Gennie and Brian’s guestroom at Camp Namaste is as Spartan as the website promised. Two twin beds; organic, paste-colored linens; laminate floor. The windows are curtainless and made of some kind of reflective glass, which from the outside resembles bugs’ eyes. Gennie stands at the large window and imagines herself the iris. She is invisible up here behind the tinted glass. She watches as a few people make their way along the mulched pathways.
“I wouldn’t call this rustic,” Gennie says. She turns to see Brian pulling up his new yoga shorts; his familiar, pale ass squeezed and puckered under the fabric. Gennie continues even though she knows she probably shouldn’t: “I mean, it’s not even in the actual mountains.” Across the manicured lawn, there are spineless, rolling hills, murky in the hazy heat; a mild, unsurprising beauty. “If this place were a fruit,” Gennie adds, “it would be a banana.”
“What?” Brian says. “What would be a banana?” There’s an edge to his voice, but he doesn’t want to fight, Gennie knows. Twenty-six years of marriage: looking at Brian is like looking too closely at her own hand.
“Camp Namaste,” Gennie starts, then pauses. She shouldn’t be doing this, prodding Brian. She is supposed to be trying hard not be critical, not to make fun of anything related to Camp Namaste. She is not supposed to call it Camp Namaste; its real name is the Niyamas Institute for Spiritual Well-Being or NISWe. She is not supposed to say these things because the new Brian, the reborn-yogic-karmic-holistic Brian, does not like to see the edges of things, the dark corners that Gennie tends to inhabit (that they used to, she believes, inhabit together). And it’s not darkness; Brian is wrong about that. It’s just a healthy skepticism.
Brian slides his new t-shirt over his head. It’s pale orange with the NISWe logo, two carp swimming in a circle, silk-screened in white. It came free with the yoga retreat. Gennie didn’t get one, since she is, as her ID badge officially designates, a “Visitor.” The t-shirt is a little tight on Brian, but Gennie doesn’t say anything more. After all, it had been her idea to join him this weekend. She knows he wanted her to stay home, which is part of the reason she invited herself along.
Brian gives her a quick goodbye as he leaves for his first yoga class, letting the metal door slam behind him. Gennie opens her suitcase on her twin bed. Her new purchase for the weekend had been black lace lingerie. She felt embarrassed going into Victoria’s Secret for it, having already invented a story to use (bridal shower, joke gift) in case she ran into someone she knew. It had been a long time since she bought such a thing. In fact, she can only think of one other time: before a date with Brian, early in their relationship. They were just seniors in college, and they both had roommates, so he had booked a room at the Holiday Inn off the Thruway. She stuffs the lingerie into the bottom of the suitcase, feeling ridiculous now, and slides it under the bed.
***
For the past few months Brian has been on a journey, a quest, a search; whatever it is, Gennie doesn’t get it. “Don’t go all Zen on me,” she said to him one evening, laughing to try to make light of it.
Brian was chopping carrots for a salad. He turned to her and said, “What would be so wrong with that?” And then he broke the news. About the yoga class; about the Reiki and the acupuncture; about the supplements from the health food store; about the books he’d ordered from Amazon that he’d had shipped to the nursery so Gennie wouldn’t see them (Tolle, Chopra, Coelho — she had to Google them later). And about Leah.
“Who’s this Leah?” Gennie asked quietly, trying to sort out the enormous burden of information he had just dumped on her.
“She’s changing my life,” he said. Then, as though realizing that needed more explanation, “Her yoga class, I mean.”
“Yoga is changing your life?”
He was rinsing a colander of quinoa. “It’s toxic, you know.”
“Yoga?”
“Toxic to live in bitterness and criticism like you do.”
“Like I do?”
“Yes, the way you’re so critical of everyone.”
“Critical?”
“Well, yes, like now.”
“I’m being critical?”
Of course, she should have figured it out. Brian had been losing weight, had started cooking healthy meals. No more pizza, no more steaks on the grill. She thought, initially, that he was just following the doctor’s orders after that terrifying visit to the hospital. It had hit them all hard: a perfectly normal Wednesday night, she and Brian and their daughter, Mackenzie, watching an episode of “Alone,” when suddenly they were in the ER, Brian gasping with chest pains. Mac crying. Gennie’s hand shaking as she filled out the admittance forms. So, in that context, quinoa made sense. But Eckhart Tolle?
Gennie thinks she should be given some credit for trying. She has tried not to grimace, for instance, whenever Brian mentions Leah: Leah thinks I need more magnesium. Leah says cardio isn’t beneficial. Leah says I’m limber for a man my age.
One day she offered to drop Brian off at his yoga class, which he was now attending three times a week. Gennie said she wanted to visit the studio. She said it casually, almost off-hand, but she could see Brian hesitate before he agreed. The studio was in a new building with solar panels that took up half the parking lot. She followed him in, like an overprotective parent, and, like an embarrassed teenager, Brian dismissed her with an, “K-thanks-bye.” Gennie knew immediately which one Leah was. She watched Brian talking to her inside the glass-walled studio, grinning, his cheeks a little flushed. Leah was Gennie’s age, give or take five years, but she was lithe and muscled, with blond hair cropped short against her head. She had a long-limbed, easy confidence, and a smile Gennie might describe as condescending as she watched her students roll out their mats. She wore tight yoga pants and a tank top with one of the Indian gods on the front — the elephant woman with arms and earrings. She was the complete opposite of Gennie, if such a thing could exist; the reverse of a doppelganger. They would not be friends; Gennie could tell that much from just looking at Leah. Never, in fact, could Gennie have imagined how they would come together. And perhaps Brian didn’t either, which was Leah’s appeal.
When Brian announced that he was going to attend Leah’s yoga weekend — a statement, not a question — Gennie had blurted, “What about me?” before she could stop herself. What she really meant to say was that they could use a weekend away together, just the two of them. Anything involving just the two of them had been awhile. “It’s been a while,” she said.
Brian squinted at her like he did when he was confused. “You don’t like yoga.”
“Well, there must be other things to do. Walks and stuff. I’ll bring a book.”
She knew, of course, that he wouldn’t say no. Brian wasn’t the kind of man who said no.
The activities open to Visitors are marked with a “V” in the daily schedule, which Gennie has pulled up on her phone. The only one offered this afternoon is a historical walking tour of NISWe, and with nothing else to do, Gennie decides to join it. They are gathering at the pond, per the instructions, and as Gennie makes her way across the soft lawn, she spots the yoga class taking place on a platform that juts over the edge of the water. There are about fifteen yogis (is that what they’re called?), mostly women, but also a few men about Brian’s age. She finds him in the last row. He is on his knees, ass too far in the air, arms stretched forward. Leah walks among the yogis, who look like they are praying to a powerful god. She reaches Brian, leans over, and says something. Then she kneels beside him, placing her hands on the small of his back, lowering it. Gennie watches as Leah’s hands slide down to Brian’s shoulders. Leah rises, stretches her neck, her throat exposed (a knife, a sharp knife). As she lifts her arms, the yogis rise as well. She pictures Leah’s smug grin, two sharp fangs.
There is a group of women already waiting for the tour, chattering like starlings. They are dressed in expensive workout clothes, tight-fitting and sleek, which means Gennie’s choice of outfit — linen pants and blouse — are all wrong. Her entire weekend wardrobe is wrong. She had pictured the women here in flowy clothing: long, loose tunics and wide pants in neutrals and pastels, as they waft — yes, these women would waft — across the lawns smelling of lavender and verbena. But these women are not soft. Their hair is pixied like Leah’s or slicked into ponytails; blended gray tones expertly done, Gennie imagines, by expensive male hairdressers. Gennie’s curly hair is dark chestnut with mahogany highlights, which sometimes verge on violet depending on who she gets at the JCPenney salon.
Gennie takes a deep breath, forces herself to approach. “Are you here for the tour?” she says.
The women stop talking, and Gennie is back in junior high: the loud, brash girl who couldn’t moderate herself. She waits for them to step away, close ranks. But one of the ponytailed women smiles and says, “Yes, we are,” as though truly delighted by the prospect.
“We’re Pumas,” another woman says, and it takes Gennie a moment to figure out what the woman means. A sneaker? A cat? But then she remembers the sign at check in. Welcome, Pumas! She had thought it was a high school sports team (competitive yoga? Why not?). But the young woman at the check in desk, whose nametag read, “Bliss,” explained it was a weekend program: The Puma Way.
“Pumas, wow. That’s great,” Gennie says to the women, again too loudly.
“It is,” the first woman says.
“So, you’re a Visitor?” another Puma asks, gesturing to Gennie’s nametag, which hangs dutifully from a NISWe-orange lanyard around her neck. She notes that she is the only one wearing one.
Gennie nods. “My husband is—” she gestures vaguely towards the platform of yogis. “But I’m here—” why is she here? — “more for relaxation.” The Pumas look a little skeptical. Perhaps mentioning relaxation is taboo, even though that’s what they’re all ultimately here for, isn’t it?
“You’ve got to book a reiki session with Karly,” the woman says. The rest of the Pumas agree.
Before Gennie can ask anything further (i.e., what exactly is reiki?), their tour guide shows up. He is an older man named Steve, dressed in a NISWe polo with baggy pants (linen!) and expensive-looking leather sandals. Gennie can feel the sweat dripping down the small of her back as they make their way along the mulched paths of the Institute, listening to Steve enthusiastically tell the NISWe story: convent, mental hospital, ruins, retreat center. Gennie imagines she’s an anthropologist, peering in on the lives of the affluent, seeking class. Her grandparents had had cold stone benches in the village church in Quebec, the statues of saints and angels, prayers in Latin. Is this any stranger?
Afterward, Steve leaves them at the entrance to the Spateria (“as in trattoria,” he says, “not cafeteria.”), where she is supposed to meet Brian for dinner. At least, that was the plan before he left the room; no cell phones permitted at NISWe. But he isn’t waiting for her, and Gennie is folded into the line, handed a tray by a woman in front of her. She makes her way down the buffet, helping herself to salads and unidentified grains, and then finds herself standing alone, facing the tables, and she’s back in junior high again. These are the same girls who guarded the spots on the cafeteria benches, carefully parceling out the privileged seating like indulgences. She looks around desperately for Brian and feels that old panicky fear — I am not like the others; I do not belong.
She finally spots him. He is at a table with his fellow yogis in matching orange/pink NISWe t-shirts. Leah is there as well, in purple, and Gennie sees that she is talking, and they are listening, captivated, forks held mid-air. Gennie is curious to know what Leah is saying. She would like to hear her speak, to see if there are lines on her face, a crooked tooth, age spots. Brian looks up, sees Gennie, and gives her a slight nod, but not a wave. Not a Hi, darling, please come join us, but a Yeah, I see you.
A ponytailed Puma appears, resting a cool hand on Gennie’s sweaty arm. “Sit with us,” she says, “unless you need to join your husband?”
“Nope,” Gennie says, “don’t need to sit with him,” and she follows the woman to a table (Reserved, Pumas), where there is an extra chair, just for her.
The conversation isn’t particularly elevated. They aren’t discussing The Puma Way, about which Gennie is now curious. Instead, they chatter cheerfully about family and kids and jobs. One of them turns to Gennie and says, “Tell us about yourself!” as though they’ve all been dying to learn more.
“Not much to tell,” Gennie says.
“Don’t be modest,” says a woman with short hair. “We Pumas share all.” The others laugh at this, like it’s actually funny.
Gennie attempts to describe her life: her job teaching high school French, her home in the housing development close to Lake George (what’s ten miles?); and Mac, away at Girl Scout camp. “She’s a sweetheart,” Gennie adds, although sweet isn’t really the word to describe Mac. She’s polite more than sweet. Reliable. Too much so. She’s a Girl Scout, still, when most of her friends dropped out years ago and are now smoking weed and asking their mothers about birth control. You’re so lucky, they say to Gennie. The rebellious, snarling, snarky teen Gennie had anticipated (that she herself had been) has never materialized.
From where Gennie’s sitting, she can turn her head just enough to see Brian popping in and out of view behind Leah’s tan, muscled shoulder. Gennie hopes Brian will look up and see her laughing and chatting with the Pumas and not sitting toxically alone. But he is watching Leah, whose arms rise and fall in graceful arcs. What does Leah have to say that is so intriguing? Gennie can see the ambition in Leah’s gestures, in her perfect posture. Leah is good at getting what she wants, Gennie can tell that much from here.
Watching Brian watching Leah, Gennie tries to see him as others might, those who haven’t known him for nearly 30 years. His blonde hair only has a few unnoticeable streaks of grey. His paunchy belly has shrunk (though not, she likes to note, disappeared completely). Is he attractive to others? She can’t even tell anymore. Once, of course, she was smitten with him, although by now whatever she had felt has thinned and faded. How could it not be after so many years? They had both been brighter when they first met, like birds or insects: vibrant and attractive. It was a college production of Flowers for Algernon, which Brian was starring in and she was stage managing. She likes to tell people the story and add flourishes, describing her punk phase (half-shaved head, heavy boots); Brian as the straight man with his polo shirts and Topsiders.
After dinner, back in the bug’s-eye room, Brian showers in their small bathroom, and she considers going to him, opening the door, squeezing in behind him, and pressing her body against his under the hot water. But it’s a quick shower, and he’s done before she can work up her nerve.
“Ready?” he says, finding Gennie lying on her twin bed, and she’d like to pat the gauzy coverlet and say, “Join me,” but instead she follows Brian to the pond, where they wait with the others for the former chapel-turned-Gathering Space to open for the evening’s concert, a husband/wife duo who play traditional Indian instruments. Under the still, late summer water, Gennie spots the glint of silver, and then, in a flash, there are several fish near her, their large mouths open and sucking at the surface. Please don’t feed the carp, a sign admonishes.
“I’m not a fan of fish,” Gennie says.
“They’re just fish,” Brian says. “You don’t need to have an opinion about everything.”
“Well, it’s not really an opinion, just more of a feeling,” she says.
“How can you have feelings about fish?”
“How can you not?” she says.
“They’re just fish.”
“You already said that. You need a better argument.”
“I don’t want to argue,” he says.
“God, no, we wouldn’t want to destroy the aura of the Camp Namaste with a few harsh words.”
“I don’t,” he says under his breath, so the carp won’t hear, “want to argue with you, Gennie.”
But I do, she’d like to say. In the before time, their arguments were perfectly executed, precise and sharp. Invigorating. Intoxicating. Afterwards, they would hurry to their bedroom, or, if they couldn’t make it that far, to the sofa, and once, the kitchen floor, colliding together, their skin damp from the heat of the fight.
The husband-and-wife duo are young and American: late 20’s at the most, tattoos up their arms and circling their exposed necks. They tell the crowd about their two years spent in the Peace Corps in Bangladesh. That story is more interesting than the music, which is awkwardly off-key.
After the concert, when Brian goes to his Yoga Nidra class, Gennie decides to find out more about the spa options. At the reception desk, Bliss books her a 60-minute reiki session with Karly for tomorrow afternoon. Gennie tries not to seem too shocked at the price. But, at this point, what’s another $200? The weekend is tres cher as it is. $300 a night. $500 for the retreat. She ought to get something out of it.
***
The next morning, Gennie makes her way alone to the Spateria, where she finds coffee (thank God; she had worried it would be verboten) and helps herself to a bowl of oatmeal. Brian left the room at dawn for something called a Sunrise Stretch. Gennie flips through the schedule, but there is nothing available for Visitors that she can feign any interest in. Next to her is the book she brought with her — a history of World War I, lent to her by a social studies co-worker. She opens it to page twelve, where she stopped a month ago. She should have brought something mindless — a mystery set in the Berkshires, perhaps. Murder in one of those pristine farmhouses. Or at a yoga retreat. Death by Karma; someone has poisoned the coconut water. Now that would be interesting.
She runs into the Pumas on her way back to her room. “Gennie!” they call, waving her over. “Do you want to join us on a hike?”
By default, Gennie doesn’t hike. Too much work for too little reward. “I’d love to, but,” she gestures to her linen pants and shirt, her worn Birkenstocks, “I don’t have the right clothes.”
The ponytailed Puma, who is their leader, Gennie decides, says, “It’s not really a hike, more of a walk in the woods. You’ll be fine.” Gennie notes that all the Pumas are in yoga pants and trail-rated footwear.
“There’s a surprise at the end,” a woman says.
“And we’ve brought a picnic,” adds another.
Perhaps the Pumas earn points for getting unsuspecting visitors to join them. Perhaps it’s some kind of ritual, and Gennie will be their sacrifice. But, then again, what else is she going to do with her day? And she must admit, she’s flattered to be invited along by these women. She glances at the harmless-looking bank of trees they’re headed toward. At least in the woods it will be cooler.
It isn’t cooler. It is as sticky and suffocating as the inside of a peach. The trees are dense and pulsing; these woods are deceptively deep. She follows the Pumas along a narrow, rocky path, sliding in her Birks, while the Pumas grip the path and move stealthily ahead. They pause at a curve to wait for her to catch up.
“So, what exactly is The Puma Way?” Gennie asks the women, hoping conversation will slow them down. They begin talking at once, finishing one another’s sentences. Gennie cannot understand most of what they tell her because it honestly makes no sense. Something about “emotional liberation,” “connecting to your natural self,” and, “locating optimal states.” The leader with the ponytail explains to Gennie that The Puma Way follows a shamanistic code, whatever that means. They share with her examples of how “asymmetric” and “asynchronous” their lives were before the wisdom of the puma entered and woke them up. Their stories are not exactly shocking, except in their familiarity. Marriages on the brink, troubled kids, dead-end careers, dying parents. The general disappointments of life. This strange middle-age, which appears so suddenly, when the scrim of optimism is torn away, revealing the dull and dreary reality of it all.
“We are travelling on a quickening path toward a spiritual awakening in which we will attract only those we want in our life,” one of the Pumas says.
“Wow,” Gennie says. “Sounds great.”
The sound of water quiets them. They stop, shushing each other. Soon, they are off the path — no walk in the woods, this — and clamoring through pine needles and undergrowth until they reach a stream. It crashes over the rocks, creating a series of small waterfalls. They follow the stream down, and Gennie’s sandals slide in the mud, and she has to grab onto tree branches to steady herself.
The Pumas stop in a clearing before a wide, still pool. There is evidence of other visitors, charred logs within a ring of stones. A Bud Light can. A white sock. The Pumas drop their backpacks and begin to take their clothes off. First their yoga pants, then their wicking t-shirts, then their sports bras, then their underwear. Their bodies are not as toned up close. There is cellulite and stomach paunch and flapping arms. There are marks from childbirth. One woman — Gennie quickly looks away — has scars for breasts.
But they don’t care that she is watching. They are oblivious. They hurl themselves into the water, screeching on impact. They bob and float. “Gennie,” one calls when she is spotted, still clothed, on the shore. “Come in!”
It does look refreshing, but she won’t get undressed in front of these women, parade her body so that they can judge her.
“Gennie!” they call.
She pulls at her shirt, which is damp with sweat. Maybe she can soak her feet, just to cool down. But when she reaches the edge of the pool, she sees there’s a stony drop. She can’t just sit and dangle her sore feet in the water.
“You’ve come all this way,” says the ponytailed leader. “You’ve earned it.”
“I’m not really comfortable with—” Gennie gestures to her clothes.
But this just makes the Pumas laugh.
“It’s your challenge today,” says one.
“The roadblock in your path,” says another.
“Don’t be afraid,” says the leader.
This is what does it. Those words: don’t be afraid.
“I’m not afraid,” she snaps. She turns around to pull off her shirt, trying to wrangle it over her head. She is wearing an old, matronly-white bra, and a diaper-sized brief meant to cover her menopause belly. She wishes she had worn the new lingerie, the black lace push-up bra, and the thong. The Pumas are all watching her now, and they begin to chant: “Gennie, Gennie, Gennie.” Off comes the bra, her breasts dropping heavily. She turns around to face them. There is no way to cover herself any longer. Her swollen body, full of imperfections. But they are smiling up at her, calling out for her, their voices echoing off the river stones. Gennie stands, hands on hips, and lets them see her. And then she jumps from the little ledge, feet smacking the water until she’s sinking into it.
Gennie comes up gasping, dizzy from the shock. “It’s fucking freezing,” she manages to say, and the Pumas laugh.
They are moving into a circle, and one woman pulls Gennie toward them. The reach for one another’s hands, and in the clear water, she can see their legs moving fast, scissoring the water to keep them afloat. She tries to keep up, but her chin keeps sinking, water flowing into her mouth where her teeth are chattering. The water is insanely cold, but the Pumas seemed unfazed.
“Awaken us,” they say in unison. “Show us the path, oh, Puma. Let us feel the beating heart of the earth and of our origin ancestors.”
Their breasts float in the water, shimmering in the light. The Pumas chant something in a language Gennie doesn’t know, and then she is being pulled down, under the water, the hands grasping tighter and tighter. This is it, then. They will try to drown her. But then she is being pulled back up, cracking the surface, choking, and gasping for air. They do this three times. On the third time down, Gennie opens her eyes to see hair swirling in the clear water, the blur of arms and legs.
On the way back, after a surprisingly satisfying picnic of dried fruit and nuts, Gennie feels much better. She wears nothing but her bra and her linen pants, her shirt draped across her shoulders, collecting the water from her hair. The women, equally unclothed, are telling her about their planned trip that next spring to Peru, where their shaman lives. They will hike to Machu Pichu; they will sleep in a village in the clouds.
“It’s open to anyone,” a Puma says, and another adds, “You should come with,” as though Gennie could live like these women, could climb with them to the top of the world.
***
Gennie is heading back to her room when she remembers her spa appointment. She arrives a few minutes late to find Karly, in a NISWe-orange tank top, waiting for her at the entrance. “Make yourself comfortable; I’ll be right back,” Karly says, leaving Gennie in a softly lit room with a massage table, salt lamps, and pan flute music playing from invisible speakers. Gennie gratefully peels off her linen clothing again, unhooks her bra, tosses it all in a corner. She climbs up onto the massage table, her spine releasing into the soft cushion. She doesn’t even bother to pull the thin sheet over her.
“Oh,” Karly says when she reappears. “Reiki is usually done with clothing on.”
Gennie tries to sit, but the cushion is like a marshmallow, swallowing her. “Sorry,” she says, fumbling to cover herself with the sheet. “It’s just my clothes were kind of wet. But, I mean, I can—”
“If you’re comfortable, it’s fine,” Karly says, tucking the cool cotton sheet around Gennie. She is comfortable, if not a bit mortified. “Just relax, and we’ll get started.” Gennie presses her eyes closed, tries to take a deep breath. “I’m feeling a lot from you today,” Karly says. “A very intense energy field.”
“Is that so?”
Karly lays her hands ever-so-lightly on Gennie’s feet and legs. Gennie squeezes her eyes tight, trying hard to feel whatever it is she’s supposed to feel.
“Relax, you’re safe,” Karly whispers.
Relax, relax, Gennie chides herself. She thinks of the $200 she is spending for someone to barely touch her. She wonders if Leah is resting her fingers on Brian’s back. She considers the music — do they subscribe to some spa station on Spotify? Pan flute classics! She will google that and play it at home while cooking dinner. Would that help?
“Try to clear your mind,” says Karly, her hands hot as they rest on Gennie’s abdomen. She feels the breeze of Karly’s slight movements. Now, her hands are on her hair, frizzy from the swim and humidity. Her fingers slide down, covering her eyes, palms pressed against her temples. It’s only then that Gennie feels her body start to sink into the bed; her tight shoulder muscles release. Karly’s fingers are so soft, yet also calloused in places. Has she ever felt Brian’s hands on her eyes. Has he ever held her like this?
And then the hands lift. A sudden light fills the room. “Excuse me, Genevieve?” says a voice. Not Karly’s. Gennie lifts her head as best she can. It’s Bliss, standing in front of her, wearing her orange t-shirt, and a forced, efficient smile.
“Yes?” Gennie says. Has she broken some rule? Perhaps Visitors aren’t allowed to get reiki.
“Um, your husband? Brian?”
“Yes?”
“He’s not feeling well. He sort of, well, collapsed, I guess.”
“Collapsed?” And then her head starts to spin. Collapsed? She pushes herself up out of the marshmallow, grasping for the sheet, awkwardly trying to swing her legs around. Karly is reaching out, attempting to help her, but the sheet just becomes tangled until Gennie is sitting naked in front of these two women.
“He’s awake now and—”
“Awake?”
“Now, yes. And he’s—”
“You mean he wasn’t awake?”
Karly places her hand on Gennie’s shoulder and looks at Bliss, who seems to be struggling to get the words out while maintaining her cool, NISWe demeanor. Words like collapse probably aren’t covered during staff training. “We’ll leave you to get dressed,” Karly says.
Brian lies on a bench seat just inside the Spateria. Two orange-shirted men stand over him; one is wiping Brian’s face with a towel. Whatever fear she felt dissipates at the sight of him now, in his sweat-soaked yoga clothes, grimacing at her.
“I’m fine,” he says before she can even ask.
The second man turns to her, says in a low voice: “On his health form he mentioned a cardiac episode?”
The man, she realizes, is more polished-looking than the others. His hair is deftly parted to the side; he wears khaki pants with his NISWe shirt, and Navy topsiders. No nametag.
“Yes,” Gennie says. “A year ago.”
“We can’t keep him here,” the man says quickly and with less sympathy than she would have expected.
Brian’s face is blotchy red and there’s a smell — vomit. It stains the front of his shirt and lies in a puddle on the bamboo floor. Gennie would like to say: “I told you so.” Instead: “Do we need to go to the hospital?” aware that her voice has a hardness to it that might not sound like a concerned wife’s.
“It was just the heat,” Brian says.
“That’s a good idea,” the man says, ignoring Brian. And Gennie guesses it’s only because they want to get rid of them as soon as possible.
Through the large Spateria windows, she can see across the lawn to the platform over the pond where the yoga class is wrapping up. They lie in the death pose as Leah steps artfully around them, her mouth moving. Brian is watching them, too. Gennie wonders what happened when Brian collapsed. Did Leah run to his side, filled with concern? With annoyance?
“It’s just the heat,” Brian says again, looking away as Leah presses her hands together in prayer and bows to the yogis.
“We can’t let you stay here,” the man with no nametag says. Firmly. Resolutely. They are both visitors now, and they have overstayed their welcome.
“Do we get a refund?” Gennie asks.
The man shakes his head. “No refunds for leaving early,” he says. Gennie opens her mouth to point out that they are being forced to leave. “Due to illness,” he adds before she can speak.
Back in the room, Brian showers while Gennie starts packing their suitcases, throwing everything in randomly. From the bug-eyed window, she takes one last look at the perfect lawn, the pruned trees, the pristine mulched paths blurring the hot afternoon light. The pond, shaded now, quivers like sheet metal. Gennie can imagine the way the platform must smell of fish and warm wood; the desperate carp gathering in the water below.
The Pumas, she knows, are gathering by the pond in a half an hour for a Tai Chi session, which they had promised to teach her. After dinner, there would be a spirit animal workshop. “Maybe you’re a big cat like us,” one said to her.
Gennie leaves Brian in the passenger seat and tells him she’ll be right back. She wants to find the Pumas. “My husband is ill,” she’ll say, and they will shake their heads in pity. Maybe they will ask her to return, alone. It’s a couple of hours drive, but she could be back by morning.
But she can’t find any Pumas. They are no doubt napping in their rooms. The entirety of Camp Namaste seems to be napping.
The road out to the Turnpike is twisty and the stippled sunlight through the trees makes her dizzy.
“Why don’t we take the boat out tomorrow?” Brian says pressing his hands against the dashboard as she takes a curve too fast.
“Let’s see how you’re feeling.”
“I’m fine,” he says. “It was just the heat.”
“We’ll see.”
“We can dock on an island, bring lunch.”
But Gennie isn’t thinking about the boat, or the lake, or the islands. She is thinking about what she’ll have to do to get in shape. How she’ll need some new clothes. Maybe she’ll cut off her hair. Why not? She can always wear a hat in the village in the clouds. Because it will be cool up there, in the actual mountains.
Image by Jerm Gonzalo on pexels.com, licensed under CC 2.0.
- The Puma Way - March 4, 2025