Run to the locker room

Jenn barreled through the locker room doors like she was running from a crime scene. She pressed her back against the cool tile wall and took a shaky breath.

Pantless. She had just run across half the gym in nothing but a T-shirt and a thong.

She looked down at herself. Her shirt clung with sweat, barely grazing the tops of her thighs. Her legs were bare, goosebumps rising in the chilly air. The torn leggings hung limply in her arms like the carcass of a fallen comrade.

“Well,” she whispered to herself, voice cracking. “This is a new rock bottom.”

The locker room was mercifully empty, but that didn’t make her feel any less exposed. She ducked into the nearest bench area, tossing the ruined pants onto the seat. The rip was catastrophic, no amount of sewing, stapling, or wishful thinking would put them back together.

Jenn buried her face in her hands. “I’m thirty-eight years old. Thirty-eight. And I just mooned half the gym.”

She sat there for a few minutes, trying to decide what to do.

Jenn groaned.

A faucet dripped in the background, echoing in the silence. Somewhere down the hall, she heard muffled laughter. Her laughter. They were still talking about her.

She sat up straighter, clutching the shredded pants to her chest like a shield. “Okay,” she whispered. “We can salvage this. We… we are a grown woman. We pay bills. We floss nightly. We can figure this out.”

She eyed her gym bag, still mercifully intact. She rummaged through it, praying she’d forgotten an old pair of shorts or sweatpants inside.

A towel. A pair of socks. Deodorant.

That was it.

Jenn stared at the towel. It wasn’t even a full-sized bath towel, just a little hand towel she’d thrown in, thinking she’d dab at her face after a light jog. Now it looked like her only chance at modesty.

She held it up against herself. It covered maybe six inches. From the front. Barely.

“Fantastic,” Jenn muttered. “Just fantastic.”

The locker room door creaked open, and Jenn jumped, clutching the tiny towel against her hips.