Anyone but You

by Chelsea M. Cameron

  “Is that a dare? I never turn down a dare. Ever.” I always ran away from dares, as a rule. Seriously, I would pretend at sleepovers that my mom needed me home if girls wanted to play Truth or Dare. Because you couldn’t pick truth or else you’d get teased relentlessly. It was easier to just go home. But right now, a dare was tasting pretty good. Like cake in bed after being fucked really well. Mmmm. Great, now I was thinking about fucking. I did not need to be thinking about fucking around Tuesday.

  “Yes,” I finally said. “It is a dare. Our class schedule is online. See you in an intermediate class,” I said, finally unsticking my feet from the floor that was covered in sheets of plastic to save it from getting covered in paint. Not that the floor was anything to write home about anyway. A little bit of paint might improve it.

  “I’ll be there,” she said, and I glanced over my shoulder. I wanted to leave her with one last zinger.

  “Oh, did I mention I’m the teacher? You can rent a mat if you don’t have one.” I knew she didn’t have a yoga mat. I shut the door and walked up the stairs on a cloud of triumph.

  She was going to crash and burn and it would be perfect payback. I couldn’t wait.

  Three

  I was on a high from that encounter for the next two days. It was the weekend, but I didn’t see any evidence of her. I tried to take some time off from work, so I went to a movie with Zee, and then took myself out for a fancy dinner, which I liked to do at least once a month. Sitting alone at a restaurant didn’t bother me. I loved having a glass of wine and a nice meal and not having to talk to anyone. Sometimes I even brought a book. Sure, I got strange looks and the waiter or waitress always asked if I was alone or waiting for someone, but whatever. I deserved to get dressed up and have pasta with truffles and tiramisu. No one else was going to take me out.

  I hadn’t had a girlfriend in ages, and never one that was really serious. I was just so busy with work that most of the time I didn’t mind. It was only every now and then when I saw other couples holding hands, or when I was in bed alone (with the exception of the kittens) that I wanted someone there. And definitely after a long day at the studio when I was crunching the numbers and wondering how I was going to pay my expenses that month. Thankfully, I had Zee for a lot of that stuff, but it would be different with a girlfriend. Zee was between boyfriends right now, so we were both living the single life.

  When I came home after taking myself out for the most incredible sashimi and hand rolls followed by green tea mochi in the city, Zee was on the floor with the kittens.

  “How was your date?” they said, looking up. I slipped off my heels and got down on the floor. I made it a rule that I had to wear my prettiest clothes when taking myself out, and that included heels.

  “Excellent. I’m so full.” I put my hand on my belly and lay back on the floor. The kitties meowed and climbed all over my purple velvet jumpsuit.

  “I want to go on a date,” they said, laying down next to me.

  “Find a guy, go on date. I think that’s how it works?” I’d never been super successful at dating. Nearly all of my girlfriends had approached me and made the first move. I always ended up tongue-tied and too nervous in the presence of a pretty lady.

  “I’m so picky about guys, you know this. I wish we knew more people.” It was true; we did tend to stay in our apartment a lot.

  “I can see if there’s anyone at the studio. Dude yogis tend to be pretty chill.” Sometimes a little too chill, in my opinion.

  “No, that’s fine. I can find my own boyfriends, thanks. What about you and girlfriends? Anyone new? Other than the hot and mean one?” I sat up.

  “Are you talking about Tuesday? Because she is not girlfriend material. I don’t even know if she’s queer, anyway.” I had my suspicions, but I didn’t know for sure. I had learned from experience not to assume until someone told you flat out who they were.

  “I bet she is. I have a feeling.” I didn’t let them see me roll my eyes. They were always having “feelings” about things and, a lot of the time, they were wrong.

  “Remember your feelings about Jessica?” I asked, shuddering. I’d gone on exactly three dates with her and it had been a complete disaster. Turned out Jessica was married and thought that it was just fine for her to be stepping out on her husband with me because they’d had a threesome once and he watched lesbian porn. I wasn’t sure if I would ever recover from that date.

  “Okay, so I was wrong about that. Really wrong.” She plucked Mocha from my stomach and kissed her little head.

  “So, so wrong,” I said.

  “But I’m not wrong about this,” Zee said. I groaned.

  “Can we stop talking about this now?” I hadn’t told Zee about the bet I’d made with Tuesday. Our next intermediate class was, ironically, on Tuesday night. Two days away. I had no idea if she would show up or not, mostly because I didn’t have a read on anything she would do. The dare seemed like something . . . private? I didn’t know. Maybe I just didn’t want to hear comments or dissect the whole thing with Zee. I’d tell them after it happened. If it did.

  “Sure, my love,” they said. “Wanna see my new project?” They sat up and scrambled to their little craft corner in the living room. Zee did all kinds of amazing art, but lately they’d gotten into embroidery. It sounded like something a grandmother would do, but I doubted a ton of grandmothers would embroider the word “fuck” surrounded by pretty flowers.

  “You like?” they said, bringing over their embroidery hoop. “It’s a commission.” It was halfway done, with the rest of the words outlined and the flowers around the quote started. It said, “This place is a shithole.” I burst out laughing as I read it.

  “Nice. Very nice.”

  “I’m also doing a “Stay Sexy, Don’t Get Murdered” one for someone next week.” I handed the hoop back to them.

  “I need a hobby, but I’m bad at everything but watching too much Netflix,” I said, groaning. Yoga had once been my hobby, but now it was my job and those weren’t the same things. Sure, I still loved doing it, but it wasn’t an activity I could just dip in and out of anymore. I had to LIVE yoga now.

  “What about baking? Or cooking?” I glared at them.

  “You just want me to make more food that you can eat.”

  They grinned at me and shrugged.

  “I would never do that.” I snorted.

  “You would definitely do that.”

  “Maybe a little bit. Also, you’re a shit cook, so I don’t have much faith in your baking abilities.” I smacked them in the shoulder, but it was true.

  I wanted to find a hobby that would let me unwind from my job. I ran through all the things I’d tried and failed at before. They were numerous, and I had evidence of them sitting in our spare room to prove it.

  “You’ll figure it out,” they said, patting my arm.

  “Maybe I could be a kitten cuddler. That’s a thing, I’m sure.”

  “Yeah, you could volunteer at the shelter. But you might have to pick up a lot of cat poop.” We both made faces. Our kittens were so small still, but they pooped SO MUCH. It didn’t seem possible that so much crap could come from such tiny beings.

  “I don’t know. I’ll figure it out.” I hung out on the floor for a little bit longer and then got up to shower and then covered my face in a sheet mask as I put on a documentary. I had the social life of a grandmother. All I needed to do was add knitting, which I had tried, and failed, already.

  The kitties cried outside my door to come in. Zee didn’t like sleeping with them because they tended to thrash in their sleep and was worried about squishing them, so the babies slept in my bed.

  I scooped them up and they went right to sleep. I peeled off my sheet mask and tossed it.

  Bored, I picked up my phone and scrolled through it, checking my personal accounts as well as the ones for the studio to make sure there wasn’t anything bad in the comments of my posts. Once that was done, I found my fingers typing in the name for Tuesday’
s gym. She had a page that was sparse on information but had a logo. She was an admin on the page, so I found her last name for the first time.

  Tuesday Grímsdóttir. Wow. If that wasn’t a badass name, then I didn’t know what was. Her last name was odd, so I looked up the origins. Icelandic. Interesting. With her dark hair and tan skin, she certainly didn’t look Nordic at all. I skipped back to her personal page and couldn’t see much. I would have to follow or friend her to see more. Damn. I definitely wasn’t going to do that. Instead, I scrolled through what she had and then googled her, as you do. She’d competed in various CrossFit events, so she was there for that, and there were a few articles she’d written for various publications about training and nutrition. I skimmed a few of them and realized it was really fucking late and I had to teach first thing in the morning.

  What did I do? I certainly didn’t spend another hour looking her up online. Oh, wait, I did.

  The next morning when my alarm rang, I groaned. I had two kittens on my chest, and they weren’t happy about me waking up either.

  “Noooo,” I moaned. I’d spent too long stalking Tuesday online. What a childish thing to do. I wasn’t a horny teenager looking up a crush. I was a grown woman. A business owner. I couldn’t waste my time on such foolishness, and yet, I had.

  “Your mommy needs some help,” I said, kissing Cappy on her perfect little head. She just meowed in my face and then licked my nose.

  “Very helpful, thank you,” I said. Removing the kittens, I rolled my way out of bed and struggled to the bathroom. Zee was already in the kitchen and I fumbled my way to the cup of coffee they’d already made for me.

  “Good morning, sunshine,” they said, and I grunted. I wished I didn’t have to teach classes in the morning. I wished I didn’t have to hold classes this early, but just because I wasn’t a morning person didn’t mean other people weren’t. I had a steady crew of early bird yogis who liked to come before work and start their day in the right mindset.

  I sucked down my coffee like it was oxygen and then rested my head on Zee’s shoulder as they made breakfast. They’d been cooking for both of us since I could remember, and I wasn’t going to tell them to stop anytime soon.

  “What are we having?” I said, waiting for the coffee to kick in. The kittens came out and cried for their food, even though their bowls were full. I calmly explained that to them and pointed to the bowls, but they would only quiet when I pretended to get them more food and mimed pouring it into the bowls.

  “Egg, cheese, and spinach sandwiches on English muffins and some potatoes with avocado on top.” They had said so many of my favorite words right there.

  “Do you need me to do anything?” I said, but they just gave me a look.

  “You could throw some chia seeds and collagen powder in my protein shake if you’re really feeling frisky,” they said. I laughed and grabbed their premade shake and added the items, shaking it up and handing it to them. We tried our best when it came to nutrition, but that didn’t always work out, so we did our best when we could.

  Zee served me, making the plate all fancy and shit and we headed to the living room to eat. There was space for a dining room in our apartment, but Zee was using it as their craft corner, and we didn’t see the need for a dining table. Whenever we had people over, we always sat on the couch or the floor anyway.

  By the time I was finished with breakfast, I had to get my ass moving. I threw on my yoga clothes, kissed the kitties goodbye, and gave Zee a wave as I headed to my car.

  As soon as I got inside the studio, I started feeling better. There was just something about this space that made me happy. Maybe because it was the culmination of so many dreams I’d had of owning my own business.

  I’d always known that I would, but I didn’t know what kind of business that would be. It wasn’t until college that I went to my first yoga class and I thought I might be good at it. I’d saved my money and had done several seminars taught by amazing yoga experts and really knew that was what I wanted to do. And here I was, years later, with my own studio.

  I lit the incense and made sure the yoga blocks were lined up and everything was ready for the first class. My students started coming in and I greeted most of them by name. There were two newbies and I gave them a tour, albeit a much better one than I’d given Tuesday.

  Once I was in teacher mode, I wasn’t thinking about anything but calling the poses, assisting where needed, and making sure the heat was up and everyone was blissing out by the time we got to savasana. It was freedom and peace for a little while.

  And then class was over and I had to go out to the reception area and was reminded of Tuesday. I wondered if she was downstairs right now. I wondered what time she’d gotten up today and if she was still painting. I wondered what her middle name was, if she had one, and if she liked or hated pineapple on pizza, and if she was single or into girls. Perfectly regular things to wonder about a person you’d spent several hours looking up online into the wee hours of the morning.

  Ellen, who taught the next class and had been one of my first yoga friends, came out of the elevator.

  “Wow,” I said, taking in her hair.

  “What do you think?” She said, using her walker to do a little twirl. Her hair, which had been dyed a shade of blue last time I saw her, was now a bright orange that totally worked for her. It wouldn’t look good on many people, but Ellen pulled it off.

  “You look adorable,” I said. She beamed and came over to the benches to take her shoes off.

  “Need any help?” I asked. She had a progressive spinal condition and some days she used her walker or a cane and some days she didn’t.

  “Nope, I got it,” she said, sliding off her sneakers. “How many do we have signed up?” I checked the computer.

  “Ten as of right now, so hopefully we’ll get a few more.” Our classes during the day were quieter than the evening classes, but sometimes more would show up on holidays, or when the colleges weren’t in session.

  “Sounds good,” she said, and then put her hair up. “Wait a second.”

  “What?” I said, touching my face.

  “Something is different.” She squinted her eyes at me. I didn’t know what she was talking about.

  “Is there something wrong with my hair?” I used my hands to check it and then looked at my shirt.

  “No, it’s something else. Something in your energy.” Ellen waved her hand in my general direction.

  “What about my energy?” Ellen couldn’t read my mind, but sometimes it felt like she could. I was cursed with being surrounded by people who were too perceptive for their own good. I couldn’t hide anything from anyone.

  “Not sure. But something is different. You’re more fiery today.”

  “Are you sure it’s not just your hair?” I asked with a smirk.

  “Nope,” she said, blowing a flyaway out of her face. “Something is different.” We were interrupted by a few students coming up the stairs, so I went to set the heat for Ellen’s class and get out the chairs that some of the students used. All our classes were accessible, but Ellen taught a few that were specifically for disabled people. She also taught workshops for disabled people and caregivers on the benefits of yoga.

  In the rush to check everyone in and make sure the room was ready and the music was working, I didn’t have time to think about what Ellen had said about my energy, but I did have time to think about how hungry I was. Working so much had really gotten me on a bad eating schedule, and some days I had to set timers to remind me to eat when I got consumed with tasks.

  Deciding to go out and get a salad and fresh mango juice at the organic restaurant down the street, I jogged down the stairs and did a quick look over my shoulder at the gym. The door was open and the paint fumes were definitely lessened. From what I could see, all the walls were painted, and there was Tuesday, putting up a decal on the wall just like I had upstairs. I should just walk by and not say anything, but then I heard her make a sound of frustra
tion. The decal was defeating her, and I couldn’t just walk by and not help. Even if she was hot and mean.

  “It’s easier with two people,” I said, and she whirled around so fast, she almost slammed her back into the wall.

  “What the fuck?” I almost laughed at the shocked expression on her face.

  “That’s not a very nice thing for a gym owner to say, is it?” I said, crossing my arms. Her blue eyes narrowed and her lips twitched.

  “Touché.”

  “Do you need some help? I’ve got experience with these.” The decal she had was massive; it was at least eight feet wide by five feet tall. Impossible to put up on your own.

  Tuesday pressed her lips together and considered me. She’d asked me for help before, but somehow I was guessing that having someone offer was different.

  “Okay,” she said, and I breathed a little sigh of relief. I didn’t know how this was going to go, and I hoped she would tone down the mean a little bit. The music was on today, but at a lower volume.

  “Music at an acceptable level, this is nice,” I said. She sighed heavily.

  “Is it going to be like this?” she asked. No. It didn’t have to be. I gritted my teeth and gave her a tight smile. “Is that supposed to reassure me?”

  “Look, if you don’t want my help, I can just leave,” I said, turning around. A warm hand held my arm. Her fingers flexed and I bet they could crush my bones. Everything about her was strong.

  “No, no. I do need your help.” I had been hoping for some kind of apology, but I guessed that was as good as it was going to get.

  “Okay then,” I said. “Have you sketched out where you want it to go?” She shook her head.

  “I thought I would just put it up.” I looked around and found a pencil on the ground.

  “First we need to measure.” Tuesday found a tape measure and we measured the logo, and then drew an outline on the wall with the pencil and I hopped on a ladder to line up the top and tape it.

  “Now we just peel this back and hope for the best,” I said. “We have to do this at the same time for it to work.” I counted and we pulled the backing off the logo, pressing it to make sure it stuck on the wall, pushing out any bubbles that formed.