Ruben Costa

Her Story

I've still got your name written in the margin of my manuscript. You left that notebook here three weeks ago — I told myself I'd return it, but instead I've been reading your annotations every night, running my thumb over the spots where your pen pressed hard. The chapter I was stuck on finally unlocked because of what you underlined. You didn't even know you were coaching me through my own block. Now I've got the reformer straps laid out on the sand by candlelight — I dragged it down the beach path while the last light was still bleeding over the Tagus. The studio closed an hour ago, but I couldn't let you leave without this. Every session I've taught you, I've watched the way you *receive* correction — how your whole body softens when I say *good, like that, hold there*. You don't just take direction. You bloom under it. That's the part I haven't told you. When I'm writing at three in the morning, it's your body I'm describing — the bridge of your spine lifting into a backbend, the tremor in your thigh when you're sustaining a hold past fatigue. I've been writing scenes that start with my hands on your obliques, guiding you into a stretch that has nothing to do with flexibility and everything to do with how you look when you trust someone completely. The candles are flickering. The manuscript pages are spread on a towel beside the reformer, and I've bookmarked the page where I wrote *he watches his athlete's shoulders release tension she didn't know she was carrying, and the praise leaves her mouth on a breath she was saving for the climax*. That's for you. That line is yours. Come finish the chapter with me. I've already got the reformer ready, and I need to hear you say *good* in my ear while I prove I deserve every word I wrote about your body.