Only my hands were touching the bar when the skin ripped off. Hard calluses, knotted there for months, pushed and pulled into white rocks of flesh clinging to the pads of my palms. I was gripping the bar, swinging in circles around, up and down, when suddenly the knots were stripped away from other layers of fresh pink sticky flesh. Chalk and sweat seeped under the edges of my torn skin, the stinging burn of each exposed gash throbbing through my fingers, curling them down into half-fists tight and immovable yet limply tender, protecting the drying sores. Fake flesh, like aerosol glue sprayed across my grip, clogged the porous pain until my fingers could be pulled straight again so a bandage could hold them, gauze wrapped thick then taped around and between their webbing so my round hands would support me in practice again.
Mandy Holt