Jen led her yoga class into the final pose of the session. She felt her body, her muscles, her joints relax as she settled into corpse pose and allowed her mind to wander. The soft music from the overhead speakers filled the room with light synthesizer music, and her practice mat felt cool against her skin.
After a few minutes, she stood and surveyed her class. Women mostly, a few men scattered throughout, all of them reclined on their backs, eyes closed, their minds left to their own imagination.
She couldn't help but smile as she looked out over her students and reveled in the thought that they were HER students, this was HER business, and she held sole responsibility over it.
With a soft voice that was nearly a whisper, she said, "Namaste. See you next time."
The class rose as if they emerged from a deep sleep. Some sat and rolled up their mats, others stood and stretched one final time. Jen grabbed her mat and walked back to her office.
In her spartan office she sat behind the beat-up metal desk she had bought used from an office supply warehouse. She sat knowing there were a ton of little things she needed to do tonight, but not sure where to begin. Ever since she had gained her independence from her ex-boyfriend and her damn family, Jen had felt an exhilaration and an abundant amount of energy that no amount of work seemed to expend.
She heard a knock on her office door frame, and looked up to see Debra, one of her students. Debra stood slightly taller than Jen and had long, thin, tight muscles underneath tight skin - the results of years of Tae Kwon Do training. A sheen of sweat covered her lightly tanned body.
"You wanted to talk about Tae Kwon Do classes?" Debra said.
"Yes, come in, have a seat."
Debra sat in one the of cheap metal chairs across from Jen. Her short brown hair was mussed from class.
"I want to expand the business a bit," Jen said. "And I thought some low-impact Tae Kwon Do classes might appeal to my current student base."
Debra nodded her head. "Yes, it probably would."
"And I remember from one of our first conversations together that you used to teach Tae Kwon Do," Jen said. "Would you be interested in teaching a class two or three nights a week?"
Debra's eyebrows shot up. "Of course I would."
"Good."
Jen went over her ideas with Debra, and Debra volunteered some of her own. As they talked, Jen could hear the other students say their good-byes as they left. Debra grabbed a sheet of paper and ink pen from Jen's desk, then sketched out different options they could pursue. As Jen watched her, she knew she had made a good choice.
#
Jen had first decided to open her own yoga business a year before when she began to feel the first stirrings of discontent with Kyle. They had lived together for three years at that point, and Jen felt bored with their relationship. Kyle seemed content with the status quo, and at times treated Jen more like a showpiece at social gatherings than someone he claimed to love. At one time, he had bragged about his beautiful, tall blonde girl and how well she dressed up.
She had practiced yoga from a young age, and with a degree in business (to make her father happy) with a minor in kinetics (to make herself happy), a business offering yoga classes seemed perfect.
Jen had found a building after searching only two weeks, soon received approval for her small business loan, and began renovations. The bottom floor needed the addition of locker rooms with showers, plus some clearing out, while the top floor would become her living quarters.
When she had decided to leave Kyle and move out of their condominium, she began work on the second floor. By the time she only a few amenities left to add, she broke the news to Kyle that she was leaving him. The fights had been long, the break-up seemed to take forever, but Jen didn't regret a moment of it. And nothing made her happier than to walk up the stairs to her own apartment after a day's work.
#
In only two months Debra's Tae Kwon Do class pulled in a host of new students, including a few of Jen's regulars from yoga class. Some of those new students signed up for yoga to increase their flexibility, which made Jen even happier.
A few weeks in, Jen began attending Debra's classes as a form of aerobic exercise that offered much more excitement than a stepper, treadmill, or jogging. At times Debra seemed harder on her than her paying students, ordering her to perform an extra set of front-snap kicks or make her do continuous repetitions of her forms. Jen never complained, never commented afterwards, but Debra never failed to give her a mischievous grin.
Tonight had been no different, and Jen sensed an extra bit of impishness in Debra, almost as if she had some secret she wanted to share.
Jen climbed the stairs to her apartment, out of breath, her legs exhausted. She trudged past the storage closet on the right and down to the door on her left that led to her apartment. She put her hand on the door knob, imagined falling on the couch and relaxing for a few minutes, or a few hours, when she remembered she had left the computer on in the office.
"Shit."
She went back downstairs into her office and turned off the computer. The building held the usual eerie quiet it always did after hours, except tonight she heard the sound of running water.
