The Sigma Asset 🏳️‍🌈 (bxb)║AMBYS WINNER 2022

23: The Studio

The Pier Studio was kinda ugly on the outside, a squat wooden cube that dominated the street-side end of Arenosa Pier. I was expecting the interior to be a similarly brown utilitarian exercise room, but as I stepped inside and took in the studio space around me, my heart missed a beat.

The enormous curved glass windows of the building, even if they were at that moment being pelted by rain, looked out onto the wide ocean on three sides.

The south-facing window looked onto the beaches and gullies of the central Californian coastline, all the way to the smudge on the horizon that was María. The western window took in the entire length of the pier boardwalk as it wound out into the ocean, windbreaker-clad runners and dog-walkers and all. But the northern window was my favorite, with a view toward the tumbled rock and scree of the fault line, and the familiar golden-brown sands of Santa Elena Beach beyond. Luckily for Arenosa's yoga students, even on a shitty day the gray-brown north Pacific looked incredible.

"It's so beautiful here, Jules. The students must love it."

"Never had any complaints." But Jules's casual shrug couldn't hide her pride.

I'd been mistaken in thinking that the Queen of Arenosa was the D.A.. Jules had made Arenosa County synonymous with yoga and health, and this building was her crown. It even made me wanna try one of her yoga classes, suspended high over the ocean.

A dust-covered memory fell off my brain-shelf, of going to a thoroughly uninspiring yoga class at one of the Jogye Buddhist temples in Busan with Eomma as a kid.

I'd been excited to go because I'd kinda expected it to be like an Indian version of taekwondo, a and I'd been utterly disappointed to find that the yoga class in the post-lunch temple hall had smelled like my school canteen, and the yoga moms had chatted through the class instead of showing respect to their instructor.

The casual chaos of a Jogye yoga class had colored my idea of yoga from then on, but the serenity of a Pier Studio yoga class would be nothing like that. As my eyes swept the huge studio space before me, I fell into a little reverie: Jules's guiding voice, pink light streaming in through the west window, and the calm ocean all around.

I took a few strides of the studio and spun around, my body relaxing into the first twelve movements of the Joong-Gun[1] pattern in front of the mirrors lining the back wall, before I got distracted by Selena watching me from the doorway of a little office in the corner of the studio.

"Hey, Zeph! Hey, Jules!" Katelyn hurried out on Selena's heels, clutching paper and pen to her chest. "The waiting list is even bigger since the Retreat ads went on TV. We'll have to split the six a.m. classes between us for the next few weeks." Katelyn gestured between herself and Selena, the two of them breaking into dizzy smiles at the idea.

"You coming to the Retreat, Zeph?" Selena eyed my clothes as she spoke.

Blue sweats, blue T-shirt, green hoodie, blue windbreaker. So what if they were all Will's? Besides, Selena was dressed so much like Jules that I was tempted to ask them to stand next to each other for a photo. As well as the same ironed hair and red nails, Selena wore the same brand of vest and matching yoga pants that Jules wore, but somehow without managing to get Jules's look right.

"Kinda. I'm gonna stream the classes from Korea if the time difference works out OK."

"That's so sweet of you, Zeph! It's almost too big for me to handle this year." Jules didn't look as resplendent as usual. She was pale, and her hair hung limply around her face. The stress of planning a yoga festival complete with broadcast media was probably taking its toll.

What offer would tempt a stressed-out Jules away from her workload for a few hours? Oh yeah.

"You wanna have dinner with us? Will's cooking."