Learning to Breathe

by Janice Lynn Mather

  I try to get out of my head, focusing on walking down Mariner’s familiar streets. I should feel at home. Instead, everything is strange, reality wrenched to one side. It’s a dream, being here, the kind where scenes change without warning, where dead people live and breathe and your teeth all fall out, where cats talk and dolphins fly. When I wake up, I will be in Aunt Patrice’s house, and Gary will be standing over me. That’s the only reality I can see. A car pulls up behind me, honking.

  “Indira May Ferguson, gal, if you keep walking and don’t turn your head like your grammy raised you right, I’ll get out this car and slap you silly.” It’s a woman’s voice, and the cussing is so familiar it could almost be Grammy talking. I turn around, and there’s one of Grammy’s friends, leaning out the window of an old van. Mrs. Robinson, Churchy’s grandmother. She flings the passenger door open and waves me around. I get in.

  “Good afternoon.”

  “Don’t you ‘good afternoon’ me, I ain seen you in all this time, and now you here you ain tell nobody you was comin up.” Mrs. Robinson gives me a sideways hug and a pat on the arm as she pulls back onto the road.

  “I—”

  “Oh, that’s a shame bout your grammy. I ain even know where they take her. Nobody hear nothing from her, I made couple calls and she ain at Merciful Twilight, nor at Jones Roberts Home for the Aged.”

  “She—”

  “Oh, my. And how bout my Churchy? I hear he at the same school as you. See, if I’da known you was comin, I’da sent you back with something. Where you goin now? An today is a school day? How you get outta classes? And ain even got on no uniform. Boy, you lucky your grammy ain here, if she was to see that. You ain drop out, ay?”

  “No—”

  “Talk up, girl. You put on weight? Watch those extra pounds, now. You ain tell me yet where you goin. Which way? What, you lost your tongue, ay?”

  Her constant stream of questions makes me smile. No wonder Churchy stutters. Probably from having to start a sentence eighteen times until his grandmother left enough of a pause for him to get a word out. “Up to the school.”

  “And you here because why? You need a transcript? But you could get that from Nassau. You goin off to college or something?” She turns into the school yard. “And I guess you saw that good-for-nothing granddaughter I got there. Already start pumpin the babies out. Don’t you walk in her footsteps, now, Indy. Nor in your ma own. Don’t mind how they’s call you Doubles. You your own person.”

  If only that was true, I think as she parks, dust pluming around the car.

  “And you still ain give me an answer. You here till what time?”

  Out the window I see Joe, standing beside her pile of mats. “I go back on the four o’clock boat.”

  “So don’t go nowhere, I comin by to let you carry something to my grandson. And that good-for-nothing girl.”

  I climb out, and the van spins around, raising even more dust. When it settles, I start walking toward Joe. She’s got her cell phone out and she’s poking at it, her face dejected. I better start sucking up now, for bailing on her. “Sorry.”

  “No signal.” She holds it out to me. “Supposed to go to the hotel after this, and no signal. Can’t even call a cab.”

  “Shouldn’t we set up for the class here?”

  “The teacher said she changed her mind. I guess her sister is the woman at the church. She called her and told her what happened. And now I’m stuck here. With all this.” She sits down on the mats, defeated. I know I can fix this. And, strangely, I want to. Not because I feel sorry for her or because I want to help. But because I said I would come today and work. Because I need that hundred and ten dollars, more than ever now. Because I need to keep busy, keep moving, keep my mind off what I’ve seen. Because I’m not Mamma.

  “Hold on.” I jog after Mrs. Robinson’s van, waving one arm while I try to hold my chest in place with the other. This stupid bra isn’t made for running, and neither am I. Churchy’s grandmother isn’t driving fast, but she doesn’t see me as I chase her down the driveway and out onto the street, panting and wheezing and waving through the dust. A knife of pain shoots through my side. She’s about to vanish behind a curve when the brake lights flash on and her hand sticks out the window. She reverses her way back to me.

  “What happened? That smart-mouth Nassau woman givin you problems? Oh, everybody heard about what happen with her and Mrs. Ellis and the hill and the smoke and—”

  I’m too out of breath to try to cut in when I hear Joe beside me. She sounds almost polite when she says, “Good afternoon, ma’am. Could you give us a ride out to the hotel?”

  • • •

  Churchy’s grandmother agrees to come back for us at three-thirty and take us to the boat. Joe disappears into the hotel while I start hauling the mats up to a deck raised over the water on solid wooden poles, like a giraffe’s legs. A roof topped with still-green palm leaves provides shade, and there’s a mild breeze. I give the deck a quick sweep, then set up. It’s circular, so the mats look funny when I try to lay them out in rows. I try them going one way, then the next. Finally, I stick Joe’s mat dead center, then fan the others out, like sun rays. Everyone can see, and there’s just enough room to fit in all fifteen mats we’ve brought. I break off a casuarina branch and dust off the mats. Rubbing the needles between my hands releases a woodsy smell, familiar and sweet. Grammy.

  “It isn’t terrible. It might actually work.” Joe inspects the setup before she makes her way to her own mat. Thought you’d like being the center of the universe, I think.

  “Sorry about what happened at the church,” I say instead. She gives me a small, businesslike nod before rising into downward dog, a single graceful motion, her back flat as a sliding board, heels against the ground, arms and legs straight and strong. Sure, when she does it, it’s a graceful athletic feat. When I do it, it looks obscene.

  Students start to file in, a mixture of staff and hotel guests. They already know what to do, even as Joe goes through her own warm-up. Most settle themselves sitting down cross-legged, the way we did in primary school for assembly. A few sit back on their heels, one or two lie on their backs, arms relaxing at their sides. Finally, Joe sits too, simple and upright. She glances over at me, then at the last mat, raising her eyebrows. I shake my head. No way am I about to publicly try to tie my big self into knots.

  “Go ahead and come into a comfortable seated position,” Joe says. “Spine straight, shoulders down and back, lower belly slightly engaged.”

  “Hi!” a young voice calls up at us from down on the sand.

  Joe’s forehead creases briefly before it smooths out again. “We’ll begin our meditation—”

  “Hi, hi, people!”

  “Hi, lady!”

  “Y’all playin? What y’all doin?”

  “Y’all from Nassau? Y’all from Miami?”

  “We’ll begin our meditation—” Joe tries again and is interrupted as a big wad of dry seaweed sails through the air and thumps onto the deck. Before she can move, I get up and hurry down to the sand, where there’s a collection of three little boys, old enough to know better and young enough not to care.

  “Hey!” I put on my best Grammy voice. “Hey, y’all stop that.”

  “Y’all stop that,” the oldest one mimics, tossing another bit of seaweed up toward the deck. I know better than to try to start chasing them. I recognize their faces, but can’t remember who exactly they belong to. Then a name comes to mind.

  “Ms. Ellis!” I call.

  The smallest one pauses, dropping the clump of fresh seagrass in his hand.

  “Ms. Ellis ain here,” the oldest one says, but a look of concern crosses his face.

  “No, but wait till I tell her what y’all been doing. And that y’all ain in school.” I catch myself using one of Mamma’s old tricks: the hollow warning spoken seriously. “And I bet she’ll have something to say to your parents.”

  “I ain scared of Ms. Ellis,” the oldest one says, but h
e motions to the others.

  “If y’all go play way down on that end of the beach,” I say in a confidential whisper, “maybe I won’t have to tell her.”

  They take off on their bony legs, jogging down the beach. I dust the sand off my feet in the grass, then step back onto the deck, hoping to quietly make my way back to my place. Instead, I meet the whole class on pause, everyone staring at me.

  “And that, everybody, is my assistant and lifesaver, Indira,” Joe says. “Indira, I think you have to join us on this last mat here. We’ll wait for you.”

  Our eyes meet, and it’s different. Something’s changed; now, Joe actually wants me here. I step onto the mat and sit down.

  Joe goes into her meditation spiel again. I close my eyes, following along, but the air barely gets into my chest. I breathe out, a stunted little puff. Again, I breathe in, but the breath snags on something rough inside me. I open my eyes. All around me, people sit, perfectly serene. Joe’s voice washes over them, water against sand, then reaches me, bouncing off like I’m the one rock sticking up on a peaceful shore, rebellious and wrong.

  The students begin, hands and knees on the ground, arching their backs, then curving down, then standing, bending forward, and reaching up. Joe continues demonstrating poses, sometimes stepping off her mat to walk around and offer adjustments, talking all the time in this calm, lyrical voice. “Keep breathing, constantly, deep breaths in, deep breaths out, always through the nose.” Is this the same Joe? But there’s no time to stop and wonder. I follow along as much as I can, always a step or two behind the others, it seems. Warrior pose now, legs wide apart, left leg bent, right leg straight, arms slicing through the air. “And smile, don’t look so serious. Look at this beautiful place we’re in, the air, the water. This earth is a true blessing, and these bodies we’ve been given, and these poses that strengthen our bodies.”

  Partway through the class, my mind gives in, gives up, and I’m working so hard I can’t think about anything but when is it gonna end? Lunges, side stretches, then a sideways push-up. I follow the remedial poses—modifications, Joe calls them, but I know what she’s getting at, it’s yoga for dummies and fatties—except when I look around, I notice I’m not the only one taking the easy route. An older guy puts his knees down in the push-up pose Joe called chataranga. One of the young women rests, forehead on the floor, body curved like a comma, when Joe takes the more advanced students up into a headstand. I do the same. Resting, I make a mental note to report back to Smiley: yes, they do headstands and stuff.

  We end lying on our backs, eyes closed. “Shavasana,” Joe explains, “final relaxation.” I don’t know how long we lie there, or even realize I’ve dozed off, until I hear people moving around me. I sit up slowly.

  “It was a great class, wasn’t it?” One of the women gives me a smile as she puts her shoes back on. I look around for Joe and see her chatting with a few other students. I get up, taking my time. I feel cleared out, and strangely still.

  “We sure hope you’ll be back,” the last man calls as he heads down the walkway. I should wipe off the mats. I pry myself away from my spot and go to the side where I tucked a clean cloth and a spray bottle of herbs and vinegar.

  “You must have needed that shavasana,” Joe observes.

  “Guess I’m tired.” I spritz down the first mat.

  “Leave it,” Joe says. I look up at her, surprised, and see she’s holding out a small roll of bills. I take the money, a hundred and two fives.

  “Thanks.” I stoop down to tuck it into the straw bag. I fold the cash carefully into a pocket. The glimpse of purple should feel special; I’ve never had a hundred-dollar bill before. Instead, it feels hollow. When I stand up, Joe’s looking at me funny, her head tilted to one side.

  “You all right?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did you get to see your people today?”

  A lump forms in my throat, almost too sudden for me to swallow it down. I can’t speak. I nod, looking away. She keeps going.

  “It’s your mother who lives here? Your grandmother?”

  “Yeah,” I say. “I have to go to the restroom.”

  “Okay.” Joe turns back to the yoga mats and I hurry off. I feel like my head is about to explode. I can’t hold myself together, can’t pretend. “Wait!” I hear behind me. When I turn around, trying to arrange my face into some type of half-normal, Joe’s holding out another ten.

  “Dion said a hundred and ten,” I protest.

  She waggles the money at me. “Little bonus. You did a good job. Go get something to eat.”

  • • •

  In the hotel’s gift shop, I get a bottle of water, then sneak through the lobby and back onto the beach, nibbling at one of Mr. Toote’s coconut tarts and tucking my change away. Now that Joe’s paid me, I’m holding on to more money than I’ve ever had at one time, by far, but the magic of Joe’s class has already drained away, the threat of the boat ride closing in on me. I know what’s coming, what waits for me on the other side. Scouring Nassau to find Grammy, with no real answer to the question of what to do next. Knowing that my old home here doesn’t exist anymore. Worst of all, Gary and that house, and the swell of my body, and I wish I could hold on to now, the way Joe said. Be in this moment. Push myself into some weird pose and breathe, deep and even, like life’s upside-downs and knots are as easy to fix as sitting still.

  • • •

  Back in Nassau, I help Joe load up the jeep. From the bus stop near the dock, I watch her pull away. You need a ride? she asked on the boat coming back, but I said no. Now that I’m stuck in Nassau, no way can I afford to be caught in the jeep again, even with a lady.

  “You ga be waitin awhile, they had a big accident downtown, traffic tied up,” a woman calls as she strolls past. “Faster to walk.”

  It’ll take close to two hours to walk the whole length of Main Street to the house. I’m tired, the straw bag is cutting into my shoulder, my feet are sore and puffy, and my legs are weary from the day. I wish I’d eaten properly at the hotel, like Joe told me to. I reach for my phone. I hate wasting data on something that isn’t essential, isn’t finding Grammy. Text Smiley. Just got back. Stuck down by the dock.

  She texts back. If only you knew someone who could help. Maybe someone with a bike. Hmm. I wonder who.

  I reach into my bag. Next to the book is the parcel Churchy’s grammy gave me. A whole loaf of banana bread, peanut cakes, and a container of curried chicken. I scroll through texts sent. Squinting at the screen in the late-afternoon light, I find his number. I have to get this stuff to him anyway. I press Call.

  10

  I THOUGHT MAYBE HE would have got his sister’s boyfriend to come, when he said I-I-I ga be there s-soon, but instead Churchy appears perched on his bike, back ramrod straight, a beanpole backlit by the low sun. He slows as he approaches me. He doesn’t smile, exactly, but he gives me a polite nod that would be accompanied by the tip of a hat, if he was wearing one.

  “You ga give me a ride on that?”

  He takes my bag, depositing it in the crate he’s got nailed to the back. “Y-you behind me.”

  “You serious?”

  He’s already on the seat, his face expectant. I wait for him to make a crack about whether I could manage to get up there, or what good cushioning I’ll make if we fall, but he waits quietly, loosely gripping the handlebars.

  I hoist myself up. My feet dangle awkwardly; luckily his bike is tall too, so there’s no danger of them dragging on the ground.

  “Wh-wh-where you need to go?”

  I manage one deep breath before a jitney pulls past us, blaring gospel music. A puff of exhaust leaves me choking. I fan the air around my face. “Anywhere.” I need to find Grammy, but I don’t know where to start. “Anywhere but home.”

  We bob and weave through traffic, cutting slightly west, then more south, across the island. Finally, Churchy stops the bike by the ramshackle building that houses his family’s restaurant. “Y-y-you hungry?”


  I almost laugh with relief. “I could eat one of everything on the menu right now.” That reminds me. I climb off the bike, energized by my close proximity to food. I reach into my bag and hand him the parcels from his grandmother. He goes through them, a slow smile spreading across his face. He disappears upstairs with the curry, then comes back down with two bowls heaped high, freshly reheated. He clutches the dishes like treasure and holds one out to me. We sit on the steps at the side of the building and eat. The chicken is tender around the shards of bone; Mrs. Robinson must have butchered it herself. The food seasoned just enough, bits of orange goat pepper warning of extra heat. Hunks of creamy potato and sweet carrot offset the spice. We don’t speak until our plates are empty.

  “H-h-how my g-granny d-doin?”

  “Fine. She said you have to share the bread with your sister, and the peanut cakes for your nephew.”

  He looks up at me with a flash of defiance as he tears open a bag of peanut cakes and crams a whole one into his mouth. He holds the bag out to me. I take one, biting through the roasted nuts and sugar brittle, caramelly and sweet. He settles on the stairs, savoring the treat. “What you b-been back for today?”

  “For work.”

  “You see your g-grammy?”

  So he doesn’t know. “She ain there no more.”

  “What, M-Ms. Ferguson? Wh-where she is?”