Need a hand? Shayne Topp x reader

sweaty

Your POV

Today's the day, the first day of your new lifestyle. In the last two weeks you've revamped your workout clothes collection, got a brand new reusable water bottle, and a set of airpods. 

You pull into the parking lot and place your car in park. Yesterday was the clinical from hell. Not a single patient was stable, you didn't have any help, and the families were driving you nuts. Hopefully you can sweat the day away, and the anxiety creeping up from the anticipation of coming. Walking through the front door you check in at the desk and head to the bathroom, as you wash your hands you catch a glimpse of yourself in the mirror you become very critical of what you see. You're wearing a pair of black ankle-length Nike leggings, a dark grey tank top, and your hair in a high ponytail. You're shoes are old athletic shoes you had from college, ugly but functional. You had a bit of extra chunk below your belly button and your arms jiggled a bit, you pinch your stomach and make a disappointed face in the mirror. It was fine, you're here to work on these things. Every piece of you wanted to leave. 

Walking out to the cardio area you hop on a treadmill and start walking. Five minutes pass and you felt confident so you increase the speed to a slight jog. After a long 3 minutes you turn it back down to a walk. With the amount of running you do at the hospital, you would think you could run longer. This feeling was disheartening but you keep reminding yourself that with time you will improve. 

Looking around the quaint gym it's blanketed by pencil thin women on the cardio machines and beef head guys in the weight area. You felt like you stuck out like a sore thumb, which was one of the aspects of starting to be active that worried you. The last thing you wanted was to be the center of attention. All of the girls there were in tank tops or just sports-bras and leggings or spandex shorts, you had a baggy tank top on and some plain leggings. Looking around made you more and more self-conscious. 

You continued to walk-run for 30 minutes, finding yourself quite tired from that small bout of cardio. Since high school you've had pretty strong legs, so basing off that you move towards the squat racks.

This gym has 4 squat racks lining the wall with a mirror covering said wall. You get a glance of yourself and see your face is cherry red and all of your baby hairs curled on your hairline. How attractive. 3 of the 4 racks are taken, each with a sweaty guy huffing and puffing under a bar stacked with ungodly amounts of weight. The last rack on the row looks open, but the bar has a 15 pound rubber plate on each side with nothing around it. You assume someone had just forgotten to re-rack their weight so you go a place your water bottle and sweat towel on the platform. You walk away to grab a wipe to clean the bar and come back to see a guy taking the weights off. As you get closer you notice the man is very attractive. Dirty blonde hair is slicked down on his head from sweat, he's wearing a blue sleeveless shirt that is cut down to the hips and black gym shorts. Walking towards him he see's you.

"Sorry, got lost in my next movement that I forgot to take my plates off." he gives you a small smile.

"No biggie," you give your best courteous smile and grab your phone to sync your airpods and play a good song. After a few seconds he walks off to somewhere you don't see. 

The music is pretty loud in your headphones as you contemplate what movement you want to do. You have a history of back issues so settling for light weight and higher repetitions, you do your best to get in a good lift. At some point you feel confident that you can increase the weight and do just that.

Standing to lift the bar onto your shoulder you step back from the rack, balancing the bar. A bit heavier than you expect, but you feel it's do-able. Going down you reach the bottom of the squat but struggle to stand from there. You lower into a deeper squat and contemplate the best way to get out of your predicament, panic setting in as you stay where you are. You could sit back on your butt and let the bar fall behind you or you could ask for someone to pick it up off of you. Not wanting to ask for help you sit back and fall to your butt, but the momentum pushes you back to lay flat on your back. The bar goes crashing to the ground making everyone stop and stare at you. You stare at the ceiling, wondering what you should do next. 

Should I just leave? 

A face comes into view and you realize it's the guy from before. 

"Hey are you okay? You took a wild tumble." he reaches his hand out towards you, offering a hand up. He pulls you up to sitting. 

You're sit up on your butt, knees to chest, face in hands. Pure embarrassment fills your body and you sit in silence. Every part of you wants to just leave and never come back, but you're smarter than that.

"I would be better if I hadn't just made a fool of myself." you force a laugh. If you didn't you would cry.

He squats down in front of you. "Listen, it happens to all of us. Maybe next time ask for a spotter so this doesn't happen again. Here, take my hand and i'll help you up." you look up and see an outstretched hand again. 

Grabbing his hand he hoists you up to your feet. He picks up the bar like it's a feather and places it back on the rack. You stand and admire his strength. He begins to take the plates off for you when you take in his full physique. From what you can see through his cut shirt he has a six-pack, his arms are chiseled and quite big, hot. His flank is muscular, and with each plate he lifts they grow and become more defined. He looked like a walking, very buff, ken doll.

"There. Do you plan on lifting more or are you done with your workout?" he asks you, snapping you back to what just happened. "I can be your spotter if you want to continue." How long had you been staring? Hopefully it didn't matter.

"Uh, no haha. I think it would be best to go home and recover from the embarrassment." you laugh, placing a nervous hand on the back of your neck.

Reaching down to grab your water bottle you notice that he's still there, watching you pick up your stuff. You stand and meet his gaze. He outstretches a hand for a handshake.

"My name is Shayne." He smiles wide.

You shake his hand. "I really need to get going, thank you for your help!" you turn and walk away, hoping to never see him again out of pure embarrassment.

"See you around," he yells after you.

...