The Bounty Hunter's Trilogy: Chosen By Fate

Chapter 7. I Try to Balance Uneven Sides

Well, my diet and exercise plans couldn't be postponed any longer, apparently. Audrey kept insisting I bring workout clothes and only eat foods without added sugars. So basically, she made me miserable for my own benefit. And I didn't really get much of a choice. She kind of laid it out as either do this or die, so let's just say I went with it. It was hard giving up my extra reading time for exercise time. That bothered me the most.

Training was going okay, until Audrey decided she'd watch Stan train me. She made me do extra push ups, extra crunches, weights on my back while I planked. All in all, Audrey wasn't my favorite person to see for the next few weeks. Especially when it was around meal times when I'd have a secret chocolate in my pocket. As soon as I'd try to take it out, somehow it would disappear and it would wind up in front of Audrey who was sitting right in front of me. She'd take it, stand up and go to the closest trash can. "Dang it Audrey! How are you doing that?"

But by far, the worst one was the s'mores bar that she took from me. My mom makes these bars out of chocolate, marshmallows, and cinnamon cracker crumbs. They're to die for, and I will say this was about a month into my new diet. I'd been completely good about it, especially at home where all of the candy was. I actually hid it in the cabinets where my mom would find it, but I wouldn't.

So I had this one bar in my pocket. I was at home and it was after dinner. I had helped my mom make them after lunch. She had noticed that I was losing body fat, but gaining muscle. She thought I was going to the gym with Brendan and just exercising my summer away. Anyway, I took one up to my room, which had the curtains and blinds drawn. The whole house had the curtains drawn so nobody would see in. We did this every night just because it got so dark outside. So I sat down at my desk with my laptop up to write a report on my summer reading and I pulled the s'mores bar out of my pocket. I took the plastic wrap off of it and kicked off my socks before a loud knock cracked against my window. Of course, sudden loud noises get me, so I jumped and accidentally tossed my well-earned treat against the wall by the window, making it break and fall to the floor.

I stared at the remains of my snack as the window opened and the curtains were pushed apart, Henry stepping into my room. He almost put his foot on it, before realizing his mistake and stepping over it. "Dude, seriously, it's not worth it." I stood up going over to him. I picked up the biggest piece of the chocolatey marshmallow and cinnamon heaven.

"This is a s'mores bar that I made with my mother. I haven't had any sugar besides fruit in over a month. It's worth it and it's earned. What possessed you to come to my home and ruin my perfectly fine treat? Why would you do this?"

"Whoa," Henry took me into a hug, making me realize I was crying. "I know, it really sucks, but trust me, you'll be glad later. If you have one, I won't tell but this has to be it, okay?" I nodded.

"No, you're right, I shouldn't eat it. I just wish I could." He let go of the hug and I cleaned up the snack before throwing it away. Henry left then, and I finished my report on my laptop before shutting it and going to bed.

**********

I was in the gym with Stan the next day and Audrey came over with a tape measure. "Measuring time?" I asked.

"Yes it is." She tapped the tile beside me and it turned into a scale, numbers appearing by my feet. "On." I stepped on and she wrote down the weight. "Good, you've gained a couple of pounds in muscle," She started measuring the various parts of my body, "but you've actually gotten thinner. You must've had some left over baby fat or something, but it's turning into muscle. You need to bulk up as quickly as possible if you're going to survive the threats we talked about."

"For two seconds. Can I know what they are now?"

"No. Knowing what they are makes you even more of a target. It's dangerous, and you should be kept from that information as much as possible." She tapped the scale again and it turned back into a regular tile.