Dumbbell

[Fellow Rabbit]

A bead of sweat began to break on my forehead. With every breath, it ever-so-slowly began to trail downward. I couldn't watch it with my eyes, but I could feel it. Its growing wetness pooled among all the sweat gathering on my face. The heat of the sun beated on me like a furnace, everything getting hotter and hotter as I once again lifted the dumbbell with my left arm. A vein popped in my wrist. I didn't know if I could take it. The sweat on my brow dripped a bit further. Why had I chosen to take this outside on a day like today? I would never know, but with the audience that had gathered to watch, I couldn't up and just go inside now. Their entertainment now depended on me.

More sweat. I was panting now. For the second time, I began to lift the dumbbell closer to my chin. A man in the crowd was really invested in my efforts. I watched as he clenched his fist, crushing the bottle of water he was holding.

"GO CARL! I KNOW YOU CAN DO IT!" he exasperated. He actually seemed just as sweaty as I was even without doing any lifting.

That was it. If this guy thought I could do it, then I knew it was possible. The drop of sweat on my forehead was suddenly accompanied by another. I felt another vein pop. My heart was pounding. For a third time, I brought the dumbbell to my chin. My muscles were growing wobbly. I didn't know how much more of this I could take. The sheer weight of this monstrous weightlifting device was excruciating.

The immortal words of my mentor echoed in my head. 'Remember Carl, consume your electrolytes. CONSUME THEM OR THEY WILL CONSUME YOU.' I took those words to heart. They drove my being. They were the force that allowed me to get to where I was now. Without them, it was hard to know where I might be. I would be nothing, and nothing would be me. The electrolytes would have consumed me.

I let out a yell of passion as I lifted the weight to my chin a fourth time, and images of my training days began to flash in my mind.

The immense weight. The long runs. The complicated wrestling matches. The convoluted obstacle courses. The week-long staring contests. They, like this exercise, were the training from hell that would take me to the heights I needed to reach to attain my goal. I embraced the flashes and let them play back to me in my head. They helped me a lot.

~~Flashback~~

"Carl, you mustn't let up," my mentor told me. Pants was his name. Mai Pants. A king among men. I held him in high esteem, for not only had he already achieved all I had hope to achieve in my life, but he was gracious enough to give up his time in teaching me. "Remember your training exercise."

Pants had been right. I remembered myself closing my eyes as I reached for my toes that day. There, I could remember an even more previous training session. It was the one with the rope.

~~Nested Flashback~~

"Pull!" Pants would yell out. "The barn shall RISE!" We would work so hard to bring up the frame of the wall of the barn. Every day it was the same wall, and every day we raised it in the same place. Back then, we were four being trained by Pants. Myself, Harold from down the street, Lord Thrax XIV of Holyak, and the cosmic gas monster whose name escapes me. The rest had since moved on to other masters, finding that they had different learning styles than myself. I remained because I found Pants' mystic ways so enthralling and strangely effective.

That day, raising that barn, I learned something important about myself. If I just persevered and believed in my training, I could achieve anything. I lifted that barnside with one finger and the help of three friends. I never felt so powerful before that day.

~~End Nested Flashback~~

It was that training, I had known, that had prepared me for the day I would touch my toes. I reached further, screaming as the pain surged through my veins and into my very soul. I felt as though I had burst into flames and would turn into dust if I kept trying, but keep trying I did.

And I found it all in vain. My feet were too far away and I was not flexible enough to go that far down.

"You are growing, Carl," Pants told me, "That pain you feel? It is weakness leaving your body. You have trained for this day. Do not let your body tell you you will hurt yourself if you keep going! Hurting yourself is how you grow!"

He was right! The pain had grown nearly unbearable, but I ignored with every fiber of my being. My screams, which had up to that point not been an altogether ineffective way of releasing the pain, were now losing their effectiveness. Everything that followed had been unadulterated agony. My tendons stretched. My muscles pulled. I think I even heard a bone crack. I reached further still. The world began to fade. My body was growing numb. My feet seemed to grow ever further away. But I persisted.

I thought I had been hallucinating when I felt something hard against my fingertips. I opened my eyes and the sight before began to come into focus. It was my toe. I was barely touching, but I had done it. The session was over. A rush of joy overtook me. I couldn't see Pants' face, but I knew he had to be as proud of me as I was. All of my training up to that point had finally culminated. The world was going to be a better place now. I smiled as a tear fell from my eye.

And then I passed out.

~~End Flashback~~

I had come so far since then. And today I would go a little further. As I had the day before. I hadn't noticed that the first bead of sweat had dripped down to my nose, nor had I realized that I had lifted the dumbbell a fifth, sixth, and seventh time while I was having my flashbacks. I felt a power surge through my veins that I had never felt before. My strength was growing with every movement. The crowd was going wild. I was so close.

I let out another scream. My veins were popping out all over my body now. My muscles were burning. The puddle at my feet grew as the sweat dripped off of me in the gallons. This was a feeling unlike what my previous training milestones could have prepared me for. It was both awesome and awful at the same time. I couldn't feel my legs.

"Eight," I exhaled as the dumbbell touched my chin again. The sweaty guy from before in the crowd was crying now. I had made him so proud. He kept me going in this moment.

"Nine..." I said it much louder, trying to control my breathing. The bar was a bit slippery now from all my sweat. My clothes were soaked. This was it.

I lowered the dumbbell to my knee slowly, and with a hulking power and a guttural scream, I summoned forth all the strength I could muster. The crowd as hanging on my every movement, cheering and clenching as I slowly lifted the dumbbell for the final time.

It was excruciating. I could feel myself beginning to fade. A scene from the toe-touching flashback etched in my mind. That was the most endurance I had put into any training before, but today it was about to be topped.

I threw my head back, a death growl escaping from my lungs, and then...

"TEEEEEEENNNNNNNN!!!" I yelled at the top of my lungs. As I dropped the dumbbell to the ground, my vision returned. My muscles thanked me. I thought I wouldn't be able to stand, but I did. The crowd celebrated like it was 1999.

That was it. I had done it. Eighteen months of coming to the gym had paid off. I noticed Mai Pants in the crowd for the first time. He nodded approvingly at me. It was time graduate.

I sat down again, picked up the dumbbell from the floor and placed it next to me on the bench. Today was the day I graduated. Today was the day I could finally put a weight on the dumbbell.