As they watched Father walk towards his meeting, Markus said “So I don’t have a ton I need to do today honestly. We can knock out a couple of tasks if you are up for it later, but I had something I wanted to show you first. Come with me.”

Sevs followed Markus back to his building. Once he was scanned in, they walked down a series of familiar hallways and showed up back before the office gym. When Markus opened the door, Sevs was not sure what to say. Honestly, it looked exactly the same as when they had left it. He could see that the 10 lbs plate he had used last time had not been touched since. The bit of tape on it was in the same position as when he had put it back on the rack. Sevs looked around the gym for any other changes, but he didn’t see anything. He looked back at Markus and motioned to enter all the way in. Markus let the door shut behind them as he was going. He reached into the space the food was hiding and pulled something out. He turned to Sevs and presented it to him.

Sevs took a closer look at the thing that Markus was offering him. It looked just like the barbell. Looking more closely, it seemed a little small in Markus’s massive hand. Seeing the confusion on Sevs’s face Markus clarified, “It's a barbell you can actually use. It has a slightly smaller circumference and is just a little more than half the weight of the standard one. It took a while to get here, it actually dropped off yesterday, and I ordered it weeks ago.”

Speechless, Sevs stared at Markus. Markus seemed to be getting a little uncomfortable. “It really isn’t a big deal, it wasn’t expensive or anything.”

He took the hand not holding the barbell and rubbed the back of his head, grinning awkwardly. As he did that, he kinda looked away and almost missed the bumrush hug that Sevs threw all his weight into. Grunting at the impact, Markus returned the gesture with his free hand. After a moment, Sevs let go and took a step back. “Thank you, that was really thoughtful.”

Some of the seriousness left Sevs’s face and he added, “This might be a double-edged gift, I’m going to need you to teach me the rest of the lifts now.”

Markus’s wide smile seemed to grow even wider. It seemed to almost split his face. “I can always use a gym buddy. Let's start with seeing how well you remember how to deadlift. Maybe we can get a proper max out of you now. If you just give me a second, I’m going to change, and this time we can both lift today.”

As Markus ducked into the changing room, Sevs considered the gym. Now he wasn’t sure what a typical gym was like, to be honest, but he had seen a couple in movies and things. This seemed pretty simple; there was a rack with a single barbell on it. A stand with plates with two of each weight, it looked like. There were a couple of simple benches off to one side and along one wall with a mirror and rack of dumbbells. The only other thing in the room was the treadmill in the corner and a cable stack with some pulleys attached. Compared to the giant rows of machines and racks of weights he had seen in movies and online, this seems pretty barebones. There was also the new barbell that Markus had left on the floor. Sevs went over and picked it up. It wasn’t too heavy but did require him to use two hands. It was a couple feet shorter than the larger one, and his fingers were able to fit comfortably around the shaft. It seemed like a large improvement.

It wasn’t much longer before Markus returned. Now wearing an old company T-shirt and some gym shorts he looked ready to work out. “You know I love this room. It’s probably my favorite place in the world. Basically, it's my own private gym. I don’t think I have seen anyone else use it in nearly a decade. I don’t have space for all this at home and despite how it looks there really isn’t any exercise you can’t do here. Though I would like to get an incline bench at some point.”

Sevs was interested in how this could do everything but didn’t ask as it seemed he would find out in due time. Markus began setting up the deadlifts. He put both bars on the ground. For the larger barbell, he put the largest weight on each side. For the smaller one, he slid the 10’s on again. They spent some time warming up, and Markus occasionally would give Sevs a pointer. Sevs could feel himself improving his form. Each time he incorporated the suggestions the top of the movement felt a little more natural.

After each had finished warming up. They took turns adding weight to the bar and giving it an attempt. After each successful lift, Markus gave Sevs a fist bump. It did not take long to start struggling, though. As it got more difficult Markus got more strict with the form. Making sure Sevs was set up properly and the motion was correct. Eventually, with one weight increase Sevs was able to get the weight off the floor but not past his knees. After he dropped the weight, Markus gave him an excited, hearty slap on the back. “Congrats, little bro! That's way more than your body weight!”

“Thanks? I’m not sure what to compare it to but it felt good?”

“Yeah, I’m not sure either, there are not that many people lifting at your age that I know of. Ready to try some of the other exercises?”

“Don’t you need to finish?” Sevs asked as Markus clearly hadn’t had any trouble so far.

Markus gave a grin that made Sevs a little apprehensive and proceeded to load every plate available onto the bar and lift it without any struggle. “So there isn’t enough weight here for me to deadlift or squat heavy. I go to a commercial gym when I need to, but you don’t really need to lift super heavy all that often. I do it maybe once a month.”

“Let's just move on to other lifts….”