Gah. She hated that she had forgotten this part of her life. She hated that she was going to have to stay up late to get everything done. But, mostly, she hated that Jack was right about this.
For the first time that day, she closed her eyes and inhaled deeply, letting the oxygen fill her lungs. She held the breath before releasing. Then she did it again.
Breathe in the now. Breathe out the past. Breathe in Jack. Breathe out Kent.
And then she followed Jack.
He’d pulled two of the Adirondack chairs onto the lawn, and he was removing his socks. April slipped off her sneakers and toed off her own socks, leaving them on the concrete patio before stepping onto the lawn. The trees were losing their leaves and the sprinklers had been off for weeks to prepare for winter.
Making her way to her chair, the soles of her feet sank against the cool blades of brittle grass.
She paused. Closed her eyes. Positioned herself in mountain pose before raising her arms toUrdhva Hastasana—upward salute.
And she just…breathed. There was no divorce. No meltdown at preschool. No eating bees that weren’t really bees.
Erasing all thoughts from her mind, she moved every ounce of focus to her muscles and to her breaths. In for four counts. Hold for four counts. Release for four counts. Pause for four counts. And again.
The cool earth rooting her in place as the crown of her head pointed to the sky, her blood pressure didn’t seem so intense, her entire body felt lighter, and the crisp autumn air didn’t feel so cold.
The edges of her lips ticked up as she finished a sun salutation, moving through the poses to downward dog and then back to forward fold and then to mountain.
Her chest rose and fell with each inhale and exhale. Finally, she opened her eyes and released the practice. She turned to Jack.
If she wasn’t mistaken, he had the look of a man who had just gotten his way.
That’s when she noted that his cell phone was trained on her. He raised an eyebrow and tapped the screen. “Perfection.”
“Did you just record me?” she asked, eyeing him with a touch of what-the-heck? He should totally have given her a heads-up first.
“I believe we have your next post all ready to go.” He shook the cell. “Once you give your stamp of approval.”
She hated that this was a good idea: the calm mom being all calm and unaware of the outside world. “And if I don’t like it?”
“Then we delete it and you do the thing again.”
“The sun salutation,” she said, edging toward her chair. This actually did solve one of her pressing issues of the morning. That being: what to post next?
“Yeah, that. The sun salutation.” Small crinkles at the corners of his eyes fanned as he smiled, but he didn’t say another word.
“Can we enjoy the morning without any more surreptitious filming?” April asked.
He nodded. “Unless you do something else that reinforces your brand, your image, and I happen to be holding my cell.”
She chuckled. Low. The kind of sound that she used to make all the time. “That wasn’t a commitment, Jack.”
“Nope.” Then he closed his eyes, set his cell aside, and let his head fall back against the stained-wood chair.
She sat, settled, and let her own head rest, eyes focused on the bright blue Colorado sky.
Then she took a breath.
And another.
And, dammit, Jack was right. She needed this.
“Are you filming me?” she said softly.
“No,” he replied, also whispering. “Should I be?”
