My ponytail has loosened over the course of the morning, and it sags toward the nape of my neck. I take down my hair and am in the process of redoing my ponytail when my hair elastic snaps. I don’t have another one on me, so I head to the supply closet, tucked in an alcove at the back of the gym. The door is slightly ajar. I push it open farther and nearly bump straight into Ryan, who’s running his fingers over the shelves, like he’s in search of something.

“Oh! Sorry,” I say. “I didn’t realize anyone was in here.”

“No worries,” he says, turning around to glance at me.

He looks worried, though, as if he’s waiting for me to say or do something inappropriate again.

“Uh, hi,” I say.

“Hi,” he says, turning back around.

I rack my brain for some witty joke or easy banter to break the tension, but instead, I just freeze up. He tilts his head slightly, like he’s waiting for me to say something, anything.

“I just came back here for another hair elastic,” I explain, pointing to my awkwardly lumpy hair, still half-stuck in the shape of a ponytail. “Mine broke.”

“I see that,” he says, pulling the box of hair supplies off one shelf and offering it to me.

I find a fresh elastic, flip my head over, and smooth my hair back into a high, tight pony. I feel more like myself this way.

“Have you seen the blocks of chalk?” Ryan asks. “I know we’re running low, but I thought there was at least one more case in here.”

I scan the shelves, which are brimming with athletic tape, gauze, Advil, cans of hair spray and butt glue covered in chalky handprints, and water bottles branded with Summit’s logo. A colorful pile of latex resistance bands spools in one corner of the closet.

“Uhhh, yeah, here you go.”

I crouch down to the bottom shelf, where there’s one remaining block of chalk half-hidden in a white plastic bag. Our hands bump when he takes it from me.

“Thanks,” he says, turning to lean against the shelves.

Crammed into this narrow closet with him, it hits me that I miss the easy way our conversations used to flow, before I kissed him and messed everything up. Aside from strictly necessary conversations about Hallie’s training, we’ve barely exchanged a single word since then. We’ve stopped eating lunch together, too.

“How’ve you been?” I ask.

He exhales with the slightest hint of a laugh and looks down at the chalk in his hands.

“We’re really doing this?” he asks, muttering it more to himself than to me.

“Doing what?” I ask, suddenly alarmed that I’ve crossed a line.