When Allison ran, her breasts hardly moved, so tightly were they encased in pink Lycra. David stared at her from his armchair, burping up chicken and kale from their dinner. Her steps on the treadmill fell close, unvaried, and he felt certain that if he went hunting for the ruler in his study and managed to find it in the clutter, he could measure them at exactly the same distance apart. 

 

"To the millimeter," he mumbled aloud. He waited for her to notice the sound of his voice, but her eyes were fixed ahead as if she could see a horizon. They compelled his attention, as they unvaryingly did, to the end of their trajectory—a fold in the curtains. He exhaled sharply. The fold was a vacancy. It was a simple curve where light met darkness. If he got up now and shook the curtains, nothing would fall out. Not even dust. Yet, she had stood there earlier, before cooking dinner, before cleaning the counters, before getting on the treadmill. 

 

He wished he'd never agreed to buy that thing; Before the treadmill, when they'd hiked all over the state to secret, off-the-map places, seen bears forage and coyotes feast on prey, bobcats at rest and spawning salmon, she had seemed at one with the very soul of the natural world.

 

He sipped his beer, despondent. There is no animal in her, he thought. Maybe the wild settings had confused him. He could find none of the qualities of panther or wolf that he associated with the running personality. If he could compare her to anything animate, it was an insect.

 

The thought made him tremble. His empty hand clutched at the faded yellow armrest of the sofa. His first idea was of a stick insect, though she curved everywhere, as she ought. He flicked his eyes over her again. Her rhythmic steps on the black belt of the treadmill sounded a frenetic march that made him self-correct: an ant. A lost ant. An ant separated from her colony.

 

He'd seen a PBS special on ants, in the time before the treadmill, when they watched TV together. Ants found their paths to and from their home by smelling. A lab-coated narrator had demonstrated this by holding up a glass on the rim of which he'd brushed ant-scent. An ant placed on this rim would continuously walk in circles, around and around, until it died. 

 

David laughed aloud at the thought, and for the smallest interval between steps Allison glanced toward him. He wanted to make an ant joke to her—about her, but he said "Look at you go!" And gave her a half smile.

 

"Thanks," she gasped.

 

She glanced at him only for an instant, and she almost stumbled. He had a half smile on his face. His skin had a smoothness that was too clean. His surfaces frightened her. She had to look away. Light was glimmering through the gap between the curtains. It often caught her attention, reminding her of their trip to the river:  She had been staring at the bright, reflecting water when something red glimmered. Was it blood? The river trembled, aflood with red. In silent awe, she perceived innumerable salmon, spawning. The water enfolded the salmon in light as they struggled against the currents. "How do they find their way back?" David had asked her, digging a sandwich out of his backpack, his eyes flicking toward the trail. 

 

She increased her incline, watching a small red dot flash on the treadmill's computerized screen. That dot was showing her how far she'd gotten around a track. As she made it to the close of another oval, the whole track winked green for an instant. One hollow burst of green, then everything was black again. She tried to focus on breathing. Tanner, her yoga instructor, said it was all about the breath. The breath led you back to your center, away from the rushing thoughts that overtook you. The breath led you to release. When she lay in his class in corpse pose, she could really breathe. Only then.

 

She closed her eyes, shutting out the unremitting solicitation of red dots. David was mumbling something else—if she asked him what, he'd only say, "Oh, nothing." It was a lure she couldn't bear. The hope, then the barb of emptiness. It cut into her every time.

 

She prodded the speed button, quickened her pace. Sweat dripped down her chest. This morning, Tanner had put his hands on her shoulders as she stood from rolling up her mat. Her shirt had been clinging to the sweat on her body and the long-anticipated pressure of his fingers through the thin fabric pleased her. "I can see this class is difficult for you, but I'm proud you're daring to move out of the comfort zone." He spoke with the resonance of a practiced soother. "That's what it's is all about. Pressing in. Facing yourself. It's the road. . ." She hadn't heard the rest: She was trembling; She was thinking, "I'm a piece of shrapnel, you zen idiot, flying through the air, and I don't know what I'm going to shred." She wanted to to shake him into a state of panic. She wanted to strip off his clothes.

 

The memory of her desire made her sick. And the other women in that class— women just like her—made her want to scream, "Watch out!" They were all ogling Tanner's thighs when he demonstrated Warrior II. They would all learn from the lures and hooks together. "Stay with the breath," Tanner's voice clung to her skin like her sweat. She could only breathe in corpse pose.