"You look great," Natasha says, and feels inadequate.
"It's the golden hour. I'd expect to look at least somewhat good."
"Yes! Bringing back those photography tutorial flashbacks, girl," Natasha knows she's gone over the top, but Sawyer smiles coyly.
"It’s surprisingly hard to get right artificially. You can't easily mimic that diffuse quality."
"Mama, I need to get more details from you about this job of yours. But first, yoga."
Natasha knows she isn't teaching at her best today. She's distracted by the way that sunlight pools and shifts down the curve of Sawyer's back as she bends forward into extended puppy pose. She can't handle the way the wind teases her hair.
At the end of the session Natasha wraps a scarf around her neck, and tucks her journal and yoga mat under her arm. She makes a swift exit. When she gets home she pulls out an old sketchbook and some pencils. She sketches out the skyline of Boston from memory. When her hand has warmed up, she tries to let it float across the page by itself. She can't stop drawing eyes. Heavily lined eyes; blonde fringed eyes; defiant eyes; laughing eyes; dreamy, evening eyes. She picks her soft pastel pencils and starts shading bands of peach and yellow, interrupted by slashes of vibrant blue.
She washes up her plate and her fork, and the small pan she used to whisk herself up a scrambled egg for dinner. Her apartment is quiet and dark, and she weaves her way to her bedroom through the piles of old tights and yoga books on the floor. She leaves her doors open, she has no-one to seek privacy from.
On top of her sheets, she touches herself. At first, she tries to think of the girls she's slept with in the past. She thinks of the ones at high school that turned her down. She thinks of porn girls and girls she's seen at the club and on perfume ads. Before long, she's thinking of Sawyer. She imagines leading her up the steps to the rooftop studio. Natasha's pulling her down to the floor beside her. Natasha is fucking her while Sawyer grabs the railings. If someone looked up they'd see Sawyer's knuckles around the metal and her hair whipped by the wind. Sawyer is bucking her hips on to Natasha's hand, panting and moaning while the city buzzes underneath them. Natasha imagines Sawyer's nipples lustred peach by the low hanging sun, and so hard that they cast tiny shadows.
It unravels quickly after that. Natasha pumps her hips up into her own hand. On each thrust her teeth get stuck on the S of Sawyer. After she comes, Natasha enjoys the buzz running down the firm muscles of her legs. It's a counterpoint to the ache in her hips and her knees. She clenches her toes to click them, and hopes her bones feel less stiff in the morning.
The next day before class she spontaneously fixes one of the hair clips she made in college into her hair. She wears her good lipstick and remembers to blot it with tissue and add a second layer.
Sawyer doesn't come to yoga. The other women don't seem to notice. Or if they do, they don't ask after her. They revert to their first-name references to partners and children. Natasha is extremely attentive to everyone at the session. She finds an excellent one-armed pose for Helen who has hurt her wrist, and encourages a first timer into the splits. After the session, they file straight out for smoothies or herbal tea at the café. Natasha waves them off. Two of them give her a hug, and one does the awkward elbow cupping thing.
Natasha worries. Was the group not inclusive in some way? Did she Google Natasha and find out that her official accreditations are minimal? Did she want a yoga teacher that had studied in Thailand? Did she want a yoga teacher that had natural grace, and didn't need extra strength anti-perspirant or four presses of blotting paper per hour? Did she figure out that Natasha had had unprofessional thoughts about her? Natasha needs to talk to Lucia.
"Hey, Lucia. Did you see the tall, pink-wearing one at all today?"
"Porn Barbie?" calls Lucia from behind the coffee machine she's currently cleaning.
"Not since your rooftop class yesterday."
"Hmm," Natasha says.
Natasha perches herself on the edge of Lucia's counter. "So, can one swoon over one's yoga student?" Natasha queries. "I'm asking for a friend."
Natasha sees Lucia's wide-open laugh in the reflection of the chrome milk steamer. Its convex surface renders Lucia's perfect face grotesque, and Natasha wants to have a go at making faces in it.
"Come through!" Lucia squeals. "It had to happen sometime with your little lesbian love-in!"
"Not just lesbian! Are you sure it's not, you know, taking advantage?"
"You're not a kindergarten teacher! It's a turn on for them. You're the hot yoga teacher. You remind them of college and the one time they did acid and got fingered at Burning Man. Most of them are probably wet all down their legs in their stupid harem trousers at the thought of you ramming them when they're in the downward dog."
"But I'm a garbage monster with fucked up knees."
"No," Lucia says forcefully. "You'll never get anywhere like that. You've got the eyes of an enchanting sea witch, an enormous heart; and
