For a few months, Corinne’s mother had made the ten-mile trek between Hackensack and Cedarfield so that Corinne could still see her old friends. But then school started and predictably her friends got busy with town sports and dance classes Corinne could no longer afford, and while the physical distance stayed the same, the societal chasm grew too far to bridge. The childhood relationships quickly frayed on their way to completely falling apart.

Corinne’s sister, Rose, acted out conventionally, doing poorly in school, rebelling against her mother, experimenting with a potpourri of recreational drugs and dead-end boys. Corinne, on the other hand, channeled the deep hurt and resentment into what most might consider positive outlets. She grew focused in school and in life, determined to do her best in all endeavors. Corinne kept her head down, studied hard, ignored the normal teenage temptations, and silently vowed to return victorious to the place where she’d been a seemingly happy girl with a father. Corinne spent the next two decades like a child with her face pressed against the upper suburban glass, until, at long last, the window opened or—just as likely—shattered.

Corinne and Adam had bought a house that looked suspiciously like the one in which Corinne had been raised. If it had bothered him at the time, Adam didn’t recall it, but maybe by then, he shared her quest. When you marry, you marry your spouse’s hopes and dreams too. Hers were to triumphantly return to a place that had cast her aside. There was a thrill, he now guessed, in helping Corinne fulfill that twenty-year odyssey.

The lights were still on at the aptly named Hard-core Gym (motto: You’re Not Hard-core Unless You Lift Hard-core). Adam took a quick gander at the parking lot and spotted Kristin Hoy’s car. He hit the speed dial for Thomas’s cell phone—again, no point in calling the home phone; neither boy would ever answer it—and waited. Thomas answered on the third ring and gave his customary distracted and barely audible “Hullo?”

“All okay at home?”

“Yeah.”

“What are you doing?”

“Nothing.”

“And by nothing, you mean?”

“Playing Call of Duty. I just started.”

Right.

“Homework done?” Adam asked out of habit. It was an oft-repeated parent-child verbal hamster-wheel of a question, never going anywhere, though somehow still mandatory.

“Pretty much.”

He didn’t bother telling him to “pretty much” finish it first. Pointless. Let the kid do it on his own. Let go a little.

“Where’s your brother?”

“I don’t know.”

“But he’s home, right?”

“I guess.”

Brothers. “Just make sure he’s okay. I’ll be home soon.”

“Okay. Dad?”

“Yeah?”

“Where’s Mom?”

“She’s away,” he said again.

“Where?”

“It’s some teachers’ thing. We can talk about it when I get home, okay?”

The pause was long. “Yeah, okay.”

He parked next to Kristin’s Audi convertible and headed inside. The bloated musclehead behind the desk looked Adam up and down and clearly found him wanting. He had the Cro-Magnon brow. His lips were frozen in a sneer of disdain. He wore some kind of sleeveless unitard. Adam feared the man might call him Brah.

“Help ya?”

“I’m looking for Kristin Hoy.”

“Member?”

“What?”

“You a member?”

“No, I’m a friend. My wife’s a member. Corinne Price.”

He nodded as if that explained everything. Then he asked, “She okay?”

The question surprised Adam. “Why wouldn’t she be?”

He might have shrugged, but the bowling balls flanking his head barely budged. “Big week to miss. Competition next Friday.”

Corinne, he knew, didn’t compete. She was nicely built and all, but there was no way she’d don one of those skimpy suits and start posing. She had, however, attended nationals with Kristin last year.

Musclehead pointed—he actually flexed when he did so—toward a corner in the back of the gym. “Room B.”

Adam pushed through the glass door. Some gyms were quiet. Some featured loud music. And some, like this one, echoed with primordial grunts and the clank of heavy metal weights. All the walls were mirrored, and here, and only here, primping and posing for self-pleasure was not only acceptable but expected. The place reeked of sweat, disinfectant, and what he imagined from the commercials Axe cologne smelled like.

He found room B, knocked lightly, and pushed it open. It looked like a yoga studio with blond wood floors, a balance beam, and, yep, tons of mirrors. A super-toned woman tottered out onto the floor in a bikini and ridiculously high heels.

“Stop,” Kristin shouted.

The woman did so. Kristin strutted over in a skimpy pink bikini and the same ridiculously high heels. There was no totter, no awkwardness, no hesitation. She stalked across the floor as though it owed her something.

“Your smile is weak. You look as though you’ve never been in high heels before.”

“I don’t normally wear them,” the woman said.

“Well, you’re going to have to practice. They will judge you on everything—how you enter, how you exit, how you walk, your poise, your smile, your confidence, your demeanor, your facial expression. You get one chance to make that first impression. You can lose the competition with your very first step. Okay, all of you sit.” Five other super-toned women sat on the floor. Kristin stood in front of them, pacing back and forth. Her muscles coiled and uncoiled with each step.

“You should all still be leaning out,” Kristin said. “Thirty-six hours before competition, most of you will carbo-load. This will prevent your muscles from flattening out and get them to have that natural puff look we’re going for. Right now, you should still be eating ninety percent protein. You all have the specific diet plan, am I right?”

Nods.

“Follow it like a religious scripture. You should all be drinking one and a half gallons of water per day. That’s a minimum. We’ll start scaling that down as we get closer. Only sips the day before Nationals and no water at all on competition day. I have water pills if any of you are still retaining water weight. Any questions?”

One hand went up.

“Yes?”

“Will we rehearse the evening gown competition?”

“We will. Remember, ladies. Most people think this is a bodybuilding competition. It is not. The WBFF is about fitness. You will have your poses and pose-off, just as we’ve been doing. But the judges now are looking for Miss America, Victoria’s Secret, Fashion Week, and yes, MuscleMag all wrapped into one elegant package. Harriet will help you coordinate your evening gowns. Oh, and now let’s go over travel necessities. Please bring with you the following: butt glue for your bikini, tape for the top of your suit, E6000 glue, breast pad petals, blister bandages, shoe glue—we always have last-minute strap disasters—tanner, gloves for your tanner, tan-block cream for those palms and feet bottoms, teeth whitener strips, red-eye drop—”