"I am so sore.  And look at this rip!"<br/><br/>"Price you pay," Helen said as she took her friend Jennifer's hand and looked at the large area of torn open skin.  It was part and parcel of working the bars and you either learned to deal with it or wore super padded grips but they hurt your routine.  "You should paint it with the liquid bandage."<br/><br/>"Gross!  And ow!  That stuff stings and then it looks like you've sneezed on your hands and then let it dry," Jennifer said and took her hand back.<br/><br/>"Stop being a baby," their other friend, Madelyn, chimed in.  "You're always complaining about something.  'Oh my God, I got my period this month!  I must be getting fat!  My mom won't let me drive the Lexus!  My dad won't buy me a new iPhone!'  Whine, whine, whine."<br/><br/>"I am not!  Why are you being such a bitch?  Oh, wait, I forgot.  You don't know how not to be a bitch," Jennifer threw back.  "And it wasn't a full period, just some spotting.  I'm not getting fat."<br/><br/>"I still get mine," Helen admitted.<br/><br/>"What?  No way!  You're like, not fat fat.  Just padded."  Jennifer said.<br/><br/>"Like, every month?" Madelyn asked.<br/><br/>Helen nodded.  "There's not a lot of blood or anything, but I cramp pretty hard and just end up trying to stuff my heating bad inside my tummy."<br/><br/>"That sucks," Jennifer said.<br/><br/>"Yeah," Madelyn agreed.  "What did coach say?"<br/><br/>Helen shrugged.  "Don't get blood on her beam."<br/><br/>"God, she's such a bitch," Madelyn threw out and all three girls laughed.  In their world of near constant starvation, protein intensive diets, naturally small bodies and super low body fat, menstruation was a rarity.  The body knew it wasn't big enough or had enough fat reserves to bear a child, so most of the gymnasts didn't even have periods.<br/><br/>Helen and two of her friends were walking back from gymnastics practice.  Normally their moms picked them up and Helen walked home.  They came from totally separate worlds, but were united in one mission today.  Boy watching.<br/><br/>A couple of the guys from school did this jumping running dare type game.  Helen had seen a little bit of it and told Madelyn and Jennifer about it.  It sounded almost like gymnastics, and the boys who did it were hot, so the three of them decided to go check it out.<br/><br/>"There they are," Helen said as they came to an area of town that had been partially demolished.  Some of it was bare foundation, some of it had basements that didn't have a roof over them any more, and there were lots of walls, low and high and in between.  There was even part of a steel pipe structure that had been the base of some sort of tower once, like the world's most dangerous uneven bars.<br/><br/>"Oh my god, look at those pants!  I just want to see them fall off his hips!"  Jennifer started to point at James then stopped herself.<br/><br/>"He's cut.  Like, wow, he's cut," Madelyn said, looking at the starkly defined muscles around James' abdomen and hips.<br/><br/>"Come on," Helen said.  "We can sit on that wall."  The three girls, still dressed in their leotards and tight boy short bottoms, drifted over to where the boys were talking and getting ready to do their thing.