Second Chances: a Coincidences novel

Chapter 18: Restlessness

I woke up from another nightmare, one where I dreamt I was being chased by a faceless assailant. I never saw his face but whenever I was chased by him, I was scared and knew my life was in danger.

The moment I reached a dead end and was unable to move forward, he would pull out his katana, and just as he was about to kill me by slashing me with his weapon, I woke up in a cold sweat.

Looking at the time on my phone, it read 5:30am. I got up and took a few deep breaths and headed to the kitchen to get some water. I then decided to go to the fitness court out in the backyard that my uncle clearly had built. The air was surprisingly cool and the fresh Persian Gulf scent invigorated my senses.

I began by doing some stretches, then some pushups to get myself started. I then did four sets of twenty-five leg lifts, then went to do some pull-ups. Only, I saw that there was a rope that was well reinforced and strong enough to handle a few pull-ups but not by using two arms. I had learned to be able to pull myself up with just one arm.

I grabbed the thick rope, took a breath, and began to pull myself up with just one hand. I did a few sets with my left hand, then switched to my right after managing to do twenty-five more and my arms were almost dead but not quite since I was used to doing these types of workouts.

I realized I had already been working for close to an hour and the sun was already rising.

Khaled and Louai both stepped out with my aunt and uncle in tow.

"Sabah El-Kheir, Habibi!" Khaled greeted.

"Sabah El-Nour!" I responded.

"Were you doing pull-ups with one hand?" asked Louai.

"Yeah, I was. You guys saw that?"

"Yeah, it's kind of why we came outside" Jihan laughed.

"How did you learn to do that? It seems kind of well, hard" Khaled chuckled.

"Practice. I started by doing regular pull-ups until I learned to do them with one hand."

"Wow, you sure have a lot of upper body strength" said Louai, who seemed to want to learn how I did these rigorous workouts.

Out of force of habit, I took my shirt off because of how hot I felt but instantly regretted it because I was self-conscious about my own body, even though I was in shape. I threw it back on as quickly as I had taken it off.

I've always been the working-out type, always running and jogging, and playing sports and as a result, I have generally always been in good shape. But even so, during beach or pool parties that my friends would throw, I was not the kind to take my shirt off, nor was I the type to even change in the school's gym.

Hence, one of the reasons why I always requested my P.E. class to be the last class of the day. So I could go home quickly and shower and change there.

It was now beginning to hit me how insecure I was about a lot of things but even more so, about myself.

My family and I started working out together but I was lifting weights.

Then I texted Cielo to see if she wanted to go out tonight for dinner. It was about time I got back out on the dating scene.

Entering my room, Khaled walked in. He was standing before me without a shirt and was sweating like crazy, as I was. Only, he was more confident with his own body whereas I was well, too self-conscious.