Chapter Text
Thursday evenings felt different now. No longer rushed, no longer allowed to be swallowed by stress or unfinished work or guilt over unfinished work.
There was a rhythm to them again, a softness, like the life she and Rumi use to have before their schedules got in the way. And weirdly, enough, Mira knew exactly who deserved the credit, and it wasn’t either of them.
Zoey. The tyrant with a no-phone policy and a deceptively soft demeanor.
Mira still wanted to argue with her rule on principle, but she couldn’t. Not when it was working so well.
She stepped into the house, both relaxed and wound up from her private yoga class, and found the dining table set again. Not candlelit this time, nothing dramatic, just plates and cutlery neatly placed, take-out boxes steaming gently in the middle. Comforting.
Rumi looked up from spooning rice into bowls, smiling softly. “Welcome home, jagiya.”
“Smells good,” Mira smiled, loosening her hair and sliding into her seat, happily accepting the kiss Rumi pressed to her mouth.
“No cooking tonight,” Rumi admitted. “I didn’t have the energy.”
“Take-out is perfect,” Mira said simply, because it was. Because Rumi was here, and they’d be eating together.
She didn’t even feel the urge to check her phone right now. Instead, Mira found herself listening to her wife recount her day, her frustrations this week, her tiny victories. And when the conversation naturally wandered toward yoga, and Rumi’s class on Tuesday, Mira saw Rumi’s face soften even more.
“And Zoey was really sweet,” Rumi murmured, picking at her rice. “She guided me through extra stretches after class. It was… nice. She’s also surprisingly easy to fluster? Like, even I managed it,” she laughed lightly.
“Mm,” Mira replied, sipping her drink.
“And she’s patient,” Rumi continued, almost as if talking to herself. “And she’s really good at reading people. I don’t know, she feels safe to be around, you know?”
Mira watched her, really watched her. Rumi’s eyes shimmered with something gentle. Something warm. Something that sparked every time she mentioned Zoey’s name.
And in that moment, realization settled over Mira with surprising softness.
Her wife was falling in love with their yoga teacher. More than just a crush. Not just a passing spark between two people. Something with the potential to be real.
And the strangest thing was, there was no panic in Mira’s chest. No jealousy. No anger. Zoey wasn’t a threat.
Because Mira understood love in all its complicated shapes. She understood Rumi better than she understood herself. And even she could feel the attraction humming low in her stomach whenever she thought of Zoey.
She wasn’t blind, or delusional.
She might very well be falling too.
She pushed a piece of meat around her plate, debating whether to say something. Whether to point out the very obvious elephant doing a sun salutation in their dining room.
She didn’t even realize she’d gone quiet until Rumi nudged her ankle gently with her foot. “What’s going on in that head?” Rumi asked, voice warm but curious. “You’ve been staring at your plate like it wronged you.”
Mira looked up, seeing her wife’s gentle concern, her open expression. Her trust.
She exhaled, the decision already made. “You’re falling for Zoey.”
Mira just let the words sit there, watching her wife. Rumi blinked. She didn’t look particularly startled, or defensive, or scandalised. Mostly, she just looked thoughtful.
Several long moments passed in silence. Then Rumi set down her chopsticks and leaned back in her chair. “Am I?”
Mira let out a silent little scoff of amusement. “Yeah,” she nodded. “I think you are.”
Rumi leaned forward again. She didn’t scramble to defend herself, she didn’t fluster. She just nodded thoughtfully. “Maybe I am,” she admitted after another long moment. “She’s… easy to fall for, I suppose. Is that… a problem?”
Mira swallowed. Then she shook her head. “Doesn’t have to be,” she told her wife, voice quiet but clear.
“What about you?” Rumi asked gently.
“What about me?”
“Are you?”
Now it was Mira’s turn to lean back. There was no use lying now. She’d started this conversation herself, and she had been fully aware of what would happen. Still, it kind of changed everything.
“Maybe,” she shrugged casually. “I think I might be.”
Rumi reached across the table, fingers wiggling, gesturing for Mira’s hand to join her. The warmth when she took her hand was grounding, steady, familiar. Somehow, instead of feeling like something was breaking between them, it felt like something quietly unfolding.
Something new. Something neither of them had been looking for, but they had both stumbled across. Something that just fit. Rumi gave her hand a soft squeeze.
“Then maybe,” she said, “we don’t have to be afraid of that…”
“Who said I was afraid?” Mira joked in mock defense. Still, she felt something in her settle, her shoulders loosening. This was fine. Things were going to be fine.
Rumi chuckled, getting to her feet without letting go of Mira’s hand. “Okay, jagiya. Let’s go to bed?”
“It’s not even seven- Oh.”
-
Tuesdays were usually slow days. A late start to the day, opening up the studio around lunch, with plenty of time to work through some of the administration before the beginner group drifted in around seven. Predictable, peaceful, and calm. A little boring, even.
So Zoey was caught completely off guard when the studio door chimed open two hours before she expected a single soul, and Rumi stepped inside. Not at all rushed, not stressed. Just moving leisurely, smiling.
“Hi, Zoey,” she said in that soft and sweet way that already made Zoey’s stomach do gymnast-worthy flips.
“H-hi?” Zoey blinked at her, halfway through entering invoice numbers. “You’re early. Really early.”
Rumi gave a small wince. “I know. I had a meeting nearby, and it felt silly to drive home only to turn around and come back here. I hope you don’t mind if I just… hang out here for a bit?”
Mind? Mind?? Zoey would rearrange the entire studio to give Rumi her own personal throne if she asked.
“Of course I don’t mind,” Zoey said quickly. “Stay as long as you want. Seriously.”
Rumi smiled at that, and instead of taking one of the chairs by the window, she walked right up to the front desk and leaned on the counter. Which placed her about two feet away. Comfortably in Zoey’s line of sight.
Zoey’s heart fluttered so hard she wondered if she was going to faint on the spot. “How’s your day been?” Rumi asked, her entire focus on Zoey.
Zoey’s brain instantly forgot how to compute numbers, names, or basic human language. “Oh, uh, it’s been… good. Fine. Normal. Boring. Bills,” she gestured helplessly at the laptop. “Just doing bills.”
“You run the whole studio yourself?” Rumi asked, tilting her head in genuine curiosity.
“I have part-timers during busy season, but most yeah, it’s just me.”
“That’s really impressive,” Rumi smiled. “How did you get into yoga?”
Zoey swallowed. “I, uh… have always had a lot of energy. Lots of thoughts knocking around in here,” she pointed at her head, instantly grimacing. “I found yoga on YouTube, I think back in high school in Burbank. It helped, so I kept doing it more and more and then I got certified and then I realized corporate jobs aren’t for me and so… here we are.”
Rumi laughed softly, making Zoey wish she could get away with recording it and playing it on repeat. “So has this always been the plan?” Rumi followed up. “Owning a studio?”
“No,” Zoey admitted with a little shrug. “It just sort of happened. Had some savings, saw this place up for rent. Took out a loan, signed the lease before my brain could talk me out of it.”
“Sounds brave,” Rumi murmured, seeming to lean even closer.
“It was stupid,” Zoey corrected with a breathy chuckle.
Rumi shook her head. “You seem to have made it work for you pretty well. So, not stupid at all.”
Zoey forgot to breathe for a few moments under Rumi’s gentle praise.
“How old are you, Zoey?” Rumi suddenly hummed.
“Twenty-four?”
Rumi’s brows lifted slightly as she gave a thoughtful nod. “Young for someone who owns a successful business.”
“I started early,” Zoey looked away, suddenly shy.
“You’re very good at it.”
Zoey’s heart fluttered again, harder.
“What’s your favorite animal?” Rumi asked next, like it was the most natural question in the world.
Zoey blinked. “My… what?”
“Favorite animal,” Rumi repeated with quiet amusement. “I want to know more about you.”
“Oh, uh, turtles,” Zoey said after a second. Before she could stop herself, she fired off in a long ramble about different kinds of turtles, their pros and cons, which ones they had at the local aquarium, which one were endangered and why and what was being done to save them and what other measures should be taken if only people cared enough and-
The whole time, Rumi was nodding slowly, listening intently and smiling at Zoey like she was the most interesting woman in Seoul.
It was both thrilling and terrifying.
Other people would have cut her off by now, told her they didn’t need the whole documentary in word-vomit version. But Rumi hummed, asked follow-up questions, spurred Zoey on to keep talking.
Somehow, more than an hour flew by, and Zoey realised her mouth was dry from all the talking, and Rumi was still leaning on the counter, nodding along. Not in a bored, zoned-out kind of way. No, her eyes were sharp, as if she was filing every little bit of trivia away.
Somehow, that made Zoey’s inside even mushier than Rumi had already left them.
“I should get changed,” Rumi eventually muttered, straightening with an illegal little stretch. She reached into her bag, pulled out her phone, and unlocked it to check her notifications.
Except she didnt check at all. She opened the contacts page, carefully placed her phone on the counter and slid it across the smooth wood toward Zoey with slow, deliberate intent.
“Here,” Rumi said, eyes glinting. “Maybe you should put your number in.”
Zoey’s brain, already dangerously off-kilter today, stopped functioning entirely.
“Oh,” she squeaked. “Um. For what purpose?”
Rumi smiled in a way that made Zoey weak in the knees. “Oh, you know,” she practically whispered, leaning in a little more. “Just in case…”
“Just in case,” Zoey echoed with a dumb nod, her voice cracking like a dropped ceramic bowl.
Rumi winked, actually winked, and then turned on her heels, her braid swaying in tune with the movement of her hips.
It took Zoey a good thirty seconds to remember how phones worked. She typed slowly and carefully, triple-checking to make sure she got her number right. She put ‘Zoey the Yoga Instructor’ as her contact name. Professional. Ish.
No other student had her personal number, but she chose not to linger on that right now.
“Get it together,” she whispered to herself, patting her cheeks. “You are a professional adult woman with a functioning career. You can teach one class without combusting.”
The universe, of course, just loved to prove her wrong. And it did so the very moment Zoey stepped through the door.
Rumi was already on her mat. Rumi, in tight shorts and a sports bra.
Not yoga pants. No crop top.
Zoey made a sound in the back of her throat, her eyes fixed on the vision off to the side. If her brain had been working normally, she would’ve either watched where she was going, or stopped walking.
But her brain was fried, so naturally her foot hooked under one of the mats. It tangled, Zoey made a weird step in an effort not to tackle one of her students, her arms pinwheeled, and she went down.
Flat on ehr stomach, limbs sprawled, dignity gone.
A collective gasp swept through the students, all eyes on Zoey’s literal downfall. But Zoey barely heard any of them.
She only picked up on Rumi’s gasp, and then she was rushing over, and warm hands were on her back, helping her upright, brushing her hair out of her face.
“Oh my God, Zoey!” she rushed out, and really, none of this was helping at all.
Zoey groaned, half from the fall and half from the fact that Rumi in tiny shorts was kneeling beside her with concern written all over her perfect face. “I’m fine,” she croaked. “Totally fine. Gravity just… hates me.”
Rumi just smiled, brushing a stray tuft of hair from Zoey’s cheek like they were in a slow-motion romance commercial. Then she stood, helped Zoey to her feet, and returned to her mat. Zoey knew she got caught staring, again, by the quiet snickers from two of her students.
But honestly? Who could blame her?
Zoey started class. She tried to focus on her breathing, her cues, her flow. She tried so hard.
But every time she so much as glanced to the right, Rumi was there. In a warrior pose that should’ve been illegal. In a twist that displayed far too much of that toned, elegant back. In a downward dog that made Zoey considered poking out her eyes and becoming legally blind.
Zoey’s voice cracked twice, mid-instruction. She forgot one of her poses entirely, fumbling for a few seconds before making something up. Students giggled. Rumi smiled smugly.
Class was, all in all, a complete, wonderful disaster.
When class ended, Zoey felt like she’d just run a marathon. Rumi lingered, of course. Standing on her mat, drinking from her water bottle.
“Do you have some time for my private lesson?” she asked after swallowing and licking her lips in a way that had to be deliberate.
Zoey only squeaked.
-
Thursday arrived all too soon.
Zoey was still trying to recover from Rumi’s ‘private lesson’ on Tuesday, which had been filled with exaggerated stretches, soft sighs, little groans, arched backs and jutted hips.
Zoey knew Rumi was trying to drive her insane, entirely on purpose. Like it was a game to her.
She was still thinking about it even now, sweeping the studio floor, ninety minutes to go before her next class. So, of course, the door chimed this very moment to draw her attention to Mira walking in like a queen returning to her personal domain.
Zoey was halfway through her usual greeting when Mira’s phone rang, and she raised her hand at Zoey. “Sorry, one second,” she said with a roll of her eyes. She answered the phone without even looking at who was calling. “I’m at yoga. Figure it out without me.”
She hung up without another word and smiled at Zoey. “Sorry about that.”
“Oh, uh, that’s okay,” Zoey nodded quickly. “I mean, hi! You’re… early?”
Mira hummed thoughtfully. “I guess I am. Gives me a good excuse not to answer my phone for a while,” she smirked, leaning casually against the counter exactly the way Rumi had done two days ago. “I could go and wait somewhere else if I’m bothering you,” she added with a knowing smile.
“No, no, that’s not- It’s all good,” Zoey rushed out, because that was honestly the last thing she wanted.
“That’s what I thought,” Mira nodded. “I’ve been thinking, you teach a class on Tuesdays too, right?”
“I, uh, yes?”
“Would that one be a better fit for me? Maybe I can switch to that one?”
Zoey froze. Absolutely not. No.
If Rumi and Mira ended up in the same class, Zoey would simply perish. She would not survive. The two of them even being in the same room at the same time would surely cause some kind of cosmic imbalance or … something.
She grinned widely, her hands flailing before she could stop them. “Thursdays are… much… better for your progression!”
Mira blinked slowly. “Really?” she asked skeptically.
“Yes! I mean… Your body is adjusting beautifully? Your, uh, rhythm. Breathing! Changing days now could, um, disrupt your…” she waved vaguely, “... your flow.”
“... My flow,” Mira repeated, one eyebrow rising.
“Exactly!” Zoey insisted, nodding too hard, too fast, she had to look like an idiot now. “Thursdays are perfect for you!”
Mira studied her for a beat. Then, slowly, she smirked. “Okay, I’ll stay,” she nodded slowly.
Zoey could only hope Mira didn’t clock her relief as she sent a mental thank you to whichever ancestor was listening.
Judging by Mira’s quiet chuckle, she hadn’t been subtle enough. Still, she didn’t press the issue, and unlike Rumi she didn’t engage in small talk. Instead, she spent her time just watching Zoey, like she was the most interesting event unfolding in front of her.
Zoey was just clicking around on the computer, doing literally nothing but making sure to look busy so she wouldn’t combust.
During class, Mira was still Mira.
She was powerful, focused, sharp. She looked like she was simultaneously trying to conquer yoga and flirt Zoey into an early grave. She hit all her poses with a growing confidence and stubborn determination.
And every time Zoey crouched beside her to adjust a knee or guide her spine, Mira didn’t flinch, no, she leaned into the touch. With purpose.
Zoey spent most of the class biting her lip, ignoring the knowing snickers from the other students while she spent far too much time on Mira to really still be calling herself professional.
Before she knew it, class ended and everyone else left. Mira remained, of course, stretching on her mat, glancing over her shoulder at Zoey with that lazy, dangerous smirk.
“Private time with my favorite teacher?” she asked lightly, making Zoey choke. “We have a deal, remember?”
Zoey nodded, her face hot, her tongue heavy in her mouth. She began leading Mira into the first pose, and when she looked over, she found Mira just watching her, arms crossed, smirking as her eyes raked up and down Zoey’s body.
“Can you show me again,” Mira hummed, her voice low and gravely. “I wasn’t paying attention.”
“You looked like you were paying attention,” Zoey replied with a raised eyebrow.
“Hm. Maybe I was, just… not to the pose,” Mira smirked while Zoey tried not to melt into the floor.
The little private lesson continued like that, with heavy, lingering looks and smirked compliments about Zoey’s flexibility, her form, the way she looked with her back arched.
Mira wasn’t being subtle.
And then, after Mira had winked at her and sashayed into the dressing rooms and Zoey found herself back at the reception desk, it hit her like a brick.
She had a chance. A real chance. With Mira.
And she also had a chance with Rumi.
Her heart seemed to go into overdrive as her mind spiraled.
Oh god oh no oh no no no. How am I supposed to pick?! They’re both… both beautiful. Amazing. Devastating. Perfect. I’m just one small innocent human being why do I need-
“Zoey.”
Mira’s voice cut through her mental haze like a scalpel. Zoey blinked hard. “Huh?”
Mira was standing in front of her, water bottle in hand, hair sticking adorably to her forehead from sweat, expression soft with mild confusion. “I asked for your number.”
Time seemed to crawl to a stop.
“W-why?!” Zoey blurted, immediately regretting it.
Mira just stared at her for a long moment, and then she snorted. “So I can call or text you,” she told her dryly. “Duh.”
“Oh,” she practically whimpered, voice barely a whisper. Mira was still holding out her phone, unlocked, the contacts page open and waiting.
Zoey took it with trembling fingers,t typing in her contact info so slowly, she probably looked like she’d never used a touchscreen before. She saved her number under ‘Zoey (Yoga)’ and added a little lotus flower emoji.
She handed it back and held her breath as Mira looked at the contact. “You’re cute,” she smiled, one eyebrow raised. “See you next week,” she smiled as she tucked her phone away, slung her bag over her shoulder, and gave Zoey a final, devastating wink.
Zoey sank onto the front desk chair, staring at nothing. Her number was in Rumi’s phone. And Mira’s phone. Both flirted with her, both had repeatedly asked for ‘private time,’ and both were perfect.
“Oh my God, what am I going to do,” Zoey whined to an empty studio, resting her head in her arms. “I cannot handle this.”