Prose Poem: My Yoga Teacher.

 

My yoga teacher disappeared from her class on Monday, March 8, 2020.

Our class waited around a half hour for Helen to show up that day, but she never came in. When we asked the Yoga Center Director about it, all he could do was shrug his shoulders and say he had no idea what had happened to her. 

He had called her cell phone, but there was no answer, and no voicemail.

I thought this was pretty strange. 

She and I were beginning to bond in a pleasant way.

I thought we might be able to have a relationship out of class that would be good for the both of us.

Helen, because she was anorexic, and me because I am neurotic.

We could help each other overcome our challenges.

And if it went any farther than that -- 

well, so much the better.

A week after she disappeared I drove down to the Misplaced Yoga Teachers Association.

To see if they had any information on her whereabouts.

The receptionist told me that Helen Frontenac (I hadn't known her last name until then) was listed as MIA -- Missing In Action.

"What do you mean, missing in action?" I asked, somewhat bewildered.

"She never reported for duty at her Yoga Center and has not made contact with the Yoga Central Command. That automatically makes her MIA" replied the receptionist, while sharpening a corkscrew.

That should have tipped me off that I had walked into a den of magpies.

"Is there a war on or something I don't know about?" I asked facetiously.

But the receptionist answered me seriously:  "Yes there is, Mr. Torkildson. And it's about to sweep the globe like a pandemic so devastating that it will be compared to the Black Death or Rinderpest."  

I stood there, aghast.

"Well, what did Helen have to do with any of that? I wanted to take her out for a smoothie." I blushed as I finished my last sentence; I had inadvertently revealed my feelings for her to a complete stranger.

The receptionist pressed a button and I fell through a trap door into a dank, bare, room with no windows and an empty paper napkin dispenser in the corner.

Helen was chained to the wall.

"Helen!" I cried, when I saw her.

She looked at me, her eyes dull with resignation.

"It's no use, Tim" she said to me, and I thrilled that she had used my first name.

"They've started the virus and it can't be stopped."

"Who started it?" I asked her.

"The Yoga Cartel" she said, choking back a sob. "My own people did this -- just to cut off the Pilates Gang. I couldn't stand thinking about what was about to happen, so I tried warning people -- and this is what they did to me . . . "

Her head fell down onto her breast. I went to her. I comforted her. We became prisoners of love.

When Task Force Biden finally broke down the door to free us we were too weak to walk out on our own -- so Joe and Kamala  helped us to their helicopter  --

and we got to spend a week in the White House, recuperating and sleeping in the Lincoln Bedroom.