Chapter 8
Chapter Eight
Clark
AS EVENING SETS IN, the shadows between the trees deepen, dark pools oozing across the short trail from the lodge to the lakeside. I know it’s safe. I know there’s people waiting on both ends of it. But as the sun sinks the forest grows very dark, very fast, and I clutch my yoga mat a bit too tightly as I walk.
I can’t believe I’m actually doing this. Perhaps the fear helps keep me going. It at least keeps me from thinking about what I’m doing and why I’m doing it. What possessed me to accept River’s invitation? Sure, I do have neck pain — what office worker in his thirties doesn’t? — but a mean little voice inside me jeers that that’s not the real reason I said yes to this unofficial extra yoga session.
I shove the voice aside. Neck pain. Posture. This will help so that I’m not hunched over and complaining about my back before I even hit forty. It’s a good thing. Besides, it’s just yoga.
Just yoga.
Nothing else.
Anyway, even if it was something else, who’s to say River is gay? He has blue hair, sure, but a lot of younger people have dyed hair these days. It’s impossible with these hippie types to tell who’s queer and who isn’t.
I emerge from the trail. The lake gleams pink and red under the setting sun, like an enormous jewel set into the forest. The day’s warmth streaks across the sky in gorgeous slashes of color, the sun itself a glaring orange paint splotch dipping low. For a moment, I simply stand there taking it in. I guess the lake on the flyer was real after all, and it’s even more beautiful in person. Then a voice startles me.
“You came.”
River strides out of the forest and heads toward me, a yoga mat tucked under his arm. He wears loose, billowy pants with a patchwork design and a shockingly normal T-shirt. I was beginning to wonder if he owned any shirts at all, but I’m surprised to find the clothing disappoints me a little. His blue hair tumbles past his shoulders, and I have to fight down a swell of heat as he smiles broadly at me.
Okay, fine. Yes. He’s attractive. Of course he’s attractive. I’m not an idiot. But I need to be sensible about this. He’s an instructor at the retreat. There’s a professional distance here, no matter how stupid my pent up brain wants to be about it.
Seriously, though, how long has it been since I’ve gone to a bar, a club, a party, any kind of venue where I might meet another man? I used to do those things, I recall. Back in my twenties, I did those things all the time. I dated. I even dated seriously. When did I stop? When did work eat all that time and energy?
I shake my head. Now, as River strides up to me, is not the time to get fixated on such things.
“Should we set up here?” he says.
“You’re the teacher,” I say.
“Yes, but this is your practice,” he says. He glances around, at the trees, the lake, the sky. “This spot is perfect. You have a good eye.”
I didn’t think about the location at all. I just started looking at the lake. River rolls out his yoga mat, and I have little choice but to do likewise.
I expect him to take me through some of those standing positions, like he did this morning, but instead he sits cross-legged on his mat and motions for me to do the same.
Only when we’re sitting across from each other do I realize how close we are. River easily reaches out and pats my knee, the warmth of his hand penetrating my sweatpants.
“We’re going to do something a little different this time,” River says. “I want to get you in tune with your body.”
“What about the neck pain?” I say.
“This is the first step toward working on that,” River says. “You fight yourself during class, like if you force yourself into the positions you’ll have won a battle against them. This isn’t about winning. It’s about finding what your body needs and what it can give. So I want to see if we can reframe your practice with some simple breathing and things like that, alright?”
I have no idea what half of that shit means, but it sounds good when he says it, and I’m already here, so I simply nod.
“Great,” River says. “Now, set your hands on your knees, palms up, like this.”
He demonstrates, and I mirror him, even though I feel a bit silly sitting like I’m meditating or something. Is this how people meditate? I wouldn’t know, but it reminds me of pictures of meditation.
“There, now, let’s do a few deep breaths,” River says. “If you feel your eyes getting heavy or your body wanting to shift, that’s perfectly fine. Let yourself move with it. Let whatever your body wants to happen, happen.”
I don’t quite know what that means either. How could my body want something without me knowing about it? I do as I’m told regardless, following him through some breathing exercises. It’s weird timing my breaths to someone else’s, but following the steady rise and fall of his chest almost becomes hypnotic. I find myself watching his body move and trying to match him. And, weirdly enough, my eyes do get a bit heavy.
“There you go,” River says. His voice is barely louder than the lake murmuring softly a few feet away. It’s just another piece of nature around me. “Let your eyelids droop. Let your body get heavy. I’m with you.”
My eyes fall shut. I can still feel River before me, his presence warm and solid even though I can’t see him. It’s strange knowing he’s there without seeing him, feeling him there without seeing him. His presence is a physical thing in front of me, washing against my skin like the lake lapping against the shoreline. It’s almost like being touched, but not quite.
I don’t flinch away like I might from a hand. River keeps talking, and I sit there allowing his voice to seep through me like warm tea on a cold day.
“Deep breath in,” he says, and I follow his cues. “Feel the breath in your chest, in your back, in your shoulders. Hold it there. And exhale it out.”
I breathe out, long, audible. My shoulders slouch as I do, something loosening in my back that I didn’t even realize was tight. We do it a couple more times, and soon my shoulders feel so light they could float off my body. It’s almost like when River cracked my back in that first yoga class I went to, except he hasn’t laid a finger on me this time. He’s done this with nothing but our breaths.
“That’s great,” River says, and coming from him, it doesn’t sound like a mere platitude. Somehow, I’m sure he can see the difference in the tension I’m holding around my shoulders, and he does actually think it’s great. “Now let’s check in with the rest of our bodies, okay? I want you to take your next breath all the way down into your belly.”
I continue following along, but this time when I breathe in, the focus goes lower. The breath meets with a tingle of awareness, a slow, gentle heat murmuring deep under the surface. It alarms me, but I try not to let that show and keep heeding River’s instructions. Except the next time I take a deep breath, that gentle heat becomes a tickle, and the next time, it’s a tingle I struggle to ignore. It’s a feeling I’ve shoved to the side for years, always too busy, always thinking about work, always allegedly unconcerned. Here in this quiet forest with no one around but River, it roars back to life within me, like dim, dying coals suddenly flaring back into a fire.
“What’s going on for you, Clark?” River says, just as softly as he instructed me to breathe.
“I…” I falter, shaking my head with my eyes still closed. How do I even begin describing this to a man who’s probably a decade younger than me?
“It’s okay,” River says. “Whatever’s coming up, it’s normal and okay.” When I still don’t respond, he goes on. “The body can hold onto a lot more than physical stress. All those things you haven’t been feeling, all those things you’ve brushed aside, they can stay within us too. When they all come back at once, it can be overwhelming, but I want you to let yourself feel them.”
I attempt it, but it’s too much. I open my eyes, searching for the lake, the trees, the sunset: solid, real things. My body is warm, my blood stirring, my heart beating too hard when all I’ve done is sit here and breathe. For some reason, the streaks of red and pink slashing through the sky make my throat tight. I saw this place this morning, but it feels new now. The water is brighter, the sky bolder, the wind a caress against my cheek. I shudder as though waking from a dream, a long, long dream about spending the past ten years of my life doing nothing but working, never once smelling the trees, hearing the birds, watching the sunset. Suddenly, all those things are happening right before me, the sun splashing joyous flares of color into the sky as it sinks.
“It’s incredible, isn’t it?” River says.
I don’t startle, as much as I’d like to, but when I turn my head even a little, I find him watching me and not the lake. As with the lake, I feel like I’m seeing his face for the first time, the easy tilt of his lips toward a peaceful smile, the clear gray of his eyes, the faint shadow of stubble on his cheeks. I noticed the first time I met him that he was attractive, but in a vague, detached sort of way. Now, his beauty barrels into me, and that warmth lurking deep within surges up to fill my whole chest.
“There you are,” River says, his smile widening. “It’s wonderful, isn’t it, to really see the world around you? To really be here in the moment?”
“It is,” I admit.
“How long has it been since you’ve just breathed and been present?”
As hard as I try to tell myself I don’t understand his question, that it’s more hippie nonsense, something clenches tight inside me, a pang I can’t ignore.
“A long time,” I admit.
He sets a hand on my knee, and I let him.
“That’s okay,” he says. “We all have to survive sometimes. You were trying to take care of yourself, but I bet you were also neglecting yourself in some ways, right?”
I nod because I dare not speak. I was neglecting myself in ways I can’t bring myself to admit to this handsome younger man as he gazes so sincerely into my eyes, as he leans into my space, as his hand lingers on my knee. It would be so easy to lean toward him in return, to let myself tilt forward and fall into him.
River must know. He must see it on my face or in my eyes. His hand slides from my knee to my thigh, a more than purely professional, friendly touch. He leans even farther in, but doesn’t close that final gasp of distance between us. He leaves that entirely up to me.
I set my hand atop his, and for the first time in so very long, I leap.