Bo & Ember (30 page)

I nodded and simply watched and listened as my wife flowed through the most beautiful set of movements I’d ever seen.

Her voice never went above a meditative hum. “Urdhva Hastasana, Uttanasana, Ardha Uttanasana…” She got slightly quieter as she lowered herself to the ground in a pose that looked exponentially harder than a push-up, but her breath never changed.

The muscles in her arms and shoulders rippled beautifully beneath her skin as she flowed into what I knew was downward-facing dog, and back up through the reverse of the same movements until she was once again standing in “Mountain Pose.”

Ember took a deep breath and opened her eyes. “Ending in Tadasana…”

“Jesus,” was all I could say as I stared at her flushed cheeks and completely relaxed aura. It was the first time I could see an aura, and it was stunning as it blended with the lights from our Christmas tree. A soft glow that came from somewhere inside her bordered the edges of her body. When she smiled, it got brighter.

Ember drifted toward me. “Okay, you try. I’ll explain what you should be doing as we go through it. Your job is to keep breathing deeply, okay?”

I nodded.

She tugged on my shirt. “You might want to take off your shirt.”

“I’m not doing yoga for your pleasure,” I teased. It had been a long time since we’d goofed off with each other, and it felt good.

Ember rolled her eyes. “Do you think I do yoga for
your
pleasure? Ever notice how tight my yoga clothes are?”

I grinned and wiggled my eyebrows.

She smacked my arm. “Pig. That’s because I spend half my time upside down and don’t want my clothes in my face.”

Suddenly, yoga clothes made perfect sense beyond my visual gratification. I removed my shirt and Ember took a step back, visually assessing me.

I tossed my shirt at her. “Liking what you see?”

“Mm-hmm. Now, take a deep breath, and listen to my words.”

Within seconds, our playful banter was transformed as Ember’s voice dropped half an octave lower.

She took exaggerated breaths to remind me when I was supposed to breathe.

“Now,” she hummed, “Ashtanga Namaskara and flow to Urdhva Mukha Svanasana…”

I opened my eyes to find Ember demonstrating that push-up like position. I moved overconfidently into that position. Once I was in it, my triceps were screaming.

“God!” I grunted. “What kind of demonic push-up is this?”

Ember ignored my cries for mercy. “Stop holding your breath. Move right into Adho Mukha Svanasana.”

I was breathless. “That’s downward dog, right?”

Ember chuckled. “Right.”

“Yes, I got one!” I exhaled and moaned in ecstasy once the burning in my arms ceased.

Ember guided me calmly through the rest of the sequence, until once again I was standing in Mountain Pose, feeling rather victorious.

“Take three deep breaths before opening your eyes.” Ember slipped into the exaggerated breathing that sounded like the ocean waves.

“What’s that kind of breathing called again?” I asked as I took my last required breath.

“Ujjayi. That’s Sanskrit for ‘to be victorious.’ My mom always calls it ‘ocean breath’ though. You can open your eyes now.”

I smiled as I looked at Ember, who seemed to be studying me curiously. Her head was tilted to one side and her eyebrows were drawn in slightly.

“What?”

“I want to try something on you.”

Ember slowly sank to her knees and moved into a position I’d seen her in several times over the last month. Often in the morning, when I’d walk by her and Willow on my way to make coffee in the days following the miscarriage, they were in that position.

She stayed on her knees, and stretched her arms out in front of her, folding the top half of her body onto her thighs. Her forehead rested on the ground.

“Do this,” she whispered. “Next to me.”

I moved, as instructed, and found that the pose was a bit harder than it looked, but I was able to get there.

“Remember,” she continued, “shoulders away from your ears.”

“K,” I whispered.

I sank into the position and started breathing deeply. On my third breath, my eyes were clouding with tears and it wasn’t from pain. Muscle pain anyway. Searing through my chest was a deep ache I’d only felt a few times in my life. I sniffed.

“Weird, right?” Ember sniffed back.

“What … what the hell?” Tears were falling hard, and yet, I felt okay.

“Don’t fight it.”

“What is
it
?”

Ember’s voice was heavy with her own tears. “Willow and I cried in this position almost every morning for two weeks. Certain yoga poses unlock certain emotions.”

“What’s this one for?” I asked, sniffing between every other word.

“Softening grief. Balasana…”

“What is that in English?”

Ember was silent apart from a few soft sniffs.

“Ember?” I asked again. “What is this called in English?”

“Child’s pose,” she whispered.

I took a deep breath. “Oh…”

A second later, Ember’s hand touched my arm, and her fingers worked their way down my skin until they found my hand. I gripped it for dear life.

“Just a few more breaths, k?” Her voice was strong and reassured.

For three deep breaths, I begged for my grief to be
softened
. I felt like I was being wrung out. With each breath I took, the grief was squeezed a little harder out of me, from places I thought I'd already wrung it from. It killed me to know that for two weeks, as I guzzled coffee and checked emails before heading to work, my wife was on this very floor with her sister, wringing out her own grief—and I’d had no idea that’s what she was doing.

Ember spoke again. “Slowly move into Shavasana to close it out, okay? We’ll hold that for a couple of minutes.”

“Thank God,” I mumbled. Shavasana was the first yoga pose I’d learned. You just lay back and … lay there.

Ember’s voice took on her instructor tone again. “Let the earth hold you, remember. Give yourself some space to process the feelings from the last pose.”

When our time was up and Ember said “Namaste” to me, more out of habit than anything else, we sat cross-legged on the floor, staring at each other.

“You made me cry,” I said as I wiped under my eyes, still not dry from all the wringing.

Ember shook her head. “Balasana did.”

“You made me do it.”

She shrugged. “I wanted to see if it worked on you.”

“Sorcery. First that tortuous push-up nonsense, then that?”

Ember gave a soft giggle before pulling the elastic from her hair and raking her fingers through her thick waves.

“I’m sorry I wasn’t there for you,” I blurted out as I watched her tie her hair back once more.

Her eyes shot open and moved rapidly over my face. I watched her shoulders rise slightly as she swallowed, her eyes starting to glisten with fresh tears. There had been so many tears, I wondered when either one of us would dry out.

Ember crawled over to me and pushed my knees apart, curling her body into mine.

She kissed my chin and rested her head on my shoulder. “I’m sorry I wasn’t there for you. It was
our
loss. Not just mine, and not just yours. Ours. We’ve never grieved together, and this loss was so…” Her voice broke but she recovered quickly. “Much. I know I don’t know what it’s like to lose a parent, or a sibling…”

“Hey,” I cut in, rubbing my hand across her shoulders. “This
was
big. Deep. Like nothing I’ve ever felt. Listen … I’ve got something for you.” I nudged her forward and stood, walking to the backside of the Christmas tree.

I reached up as high as I could, feeling around for a minute before grasping the box and pulling it gown. I ran my thumb over the textured gold wrapping as I walked back to Ember and sat across from her on the floor.

“What’s this?” she asked as she took the package from my hand.

I laughed. “You always ask that. Just open it.”

She was careful as she separated the tape from the paper, taking care of the wrapping as if it were the gift itself. Removing the small square box from the paper, she eyed me.

“Go ahead,” I encouraged.

Slowly, Ember lifted the lid off the box. She gasped and covered her mouth with her fingers.

“Bo,” she whimpered as her head tilted to the side.

She looped her finger through the thin string and held the ornament in the air between us. It was a set of silver angel wings I’d found in a store in the center of town earlier that week. I was in there looking for something else for her for Christmas, and when I spotted the wings hanging behind the cashier, I discarded what was in my hand, and purchased the wings.

I cleared my throat. “I want you to know I felt it too. The loss. I miss the baby, too, Ember. These wings will remind us that the baby is always going to be a part of us, and is watching over us. My parents and sister, too.”

Ember nodded as tears rolled down her cheek. Still holding the ornament, she shifted forward and wrapped her arms around my neck. “Thank you,” she whispered.

She stood and placed the ornament front and center on the tree, then stepping back to admire it.

“It looks good.” I wrapped my arm around her waist and pulled her close.

She nodded. “I want to keep it out year-round. We’ll find somewhere to hang it when Christmas is over.”

We stood in silence for a few moments, our eyes grazing over ornaments my sister and I had made as kids, and ones that my parents had exchanged with each other.

“I’ve never had a Christmas ornament before,” Ember said, as she remained focused on the tree.

The past couple of Christmases we’d exchanged gifts, but we’d been on the road, and never had a tree of our own.

“Well,” I sighed, “we’ll have plenty of time to fix that, won’t we?”

“We will,” she agreed. “I have something for you, too. But, we have to drive there.”

“Ember,” I grumbled teasingly, “why would you buy me a house? We have one right here.”

She pulled her head back and pursed her lips. “Yoga makes you weird. Put your coat on—we don’t need to change.”

Once we had our coats on and braced the bitter three-second walk to the car, Ember beat me to the driver’s seat. “I want it to be as much of a surprise as possible.”

I shrugged and got in the car, buckling my seatbelt as Ember pulled out of the driveway. As we rolled through the center of town, I took a few moments to enjoy the quaint shops that were decked out with perfectly placed lights and lush garland.

My idle enjoyment quickly turned to anxiety as Ember slowed down in front of the church. Without moving her eyes from the road, Ember drifted to a parking space directly in front of the steps, put the car in park, and cut the engine.

Neither of us moved for a solid fifteen seconds.

“What are we doing here?” I planted my elbow on the rounded edge by the window and rubbed my chin.

“It’s between Christmas Eve services,” Ember said plainly. “We probably won’t be alone, but it’ll be okay.” She placed the keys in her pocket and exited the car. I left my seatbelt on. Ember walked around to my side and opened the door. “It’s not polite to ignore me. It’s Christmas.”

My palms began to sweat. Not wanting a fight, I unlatched myself and stepped onto the frozen sidewalk. “Ember…”

She held up her hand and cut me off. “Bo, if you really don’t want to go in, we don’t have to. But, I want you to try. Trust me.”

“How long have you been planning this … whatever this is?”

Ember took a deep breath. “A few days, but,” her eyes watered, “after you gave me that gift I knew I had to do it
now
.”

She held out her hand, and I took it, walking one step behind her as we ascended the stairs. I kept my head down as we walked through the doors, just grateful that the building didn’t crash around me.

Ember didn’t stop walking until we reached the front. She pulled me to the left and sat in the front pew. You mean business if you sit in the front pew.

I sat next to her, my chest tightening as the rest of me began to sweat. I felt like I was going to explode.

“Look up,” Ember whispered.

I shook my head. “No.”

I’d seen it before.

Ember was quiet for a moment, gliding her thumb across my hand. “Bo,” she said again. “Look.”

Lifting my head, I was greeted with the same cross I’d screamed at weeks earlier. There was nothing different about it this time. Except everything.

“What?” I questioned. “This is what you’re giving me?”

Ember nodded.

I shook my head, shrugging. “I don’t get it.”

My throat tightened as I fought to look away from the striking wood. I couldn’t.

Ember cleared her throat and wiped under her eyes. Her voice maintained a steady whisper. “Once upon a time, an angry, scared, and sad girl walked away from her dad.” Her lip quivered as bulbous tears fell. “On the second to last page, that girl and her dad made up … because her hero brought them together.”

I coughed as the pressure from my chest released through my eyes.

"You see,” Ember continued, tears falling more rapidly than I’d ever seen. “If the second to last page hadn’t been written, neither, then, would the last page.”

“What happened on the last page?” I tried to keep my voice quiet, but I never was skillful at talking through my tears.

Ember moved her hands to my face, looking me straight in the eye. ”She got to live happily ever after.”

She pressed her forehead into mine, the way we’d been when I’d asked her to marry me. “Come,” she said. “Live happily ever after with me.”

A loud sob leapt from my throat. “I’m so broken, Ember…”

She smiled. Even through those tears, her smile was the most beautiful thing I’d ever see in my life—I was sure of it.

“Me too. Let’s be broken together.”

I stood from the bench and squeezed Ember’s hand. I knew that in order to be the man she needed, I had to do this part alone. I moved to the same marble stairs that I’d crashed onto weeks before, but this time—when I crashed—it was in humility rather than anger.

Immediately, thoughts and prayers whose words were numbered enough to fill volumes of books filled my mind. I couldn’t speak a word. All I could do was bow my head and beg for forgiveness and strength through salty tears.