“Sink your center downward into chaturanga dandasana…sweep your heart forward and up to the sky, coming into urdhva mukha svanasana…blossom open into virabhadrasana 2,” he named each pose as he paced the room with silent feet. His face was serene, but his eyes lit from within, dancing across each body, evaluating, looking, seeing. Adele couldn’t help but wonder what he noticed when he looked, what truths that she couldn’t see.
When she wasn’t upside-down or otherwise indisposed, she followed the direction of his gaze to the other women in the room. She watched his expression as he watched them, followed his hands as he touched them.
“Press your chest toward your thighs,” he instructed as they held a long downward-facing dog, and she watched him move toward a young woman named Meghan in the front row. Meghan was voluptuous in every sense of the word—a free spirit, open with her sexuality, alternately round and flat in all the right places. She let her wavy sun-streaked hair fall free during practice, and now it tumbled down toward her mat. She wore a tiny pair of bright green yoga shorts, barely more than underpants, the tanned cup of her bottom just peeking out where they ended. Ajuni approached and slowly, one finger at a time, placed his strong hands firmly on either side of her hips. His palms pressed upon the rounded curvature of each cheek, his fingers gaining purchase on the hipbones on the other side. He pulled toward him, lengthening out Meghan’s spine and allowing her shoulders to relax away from her ears. She let out a low sigh as he removed his hands, grazing her inner thighs lightly (accidentally? On purpose?) as he moved away.
Holding her own downward dog, Adele’s eyes began to wander. Of course, they were supposed to remain softly focused on the spot between her feet, letting all thoughts melt away, but she couldn’t seem to quiet her mind today. The air buzzed with too much life. Moving past her mat, past the mat of Karli, the tall German woman next to her, Adele’s eyes travelled outside the room and to the grassy expanse beyond the open doors of the yoga hut. Her smooth ujayi breathing stopped short as she saw him.
Danny sat on the grass, legs casually crossed, leaning against a palm tree. To her ongoing disappointment, she hadn’t interacted with him at all since their breakfast banter, and this was her first opportunity to admire him in a long time. He was in profile, the ocean on his right, the yoga hut on his left, and his eyes gazing forward at the craggy green shoreline. A book lay open in his lap, but the focus of his gaze told Adele that it had been long forgotten. Shadow and sun alternately dappled his bare shoulders, and as Adele’s gaze followed the lean lines of his torso down to the sharp musculature just above his shorts, she involuntarily let out a sigh of overwhelming need. As if in response to the sound, though he was far out of earshot, Danny’s head turned toward the yoga hut.
Suddenly filled with panic, Adele almost fell out of downward dog, and quickly realized that everyone around her had long ago left the pose and were now lying on their bellies in a locust series. Scrambling through a vinyasa on her way to the correct pose, she caught Ajuni’s eye. A sly smile played over his lips, and she thought that one eye gave her an almost imperceptible wink.
When they moved from bow back into child’s pose, she was able to glance outside once more. Danny was gone.
After afternoon lectures that day, Adele went for a long walk. She couldn’t shake the strange energy she’d felt during the entire asana sequence. There was a buzz in the air, an agitation of energy that was almost…arousing. The best way to describe it was as if her entire body were being tickled lightly be a feather. The thought crept into her head that it all stemmed from the simple knowledge of Danny’s presence on the island, but she dismissed that notion out of hand.
Leaving the yoga hut, her mat strapped across her back, she wandered aimlessly and far. She would walk her way to calmness.
She wandered up the sloping drive, away from the resort’s thatched-roofed “lobby,” passing the small warungs on her right and hilly fields on her left, cows grazing lazily in the fading afternoon sun, the sparkling ocean behind them. She walked past the one other hotel on this corner of Bali, took the narrow, rocky path that veered away from the main road and down a steep grade, through a grassy ravine, and back up, past a wild grove of untamed and unnamed thorny flowers, around a sea-sprayed outcropping of black rock, to a hidden beach where everything was hushed, even the waves—tumultuous and powerful on all other stretches of the beach, here they rolled slowly and serenely in, gently sheathing the smooth, packed sand with their glistening water.
An hour or more must have elapsed, and the sun was now falling quickly toward the horizon. The hypnotic trance of her stroll broke as she became aware of the dusky light all around her. She turned back and began to retrace her path, quickly this time. It would be dark soon, and she didn’t want to be stranded in a cow field with no shoes come nightfall.
Just where the small side path rejoined the main road, she felt a fat droplet of warm rain hit her shoulder. She looked up and saw a collection of dark, unfriendly clouds that had been nowhere in sight just ten minutes before. The lobby hut was in sight, but a good hundred yards or so away, and her own cabin another quarter mile past that, and already she felt another splat on her arm, then another, then a fourth.
She picked up her pace, trotting gingerly across the roughly paved road. The hotness of the pavement on her bare feet became more pronounced as the rain cooled the air. Within moments, the entire sky had become a deep purple-gray, and she could hear the sweeping whoosh of a torrent of rain being unleashed from the sky. Breaking into a full sprint, she glanced over her shoulder to see a wall of rain racing toward her, a solid sheet advancing.
“Eeeek!” She heard herself shrieking like a teenage girl, then erupted in laughter. Her chestnut hair had come out of its loose bun and tumbled down her neck. The yoga mat thumped against her back—she couldn’t even remember now why she’d brought it with her. Her light pink tank top was plastered against her belly and back, clinging to the yellow sports bra underneath. Remembering that she’d worn black shorts that day—she’d been thisclose to a pair of white flowy pants—she looked up to the sky in gratitude and laughed again.
Rounding the final curve before the boundary of the resort, she careened past the lobby hut and off the slate path, onto the grass. The rain-glossed grass was slick, and her mud-covered feet slid out from under her. She leaned dangerously backward, flailing her arms to regain her center, and just managed to bring herself back up to standing.
Panting, hands on her thighs, she stood still in the blanketing raindrops and took a few deep breaths. As she lifted her eyes, she almost fell backward once more—there was someone watching her. Not thirty feet away, nothing more than a dark silhouette in a rectangle of glowing light, a tall figure stood facing steadfastly toward her, unmoving. Adele stood up fully, and her eyes adjusted to the dark. The figure was standing on a covered porch outside of one of the resort cabins, and the light from inside the hut spilled out the open door and onto the porch, framing him.
Him. Of course it was him. She was briefly shocked that it had taken her so long to recognize those spreading shoulders and sculpted arms, that slim torso, those locks of unruly hair, that confident yet friendly stance. Of course it was Danny.
Acting without any thought, she brushed the wet hair out of her eyes and moved across the wet grass—carefully this time—toward the square of light. The thought Like a moth to a flame popped into her head, but she pushed it back. Just this once, she would stop over-thinking, stop narrating her life instead of living it.
“I would say come in before you get drenched, but…” Danny’s voice resonated richly in the humid air, vibrating through the soft night to her ears.
“Ha,” was all she could manage in response. Her bare feet had reached the edge of his porch, and she took the step. Eighteen inches stood between them. When she swayed forward toward him she could actually feel the buzz of his energy increase.
“Hi,” he said, his voice less of an echo this time, more intimate.
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“Hi,” she said.
Though the sky had turned completely dark, enough light spilled from the cabin to illuminate parts of him—his shining eyes, the rounded top of his shoulder, the plump center of his lip. Out of her peripheral vision, she saw one arm reach and grasp something, and then he was moving toward her. In an instant, she was enveloped not by his skin, but by the rough, warm embrace of a towel.
“I grabbed this when I saw you coming,” he said. He’d wrapped the towel around her, but was still holding either side with his hands, so they were in a kind of towel cocoon together. She could feel the heat of his chest, and when she allowed herself to look up, to see his body, his face, she felt a pulsing between her legs.
“How did you know it was me?”
He shrugged, moving the towel with his gesture, bringing her slightly—accidentally?—closer. Despite her efforts to stop them, her eyes drifted down to the part of his shorts just below the drawstring. It was difficult to be certain in the dark, but there seemed to be a considerable bulge there. She felt the only dry part of her get wet. He held himself at a distance, gripping the towel tightly around her and yet letting no part of their warm, wet bodies touch.
In a galloping outburst of heartbeats that seemed to erupt not from her chest but her stomach, Adele felt herself falling forward and against his hot, smooth, chest. With instant reflexes, he let the towel fall to the porch and caught her, sliding one arm around to her lower back and touching the other hand to the base of her chin, tilting her head toward his. The hesitation lasted no longer than a fraction of a second but managed to send a rush of blood down to her toes—the moment after he’d lifted her face and before he leaned in, his green eyes sparkling in the moonlight, locking with hers.
And then the kiss. His lips touched hers softly at first, and when he felt her raise her face up, wanting more, he pressed back with more intensity. His pillowy lips were as smooth and inviting as they’d looked from afar, and she had to consciously slow down, reminding herself to move with his rhythm. Her lips parted at the gentle suggestion of his firm tongue, and she surged up against him again. Their torsos pressed together by the abandoned towel, the rain and sweat on their bodies the only thing between them. She established, happily, that the bulge had not been in her imagination.
Now both of his hands were on her back, sliding underneath the wet tank top. She couldn’t believe this was happening. Who was this guy? Where was she? As if in answer, a bird cawed brashly, and she almost laughed into Danny’s mouth. What universe had she ended up in? An amazing one, she answered herself.
This was all so crazy—she didn’t know this man at all. Yet the kiss felt familiar, was in fact the first familiar thing she’d encountered since coming to Bali. Despite the fairytale setup, the surreal surroundings, the other-worldliness of life here, she was somehow connecting with Danny on a more substantial plane. In the realm of the “real world,” whatever that was. She grasped Danny’s shoulders tighter.
But at that same moment, she felt his hands retreat from under her shirt, and then—no, please don’t—move off her body, only to come back down, lightly, on her shoulders. He pulled his face away and looked at her, holding her, quite literally, at arms’ length.
“You’re freezing,” he said, looking concerned.
“I’m what?” It took Adele a moment to process the words. When she did, she noticed that, to her surprise, she was freezing. The hot raindrops had turned into cold, damp clothing pressed against clammy skin.
“Jesus, you’re shivering like crazy,” he said, and let his hands drop from her shoulders as he bent down to grab the towel. “You’ve got to take those clothes off.”
She couldn’t help but laugh. “You can’t be serious,” she said. The magic of the kiss had vanished. She was freezing cold and it turned out he just wanted to get in her yoga shorts. Indignance seemed obligatory.
“I’m completely serious. Your lips are practically purple. Don’t worry, this isn’t some elaborate scheme,” he laughed too, and the playful glimmer in his eye made her soften again. “Even I can’t control the island weather, believe it or not.”
She only looked at him, eyebrows raised. She crossed her clammy arms across her rain-soaked chest.
“Seriously, come inside, take a hot shower, and I’ll get you something dry to wear for the walk back to your cabin.”
During her entire shower, she’d been half expecting Danny to bust into the bathroom and join her, and she’d been surprised—and, fine, maybe a little disappointed—when her shower had ended sans interruption. In fact, when she’d emerged, it seemed that her shower had been the furthest thing from his mind. He was hunched over a glowing laptop, completely absorbed in what looked like marketing analytics, oblivious to her presence until she lightly cleared her throat.
“Hey!” He spun around. “You’re done already? I’m sorry, I got wrapped up in something, hang on, I’ll go find you something to wear that’s not enormous.” He started for the bedroom door then turned back, gesturing vaguely toward the couch, visibly forcing himself to look at Adele’s eyes rather than her towel-clad body. “Make yourself at home, I’ll be out in a sec.”
So now she sat, listening to the roar of the waves underneath the still spattering raindrops, perched on his couch uncomfortably—was it possible to sit demurely in a towel and be comfortable? She was warm and dry, and felt grateful for how this strange yet familiar man had taken care of her. Other than that, she had no idea how she felt.
I just need to breathe. Find some calm in myself. My wise mind knows what I want. She repeated the learnings and mantras of her practice, and reflected that tomorrow’s asana would be a good time to reflect. She would wake up ten minutes early to get in some extra meditation. She needed to calm the chaos in her brain.
Then the door opened.
Chapter 5
When he opened the door from the bedroom to the living room, Danny didn’t know what he was expecting or hoping for. Well, he knew what he wanted, viscerally at least. But there was something dangerous about this woman. Not that he thought she had any bad intentions toward him—no, he didn’t pick up anything like that—but he had the feeling that she could really throw a wrench in the vision he had for his future.
Regardless of what he wanted, consciously or unconsciously, as soon as she came into view as the door swung open, he knew he was helpless. She sat on the couch, perched daintily on one side, one hand holding the towel close to her chest, the other resting carefully on her lap. She looked like a little girl waiting for her imaginary friend to join her for tea—it was adorable.
At the sound of the door opening, she snapped her face in his direction. He could have been imagining it, but he thought he saw a change sweep through her whole body as their eyes met: shoulders loosening, jaw unclenching, chest opening. Her eyes were soft as she looked toward him. Any little girl demureness was gone. He almost dropped the clothing he held in one hand (a favorite old t-shirt from a concert he’d gone to in college, a pair of shorts his little sister had left when she’d visited), and quickly tightened his grip.
Adele bit her lip, and said, “Come here.” He hesitated, began to gesture dumbly with the wad of clothes in his hand. “I want you to come.”
She removed the hand at her chest and the towel fell down to her waist, then apart, tumbling onto the floor. He took her in for a moment, the perfect sloping curves of her small, perfect breasts, the tanned crests and valleys of her stomach, the smooth thighs leading to the dark mystery between her legs. And then, after barely a second, he saw her body tighten and the little girl come back, a vulnerability and fear creeping back in place of the powerful, sexy woman that was there a moment before.
Perhaps it was his protective instinct, perhaps just the gorgeousness of her naked body in the moonlight, perhaps it was her—whatever it was, he was walking toward her. Then he was kneeling on the couch, facing her, gently pushing her back against the armrest, lying her down, lying down on top of her, running h
is hands down her sides, then back up. He framed her face with his hands and looked at her for a moment, but she had none of it. She lifted her neck up to reach his lips with hers, running her fingers through his hair and pulling him down.
Adele didn’t know how she’d gotten here. The fact of her current situation—naked, kissing a man she’d barely met, listening to the sound of spattering tropical rain against the waves of the Indian Ocean—was so fantastical she didn’t believe it was real. It was liberating. In this unreal world, she could do anything. She could be the girl who sleeps with the gorgeous, charming surfer, without overthinking it. But here she was, thinking again. To quiet her mind, she squeezed her eyes shut tighter and pulled him closer, both with her hand and with her leg, which had now wrapped around his body and was pulling his hips down against hers.
It worked. All coherent thoughts melted as she felt him press between her legs, rock hard. She surged up against him, and the sensation of his linen shorts against her skin reminded her that she was naked. Feeling a blush of self-consciousness, she pulled her face away and looked up at him.
“I’m naked,” she said, dumbly.
He laughed, looking away for a moment. He turned back, brushed away a strand of wet hair that had matted itself to her forehead, and replied, “Prove it.”
In spite of her self-consciousness, she laughed in response. It was funny! She cupped both of her breasts, as if as evidence, and looked up at him wryly. “Proved,” she said.
They both erupted into laughter, that strange comfortableness making it feel like they were two old friends.
As their laughter quieted, she said, “You’re not naked.”
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