I knew from the very beginning that our first date would be the last, and it just wasn't going to work between Valeria and me.
Firstly, she was too attractive. I have no problem with attractive women, of course, but I think that every sane person knows that some people are just too attractive relative to others. A relationship looks suspect, I submit, when one member is disproportionately attractive to the other. Valeria was just that relative to me. She walked into the coffee shop with dark, cascading hair in a high top-knot and electric blue-green eyes, and she immediately turned heads. I didn't register her as my date until she sat down at my table, talking as if she knew me. I barely recognized her, as her profile picture on the dating site had been a bit ambiguous on account of an overexposed, solarized quality. In that photo, she'd been wearing sunglasses, with strands of hair blowing across her face.
Secondly, we were obviously not the same type of person. Even the most egalitarian thinker knows there are different types of people on account of some calculus of personality, place of origin, class, and appearance, among other factors. Valeria's shapely, fit figure came packed into sleek leggings and silvery Louboutin heels. She wore a Gucci belt, and her shirt said “Los Angeles” in all-caps. Her eyebrows were drawn-on, her lashes plumped, and her lips may very well have been collagen. Her exposed flesh bore an array of tattoos, and she had a ring in her nose. Between the body art, brand-name accessories, physical fitness, and overall done-up quality, I knew that Valeria was not my kind of person.
Thirdly and finally, the conversation established as much. Valeria talked exclusively about herself. She told me about all the places she had lived, from Genoa to Jaipur. She most liked California, she explained, on account of the sun, but she had had to move away because Orange County—“Orange,” as she called it—was getting way too expensive. She loved L.A., she said, but she didn't like a lot of the guys and the pace they kept. She had left for San Francisco, but not being able to handle the cold wind and the wetness, she continued north until she wound up where we were. She said she was learning to love the vibe in our little city, explaining how it was such a change of pace from all the other places she'd lived. She told me all about starting up her business, namely a hot yoga studio above a vinyl store just a few blocks away. This led her into a disquisition on yogic techniques, and how she was innovating all kinds of new methods. She repeatedly referred to herself as a “yogi.” The upside to her non-stop monologue was that she seemed to enjoy my presence, as she apparently appreciated having an audience.
As she went on and on, I became conscious of the wider audience. People were staring, I sensed. At best, they probably took me for Valeria's brother or gay friend rather than her date. At worst, they may have taken me for her john. She was a very striking woman, bearing all the trappings of effortful beauty. I tried not to gaze too obviously. Instead, I focused my attention on reading her tattoos. Her low-slung top revealed the word “bulletproof” scripted along her collarbone in letters with a line atop as per the Indian Devanagari orthographic system. She had the words “Omniscient” and “Omnipotent” inked on the sides of her left and right hand, respectively.
“You really should try it, you know,” Valeria was saying.
“Excuse me?” I said, pulled from my fugue.
“Yoga,” she said. “You should try it. It'll do wonders for your posture and your energy levels.”
She must have seen me sagging. I sat up straight and responded almost bashfully. “Oh, no,” I said, “not me. I'm not really the yoga type.”
“There are no yoga types, Dimitri,” Valeria said. “It's for anyone and everyone.”
I winced. “No, you know, honestly, I just don't see myself in a room with all kinds of fit people in yoga pants and what not. It's just not my scene.”
Valeria shook her head, her top-knot quivering, her eyes widening sympathetically, her bee-stung lips puffing out. “You just have to try it,” she said. “It won't be like anything you expected. We have all kinds of body types. We go very slow, so everyone can be included. You'll have a great time. You'll feel wonderful.”
Was this her true angle? Using online dating sites to recruit relatively unkempt, unremarkable men to her yoga studio so as to extract their business?
“I don't know,” I said.
“And it's free,” she said. “The first lesson, at least.”
I twisted in my seat and made non-committal utterances. Apparently, Valeria wasn't all about the money, but I still didn't want to do yoga.
“I'd be way behind the other people in the class,” I said limply.
Valeria shook her head. “I could get you caught up. You'd be surprised how fast you learn.”
“Okay,” I said.
“You'll do it?”
“Maybe.”
“Oh!” Valeria said, clapping her hands together. “I'm so excited.”
“We'll see,” I said.
But I was prevaricating. I assumed I wouldn't actually be seeing Valeria again, so there wouldn't be any hot yoga in my future. I told Valeria I had an early morning the next day and we parted ways, but not before she obtained my phone number.
For the next week, I went on with the sort of life my type of person lives. Then, late on Saturday afternoon, the phone rang.
“Hi, Dimitri. It's Valeria.”
“Hi . . . ?”
“You remember me, right?”
“I do.”
“Do you remember your hot yoga lesson?”
“Uh . . .”
“It can happen right now, tonight. The studio's free.”
“Free?”
“No charge. Just you and I. I'll get you caught up. Your very own private lessons.”
“Um . . . ?”
“You don't want a private lesson? Totally free of charge.”
“I . . . I . . .” I stammered, not knowing what to say. Then, an image flashed into my mind ex nihilo. It was Valeria in yoga pants, I'm ashamed to admit. It dawned on me that there could be some superficial upsides to this unwanted yoga lesson. And we'd be free of an audience, so my fumbling and faltering would remain discreet.
“C'mon,” Valeria said.
“Okay,” I said. “I'll give it a try.”
“I'll text you the address,” Valeria said. “When you get there, knock on the front door. I'll let you in.”
I walked down to the studio and did as instructed. Valeria opened the ground-level door onto a dark stairwell. I could barely see her, though I recognized the smell of her hairspray. She greeted me as she started up the stairs, beckoning me to follow her. She opened the door at the very top onto a dimly lit studio with a well-worn parquet floor and mirrors on all four walls, a space originally designed for dance, no doubt. Soft sitar music played on an iPad docking station in the corner. It was the only object in the room save for the two dark-blue yoga mats positioned end-to-end in the middle of floor, a few feet of hardwood between them. I caught only the most fleeting glimpse of Valeria in yoga pants before she summoned me into place. So much for the male gaze.
“Take your position on the mat,” she said. “Standing with feet shoulder-width apart.”
I did as requested.
“Now, I'll take you through the beginner's poses.”
Slowly, we went through three poses, or āsanas, as Valeria referred to them. Only she pronounced the word like “ass and ass.” From the introductory Sanskrit I'd taken way back in college, that didn't sound entirely correct, but I found the Anglicization charming. After pulling off the mountain, the child, and the cat āsanas, I ran into trouble at the downward dog. When Valeria encouraged me to incorporate leg lifts with my body already tented, I toppled, hitting the mat for the first time.
“Try again,” Valeria said. “Slowly. You must go slow.”
So I tried again, moving very deliberately.
“Keep your eyes trained on the blueness of the mat. Keep the surface area of your palms flat. Give your leg to the sky.”
I eventually accomplished the pose. Sweat ran down my nose.
“Very good!” Valeria said.
I brought myself up to a standing position and saw that Valeria had removed her clothes. She knelt naked on her yoga mat, looking up at me meditatively.
“Don't look away,” she said. “I'm not trying to make you more uncomfortable. It's the very opposite. I'm trying to make you more comfortable.”
I looked at Valeria, as requested, maintaining eye contact.
“Your eye shouldn't be so tethered,” Valeria said. “You can look at any part of me you like.”
I liked pretty much all of her. Valeria had skin like marbled honey. In the middle of her cylindrical torso, she had an ornate breastplate tattoo in an Indic style, and it seemed to hold in place her beautiful, heavy breasts. An open palm had been inked at the top of her abdomen.
“It's the abhaya mudrā,” she said, seeing me looking, grazing her own palm across it. “It means you have nothing to be uncomfortable about.”
“I know,” I croaked, “what it means.”
“Then you wouldn't be afraid,” Valeria said, “if I demonstrated some of the yogi's more advanced techniques.”
“N-no,” I stammered.
“It will help if you take off your clothes, too,” she said.
I hitched.
“Don't worry,” she said. “Arousal is natural. Supernatural!”
I took off my sweatpants, which weren't leaving much to the imagination. Then I took off my shirt.
“Come,” Valeria said. “Join me on my mat.”
I stepped onto Valeria's mat, my erection bobbing cartoonishly. Valeria took it in both hands briefly, steadying it, alternating “Omniscient” and “Omnipotent” as she adjusted her hands on the shaft. She released her grip and inspected my phallus with narrowed, sagely eyes.
“Your linga is ready,” she said. “Now, without touching it, press it against my nipple.”
I blinked several times, then followed the command. I bowed myself forward at the pelvis, my torso convex.
“No, no,” she said, “the left one.”
I swung slowly to the other side, and my glans made contact with the point of her nipple. A blissful sensation coursed through me upon contact, and my mouth fell open. Valeria closed her eyes and nodded, as if feeling some version of the same.
“Yes,” she said. “Now push.”
I bowed forward even more, depressing the aureole with my glans.
“Oh,” I said, feeling her heartbeat travelling the length of my member in waves. “Oh god.”
“That's right,” Valeria whispered. “Hold your position. Hold, hold. Yaaaaammmm. Mmmm.”
With that penultimate hummed syllable, some kind of sublime change came over Valeria, nigh-imperceptible but downright ontic. I trembled. The point of her nipple traced the tiny portal of my urethral opening.
“Wait,” she whispered.
I'm certain she knew I could have finished right there. Valeria stood up, freeing my linga from her nipple.
“Now,” she said, “press my navel.”
Not entirely knowing what I was doing, I set my legs farther apart and lowered myself into a high squat. On the strength of my hips alone, I guided my glans toward Valeria's navel. I found the spot and sunk into it.
“Yes,” Valeria said. “No deeper than the breadth of a mustard seed. Yes. Vaaaaammmm.”
After trailing off with this latest syllable, Valeria shuddered a little, and tilted her head back, facing toward the roof. She threw her hair from her shoulders with a whip of her long, lovely neck. She smiled and sank back to her knees.
“Now,” she said, eyes fluttering, “my yoni. You know what a yoni is.”
“Yes,” I said, even though she hadn't been asking a question.
Valeria rolled onto her back and gave both her legs to the air. She held the pose for a few seconds, then gracefully lowered her outstretched feet behind her. Her vulva was pillared in the air, her labia marking the highest point.
“Now,” she said, “infix the yoni with the linga.”
I stepped forward, gripping my erection.
“No,” Valeria said. “No hands.”
She must have been watching our reflection in the mirror. I let go of my linga and waited for it to straighten out. I stood over Valeria's pillared yoni, and had no choice but to contemplate it searchingly as I lined up my linga for entry. Her yoni seemed to reach for the ceiling, working like the mouth of a fish. I eased into a squat, bringing my glans down to her labia.
At last, contact happened. My erection seemed almost prehensile, maneuvering its way past Valeria's labia and into her vagina. I squatted again, going lower than I had before, and entered her in full. I raised up out of my squat and back down.
“No,” Valeria said. “No thrusting. Put your linga in the yoni and leave it there.”
I blinked once, twice, and looked over at the scene in the mirror. A wide-eyed, unkempt, unremarkable man stood brandishing a massive hard-on a top his beautiful, contortionist yoga instructor. It looked so tawdry, but it felt so dizzying and sublime. The sitar music crested and clucked on. I steadied my palms on my thighs and squatted again, sliding myself all the way into Valeria's vulva. I bottomed out and then I held tableau.
“Good,” Valeria said. “Laaaaammmm. Now hold.”
I held. Time passed, perhaps a full minute.
“How does that feel?” Valeria asked. “Laaaaammmm.”
“Glorious,” I said.
“I know,” Valeria said. “Isn't that the best feeling?”
“It's pretty good,” I said.
Strangely enough, I felt my linga growing harder—a lot harder than I'd ever known. Inert inside Valeria, I felt bigger.
“It is the secret of the yogi,” Valeria said. “Laaaaammmm.”
Perhaps a minute passed. Valeria trailed off, gathering her breath.
“Yoginī,” I said.
Another fifteen or twenty seconds went by.
“Excuse me?” Valeria asked.
Another minute passed.
“Yogini is the feminine,” I said. Thirty seconds elapsed. “If I'm remembering my Sanskrit correctly.”
“I see,” Valeria said. “Laaaaammmm.”
We stayed silent in this tableau for as long as five minutes. I began to quiver, lactic acid collecting in my legs.
“Steady,” Valeria whispered. She was unwavering, even with my gaining shakes.
“I don't know if I can hold,” I said. Meanwhile, I felt a slackening in my linga.
“Alright,” Valeria said, feeling it, too. “Upasthasya tu madhyagā retovāhe sadoditā,” she chanted, pausing to take in a sharp shot of breath. “Melāpe militā sā vai ānande paramā citiḥ.”
At the sound of the last syllable, my linga swelled anew, getting as hard as corundum. A tempest swirled in my testes, and then a bolt of semen came wrenching through my linga as if pulled by a force not of earth. I screamed as I felt my hot seed coating Valeria's yoni, our genitals soldered in bliss, then the ejaculate brimmed up and over her labia lips. She circled her hips and shuddered, undertaking another little ontic change. Then she drew her muscular legs up and gently pressed the soles of her feet against my chest. In this way, she drew me away.
My member came out limp, hanging wet with the profusion of come.
“Very good,” Valeria said, standing up in one graceful motion, bringing her smile within inches of her face. “You're an apt pupil.”
“Thanks,” I said, still dizzy. “What just happened there?”
“You'll learn more in time,” she said, slipping back into her sports bra. “This is why you should join the group.”
“I don't know,” I said. “Is this the kind of thing you do every week?”
Valeria laughed, working her way into her yoga pants. “Not in the class, of course,” she said. “Only for a select type of students.”
“How do you select?”
“That,” Valeria said, “is the secret of the yogi. Sorry—the secret of the yoginī, you say it should be.”
“That's the feminine,” I said weakly.
She had put her yoga pants on, and was headed for the iPad. She flicked off the sitar music . “Then I'm a yoginī,” she said, “and that's that.”
“Group or no group,” I said, “I'd really like to see you again. We should do another coffee.”
Valeria shook her head. “No, it will have to be the group. We had our one date and that's enough.”
“What? Why?”
Valeria flicked off the lights. “Dimitri,” she said, “let's face it. You're not really my type.”
§§§
Image Credits: DAUGHTERS OF THE GODDESS, CC BY 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons