The lobby hadn’t changed that much since the last time I’d been at Greenmeadow Golf & Country Club. The place definitely leaned heavier into the Country Club than any other place in the area, and its longstanding reputation as the playground of the local wealthy and elite was well deserved. Daily brunch service, multiple pools, tennis courts, squash courts, two complete 18-hole golf courses, a private games room for card tournaments, a billiards hall, and even a full ballroom for weddings and whatever other extravagant parties their patrons wanted to hold.

I’d grown up going to Greenmeadow, dressed in starchy, uncomfortable but fashionable clothes, eating the richest foods and only partially appreciating the wild array of opportunities being presented to me. But I hadn’t stepped on the grounds in three years, and I likely wouldn’t have ever again if my Father had anything to do with it.

“Good morning, sir,” a pretty brunette said as I stepped through the front doors. “Your membership card please?” She gestured at a little blinking stand where I assumed I was expected to swipe a card. It looked like they’d modernized a bit.

“Actually, I’m here for my first day,” I said. “I’m Trevor Brantford. I’m supposed to be meeting Olga Bondarenko?”

“Oh, alright,” the woman said, her smile sliding from customer service to a more casual attitude. Even her posture changed a little as she relaxed. She tapped on the touchscreen in front of her. “I let her know you’re here, Olga should be up any minute. From now on you should come in at one of the staff entrances. There’s one down and around to the left through the golf cart garage, and another one at the far end of the building just opposite the pool area in the parking lot.”

“Will do,” I said. “Thanks.”

She returned to what she was working on behind the welcome desk, and I went and stood a little further into the lobby so I didn’t look like I was taking up her attention. From what I remembered, Greenmeadow had always been fairly strict about their front-of-house staff giving quick, efficient service and some of the longstanding members could be a little bitchy if they were kept waiting.

They hadn’t redone the lobby at all and the modernizing had maintained the old, rich atmosphere. I was checking out some of the ridiculous paintings they’d hung, which reminded me of British hunting scenes but somehow abstract at the same time, when a short woman about my age approached me. “Hey, Trevor?”

“That’s me,” I said, turning with a smile.

She was short, maybe five foot nothing, and was wearing one of the deep green polo shirts and khaki shorts that the athletic attendants and snack cart girls wore, with the crest of Greenmeadow on the left side of her chest. She was cute in a nerdy sort of way, her long blonde hair was straightened and pulled back into a ponytail that trailed down her back, and she wore a pair of frameless glasses that gave her a sort of hot librarian look without leaning too far into it. “Cool,” she said, “I’m Marissa, Olga sent me to bring you down to her office. If it’s your first day do I need to give you the nickel tour?”

“It is,” I said. “But I’ve been here before. My parents are members.”

“Ah,” Marissa said non-committaly as she started leading me through a Staff Only door discreetly hidden behind an urn in the back corner of the room. “Summer job?”

“Heh, no,” I chuckled. “This is my full-time gig for the near future.”

She glanced over her shoulder, considering me. I could tell she was trying to get a fast read of what kind of person I was. She led me down a plain service hallway and then into an industrial stairwell where our voices echoed - these were areas of Greenmeadow I’d never seen before. “How’s a guy whose parents can afford membership here end up working at the Club?” she asked.

“By choice,” I said. “I was terrible with math and languages all through school because of my dyslexia, but my father still thought I should go to school for business. I got a three-year degree in massage therapy instead; he still hasn’t forgiven me.”

“Oh, so that’s why you’re meeting Olga,” Marissa nodded. We’d left the stairwell and were heading down a tiled hallway with windows overlooking the tennis and squash courts. “I figured I was picking up a new maintenance guy or something when she asked me to come up. But you’re going to work in the spa.”

“That’s the plan,” I said. “Get some experience and save up to open my own practice at some point. What area do you work in?”

“Depends on the day,” she said, relaxing more now that she’d decided I was at least sliding my way into being a normie instead of a Club member. “Today I’m driving the beer cart out on the courses, but I also work as a waitress and bartender in the main restaurant and work on the catering crew for the big events.”

“Sounds like they keep you busy,” I said. We’d turned a corner and were looking at a staff break room with a few offices studded around the exterior. The break room was empty, but two of the five offices had people working in them.

“Oh, it’s by choice,” she said. “I’m paying off grad school as I work my way through it.”

“Cool,” I said, but didn’t have a chance to ask her any more questions because she stopped and knocked at one of the office doors.

“Here he is, Olga,” Marissa said. “I need to get back out there.”

“On your way then,” Olga said, giving her a shooing gesture as she stood from her chaotically messy desk. “Alright, Trevor. Let’s get a proper look at you.”

Marissa turned and gave me a wink as she sauntered off. I had to try not to turn and glance at her walking away. Even though she wasn’t classically beautiful or looked like an Instagram influencer, she had a quirky prettiness in her short, full-figured body and personality. The fact that she was also somewhere in the ballpark of my same age already had me interested in her, and I wondered if our paths would cross during a workday.

Olga, on the other hand, was a severe woman that was all angles, judgemental stares and brusque business. I had interviewed with her and Mr Graves, the VP of Amenities and Services of Greenmeadow, over Teams from back at college before I graduated. Between my history with Greenmeadow, a couple of big recommendations from my teachers and the apparent need for a new massage therapist for the Club they had hired me without either of them actually meeting me in person.

Olga had me sit down in her office and ran me through her expectations and the limitations put on staff in terms of where we could and couldn’t be seen on Club property. Then we went through the employment forms, and the NDA I needed to sign since I was working in a ‘sensitive area’ with the Club clients. She also explained that she was technically my direct supervisor, as she was in charge of the entire Spa and the pool areas, but she was also managing the newly renovated salon the Club had opened so I would rarely see her day-to-day and was expected to follow the routines and not cause issues.

Once all the paperwork was out of the way, Olga marched down through the back halls and rooms of the club to the eastern Staff Entrance, located just where Marissa had said it was at the Golf Cart garage, then showed me the way to the staff change rooms, and from there to the staff entrance into the Spa.

She gave me the quick 2-cent tour. Even as a teen I hadn’t ever set foot in the Spa of the Club since it was adults only; the little entryway was all rugged stonework and smoothly polished wood counters that gave off an ‘ancient garden’ kind of vibe, with warm and soft lighting and the sound of trickling water playing in the background. There were change halls for men and women with private stalls, and multiple saunas and cold rooms kept at various temperatures. My main area of work was down ‘Massage Alley,’ an offshoot hallway with a series of massage rooms with big glass windows that turned frosted and entirely opaque at the flip of a switch.

There were seven of these rooms, and I basically had full choice of how I would lay mine out and what supplies I wanted to order and use. Olga pointed out the one she nominally used when she was filling in and gave me some sample bottles of products the Club had a deal with the suppliers for. She also noted that despite our seven rooms, I was only the fourth massage therapist currently on staff including her

“It’s an awkward situation,” she said. “We’re overwhelmed with bookings, but we can’t hold on to people. Half the time it’s because kids your age don’t seem to actually want to do the work and I need to ask them to leave, the other half of the time they quit because they can’t handle the expectations of some of our more ... vocal clients.”

“Well, I’m here to work,” I told her. She’d led me into the room that was going to be mine to use. “I did a three-year degree for this because it actually interests me. And I grew up around these kinds of people, so I at least like to think I can diffuse any situations that might come up.”

“Good,” she nodded. “Now, as I said, we’ve got an overwhelming number of bookings and now that word is getting out we’ve got a new male masseuse I’m sure we’ll be getting even more. So one last thing before I leave you to get set up.”

“What’s that?” I asked.

“Don’t fuck the clients,” she said, levelling her gaze at me from over the plush massage table between us.

“Um,” I said, a little taken aback. “I-”

“And if you do end up fucking any clients, don’t get caught by anyone. And make sure you’re fucking one who pays their membership dues, not the husband or wife of the paying member.”

“I ... will take that to heart,” I said. Having any sort of sexual interaction with a client was so utterly unethical that it had been drilled into me every year of my course, including my practical apprenticeship placements. “Is that a thing that’s commonly an issue?”

“You have no idea,” Olga rolled her eyes. “It doesn’t help that half the staff here are fucking each other. Kitchen staff hooking up with waitresses, landscapers humping the cleaning ladies. If the golf pros invite you to an ‘after-work party’ expect to see way too many people naked around someone’s backyard pool. And the clients aren’t any better.”

I blinked hard a couple of times, trying to absorb this new information that made me question so much about the experiences I’d had here for most of my life. “OK,” I said. “Noted, and I’ll do my best not to fall into the hedonism.”

“Good,” she nodded. “If you can keep things professional, you’ll do fine. I’ll leave you to it, you’ve got about forty-five minutes before your first booking.”

She left me to organize my space and fetch the supplies I wanted from the storage closet. It felt ... weird to have a space like this to myself. I’d heard plenty of horror stories from my teachers and other students in my program about the kinds of places they had worked or done placements at. I’d done my own placements at a hotel and mid-tier spa local to my college, so I hadn’t had the worst conditions but never something like this. Part of me wondered how much personality I could really put into the room.

I went through the checklist of what I would need for my core massage therapy offerings, then stocked the cupboards with extra supplies. I got the massage table ready after that with a clean fitted sheet, then stocked extra sheets and towels in another cupboard and laid out a few neat and folded ones in case a client asked for them. Then I ran out to my car to get my bag with my change of clothes and my personal essentials. I quickly changed in the staff change room and five minutes before my first appointment I went out to the Spa lobby.

At the hotel where I did my placement we’d worn pastel-coloured medical scrubs, and at the spa I’d been given a uniform, but the Club Spa was trying to give a more bespoke, high-class experience so they’d given me some guidelines for my work clothes. That meant I looked more like a client than I did an employee, and it was another one of those weird feelings - how the hell did I land such a good start? I knew several of my fellow graduates from my year were starting their own little businesses in their hometowns, or had gotten jobs at the places they’d unhappily done placements in, and here I was dressed comfortably in slacks and a loose collarless but fashionable shirt and with a full schedule of appointments on my first day.

The lobby area had a little stand, and a girl named Jessica was working it. She was pretty much a glorified restaurant hostess, managing the phone and walk-in bookings for Club members who didn’t want to book online, while welcoming members as they entered. She was cute in a naive sort of way, and she told me this was a summer job before her senior year in high school - her parents were members too, and she could actually remember me as one of the older kids when she was younger. We chatted a bit, but I didn’t know any of the people she did since we were a high school generation apart.

“Mrs Booker,” Jessica smiled as the Spa door opened. “Hello again.”

“Well hello dear,” Mrs Booker said. “I’m here for my appointment.”

“I have good news for you. Trevor here is our newest massage therapist, he comes very highly recommended and he’ll be helping you out today.”

“Good morning, Mrs Booker,” I said, stepping forward and taking her hand in both of mine to shake it softly. “It’s nice to meet you.”

Mrs Booker had to be well into her sixties, was slightly overweight and was dressed with the casual richness of jewelry and high-end clothing that I’d come to associate with my time spent at the Club. “It’s very nice to meet you as well, young man. Now, let me see your hands.”

It was an odd request, but one that I’d learned not to take to heart - for some reason there was a sort of person who felt like they had to judge your hands to know if you would be a good masseuse. Usually it came from wealthier clients, but I’d had a woman at the hotel who I could best describe as ‘poor white trash on holiday’ do the same thing. She’d tutted and said I would be ‘good enough’ and then didn’t leave a tip afterwards.

So I held out my hands to Mrs Booker, palms up, and let her inspect them.

“Very nice,” she nodded, like she was judging a vintage of wine. “I’ll just go get changed.”

“I’ll be waiting here for you to bring you back,” I nodded.

Thus began my workday. My clients would show up for their appointment, usually a half hour but some of them up to an hour, and I would meet them at the door to welcome them. They would go disrobe in the appropriate change halls, then come meet me wrapped up in a fluffy white Club robe and complimentary slippers, and I would bring them back to my ‘office.’ I’d sit with them and ask them some general questions about their health and any problem areas, and if they were looking for anything in particular. Several of the men and women were surprised that I was taking notes, and I explained that it would shorten the time on their next visits with me and we could just update instead of doing the whole conversation over again.

I’d seen seven clients by the time my scheduled lunch break at 1pm came around, and five of them had ended up just wanting a basic massage as relaxation rather than any particular therapy. I’d been expecting this, so while it wasn’t exactly challenging I could sort of shut my mind off as I did it, just talking with them about their lives and jobs. Only one of the clients was under fifty, and he was a golfer who had suffered a partially torn calf muscle he was doing some rehab for following his surgery. That was a more delicate and specific massage, but definitely a nice challenge after a morning of old folks coming through as part of their regular routine.

I was just escorting the golfer out to the lobby so he could go back and change when someone called my name. “Trev? Trevor Brantford, is that you?”

“Mrs Cargill,” I said in surprise. “Hi, how are you?”

“Well I’m great, but I’m not Mrs Cargill anymore, to you or anyone. Tony and I got divorced about a year ago,” she said. “And you’re not dating my teenage stepdaughter anymore, so I think you can just call me Eden.”

Eden stepped towards me, smiling brightly, as she opened her arms for a hug. I accepted, and she pulled me in close into a warm, familiar embrace. She was as gorgeous as I remembered even three years later. She was tall for a woman, standing equal to my height in the fashionable open-toed heels she was wearing and seemed to have bounced back her figure after she’d been pregnant. She had on a pair of tight white pants with a high waist and a beige crop top with long shoulder straps that showed off her cleavage - which seemed to be one of the only things that had changed about her, having gotten larger, and I wondered if that was a remnant of the pregnancy or if she’d had some work done. The other thing was that she’d chopped off her long wavy blonde hair almost at her jawline, turning it into a cute and stylish bob with a part down one side that helped asymmetrically frame her cute, cherubic face.

“It’s good to see you, Eden,” I said, squeezing her back in the hug. “I’m sorry to hear about the divorce.”

“Oh, that bastard cheated on me with a younger woman,” she said, waving it off. “He started right after I got pregnant and never stopped. Now he’s on his third wife, and he’s paying me alimony and part of the settlement was that he keeps me on his membership here at the Club. But what are you doing here? You didn’t even come to say goodbye when you and Daisy broke up.”

“I would have liked to, but it’s a little awkward to do when your high school sweetheart dumps you at the beginning of summer after graduation so she can chase the captain of the football team,” I said.

Eden rolled her eyes and sighed. “I tried my damndest to teach that girl to appreciate a good thing when she had it in front of her.”

“Well, it’s water under the bridge,” I said. “I’m actually working here in the Spa. I graduated with my degree in massage therapy last month and I couldn’t think of a nicer place to kick off my career.”

“That’s fantastic, kiddo,” she said with a broad grin, using her old nickname for me. She turned to Jessica at the welcome station, who had been listening in to the conversation. “Does Trev have any openings today?”

“We’re booked up, Miss Giardinu,” Jessica said with an apologetic smile.

“Well, is there anyone on the books who didn’t ask for him specifically?” she asked. “Maybe we could switch the bookings around so I can catch up with him?”

Jessica pursed her lips and tutted for a moment as she worked the touch screen she had. “Um, I think I can do that. Let me just call up Mr Augustine and see if he can move back a half hour and I should be able to make it work.”

“Thank you so much, dear,” Eden said, then turned back to me. “Unless you think it would be strange to massage an old lady like me, Trev.”

“I think I can struggle through for you,” I smiled, giving her a wink with the sarcasm.

“OK,” she said, then broke into another grin. “If I’m with you a little earlier, I should probably go grab lunch now. See you at two, kiddo.” She stepped into another one-armed hug and kissed me on the cheek before making a ‘call me’ motion at Jessica, who was already dialling whoever Mr Augustine was to try and do the reschedule.

I waited for Jessica to make her call to see if he was open to the change, which he seemed to be thankful for since he was running late anyways.

“So you dated Daisy Cargill, huh?” Jessica asked me.

“Three and a half years,” I said. “Loved her to death, and she paid me back by hopping into bed with one of my best friends after she decided I wasn’t going to a good enough University program.”

“Well, I’ll make sure I don’t schedule her with you,” Jessica smirked.

“She’s around?” I asked, wincing just a little.

“Not often,” Jessica said. “I think I overheard her talking with someone about having an internship up in New York, so she’s only back on some weekends this summer.”

“Well, thanks,” I said. “I’m off for lunch.”

“You’ve got about twenty minutes,” Jessica said. “If you go to the kitchen, ask the fry cook Davey for a Jessica Special. He’ll get you a couple chicken strips and a little salad in like 5 minutes.”

I grinned. “Good to know. Thanks for the tip, Jess.”

“No problem,” she smiled back. “Can’t let our newest celebrity masseuse go hungry.”

“I’m not a celebrity,” I frowned and chuckled.

“Are you kidding?” Jessica smirked again. “As soon as I found out you were the new massage therapist I put it in a couple of group chats and you’re half-booked into the end of next week already. And I bet Eden Giardinu is going to let all her friends know too, and you’ll be booked into the week after.”

“Oi vey,” I sighed.

I did what Jessica suggested and found my way up to the sprawling kitchen and asked for Davey. I was pointed over to one side and around a corner where I found a guy in his early twenties sporting a thick black moustache and a backwards baseball cap as he worked a bank of six deep fryers. I asked him for a ‘Jessica Special’ and he laughed, telling me to go wait over at the staff entrance to the kitchen.

In almost exactly five minutes Davey came over to me with a takeout container that was steamed up from the heat of the freshly fried chicken strips, cut up and topping a small garden salad with a little sealed container of ranch dressing. I thanked him, but he was already waving me off and heading back to his station.

The staff room was busy, almost three-quarters full of workers from all over the club. I spotted Marissa at a table in the corner, eating by herself as she read something on her phone, and immediately went to her table.

“Well, the good news is that I haven’t quit yet,” I said, sitting down next to her at the table.

She looked up from her phone. “What’s the bad news then?”

“Apparently I’m a minor celebrity with all the old folks and I need a dose of someone our age,” I said. She gave me a confused look. “Uh, I’m Trevor?” I continued. “We met earlier today?”

“No, I remember,” she said. “I’m just confused about why you’re coming to sit with me of all people.”

“Because I thought you were funny, and pretty, and you mentioned you were in grad school so you must be intelligent as well, and I could use all three of those things in my friends,” I said.

“Look, Trevor,” she said. “I’m just going to throw it out there now - I don’t date. Not ‘I don’t date coworkers,’ I mean I literally do not do dating.”

“Well, let me ask you this; Do you want to go out with me?”

“No,” she said. “I just told you I don’t date.”

“Then we won’t date,” I said. “That doesn’t change that I think you might be a cool person to be friends with.”

“And you’re fine with that?” she asked.

“Why shouldn’t I be?” I asked. “You have every right to say no, and why should I hold it against you?”

“Because you’re a guy, and a lot of guys get butthurt over stupid shit,” she said.

“I don’t know who you’ve been hanging out with,” I said. “But that’s called ‘being an asshole.’ I try to limit myself to being slightly dickish at worst on any given day.”

“That’s fair,” she said, snorting out a little chuckle. “Alright, massage boy. You can sit with me at lunch.”

I tutted and shook my head. “Izzie, I’m already sitting,” I said.

She rolled her eyes, her smile growing a little bit. “Izzie? Really?”

“I figured everyone else must shorten your name to Mari, so I thought I’d change it up for you.”

“You know you’re kind of a weird guy, right?” she chuckled.

“Oh, I know,” I said. “It’s part of my boyish charm.”

Over that lunch Marissa and I chatted quickly. It turned out her job at the Club, which was actually more like three different jobs she was working between the snack cart, the waitressing and bartending, and working as event staff, wasn’t even her only employer. She also worked the breakfast rush at a diner in town three days a week and volunteered her time at a women’s shelter when she didn’t have afternoon shifts at the Club. She kept herself extremely busy during the regular school year, and even during the summer she tended to prefer working to free time.

For my part, I told her about growing up as a Club kid, and struggling with dyslexia - I’d gotten over my embarrassment of it later in high school and was happy to talk about it. That was really the only way I’d even gotten through my Massage Therapy program; being open about it with the school helped me get through all the written tests without completely bombing.

Marissa was out of there first, giving me another smile as she said she’d see me tomorrow. I finished right after her and was out the door, back in the Spa with two minutes to spare on my break. I met my next client and escorted him back to my room and ran him through the routine. He was a portly guy, early sixties, and was yet another ‘I’m just here for a massage, kid’ kind of man. I spent most of the time chatting with him, using little tidbits of info I’d picked up from other clients earlier in the day to keep up with economy talk and the local teams.

Afterwards, I escorted him back out and he headed for the sauna, and I looked at Jessica.

“She’s already changing,” she said.

“I’m already changed,” Eden corrected, coming out from the women’s changing hall bundled up in the white robe and slippers just like everyone else did, except she managed to look halfway stylish instead of just comfy.

“I’ll need one moment to turn over the room,” I said. “My last client just got out of there. Would you like to stay here, or come back with me?”

“Oh, Trev. Like I would mind spending an extra minute or two catching up,” Eden smiled. She hooked her arm in mine and looked over at Jessica. “Thanks again for switching me over, hon.”

“No problem, Miss Giardinu,” Jessica said.

“Now, Trev, start from the beginning,” Eden said as I started walking her back down the Alley to my room. “After my idiot stepdaughter broke up with you, the girls must have been fawning all over you at college.”

I chuckled and shook my head. “Not exactly. There were a couple of ... encounters, but nothing that ever developed into a real relationship.”

“Oh, to be young again,” Eden laughed. “Flings and fuckbuddies, huh? Sometimes I feel like I miss that time of my life, but then I go home to my little Oscar and I know I couldn’t juggle trying to find a proper guy to date, and working, and him.”

“Honestly, Eden,” I said. “I think you probably had a lot more happen in the last three years than I did, it sounds like. I went to college for three years, got my degree and certificate, and now I’m back here. How are you?”

“See, that’s why I always liked you, Trev,” she said. We’d entered the room and she watched me with a soft smile and a critical eye as I quickly stripped the sheet off the bed and then sprayed the soft leather down with disinfectant before putting another one on tightly. “You are more interested in the people around you than talking about yourself. It’s a disarming skill, and very flattering.”

“Well, I got a lot of practice listening instead of speaking when I dated Daisy,” I chuckled with a little smirk.

“That is a truth I can understand,” Eden laughed. I liked the way she did it, with a big smile that flashed her pearly teeth. Unreserved.

With the new sheet on, I grabbed my clipboard and pen and gestured for Eden to sit on the table while I took the stool out from beside one of the cupboards. “Alright, Eden. We can keep catching up once we’ve started your massage,” I said.

“You mean once you get me naked,” she grinned and winked.

“That’s not how I like to think about it,” I rolled my eyes.

“I know, kiddo. It’s just fun to be able to tease you again.”

“You were always good at that,” I said. “Do you remember that dress you wore the night I came to pick Daisy up for our senior prom?”

“The green one,” she said. “I may have done that on purpose. Daisy was being a brat all week beforehand, and a real bitch that afternoon, and I still love her like she’s my own but she continues to act like that. I figured I’d flirt with you just a little so she’d get jealous and want to be sweet to you.”

“Well, it worked,” I said. “But I still couldn’t get the vision of you in that dress out of my head for three months afterwards.”

“Just three?” Eden teased again.

“Yeah, it went from every day to every other day after three months,” I teased her right back. “Anyways. This is just a quick survey so I can get the facts I need on file. Could you spell your new last name for me?”

“G-i-a-r-d-i-n-u,” she spelt for me.

“Where’s it from?” I asked.

“My grandfather was originally for Corsica, it’s Corsican for ‘garden.’”

“It’s pretty,” I said. “But I’m guessing your first name is a bit of a family joke, then.”

Now it was her turn to roll her eyes. “Yes, and no. I’m named after my Grandmother.”

“That’s sweet,” I said. “Now, I know it’s rude but I need to ask you just so I can keep any medical issues in mind. How old are you?”