Balancing Acts Read Online Free Page B

considerable distance to and from class. Even in the depths of winter, Bess would gaze out from the T window and see Charlie loping down Commonwealth Avenue, bundled up beyond recognition except for those long, denim-wrapped legs.
    â€œSo what are you doing now?” Charlie asked Bess. “You were in the journalism school, right?”
    â€œYup,” answered Bess. Charlie settled up with the bartender and turned to face Bess for her explanation. “I’m working for a magazine now.”
    â€œOh, which one?” asked Charlie.
    â€œ Pulse ?” Bess replied timidly. It sounded more like a question than an answer.
    â€œOoh, I know that magazine!” said Charlie. “That’s the one that lambastes all the celebrities, right?”
    â€œThe one and only,” Bess answered wryly.
    â€œDo you like it?”
    â€œEh, it’s okay. I do some freelance work on the side, so hopefully I can break out of that place soon enough.” She moved on quickly; the last thing she wanted to do was talk about her job. “What about you? Weren’t you a finance major? Have you taken Wall Street by storm?”
    Charlie laughed. “Believe it or not, I’m a yoga instructor.”
    â€œWhat!? Get out of here! That’s amazing. How did you end up doing that?”
    â€œLong story. In a nutshell, I just got sick of the rat race.”
    â€œI hear that,” said Bess. “Seriously, I think that’s incredible. To have the balls to make a career switch like that. . .that’s something that I dream about all the time. Where do you teach?”
    â€œI actually have my own studio out in Bushwick. You should come check it out.”
    â€œOh, that sounds good,” answered Bess. “But I’m a complete novice. I’ve taken yoga only once and I was terrible at it.”
    â€œYoga is not about being good or bad at it. You have to let go of that mind-set. You should absolutely come by, I’d love to have you.” Charlie reached into her bag and handed Bess a flyer. “And I know Bushwick seems like a long way to go for yoga, but it’s only about forty minutes from midtown, door to door.”
    â€œThanks, Charlie, maybe I will,” answered Bess, thinking about her story idea. The premise was pretty simple actually, but based on more of a vague idea than any concrete evidence. Bess was hoping to meet women tonight who naturally fed into her hypothesis. Charlie was actually the antithesis of the type of women Bess had planned on profiling, so she wasn’t sure if yoga had any promise for her on that front. On the other hand, she could use more stretching in her life.
    Charlie searched the crowd. “I was hoping to pass out a ton of fliers tonight, actually. We’ve only just opened our studio, so I have to get the word out.”
    â€œI’ll help you! It will give me something to do besides drown my workweek sorrows in vodka. Let’s take a lap.”
    â€œNice! I really appreciate it.” They both slung their bags back over their shoulders and turned to face the room.
    â€œHere, give me a bunch of fliers,” said Bess. “I’ll go this way and you go that way. We’ll meet in the middle. Whoever has handed out the most fliers buys the other a shot.”
    â€œGood deal,” replied Charlie, with a grin.
    As Bess plunged through the crowd, she thought about her article. She had come to the reunion wanting to write about the washed-up dreams of thirty-plus women; maybe a “then and now” sort of exposé about the aging female’s shifting priorities. In a way, she was taking her concerns about her own life and projecting them onto a group of virtual strangers. Since she struggled with maintaining any sort of creative drive, she figured her former classmates had to as well. Right?
    But then, what about Charlie? She completely turned Bess’s entire quasi-hypothesis on its head. Instead of