing,” he said. “It’s just that sometimes, in some ways, I kind of hate myself.”
“I even know a place. I take lessons there.”
“You do gymnastics?” said Reginald.
He’d had no idea. But really, how much could a vampire know about a 10-year-old girl who he’d once stalked as prey? The fact that they talked on the phone wasn’t even weird anymore, because nothing about the relationship that “Uncle Reginald” shared with Claire made any sense. At least it was better than Reginald spending his 2am lunch hour in her living room, watching Columbo reruns while her mother was drunk upstairs. He’d put an end to that. Once Reginald, Nikki, and Maurice had saved her from the Vampire Council and gotten her a blanket order of protection and it had become apparent that Claire was in their lives for the long haul, Reginald had declared that enough was enough and insisted that she get some sleep.
Claire gave him the phone number of a rec center and urged him to call, promising that it’d be good for him. It felt strange taking life advice from a 10-year-old.
So he’d called the rec center and inquired about adult gymnastics. The woman he spoke to told him that there was no adult gymnastics program. Reginald was about to thank her and hang up, but then he remembered how persistent Claire could be. He had to at least try or she’d never leave him alone.
“How about individual lessons?” he asked.
The woman had asked him to hold while she rang an extension. Eventually, a chipper, young female voice answered, and Reginald repeated his question.
“I can do lessons,” said the girl. “I’m only there Thursdays, though. Does 9pm work for you?”
“Sure,” Reginald said. He sighed.
“Were you a college gymnast?”
“No.”
“Just interested in learning?”
“Apparently.”
“Do you have a gymnast’s build?” she said. “Just wondering how to set our sights for what you’ll work on.”
“I’m six-foot, three-fifty,” said Reginald.
A dog barked outside Reginald’s window.
“Are you still there?” said Reginald.
“Oh, yes,” she said.
“You said Thursday at nine?”
“Um…” But she’d already committed.
“See you then,” he said.
When he arrived at the rec center, wearing a huge grey sweatshirt and huge grey sweatpants, the instructor looked him over from top to bottom, made a “Hmm” noise, and then introduced herself as Rebecca. She was maybe five-two and was waifish enough that Reginald had originally thought she was a teen boy. She explained that they’d be joined by another student for a joint lesson.
“I’m just here Thursdays, and she’s been training with me for a while, so I figured I’d lump you together, and….” Then she looked past Reginald, waved, and said, “Oh, hi!”
Dammit.
Reginald turned and found himself looking down at Claire, who was fighting unsuccessfully to hold back a smile. A tall woman was holding her hand.
I even know a place. I take lessons there.
The center wasn’t dedicated to gymnastics use. Had Claire known that the only instructor was only available at one time, no matter how many students chose to join her? He thought she did.
And so, all of a sudden, Reginald found himself taking not an adult gymnastics class, but just a gymnastics class… with a little girl. This had to look bad.
Rebecca introduced Reginald to Claire and Claire to Reginald.
“Charmed,” said Reginald, shaking Claire’s hand.
“I’ve never met you before now,” said Claire.
Then Reginald extended a hand to the tall woman beside Claire. “I’m Reginald,” he said. Then, because he felt he should say something more, he added, “I’m not a creep.”
The woman took his hand and shook it. “Victoria.”
Reginald had never laid eyes on Claire’s mother before. She didn’t seem drunk or messy or even negligent. He found it hard to believe that he’d spent untold numbers of hours less than fifty feet from this woman while she slept off a bender.
“I have a nervous system disorder that affects my balance and am here on doctors’ orders, and it was Rebecca’s idea that she teach us both at once, and also, I thought I was taking individual lessons.”
“Rebecca told us you’d be joining us,” said Victoria, deftly ignoring his backstory.
“I’m not creepy,” Reginald repeated.
“I’m sure,” said Victoria.
“I’m also not a great gymnast,” said Reginald.
Victoria smiled.
After a few minutes of stretching, Reginald asked if they could start with some balance activities, so Rebecca ignored him and lined them up for vaulting. Reginald protested. Rebecca said, “It’s just like jumping a fence” in a way that was supposed to sound dismissive, but that to Reginald rang more like a threat.
They lined up in front of a thing that looked liked a giant flat mushroom with a springboard at its base, and while Rebecca adjusted the apparatus, Reginald whispered with Claire.
“She seems nice, your mother.”
“She got laid off from one of her jobs,” said Claire. “So to save money, to keep off of food stamps, she quit drinking. Interestingly, it worked out to be a wash. Apparently her second job made just enough money for a lot of booze.”
“So I wouldn’t be able to come over at 2am anymore anyway,” said Reginald.
“Not unless you wanted to get shot,” said Claire. “Once she got more conscious at night, it suddenly dawned on her how unsafe our neighborhood is. So she bought a gun. Could you get shot and live, Reginald?”
“Yes,” he said. “I got shot a few weeks ago. I don’t recommend it.”
“When you heal from being shot, does your body spit out the bullet?”
“Sometimes,” he said.
“Sometimes it just stays in there?”
“Yeah. It’s okay. It doesn’t hurt. And if it does, there are vampire surgeons. They can work fast enough to get stuff out before you heal over it.”
“That sounds awesome.”
“They’re crooks with fast hands. It’s closer to a smash-and-grab burglary than a medical procedure,” said Reginald. Reginald didn’t have a high opinion of vampire doctors. He’d gone in once for liposuction, reasoning that if he could put foreign items inside of his body (bullet slugs, his stunt at the Council trial), there was no reason he shouldn’t be able to pull items out of his body. The doctor smirked knowingly and put him on an unsanitary table and, after numbing him up, began shoving a large tube into his abdomen. Reginald had watched as a suction tank beside him filled with white fat and red blood, then watched as his stomach re-grew in front of his eyes and the fat in the tank turned to ash.
“Claire,” said Rebecca from the vault table, patting its top. “Your turn.”
Claire sprinted toward the vault table, struck the spring board at its foot, planted her hands, and flipped once to land in the foam pit more or less on her feet.
Victoria had sat down in a folding metal chair and was watching. She clapped.
“Reginald, you just kind of swing your weight around the side. Don’t try to do what she did. Just kind of sidle around it.”
Reginald looked at Victoria, then back at Rebecca.
“You’re kidding.”
“It’s simple. Just like hopping a fence.”
He looked at Victoria. He wished she weren’t watching this.
“I’ve never hopped a fence. I don’t know what that looks like.”
Rebecca nodded to Claire. “Claire, show Mr. Baskin how you’d hop a fence.”
Claire showed him. Reginald’s eyes darted quickly to Claire’s mother, wondering if all of this looked as odd to her as Reginald thought it must. He felt a strong desire to remind Victoria that it hadn’t been his idea to be part of a kids’ gymnastics class.
“Now you do it.”
Reginald ran at the vault table. At the end, he took a little hop as Claire had and came down on the springboard, which uttered a loud bark and collapsed. Reginald’s momentum threw him into the table.
Rebecca walked up and looked at the springboard. It wasn’t broken, but the springs inside had all turned sideways. Her face was perplexed, trying to assimilate the possibility that her two students might weigh different amounts.
“Hang on,” said Rebecca. She righted the springs inside of the collapsed board, declared it to be “Claire’s board,” and then took a second springboard and shoved six heavy-duty springs between its leaves. This would be Reginald’s board.
“Go ahead,” said Rebecca.
“I don’t think I’m a vaulter. Gravity hates me.”
“Just give it a shot,” said Rebecca.
Reginald tried again. The board didn’t collapse this time, but it didn’t spring him upward either. When Reginald landed on it, it simply flattened as if he were standing on a doormat. Reginald’s body, committed to the fence-jumping vault, planted its hands and swung its legs out, but the whole of him was a foot too low and so he simply ended up wrapped the leg of the table, below the vaulting surface.
“I don’t think you’re a vaulter,” said Rebecca.
“Clearly.”
“If you come back again, I’ll bring the nuclear option. It’s a super springboard.”
“Ah.”
“You’re a bit larger than most gymnasts,” said Rebecca.
“Really?”
“It’s okay. Little gymnasts are a dime a dozen. When bigger ones can pull things off, it’s impressive.”
“That’s very optimistic.”
Rebecca, who didn’t see Reginald’s sarcasm, smiled brightly.
As the lesson progressed, Rebecca ran them through a handful of other skills. They tried cartwheels, handstands, various contortions, and even a dangerous flirtation with a set of high bars, which Reginald nearly snapped in two.
Eventually, after failing through most of the gym’s equipment, Rebecca moved them to a balance beam that had been mounted on the ground. Rebecca explained that the floor beam was there to allow students to practice balance beam skills without the risk of a large fall.
“Reginald,” said Rebecca. “Walk down this way.”
Reginald started to walk toward her.
“On the beam, obviously.”
“Oh.” Reginald walked back to the start of the beam and then walked toward Rebecca. Then he remembered that he was supposed to be on the beam and slapped his forehead.
“Hey, that was good,” she said.
“What was good?” said Reginald.
“You didn’t even slow down.”
“Well,” said Reginald with faux pride, “I have been walking for most of my life.”
Rebecca pointed down at the balance beam, which Reginald realized he was standing on.
“Try it again. Walk down to the end, then turn and come back.”
Now that Reginald was aware he was on the beam, it was harder. He took a step, faltered under his weight, and put his foot on the floor beside the beam.
“Hang on,” he said.
When Reginald had discovered each of his mental abilities, the process of letting his deeper, vampire mind take over had felt like entering a fugue. He didn’t understand the process. He simply had to surrender and trust whatever was within him to take the reins. It was that way when he recalled long-dormant facts. They simply arose, and he didn’t know the truth until he heard himself voice them. Maybe learning balance was like that.
So he closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and began walking as he just had, not looking down, not putting his arms out, trusting his feet to find the beam.
He opened his eyes and looked down. He was still on the beam, so when he reached the other end, he turned on one foot and walked back.
“I wouldn’t have thought you’d be able to do that as easily as you just did,” said Rebecca. “Don’t take this the wrong way, but the physics aren’t right.”
Reginald thought back to what Maurice had said, about all of those little muscles being there already, and about how he’d just need to get them working together. It doesn’t take a lot of muscle to balance, he’d said. It just takes the neural ability to coordinate those muscles. And neural ability is one thing you definitely have.
“Try it backward,” said Rebecca.
So Reginald walked the beam backward. The trick seemed to be to focus only on the largest level of the goal and not the specifics: Get to the other end, not put one foot in front of the other and hold your balance. Something deep took over and seemed to know what to do when he left the details out of the equation.
“Skip,” said Rebecca.
“I don’t know how to skip.”
“Like this,” said Claire, who then showed him on the gym mat.
So Reginald skipped down the beam, very conscious of Victoria watching him.
After that — and probably because she’d finally found something Reginald could do — Rebecca seemed determined to give Reginald more and more difficult balance tasks until he failed at one. She had him jump, spin, and traverse it in giant, gazelle-like leaps. Finally, becoming bored, Reginald hopped off the beam and walked to the opposite side of the gym.
“Let’s just go for the big finish,” he said, picking up a basketball that had been left in the corner.
Reginald placed the ball on one end of the beam. Then he stood on the basketball and, like a stunt bear in a circus, rolled it under his feet across the beam to the other end.
Rebecca’s mouth was hanging open.
“Watch this,” said Reginald. He gripped the ball with his feet and hopped with it onto the floor. Then, the ball compressing underneath him, he rebounded back up onto the beam. He traversed half of the beam that way, bouncing on and off with the ball under his feet, until the ball exploded and Reginald fell across the beam, breaking his shin. He quickly turned away from the three humans, torqued it, and felt the bone knit back into place.
Rebecca said, “Try it on your hands.”
“I can’t support my weight on my hands,” said Reginald.
“Try.”
So he tried, attempting a handstand against the wall. And fell untidily into a heap.
“Next time,” said Rebecca, slapping him on the back. “Good job today.”
Reginald bade goodbye to Rebecca, Claire, and Victoria, and promised to at least consider returning for a second lesson the following week. Then he showered, changed, and headed to work. Maurice asked for a status update as soon as he saw him arrive.
“Balance beam good, everything else bad,” Reginald reported.
Maurice asked for details, and Reginald gave them. He told Maurice about the beam, the ball, and the showing off. Maurice seemed pleased.
“Did you try it on your hands?” he asked.
“I can’t do a handstand,” said Reginald.
“I’ll bet you can,” said Maurice. “I’ve seen you do pushups. I’ll bet you could do a handstand.”
“I tried. I can’t do it.”
“Try again,” said Maurice.
“Maybe I could stand on my hands if we switched torsos,” said Reginald, indicating Maurice’s small frame. “A pushup is a long way from a handstand. Takes a lot of strength to hold this bad boy up.” He patted his gut.
“I’m not telling you to do handstand pushups,” said Maurice. “I’m just saying to hold yourself up. Most humans can physically hold themselves upright for a few seconds if they’re braced right, and you’re a vampire. Muscles tend to grow enough to service the body. Like, your legs. You may not think they’re strong, but if it were possible for you to lose two hundred pounds, you’d find yourself in possession of some impressive pillars because they’ve been doing lunges all day long for years with three hundred and fifty pounds on them.”
“I don’t walk around on my arms,” said Reginald.
“Ten bucks says you’re wrong. Try it.”
But they couldn’t try it, because Reginald didn’t know how to get into a handstand and neither did Maurice. So they looked it up and found a few videos online showing people bending over and putting their hands on the floor in front of a wall and then kicking their legs up overhead. Reginald couldn’t touch his toes, and when he crouched to place his hands on the floor, he didn’t have the leg or back strength to kick his torso and back up against the wall. Finally Maurice simply stood on a reinforced wooden box, picked Reginald up by both legs, and held him upside down above the ground. Reginald extended his hands over his head and placed them on the carpet.
“Ready for me to let go?” said Maurice.
“No.”
“Ready now?”
“No.”
“Now?” said Maurice.
“I love that you think the answer is going to change,” said Reginald.
“Okay, letting go… now.”
Reginald collapsed onto his face. His body became a giant floppy rag and fell into an untidy pile.
“Well,” said Reginald. “That went well.”
“You’re too loose. Tighten up in your core.”
“Where’s my core?”
“In the middle of all of the fat.”
So they tried again, with the same result. This time, rather than collapsing into a blob, Reginald’s straight body fell like a tree, knocking down a cubicle divider.
Reginald, slightly out of breath, extended a hand toward Maurice. “Ten bucks.”
“No. We didn’t specify a timeframe.”
“You dick. You turn me into a fat vampire and then you welch on a bet?
“Keep practicing,” said Maurice. “All those little muscles just need to learn to talk to one another and obey that big brain of yours. Trust me.”
Maurice hadn’t been wrong yet and the ten dollars was going into escrow either way, so Reginald nodded reluctantly. He agreed to do both.