Cara Lockwood - The Big Break

“Good to see you, Po!” Kai said, and meant it. Seeing him happy and healthy meant something. It reminded him how precious life was. In this moment of pure joy, Kai didn’t think surfing even mattered. He wondered why he had stayed away from Po for so long. The elation on his innocent face warmed Kai’s heart. He felt better than he had in months.

Kai caught the disapproving look on Jun’s face and put Po down, suddenly noticing how much the boy had grown in a year. He’d lost some of the baby fat he’d carried then. His dark hair was shorter, but the devious smile on his lips as his mother whispered something in his ear was exactly the same. In his hand, he clutched a plastic Spider-Man figure, and he was dressed nearly head to toe in clothes depicting the web slinger.

Thinking back to the tsunami, Kai remembered Elmo tennis shoes as the boy scrambled up the stairs to the second floor of the day-care building just seconds before the first wave hit. Kai could hear the loud chest-thumping roar of the wave even now, could feel it reverberating in his bones.

“I have a poster of you in my room!” Po exclaimed, breathless. “You’re like this!” Po mimicked a surfing pose.

“A poster, huh?” Kai glanced over at Jun.

“He saw it at the store and wouldn’t let us leave until I promised to get it for his birthday,” Jun admitted as she juggled the beach bag, a bottle of water and a clipboard.

“Can I take that?” Kai again offered to take the bag, but she resisted, moving her shoulder away from him.

“I’m fine,” she said, tightly, like a woman who didn’t want help. She probably didn’t like men who opened doors, either. Stubborn and independent, he could tell. Yet the obstinate set of her chin just made her look even prettier, a fact she’d probably hate to know. “Can I...uh, we...help you? I’ve got a class here...” She nodded anxiously down at the modest crowd milling about in the shade of palm trees on the beach.

“That’s why I’m here.”

Jun looked at Kai as if he’d grown horns. He wanted to check to make sure his hair wasn’t doing something strange. She cocked her head to one side, her dark ponytail flowing down one pale shoulder as her brown eyes studied him, confused.

“Your free class?” He held up her business card between two fingers and then her face lit up in recognition.

It had been on a whim he’d even come, but after Gretchen had quit, he’d been at loose ends. The card she’d given him had felt like serendipity.

Gretchen’s words still ricocheted around his head. It’s not me who’s quitting. It’s you.

He knew she was right, and yet he didn’t know how to snap out of it, or he would. He glanced at the beach, at the people there in loose-fitting shorts, waiting on class to start. Part of him hoped Tai Chi would help him. But deep down, he knew Tai Chi wouldn’t replace Gretchen’s grueling training sessions. Tai Chi wasn’t the answer, but it was a way to spend the afternoon that didn’t involve heading to a tourist bar and seducing another hotel guest, which he thought had to be an improvement.

Unless it involved seducing a beautiful Tai Chi instructor instead.

He glanced at her fitted leggings and her bare toned calves. Yes, he wouldn’t mind that at all.

“Oh...yes, of course.” Her demeanor changed. “I didn’t expect you today, but you’re welcome to stay. Although today might not be the best class. Po, uh...is usually at day care, but...”

“I bit my teacher!” Po exclaimed, in the blunt honesty of a four-year-old.

“You bit your teacher!” Kai echoed, surprised. “Why?”

Kai saw Jun wince.

“She wanted to throw me in the pool!”

“But I thought you liked to swim,” Kai said, remembering how amazed he had been at the then-three-year-old’s advanced dog-paddling skills in the flood after the tsunami. They’d saved him. The boy’s eyes grew wide and he shook his head slowly side to side. Kai got a feeling then that there was more going on with Po than his mother had let on when she’d dropped by his house. The look on his face when he’d mentioned swimming was plain old fear, and Kai recognized it clearly enough. It was the same way he felt about surfing.

“Po, come along now. We’ve got to start class. If you’d like to join, you’re welcome, Mr. Brady.” Jun infused a formalness into her speech and Kai could almost hear a wall coming up, a protective mom’s instincts. The day-care discussion or one about swimming was not one she wanted to have.

“Call me Kai,” he said, flashing his best smile.

“Yeah, Mom. Call him Kai!” Po exclaimed, jumping up and down and clapping.

“All right,” Jun acquiesced, but Kai noticed she didn’t actually say his name. She looked away from him, a blush creeping up her cheek. “Come on, Po. Let’s set you up so you can build sand castles while Mommy does her class. I need a good helper.”

Po nodded solemnly in a way that showed he was taking this as seriously as a little kid could. He trailed after his mom as the three of them joined the rest of the class on the beach under the shade of some large palm trees. Jun waved to some of the people waiting as she bustled Po over to an outcropping of lava rocks at the edge of the shade, plopping him down on a towel with a bucket and shovel about thirty feet from the ocean. Kai tried to imagine this sweet boy as a wild child who would bite his teacher at day care. He just couldn’t see it.

A man waiting for the lesson to begin sighed loudly near him.

“She brought her kid?” the fiftysomething man groaned, disapproving. “I didn’t pay for a toddler class.” Kai eyed the man with the silver hair in the black T-shirt and frowned. The judgment rolling off him was palpable, and Kai wanted to tell him to give Jun a break. What was she supposed to do? Leave Po in the car to die of heatstroke?

Kai felt defensive of single moms. After all, he’d been raised by one, and then, after she died, he’d been raised by his aunt, who’d done it all by herself. He knew how hard a job it was, and he also knew that this man had no idea at all the sacrifices Jun likely made.

Jun was too far away to hear and Kai was grateful. He hoped the guy kept the rest of his complaints to himself. Jun and Po didn’t need his grousing. Kai took up a position beside him on the far side of the class as the dozen or so people fell into a loose grid in front of Jun. Kai had always thought that Tai Chi was only for older people, but the class included a wide variety of ages, and surprisingly, most of them were men. Jun unzipped her Windbreaker and was now in a sleeveless coral-colored tank and yoga pants. Kai couldn’t help but notice the tight fit of black Lycra down her muscled legs, and instantly, his thoughts went to what it might feel like to run his hand up them. He realized he wasn’t the only man who was thinking that way, either, as most of them stared openly at Jun, some eyes lingering on the hint of cleavage in her scoop-neck tank. Then he understood why there were so many men taking a Tai Chi class. He had no doubt she was good at what she did, but he also knew some of the men in this class probably didn’t care about Tai Chi as much as ogling a hot teacher for forty-five minutes.

If Jun knew that was why she had so many men in her class, she didn’t let on. Her smile was warm but not flirty as she, and everyone else in class, kicked off flip-flops. He did the same and sank his toes into the cool sand.

“I am so sorry we’re getting a little bit of a late start,” Jun said. “I had...uh...babysitting trouble today, so I really appreciate your patience.”

Most of the class seemed fine, but the grumpy man in the black T-shirt let out a disgruntled sigh. Kai glared at him. “Kids,” the man said to Kai with an eye roll as if Kai were in on the complaint.