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I grin. “Makes me really appreciate all the work caregivers do.”
“We’re the best.” Grandma cuts me a look. “Does Rhett appreciate the work you do?”
My heart skips a beat. “He does. He sees it, and we talk about it. He says he wants to learn from me.”
“Of course he does! You’re an expert in the field.”
“And a pariah in that field, but that’s neither here nor there. I thought for sure Rhett wouldn’t be as involved, you know, with the season coming up and everything. I thought he wouldn’t be around much.” I glance at the crowd already gathered on the brewery’s massive lawn, people rolling out yoga mats and clasping their hands above their heads to stretch. “But turns out he’s around a lot, and when he is, he’s very hands-on. He tries. I think he’s also having fun being a dad. Today, he came home early and ran through the sprinkler with us—me and Liam. I haven’t seen Rhett laugh that hard in a long time.”
“Hm.”
I turn to see Rose smiling. “What does that mean?”
“You’re gushing.”
“I’m not a gusher,” I say, pressing a hand to my face. My skin is warm.
“I know.” Rose finds us a spot in the shade, and together we roll out our mats and set down our water bottles. “That’s why I mention it.”
I fall onto my knees. Smoothing out the corners of my mat, I keep my gaze trained on its slightly pebbled surface. “Nothing happened if that’s what you’re asking. Between Rhett and me.”
“I didn’t ask a question.”
“Yes, you did. And I’m giving you my answer.”
She’s still smiling. “But is that your final answer?”
“Yes,” I say, even though we both know I’m full of shit.
The instructor, a ripped man in shiny bike shorts and sunglasses, takes his place at the front of the lawn. Adjusting the microphone on his headset, he leads us in a chant about the power of claiming our truest selves by shaking our asses, and then we get to work.
Technically it’s a “Hip Hop Yoga” class, but really, it’s an hour of dancing your heart out underneath the evening sky with a few sun salutations thrown in.
My grandmother jumps in with both feet, literally, doing this little samba move to a Maroon5 song that draws claps of approval from the young hipsters around us.
“So tell me,” she says, not at all breathless. “What is it about Rhett, exactly, that makes you want to plunder his booty again after all these years?”
“I like her,” the guy next to us says, tossing his thumb in Rose’s direction.
Meanwhile, I’m already sweating bullets. I could lie. I could blow her off. But no one knows me better than Rose, and I need her advice.
“I think he’s—he’s changed,” I pant. “Or he’s changing. He still says he’s all about winning championships, but I think—I don’t know, I think he’s finding a lot of joy in the simpler things.”
“Things that you’ve always valued. Time spent with loved ones, having fun, being outside.”
“Yes.” I don’t know why I’m still stunned by my grandmother’s ability to get it, to get me, so quickly. But I am, and for several beats, I just stare at her, letting the SZA song pass on by while I draw to a stop. “Yes, that’s it. Exactly.”
“Which means the two of you might not be so different after all.”
I start moving again if only to distract me from the butterflies taking flight inside my stomach. It’s like my gut is catching onto something, an idea, a possibility, that my mind can’t grasp yet.
“It’s not that we’re different—”
“It’s that you want different lives. Yes. You’ve mentioned that a couple hundred times already. But what if—hear me out, lovie—what if y’all always wanted the same life, but you’re just realizing it now? Or, really, maybe Rhett is learning what he thought he wanted and what really makes him happy are two different things?”
“Damn, that’s deep,” the dude beside us says, shaking his head as he falls into a plank position on his mat.
The butterflies are swirling inside my torso now, tickling my sides. “Even if that were true, it doesn’t change the fact that my career will be over if—if—we were to . . .”
“Bone?” Rose asks.
“Do the dirty thing?” the guy adds.
I grunt as I attempt the Superman pose. “I don’t even know what to say to that.”
“Say you know your mother would be proud of you, whether or not you follow in her footsteps,” Rose says.
My pulse thunders as my heart twists, making a lump form in my throat. Rose and I talk all the time about my mom; she was Rose’s only child and my only parent, and she looms large in our collective memory.
But we haven’t talked about the pressure I feel to honor her memory by making her proud. By finishing the work she started.
