Josie looked out at her class, checking everyone's form to be sure they were doing the yoga correctly. She was teaching a beginners' class today and wanted to make sure that everyone was doing their best to get into the poses. It did them no good to do it incorrectly. They'd never advance and could damage their muscles and injure themselves.
"You want to get your feet as flat as you can," she instructed aloud, noticing a newcomer who seemed to be having a little harder time. The woman changed her form a little bit, and Josie left her alone. With time, she'd get better at it.
Josie led her class in their cool down, feeling so relaxed herself that she almost fell asleep on her mat. She hadn't been this relaxed in a long time, even during her classes.
She opened her eyes and stood, thanking her class for coming out and working out with her, smiling broadly as she began to roll up her mat, watching everyone else do the same. A semi new regular, Quiana, came over to her with her yoga mat under her arm. "You need to quit playing. I don't bend like you," she complained to Josie who just smiled.
"You know what being bendy is good for," she told Quiana with a wink, heading towards the locker room.
Quiana laughed, shaking her head, following behind her as they went into their lockers. Josie liked Quiana and was immediately drawn to the other woman's energy. She was hilarious.
Josie slipped her mat into the locker and grabbed her shower bag, heading for the showers.
When she got out, she headed towards the snack bar, ordering a bag of cashews and a yogurt smoothie.
She saw Quiana heading out and waved goodbye to her as she sat at the counter for a moment, greeting the Zumba instructor, Desi, as she entered the snack bar and sat beside her. "Good afternoon." Desi had a bright smile on her face as she set her bag at her feet and turned to ask for a bag of peanuts. Paying for her purchase, Desi turned back to Josie. "What are you doing this weekend?" she wondered.
"I have a shoot for 'Beach Bodies' Saturday with the baseball team and a few other girls. I was invited to a party Saturday night and told to bring a friend," she offered with a smile to Desi.
"You know I'm not going to any types of parties with you, Josie." Desi laughed, tossing her head back.
"Okay, but if you change your mind, you know how to reach me. I'll see you later. I have to go see my parents," she told her, hopping down and hugging Desi before she headed to her car, pulling her sunglasses on.
In the car, she rode with the music off, being left alone to her thoughts. She was in such a positive place and close to nothing could bring her down today. The world seemed to be at her fingertips, and she was enjoying every moment of the ride.
Pulling into the driveway of her parents' place, she rolled her windows up and got out of the car and started up the walkway.
Opening the door, she stepped into the house. "Mamá, Papá," she called, closing the door behind herself. They never answered to her when she called them like that. She used to get scolded for it, but over time, the couple accepted this as her way of announcing herself. This was clearly something she had gotten away with doing as a child.
She found her daddy sitting on the sofa watching a soccer match and she leaned down and kissed his cheek. "Hey." Her grin was all teeth as she wrapped her arms around him to hug him. "Where is Mami?"
"I'm in the kitchen, mija," Sofia called.
Josie went into the kitchen and greeted Sofia with a hug, kissing her cheek. "How was your day, Mami?" she asked, moving to sit at the island counter, crossing her ankles.
"It went," Sofia told her, stirring her cheese sauce. "How was your day?"
"It was pretty good," Josie answered with a slight shrug. "I've been in a good mood since I woke up."
"That's good, baby. How's your friend?"
"Val?" she checked.
"Yeah, I haven't seen her in a little while. Why don't you invite her family over to Sunday dinner sometime," she suggested.
"Oh, she'd love a day off. Val's good. I'm going to see if Michael will let her come out with me tomorrow night."
Valerie was Josie's best friend and had been since they met in the ninth grade. Their junior year, Valerie got pregnant and married Michael who then enlisted in the Air Force to have the money to provide for his new family. He didn't have any problem with Josie and in fact loved her dearly, but he did not like his wife being out with her. Not that there was anything particularly wrong with Josie. She was just a single woman and single women did things married women did not. At least, things married women should not. Josie was always allowed in their home. It was just that Valerie was rarely allowed out of it at night with Josie.
On occasion, Michael gave the okay for Valerie to have a night on the town with Josie because he felt she did deserve to have breaks outside the home and adult interaction outside of him. He wanted her to have fun sometimes and not feel tied down. He didn't want to smother and stifle her to only one day wake up and discover she had left him.
"What are you doing tomorrow night?"
"I was invited to a party by a magazine I work with. They're photographing a few of the baseball players tomorrow. The stars of the team, I guess."
Sofia looked over at Josie as she turned the stove off and shook her head, peeking into the oven.
"You know that Michael is definitely not going to let Valerie go with you to a party hosted for a baseball team full of rich, good-looking men."
Sofia closed the oven back and turned to regard her daughter, watching her for a few moments before she sighed. "Jose, I told you before, when you were seventeen, Val is a married woman now. A lot of the things she did with you before, she can no longer do or will be able to do less frequently. A lot of the things that you enjoy doing as a single woman, you will have to do without her. I understand that you are young and want your best friend to be with you, having as much fun as you are. Just understand why she isn't. I'm sure she wants you to still go out and enjoy yourself."
Josie sighed, knowing her mom was right. She didn't ask Valerie to go out all the time because she knew the answer. She even knew that the possibility of Michael saying no to this party was pretty much set in stone; but this was going to be probably one of the biggest parties she ever went to. There was going to be so much fun happening in one place that she couldn't fathom not getting to enjoy every second with her best friend, buzzing in excitement beside her.
"Oh… Mija. She is still your best friend. You're just on different journeys and in different places."
"No, no. I understand that. I just miss being able to get in the car with her and go wherever. When I got my car, we were out all weekend," Josie recalled with a wistful smile.
"Your car and go, go, going is probably the reason she wound up in her predicament."
"Nuh-uh, Mami. It didn't happen to me."
"Not because you weren't doing the same things, little girl. Because you were smarter."
Josie shrugged. That was the truth. She and Valerie got into all sorts of trouble and were into all sorts of foolery in their younger days.
Josie always knew that one day she wanted to have a husband and children, husband first. She wanted too much to take a bigger risk than the sex already posed. She made sure she got on birth control and always used condoms. When Valerie pulled her into the girls' room to stand guard while she took a test and came out looking like she'd seen a ghost, Josie freaked out like she was the pregnant one.
"I try going out with other friends," Josie explained.
It wasn't as if Val was her only friend. She was just her best friend and experienced the same kind of excitement over the same sorts of things. They were day and night but loved what they loved together.
"There's a girl who started in my yoga class, Quiana. I like her and she seems down to party. I mean, I don't know her well enough to take her to this big of a party, but maybe next time."
"Maybe next time," Sofia agreed.
"I'm going to go and talk to Papá," Josie decided, getting up and heading back to the front, sitting on the opposite end of the sofa with Camilo.
"I saw Lenny this afternoon at the barbershop. He asked about you."
"Did he?" Josie asked, leaning forward, interested.
Lenny was Josie's high school sweetheart. Things hadn't quite worked out, but she was always going to have a soft spot for him. She swore that he could always call if he'd ever needed anything, and she knew that it was true to date.
"Yeah. I told him about your classes and modeling."
"Did he look well?" she wondered, genuinely interested.
"He did," Camilo agreed. "He asked me to give you his number," he informed her, passing her his cell phone. She took the number from the phone and slid the phone back to her daddy.
Josie stayed with her parents for a couple hours before she left and headed home, tossing her phone onto the nightstand in her room and tossing her bag into the closet before she went to the mat lying in front of her window and sat cross-legged looking out at the Atlantic. This was a sort of meditation for her.
This was her sanctuary, her little piece of solitude.
She had recently moved into the oceanfront condo, and she loved it. She painted her bedroom in varying shades of white and blue to mimic the ocean. It was so calming to walk into this room, and she was glad to be here instead of her old apartment in Little Havana. It was so quiet, scenic, and spacious. The energy was perfect for her and just loved being able to get out of her bed and look out at the ocean.
Staring out at the ocean, she felt her lips curve a little, thinking of far she'd come and good she had it. She knew that she had so much more coming; and all she had to do was wait and be patient.
Closing her eyes, she sat in front of the window, taking deep breaths, inhaling and exhaling slowly and deeply. She told herself even better things were coming.