Page 38 of Wells

Cera

The Fève: The fève is the small charm hidden inside the Carnival cake, and whoever bites down on it is bound to provide the next one. The sweetness always carries something concealed, and the one who finds it owes a debt they never chose.

Locke drops his mat next to mine with enough force to make the woman on the other side glance over. His energy is already dialed too high for a Saturday morning class, and I know I made a mistake the second he settles cross-legged and leans in.

"So."

I fold forward into child's pose and press my forehead to the mat.

"Cera."

"We are not doing this right now."

"You texted me at one in the morning, saying something happened at work. There's only one kind of work thing worth a text at that hour."

"I was just checking in on my way home."

Locke stretches his legs out in front of him and rolls his ankles. "You lie like a rug. Spill it."

Heat crawls up my neck. I sit up and reach for my water bottle, buying time. Around us, bodies fill the studio. Mats unroll with soft thumps. Someone adjusts the blinds, and pale morning light cuts across the hardwood. The scent of lavender and cedar hangs in the air, meant to calm. It does nothing for me.

"Fine. Something happened," I whisper. "But now isn't the time."

His entire face sharpens. "What kind of something?"

"The kind I am not discussing before class."

"You cannot drop that in my lap and expect me to become spiritually evolved."

I turn my head and look at him. "You just spent three weeks at an ashram. You're more spiritually evolved than most. Practice your patience."

The instructor walks in before he can extract anything else. She moves to the front of the room and sits, her voice low as she starts the opening meditation. I close my eyes and try to breathe in through the nose, out through the mouth.

The first inhale pulls sensation into my ribs, my belly, lower. My body remembers before I can stop it, and I am back at that desk last night, his hands on my hips, his breath at my ear, the sharp edge of wood against my thighs. I press my palms into the mat and try to ground myself.

The instructor cues us into downward dog, and I push up, grateful for the work of it. The stretch pulls through my hamstrings and shoulders as I hold it and breathe.

Locke shifts beside me, but I don't look at him.

In warrior two, I step my right foot forward and sink into the lunge, arms extended. The burn starts in my thighs and radiates out. I'm supposed to be present, to breathe into the discomfort. What I am doing is replaying Wells, the look he gave me after, the one that neither apologized nor shrank from what we did, and how I walked out as if it cost me nothing while my thighs were still shaking.

Locke mouths something at me from his mat. I can't make out the word, but the grin on his face tells me it is filthy. I wobble and have to reset my stance.

"Focus on your breath," the instructor says.

We move through the sequence: reverse warrior, triangle, extended side angle. Each pose asks me to open, to stretch, to sit with sensation. My body cooperates and betrays me at the same time. Every inhale pulls heat into places I am actively trying to ignore.

Pigeon is the worst. I fold my right leg under me and extend the left, sinking into the deep hip opener. There is nowhere to go in pigeon. You just sit with it. There is the stretch, the discomfort, the slow ache that builds until you either breathe through it or bail.

I close my eyes and press my forehead to my forearms. Calm the fuck down.

By the time we reach savasana, I am wound tighter than I was when I walked in. I lie flat on my back and stare at the ceiling, willing my heart to slow. The instructor's voice floats over us, guiding us into rest.

We walk to the Fly after class, our favorite spot of green grass behind the Audubon Zoo, to finish our flow after our Saturday morning classes.

Locke swings by the corner store for king cake, and I carry the blankets. The air smells like river mud and sugar. Somewhere past the park, drums sound in the distance. There must be a parade today.

The grass along the levee is damp and cold. I spread the blankets and sit, stretching my legs in front of me. The Mississippi runs wide and flat beyond the stones, carrying barges south. Beads hang from the oak branches overhead, purple and green and gold, leftover from parades that rolled through days ago. Carnival turns the city half feral this time of year. The light is gray-gold and too thin, winter hanging on past its welcome.