Page 57 of Thursdays at Orange Blossom House
Patricia feels herself stuck in the mire of a quandary. She’s not averse to the idea of being Marjorie’s conscience when it comes to yoga, but – still being selfish – she loves her little Thursday night trio with Dorothy and Grace Maud, and doesn’t really want to change it. She could go to a second class on Saturday – Sandrine has mentioned that practising yoga more than once a week will speed progress – but she has a lot of housework to do.
‘I can go with you on Saturday every now and again,’ she tells Marjorie, wanting to be helpful without committing to something she will find hard to break if she needs to.
‘What’s on Saturdays?’ asks Dennis.
He’s managed to appear without either of them noticing, as he tends to do whenever Patricia is on playground duty. She saw Gordon glaring at them recently when they were chatting while two of the boys were pretending to be boxers, so she’s been on alert about Dennis since then. But not so alert that she spotted him today.
‘Yoga!’ Marjorie says.
‘Oh yeah?’ Dennis folds his arms and looks across the playground. ‘Oi, Kenneth – try that again and I’ll take that tennis ball off you.’
Patricia turns and sees a disgruntled-looking Year Nine shoving the ball into his pants pocket.
‘What was he doing?’ she says, knowing she should have spotted it before Dennis did.
‘Shaping up to brand that Year Seven over there.’ He nods at a small cluster of not-quite-pubescent boys. ‘No wonder they’re usually in the library at lunch. Probably be back there tomorrow. Anyway – yoga.’ He grins at her and for some reason she grins back. ‘I’ve been doing a bit of reading about it.’
‘What have you been reading?’ she asks.
‘Some book calledLight on Yoga. My mum recommended it. Turns out she’s started doing yoga. Marjorie was talking about yoga the other day’ – at this Marjorie looks like a startled proud parent – ‘and I was thinking of giving it a crack. Mum said it was invented by a bloke so I should do all right.’ There’s that grin again. ‘Not sure I’d be as bendy as the bloke in the book, but it might be worth a shot. Good for the hammies, Mum says.’ He puts a hand to the back of his thigh, just in case Patricia’s in any doubt about what he means.
‘Sandrine’s a great teacher, isn’t she, Patricia?’ Marjorie says.
‘She is. And I believe that Saturday class isn’t too full.’
‘Is that when you go?’ Dennis says, glancing quickly at her as if he doesn’t care about the answer.
‘I’ve been going on Thursday nights.’ Patricia pauses, thinking of what might happen if Dennis starts attending that class. While she has no objection per se to him being there, she’s not wild about the idea of him seeing her in a downward-facing dog with her bum in the air. It’s safer to send him to Saturdays.
After some initial shyness about how she looks in some of the postures, Patricia’s relaxed now. She doesn’t think about whether or not anyone’s watching her, because they’re not. It’s freeing, and not something that’s easy for her – or most women, she thinks – to replicate in the rest of their lives. Everywhere else they go, everything else they do, their bodies are being assessed and critiqued – and not just by men. Other women can be the worst offenders. Patricia’s been guilty of it too and she doesn’t even know why, apart from the fact that she grew up hearing her mother and sister do it to practically every woman they knew.
‘We have athletics training on Thursday nights,’ Dennis says, sounding disappointed. ‘So you’re, ah, safe for now.’
He looks at her as if she’s hurt him, and she wonders what expression she had on her face.
‘The Saturday class is just as good,’ she says, just as Dennis looks away.
‘Kenneth!’ he shouts. ‘Get over here now and give me that ball.’
The offending Kenneth takes his time wandering over and deposits the ball in Dennis’s outstretched hand.
‘Sorry, I should have been watching,’ Patricia says when the boy’s gone again. ‘Marjorie, we’d better disperse. Check the other areas.’
‘I’ll head to the back playground,’ Marjorie says. ‘See you, Dennis.’
‘Ciao,’ he says and Patricia’s eyes widen.
‘I learnt Italian last year,’ he explains.
‘Why?’
‘Because I was sick of pronouncingcappuccinoincorrectly.’
She’s not sure if he’s joking and can’t tell from the neutral expression on his face. ‘Seriously?’
‘Yep. And I want to go to Italy someday. I’d like to be able to talk to the locals. By the way …’ He turns completely towards her. ‘Sei una bella donna.’
‘I have no idea what that means,’ says Patricia, who became an English teacher partly because no language has ever interested her as much as her own.
