Beneath a Transparent Dream novel · Chapter 17 of 24
Chapter 17: Still Water
Still Water Yoga was throwing a grand opening for its new Garden Room, and the whole of Portland had been invited.
Matilda read the flyer on a lamp post and took it down and folded it into her bag.
She walked in at ten, past a table of green juice and a banner with bamboo painted on it.
The old woman from number twelve walked in beside her, in a plastic rain bonnet and a purple tracksuit.
"I've been coming to the Thursday class for two years," the old woman said. "I paid for a ten-pack. I'd like to see what it's bought."
"You don't have to come in."
"My dear, I'm eighty-one. I wouldn't miss it."
The Garden Room was a glass annex with new bamboo floors and sixty people on mats.
Cora stood at the front in white, with a pair of enormous ribbon scissors and a smile that had been put on that morning.
Zach stood a step behind her in a navy blazer, with his hand at the small of her back.
A photographer from the local paper knelt in the aisle, and a reporter was holding out a recorder.
Matilda saw the woman in the blue dress from the Cumberland Club, in the third row, on a mat of her own.
Cora saw Matilda.
Her smile held for exactly as long as the reporter was looking.
"Tillie," she said into the microphone, warm and wet. "I'm so happy you came. Everyone, this is my best friend."
"I came to see the floor," Matilda said.
A few people laughed, uncertain.
"Isn't it beautiful?" said Cora. "Bamboo, all of it."
"I know. I paid for it."
The laughter stopped.
Zach took a step forward. "Matilda. Not here."
"I'll be quick." Matilda took her phone from her pocket and held it up toward the reporter's recorder. "The week after the party, Cora sat across from me in a cafe and said something."
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