Page 9 of The Consequence of You
My eyes spring open, and I look to my right.
Hell to the mother fucking no.
Asher Pennington does not take this class. Except here he is, bold as fucking brass, sitting on the mat next to me with his legs crossed, looking every bit the God of fucking peace. He’s facing forward, his hands clasped and his back ramrod straight.
“What are you doing here?” I demand, louder than I mean to. The instructor looks up at my words and frowns. Asher ignores me and bows his head. I bristle. What are the chances of me signing up for a class he attends?
Just my luck.
I tune back into the instructor's words as she asks us to concentrate on our breathing. I fill my airways slowly and deliberately, holding for a few seconds before letting my breath out. Before long, the steady controlled rhythm has me feeling relaxed and chilled out. For the next ten minutes, I forget who is sitting next to me as I follow the instructor's gentle warm-up exercises and then move into the more challenging poses. That is, until she asks us to get into a half-moon pose, and I come face to face with Asher.
If he had turned the right way, I would be looking at the back of his head. I narrow my eyes as he grins at me wolfishly and licks his lips slowly and deliberately. Distracted, I wobble, dangerously close to losing my balance completely. The instructor strolls around the room, correcting people's positions. She commentsexcellentas she passes Asher’s perfect form. Twat-face, of course, he’s good at this. A smug look passes over his face as the instructor touches my hip and encourages me to straighten up. As she walks away, he whispers,
“Need some extra lessons, Calliope?”
“Piss off.” I retort, closing my eyes so I don’t have to look at him. We hold the position for what seems to be an eternity. Finally, we lower our bodies back to the mat and repeat the pose, but turning the other way. I pull my hip as straight as possible, not wanting to give him the satisfaction of having the instructor correct me again.
The rest of the class passes uneventfully, but the dickhead next to me has truly shattered my inner calm and Ican’t find it again. I make a mental note to look for an alternative class for the next week, as I absolutely cannot attend another one with Asher.
Kneeling at the end of my mat, I roll it tightly as Asher does the same next to me. I’m about to leave when a shadow falls over us. It’s the group of girls from earlier. They surround Asher, making it impossible for me to pass. They laugh and giggle with him, and it's all I can do to not push past them. Whereas I desperately need a shower before my classes start, they all look like they’ve stepped straight off a magazine cover. None of them look like they’ve broken a sweat. One of them is literally stroking his bicep. He catches my eyes while flexing his arm for the girl.
I mime sticking my fingers down my throat and motion a gagging reflex, but it does nothing to deter him as he pushes out his thigh, and the girl touches him there, too. That’s it, no more.
I stand up straight and spin my rolled-up mat, deliberately nudging the girl’s back. I don’t do it hard, but it’s enough to make her aware I want her to move. She squeaks in surprise before turning to me, indignation marring her face.
“Sorry.” There’s not a jot of sincerity in my tone. “Can I get past please?” She opens her mouth and closes it again before moving aside. Asher smirks.
“Same time next week?”
I don’t bother responding as I storm back to the changing room.
ASHER
She is so easy to wind up. As she stalks off, I watch her carefully. I might not like the girl, but fuck me, she looks fine in Lycra. There is nothing fancy about her gym kit, unlike the other girls who are decked out in pastels and coordinated high end brands. Callie Messina wears her uniform of black, black, and blacker, and she owns it. Those tight black leggings show off her perfect arse and slender thighs, and the tiny crop top encases the swell of her tits in a way that has me wanting to bury my face in them. She even has a black jewel in her belly button. I swear I could see the outline of nipple bars, too, when she turned to face me earlier. Her earlobes are always stacked with silver and black studs, so I already know she likes a little pain, but the thought of her taut little nipples being pierced has me instantly hardening. I need to calm that bastard down, as my gym shorts leave little to the imagination. I adjust myself and return the rolled-up mat I borrowed back on the shelf.
The groupies are still hanging on, and I virtually have to tell them to scat before they leave me alone. Usually, I’d be lapping up the attention from a bunch of beautiful women, but I did this class for one reason only. I’d come for a quick swim, but when I saw Callie, I knew it would be the perfect opportunity to wind her up. It turned out getting under her skin was even easier than I imagined.
It was my first time doing yoga, but luckily I’m fit and flexible from fencing. All I had to do was follow the instructor. Moving from the gladiator pose to the half-moon pose was the most challenging part of the class, and I don’t doubt Callie is amazing at it, but she was affected by my presence, and I smile to myself, remembering her struggling to hold her position.
After I shower, I head to my advanced logic class. It’seasily one of the most challenging classes on my syllabus and my favourite hour of the week. It’s one of the few things that stretches me. Not much does these days.
In the second half of the class, the professor gives us a problem to solve based on the theory we’ve just covered. As is his usual method, he chooses a student to do theirs on the whiteboard while the rest of us work independently. The student he’s chosen writes out his working. He stops and checks his work and then proceeds. He’s already gone wrong, but I don’t bother correcting him. Some of the more competitive students might take pleasure in telling him he’s wrong, boasting about how they solved it within minutes, but I prefer to sit and watch them squirm. Not sure what that says about me. It’s entertaining trying to guess when they’ll give up and ask for help.
The class is pretty well split halfway between the sexes, but the girls will usually admit they’re stuck earlier than the guys. The guys' egos prevent them from admitting it, as if it might affect their chances with the ladies if they can’t nail this equation themselves. Ironic, as most these guys won’t score anytime soon, anyway.
Personally, I’ve never had any issues scoring a date. For as long as I can remember, I’ve had girls and now women making their interest known, and I have made the most of it. Don’t get me wrong, I have absolutely zero desire to form an emotional attachment or enter any kind of regular relationship. I don’t see the point. My physical needs are met; I move on. One encounter is usually enough. I get bored after that.
Some girls try to get a repeat date, and occasionally, I’llrelent if it’s been a good night, but they never hold my attention for long. Then there are the girls who play hard to get, thinking the chase will tempt me. It doesn’t. And there are those who throw themselves at me, willing to take anything they can get. They don’t hold any attraction either.
If I’m honest, the closest thing I have to an emotional connection is with my best friend, Grayson and for a long time, even that was superficial. Maybe we gravitated to each other because it was all we both needed out of a friend, or we bonded over our shitty parents, but since he got a girlfriend, the fucker has softened right up. Not saying it’s a bad thing, just new.
Dahlia has changed him or at least brought out the authentic version. Thought he was an emotionless motherfucker like me, honestly, but turned out his father was doing a bigger number on him than even I suspected. That piece of shit, Colin Banks, got his comeuppance, though. He got caught committing some kind of petty fraud and they threw the book at him for it. Serves him right. He might not have got the punishment he deserved for the other shit he did, but he won’t be seeing the light of day for a least the next couple of years.
The point is, in the last few months, my best friend has been a different guy, dare I say,a better guy. Because of a woman. I’m happy for him, but that isn’t on the cards for me. They had a history that went way back, and I get it. But there’s no soul mate shit happening in my life, no secret childhood best friend about to spring from the woodwork. I’m made up for my best friend, and Dahlia is good company. When she’s not eye-rolling at me behind my back. Reminds me of my sister a bit, and that’s not a bad thing because I miss the shit out of her.
Aurelia is the one member of my family I do like to be around. Hearing she wasn’t coming home for another year was a blow. Obviously, I’m pleased for her as it’s exactly what she’d been striving for, but for me, personally, all I could think of, was being without her for another year.
The chosen student is now on his third attempt to solve the mathematics problem and has employed the help of one of the other students, but he’s still scratching his head. The bell is still twenty minutes from ringing, but this is a waste of my time. I stand up and pack up my belongings. I stalk past the lecturer’s desk where he is half asleep and throw down my work. Glancing over it, he nods when he sees I’ve reached the correct solution. As I walk past the two thickos still stood at the front of the room, I take the red board marker and draw a circle around their error. No way I’m giving them the solution, but at least this way they might get to go home before the day is over.
