28. Forced Moves

“If we must live on a desert island, make it fertile and rich with opportunity, not so barren and unyielding that all of our moves would be like forced moves in chess.” —Daniel Dennett

For two days after her fight, Jen didn’t leave the house. The first day, her head felt foggy and her muscles ached. She lay in bed reading the magazine that Britt-Shane had shown her in the locker room, which she had given to Jen on the drive home.

“While most reporters have been discouraged by the actress’s elusive ways, we have followed Jen’s descent into obscurity, her small-town life, and the new passion that now consumes her every waking moment.”

Was this the reporter, Jen wondered? Someone who had been following her around North Middleton, unnoticed, as she “descended into obscurity.” Was Lorna O. Lee the woman who had surprised her at the side of the mat and caused her to lose her fight?

Amid the confusion and disappointment following her knockout, Jen tried had tried to piece together how it had happened. At first all she could remember was the face of the reporter, floating disembodied like a ghost above the mat, dissolving into a flash of white as Jen fell. As she rode home silently in the passenger’s seat of Britt-Shane’s car, the rest of the fight had slowly begun to materialize: the girl’s first hard kick, Jen’s strong counterattack. She had begun to feel confident that she would win, had felt her dominance against the girl. Then the reporter had appeared and ruined it all.

Jen looked down at the magazine and snorted in annoyance. The sound hurt her head, and she thought for a moment that she might throw up. Drank too much, she said instinctively to herself, and then remembered that she hadn’t had a drink in over five months.

She stayed in bed the rest of the morning, watching the small travel alarm clock she had bought at the drug store as it approached eleven forty-five, the time she usually left home for Sunday sparring class. As it crept towards noon, when the class began, she told herself, I could still go. I could be late, she said to herself at eleven fifty-seven. If I left right now, I’d get there fifteen minutes past the starting time.

As though to test this theory, she raised one arm up off the bed and held it in the air. Then she dropped it back down to the bed, exhausted from the effort. No, there was no way she could spar today; there was no decision to be made. Don’t even look at the clock, she told herself, forcing her eyes shut.

Then the clock’s hands both pointed to twelve. Class would be starting right now. Jen wondered whether Britt-Shane was there. She had won her fight yesterday and gone home in a great mood, with a celebratory date already arranged with her new love interest, Brittany. Maybe she’s too hung over for class, Jen thought, feeling a little hopeful. But she knew it was likely to be a false hope. Britt-Shane was no doubt arriving at class right now, receiving a hero’s welcome, congratulations all around. Too bad about Jen’s fight, they were probably saying to her, and maybe she replied, Yeah, Jen really screwed up.

Jen wished she were there to silence their whispers and show how tough she was, how indifferent to her loss. It’s not too late, she thought. I don’t need to be on time the day after the fight. Then she rolled over, closed her eyes, and slept for the rest of the day, dreaming of sparring class and the derision of her classmates.

The next day, she moved from the bed to the couch downstairs, bringing Zen for the Troubled Mind by Thomas Fo with her. It was one of the books that she had special-ordered, and she had only read it once so far. She didn’t feel like starting it from the beginning, so she let it fall open to a page in the middle.

“One of the greatest obstacles to our spiritual progress is excessive focus on our own mistakes. We judge our own mistakes with a harsh condemnation that we would never apply to others. When our friends make mistakes, we tell them to forgive themselves, move on, that no one is perfect. But we obsess over our own mistakes with a kind of reverent fascination. Even when we know objectively that the mistake is forgivable, even when we are forgiven by those we have wronged, we cannot help but be transfixed by our own past mistakes, nurturing them with a fascination that speaks more of love than disgust or self-censure.”

Jen put the book down next and on her stomach and stared at the ceiling, marveling at how Thomas Fo always seemed to know precisely what was going on in her life. But when she picked the book back up and resumed where she had left off, she was even more startled.

“Imagine a boxer who regrets dropping his guard and getting punched. He stops what he is doing, scowls, berates himself for his carelessness. Of course, while he is dwelling on these thoughts, he loses focus on the present moment and gets punched again.

“Any boxing teacher will tell you that one of the most important lessons for a beginning boxing student is not to react to getting hit. The new student will stop the drill each time he makes the wrong move, because he feels that he must spend time recognizing his mistake. ‘Damn,’ he will say, or ‘Sorry,’ or ‘Why do I keep screwing that up?’ That is what our culture, with its focus on self-assessment, tells us we must do—acknowledge the mistake and criticize ourselves preemptively, before others have a chance to do it for us.

“Any moderately experienced student of boxing knows to forget the error and stay in the moment. A fighter must take advantage of each fresh, new moment and the opportunities for success it affords, rather than reflecting on past failures, whether those failures occurred six months ago or six seconds ago.

“We would be wise to emulate the boxer and not allow ourselves to be distracted and weakened by self-criticism. Of course it is important to reflect on our mistakes and learn from them, but only during appropriate times. A fighter reviews his fight once it has ended, noting the strengths and weaknesses of his performance. If he is wise, he critiques himself dispassionately, indulging in neither self-congratulation for his strengths nor self-flagellation for his weaknesses. And no matter what, he must not let the mistakes of the past impair his ability to move positively into the future.”

All right, Thomas Fo, Jen said to herself, putting the book down. I’ll go back to class. Tonight. Then she fell asleep, and didn’t wake up until midnight.

She returned to the academy the next evening. When she arrived for the seven-thirty intermediate-advanced class, Britt-Shane was not waiting at their regular spot in the back by the mirror. Maybe she’s in the bathroom, Jen thought, peering at the door behind her as she stretched, hoping to see Britt-Shane appear.

Once Jen had stretched for five minutes, with no sign of Britt-Shane, she had to accept that her training partner might not be coming to class. Perhaps she hadn’t yet recovered from her victory celebrations, Jen speculated. But explanation didn’t seem too convincing, given that Britt-Shane had been in class every day since Jen had started training, even on a few mornings when her skin had been noticeably greenish and her breath had still stunk like cheap vodka.

As she stood scanning the gym one last time, hoping that Britt-Shane would appear from behind the desk or the mysterious bamboo screen, Master Park came over to her. She wondered what he wanted to say. Her experience had taught her that he conserved his words, at least the ones directed at her, but there was certainly plenty to discuss today, three days after her humiliating loss of her first fight.

He didn’t say anything at first. Instead he just stood and looked at her for a moment, as though waiting for her to speak. Jen thought of saying something about the fight, some acknowledgment or apology for her poor performance. But she remembered Thomas Fo’s words: forget the error and stay in the moment. She resolved not to say anything about her fight unless Master Park mentioned it himself. She would focus on her training right now, today, and moving into the future.

In that case, the first question was who would be teaching her today.

“Where’s…” said Jen, but stopped because she didn’t know what to call her training partner.

“I told her not to come,” said Master Park, interrupting her.

“Oh,” said Jen. “Why?”

Master Park folded his hands across the chest of his white uniform. “She needs to focus on her school. She dropped her statistics class. Did you know that?”

“No,” said Jen, feeling guilty. She had often suspected that Britt-Shane couldn’t be putting much work into her classes if she was at the academy training Jen every night and all weekend.

“I told her take a week off,” said Master Park. “Then she can come back, but only four days a week, like she used to.” He narrowed his eyes accusingly at Jen. She felt the urge to defend herself: It wasn’t my fault, she thought. I never told her to come in every night. It was all her idea.

Instead, she stared silently at Master Park, keeping her expression carefully blank, as she had learned to do back in her days as a yoga student.

She wondered what she would do on the nights that Britt-Shane wasn’t there to train with her. Rob was already leading the rest of the class in some kicking drills. Jen sighed inwardly, resigning herself to a moment she had long anticipated, when she would lose her special status as a private student and move into the regular class. It wasn’t that she minded being part of the group; it was just that Rob always taught those classes. In fact, she had been bracing for the awkward moment that she would have to take instruction from Rob ever since she came to the academy the day after he had kissed her and then confessed that he was in a committed relationship. But the moment had never come; each day, Britt-Shane had arrived and saved her from the unpleasantness.

Jen had avoided being instructed by Rob for so long that she was almost eager for it to happen, just to get it over with already. Besides, she didn’t have any hurt feelings about him anymore, just a vague sense of wariness and distrust.

Realizing that Master Park still hadn’t spoken, Jen said, “Should I go join the class then?”

Master Park shook his head. “No. I’m going to train you,” he said.

“Oh,” said Jen, trying not to let her surprise show on her face. “Okay.” She wondered if she were in trouble for losing her fight. Maybe she had gotten Britt-Shane in trouble, too, for not training her properly. That could be the real reason she wasn’t in class tonight. Queasiness rose up in Jen’s stomach and she wished for a moment that she had not come back to the school, that she had stayed at the lake house for a few more days or weeks or forever.

“Let’s go in the back,” Master Park said.

“In back?” Jen repeated. Now she was really shocked. In her four months at the academy, she had still not learned what lay behind the mysterious bamboo screen. She had asked Britt-Shane several times and only received vague replies: “It’s just a back room,” she would say, as though this weren’t self-evidently the case.

And in fact, when Britt-Shane put it that way, Jen wondered why the space behind the screen fascinated her so deeply. Storefronts had back rooms, and schools had offices; nothing so odd about that. Yet when Master Park emerged from the back, he didn’t look like he was coming from an office. It made Jen think of an exercise they had done in her drama class: emerge from a door as though you had just come from a business meeting, a party, cooking dinner in the kitchen, making love in a bedroom. He seemed to be acting the wrong role every time he came through the door.

I’m probably just imagining it, she thought, as he led her past the screen and through the door that Jen knew lay behind it from her surreptitious observations. Too many acting classes make your mind crazy.

They emerged into a cramped hallway that seemed normal for the space behind a storefront. There were several closed doors along its walls; Master Park opened the one closest to them and led Jen into a small room that she expected to be an office.

Instead, she found herself in a tiny makeshift living room. The linoleum floor, the same adobe color as the floor of the academy, was covered by a dark Oriental carpet. There was a small dining table with three chairs around it; the fourth chair had been pulled out to face the short sofa that sat against one wall. Between the chair and the sofa was a coffee table topped with a neat stack of magazines and a wooden chess set. A small bookcase in the corner held far more books than it was designed for, so many that they had been stacked in vertical piles reaching from the bottom to the top of each of the three shelves.

I suppose this is why he doesn’t look like he’s coming from an office, she thought, although this lounge still seemed a bit incongruous with what she had expected, although she didn’t know quite what that was.

“Have a seat,” said Master Park, pointing at the table.

Jen walked obediently to the table and seated herself in a chair that faced out into the room. Master Park remained standing. So, Jen thought, now I’m going to get a lecture.

“You lost focus,” said Master Park.

“I know,” said Jen. She wanted to add that it wasn’t her fault, that someone distracted her, that reporter, that woman who was stalking her, but she stopped herself. She knew better than to make excuses.

Master Park continued to look at her, and Jen felt that she should say something else. She thought of apologizing for her mistake, promising that it would not happen again. But then she thought of Thomas Fo and remembered that there was no reason to spend unnecessary energy acknowledging her errors. She could not guarantee that it would not happen again, and the way to prevent it was through her future actions, not her words.

If anyone was going to chastise her, she resolved, it was Master Park. She would agree with his assessment, if it was correct, but she would not waste her energy criticizing herself. She returned his gaze silently.

“Do you know how to play chess?” he asked.

She nodded, waiting for whatever analogy he was about to draw. A chess player must not get so focused on his…pawn…that he allows the opponent to capture his…queen? She wasn’t sure about the exact names of the pieces, but she could imagine where this was going.

“Really?” he asked, looking surprised and pleased. “Do you play often?”

Jen was confused. She hadn’t taken his question literally, and now she was afraid that she had inadvertently lied to her teacher for the sake of expediting the conversation. But thinking about it for a moment, she remembered that she had played chess as a child against her grandfather, although that had been almost twenty years ago.

“No,” she said, embarrassed. “Never.”

“Oh, that’s too bad,” said Master Park, his smile fading. “That’s okay. You’re going to start.”

He walked to the bookcase, knelt, and began to shift the books around on one of the shelves.

“Here it is,” he said, pulling out a thin, worn paperback and holding it in the air. He stood and handed the book to Jen.

“Fundamental Strategy for Chess,” Jen read aloud. Then she stopped, incredulous. She looked up at Master Park.

“It’s by Thomas Fo?” she asked.

The smile returned to Master Park’s face. “You know him?” he asked.

“I’ve read all his books,” said Jen. Except she had never heard of this one; she had no idea he wrote about subjects other than Zen philosophy. “Well, I thought I had. I didn’t know he wrote about chess.”

“He has written about many subjects,” said Master Park. “He is a favorite author of mine, and a very dear friend. Someone I know very well.”

“You know him?” Jen exclaimed, her excited voice bouncing off the walls of the small room. She was about to apologize, but Master Park smiled, evidently appreciating her enthusiasm.

“As well as I know anyone,” said Master Park.

Jen opened the book to its title page and stared at the title and author, still incredulous that Master Park was assigning her books by her favorite author. A dear friend. Maybe he would introduce her some day.

“You read this during the regular class,” said Master Park, walking to the door. “After class, we will play.”

Uh oh, thought Jen—she would need to at least remind herself what all the pieces did before then. She turned to the back of the book to see if it had an index.

Master Park walked out the door, then turned back to look at her.

“Do you know why I want you to play chess?” he asked.

Jen closed the book and looked up. “Because chess is like taekwondo?” Jen guessed.

Master Park looked at her skeptically. “How is chess like taekwondo?” he asked.

Damn. She had fallen for it again. Her teacher had tricked her into saying the wrong thing and now he was going to yell at her. “It’s not,” said Jen, quickly. “I was wrong.”

“Of course it is,” said Master Park. “You read and think about how. You’ll tell me when I come back.”

He left, and she opened the book again, now frantic to get started with her ambitious task. In the next hour, she would need to figure out how chess was played, and then how it was like taekwondo.

Chapter 29

27. A Misty Consciousness

"Suddenly I felt a misty consciousness as of something forgotten--a thrill of returning thought; and somehow the mystery of language was revealed to me." --Hellen Keller

Ever since Jen disappeared into small-town Michigan four months ago, many of our readers have been wondering—where is Jen, exactly? What has she been doing? Why has she disappeared from the public eye? Is her new reclusive lifestyle really what she wants, or is it a sign that something is deeply wrong?

In an exclusive story you’ll find only in Celebrity Gape Magazine, we follow Jen where the other news sources have not dared to go. While most reporters have been discouraged by the actress’s elusive ways, we have followed Jen’s descent into obscurity, her small-town life, and the new passion that now consumes her every waking moment.

This new obsession will be surprising to fans who fell in love with Jen in romantic comedies such as Love Sick and Meeting Elizabeth or the workplace farce Free to Chat. While the Jen we know and love is a shy but flirty ingénue who has charmed us playing quirky, off-beat love interests, the new Jen has decided to take her life in a completely different direction: into the world of full-contact fighting.

Yes, you read that correctly—fighting. Jen now spends every waking moment eating, sleeping, and breathing this new obsession.

She has taken up a radical new lifestyle filled with grueling exercise and strict self-discipline. She attends regular classes at a regional taekwondo school, an intensive training program that many have described as a cult for good reason. Jen’s routine includes four hours per day of training at the school, along with lengthy runs and intensive stretching. She follows a strict, high-protein diet to encourage lean muscle development. For at least three hours a week, she “spars” with other students, mostly men, arduous battles that often lead to gruesome, bloody injuries. Jen herself has suffered no fewer than six bloody noses as a result of her training, and subtle changes in her facial appearance have led to speculation that she may have broken her nose or jaw.

Jen’s lifestyle is not the only thing about her that has changed. Her appearance is also radically altered. Jen’s fans would hardly recognize the once slender and feminine actress. She appears to have gained at least fifteen pounds of pure muscle, leading to suspicions that she may be resorting to steroid use. Her trademark long, chestnut hair is now short and black, and she has stopped wearing makeup. She has shed her glamorous designer outfits for sweats and running shorts, and often appears grungy and disheveled.

Sources close to Jen reveal a potential motivation for her newfound passion for fighting. While Jen’s taekwondo school is run by a Korean master, Jen’s main trainer is an aggressive, masculine woman named Shane. Rumors of a torrid lesbian affair between Jen and this statewide taekwondo champion—who, at the age of twenty, is more than ten years younger than Jen—have caused a stir in their sleepy town, where local residents are calling Jen a poor role model for young women. In a time when, more than ever, young people look to celebrities as role models, it is a shame that yet another of Hollywood’s finest has succumbed to temptation and let her fans down.

In the passenger seat on her way to East Lansing, Jen thought about all the monumental occasions for nervousness that she had experienced in her lifetime. She had been through events that would make a normal person sick with fear—movie openings, awards shows, interviews with late-night talk show hosts who nurtured their own fame by making those more famous than themselves look like idiots.

She had seen people who weren’t real celebrities waiting in the green room to be interviewed about their remarkable acts of personal bravery or winning cookie recipes; they would be sickly blue with fright, sweating and shivering at the same time. Yeah, wait until your job depends on this performance, Jen would think to herself, biting hard on her pinky finger to stop herself from chewing up her manicure. She had been through it all, over and over again.

She had never—never, never—been as gut-twistingly nervous as she was at this moment, in this car, on her way to her first tournament.

She supposed it made sense. After all, as obnoxious as those red-carpet interviewers and catty talk-show hosts were, there was about zero chance of her getting kicked in the face by them.

“Hey Brittany, how much farther is it?” Jen asked.

The young woman driving the car stared fixedly at the road and made no acknowledgment of Jen’s question.

“Shane,” said Jen.

“About an hour,” said the boyish young woman who had been training Jen every day for the last four months.

Jen understood why she had changed her name; Brittany was a horrible name for a fighter, and it didn’t raise her credibility with the bouncy sorority girls that Brittany was always chasing after, either.

Still, of all the names, why Shane?

“I love that name,” Brittany had said, when she had first informed Jen of her decision. “It’s so androgynous.”

I suppose, Jen had thought, although neither the males nor the females that the name conjured in her mind were the least bit appealing. In either case, they were blond with fake tans and always wore white tennis outfits.

The renaming had happened almost two months ago, and although that was half of the time that Jen had known Brittany-slash-Shane, she still couldn’t get used to the change. When speaking, Jen tried to use the new name out of respect for the wishes of her friend and trainer. In her mind, however, she had taken to using an amalgam of the two names, “Britt-Shane,” which she had generously chosen over several other alternatives including “Shitney.”

There was nothing in the landscape to distract Jen from her nervousness. The view from the passenger’s seat was as flat and uniform as her original drive to North Middleton had been.

“Stop sighing,” said Britt-Shane, still staring stonily ahead. Based on her friend’s curt responses and heavy jaw grinding, Jen was fairly certain that Britt-Shane was almost as nervous as she herself was. Britt-Shane’s fight would be against another brown-belt, a tough Detroit girl who was known for her intimidating whooping war-cries as she threw roundhouse kicks.

“I didn’t know I was,” said Jen. She took a deep breath in through her nose and tried to let it out silently back through her nose.

“You’re doing it again,” said Brittany.

“I’m nervous,” said Jen, hoping to elicit a similar confession from either Britt-Shane or the male blue-belt who was pretending to be asleep in the back seat. Master Park and two other male brown-belts were traveling down in Rob’s car; the blue-belt boy had been forced into the girls’ car due to his lower rank.

“There’s nothing to be scared of,” said Brittany. The boy remained silent; perhaps he really was asleep, Jen thought. “People hardly ever get injured. This is totally safe.”

Safe? Jen had simply been nervous about forgetting everything she knew and looking like a complete idiot. This would be her first competition, and even though she would only be fighting another green-belt, she was convinced that her opponent would have all the skills of the brown-belts that Jen sparred regularly at the academy. In her anxiety about her performance, she had forgotten to even consider the possible physical danger involved. Thanks, Shitney, she thought.

By the time they reached the university parking lot, Britt-Shane wasn’t speaking, Jen was lightheaded from trying not to exhale too loudly, and the blue-belt was snoring audibly.

They lugged their gym bags through the basketball court where they would be fighting in a few hours. Jen looked across the gym at two women in warm-up pants, one holding a kicking shield while the other threw double jumping kicks at it, and wondered if the kicker might be her opponent. Right next to them was a bored-looking man in a jumpsuit leaning against the wall, and next to him, a raised table that Jen recognized but couldn’t quite place, until she noticed the two oxygen tanks next to it, at which point she realized with a queasy feeling in her stomach that it was a stretcher, and the man next to it, a paramedic.

She was about to point this out to Britt-Shane, who was staring fixedly straight ahead as she crossed the gym, but then she decided it wasn’t really important.

They walked past the entrance to the dressing rooms and into a small studio in the back of the gym where the fighters were warming up. Master Park and Rob were already there training the two brown-belts.

“Go get dressed,” said Master Park without looking up at them, his expression as impassive as ever as a high kick landed on the pad right next to his face. “Then start warming up.”

Once they were changed into workout clothes, Britt-Shane led the two of them through stretches, leg swings, and jumping drills, while the blue-belt boy joined the brown belts. Then, when all the boys had finished training, Master Park came over to the two women.

“Brittany,” he said. “Go train with Rob.” Jen wondered if she would remind him of her new name, but she followed Rob across the room without saying anything.

Then he turned towards Jen. “I’ll train you,” he said.

Jen was startled. During her four months at his school, Master Park had remained as mysterious as when she had first met him. With Britt-Shane instructing her on the side of the room, she had bypassed the normal class sequence, preparing for two belt tests and now for this competition without Master Park’s interference or assistance.

She had assumed Britt-Shane would be the one getting her ready for her fight. But of course, Britt-Shane had her own fight to prepare for, and Master Park and Rob were both there only as coaches.

“Okay, so we’re going to work combinations of kicks,” said Master Park. “That’s what I want you to throw out there. No single kicks.”

Master Park led her through the combinations, first three consecutive kicks, then four, then five, then five faster, then five as fast as she could possibly move.

“Move your hands. Feint,” he said. She attempted to thrust her hand out deceptively between kicks two and three.

Master Park wrinkled his brow in a faint but noticeable signal of confusion and disgust. “Not like that,” he said.

When he had decided that the workout was over, Master Park slapped her lightly on the back.

“Good,” he said. “You’re ready.”

Jen wasn’t sure what to say. Should she thank him? Did she have any questions she needed to ask him?

Master Park interrupted her thoughts before she could speak. “Meet back here at one,” he said. “Try to relax.”

Britt-Shane had already finished her warm-up. “So what do we do now?” Jen asked, as they walked back down the hall towards the locker room.

“Wait,” said Britt-Shane.

“How long do you think we have?” Jen asked, realizing that she had absolutely no idea what time it was.

Britt-Shane heaved her gym bag forward on her shoulder and pulled her cell-phone from an outside pocket. “Well, it’s eleven-thirty now,” said Britt-Shane, squinting at the phone. “So I guess we’ve got a while.”

Jen began to ask where they should wait, but she her friend’s ear.

“That girl from the bar last week called,” Britt-Shane said, in a quick, distracted voice that indicated that she was still listening to the message.

Jen tried to remember which girl this was. Britt-Shane was always carrying on about some girl or another—girls in her classes, girls in coffee shops, girls working at the bookstore. Always bubbly, vapid girls in skimpy outfits. It was hard to keep track.

Then Jen remembered a conversation from last Sunday. Britt-Shane had gone to a friend’s birthday party but limited herself to one beer because she was preparing for the tournament. Jen was always a little shocked by how much time Britt-Shane’s friends spent in bars, considering they weren’t old enough to drink, legally speaking.

“I spent all night talking to the hottest girl,” Britt-Shane had told her as they warmed up for sparring.

“What was she like?” Jen had asked, although she was pretty sure of the answer already.

“Stacked,” Britt-Shane had said, her enthusiasm lighting up her face.

Jen had snorted. “You’re a pig,” she said. When they trained or discussed taekwondo, Britt-Shane was her advisor, her guide, wise beyond her years. But when their conversations strayed to any other topic, Britt-Shane’s youthful perspective became painfully apparent.

Still, Jen was impressed by how many of the objects of Britt-Shane’s desire—paragons of conventional femininity that they were—ended up going home with her boyish but definitely female training partner.

“Haven’t you ever heard of LUG—‘lesbian until graduation’?” Britt-Shane had asked her.

Jen shook her head. “I don’t think they had those back when I was in college,” she said, meaning it as a joke, although Britt-Shane didn’t laugh.

“Besides, why wouldn’t they be into me?” Britt-Shane asked, running her hand through her hair in a gesture that drew attention oh-so-offhandedly to the definition of her deltoid and biceps. “I’m hot. And none of their boyfriends know how to give them an orgasm.”

Britt-Shane hadn’t taken this new girl home yet; she was waiting until after the tournament to see her again.

“What was her name?” Jen asked, as they reached the women’s locker room and Britt-Shane removed the phone from her ear.

“It’s Brittany,” said Britt-Shane.

Jen was confused for a moment, thinking she had called her partner by the wrong name again, before she realized that this was in fact the name of the “stacked” girl.

“That’s funny,” said Jen. “Did you tell her?”

Britt-Shane shrugged. “Tell her what?” she asked. She looked up confrontationally, as though daring Jen to make reference to her given name.

“Never mind,” said Jen. She had enough fights to deal with for today.

They sat down on a bench in the locker room, their gym bags resting at their feet, and watched the other women getting ready. It wasn’t too crowded yet. Fighters who lived close by wouldn’t be arriving so early, while those who lived much farther than North Middleton had come down the night before and were staying in local hotels. It was only those like Britt-Shane and Jen who lived a few hours away who had needed to work a large cushion of time into their travel plans. A few women walked in and out of the locker room, some giggling and gossiping in little packs, others looking tense and irritable. None of them gave Jen a second look as they passed her, and she didn’t expect them to; no one seemed to recognize her lately.

“So,” said Jen, “What are we supposed to do for the next hour?”

“I don’t know what you’re going to do,” said Britt-Shane, reaching into her gym bag. “I brought something to read.” She pulled out a rolled-up magazine, unfurling it with a flourish.

Jen groaned and pretended to be exasperated. Britt-Shane seemed to take great pleasure in embarrassing her by bringing old articles about her to their training sessions. “Look at that long hair,” she would coo. “It’s so shiny!”

Truthfully, the magazines didn’t really bother her anymore. Her self-awareness collage had served its purpose of inuring her to the stories about her. It was like getting kicked in the head, not so bad once you stopped being afraid of it. She didn’t want to disappoint Britt-Shane, though, so she fulfilled her part of the performance dutifully.

“Have you seen this one yet?” Britt-Shane said, waving it around. “It’s new.”

“Wow,” said Jen. She hadn’t been in the tabloids for at least the last few months, as far as she could tell; it seemed that the reporters had gotten bored of following her around North Middleton and taken off to some more fertile ground.

“It’s a really good one,” said Britt-Shane. “And I’m in it.”

“Oh no,” said Jen. “What does it say about you?”

“About us,” said Britt-Shane.

“Oh no,” Jen repeated, dropping her head into her hands.

“It says we’re lov-ahs,” said Britt-Shane, rolling the last word off of her tongue with relish.

“Well, they’re obviously full of crap,” said Jen. “You are so not my type.”

Britt-Shane stuck out her tongue. “That’s not what it says here,” she said. “Look, there’s a picture of us walking.” Britt-Shane held the magazine out towards Jen, but Jen didn’t look at it. “The caption says, ‘Cradle-Robber Jen with her Lezz-bian Girlfriend.” She elongated the second-to-last word as long as she could, so that “girlfriend” came out mostly as a gasp.

“Isn’t that kind of redundant?” Jen asked. “I mean, you wouldn’t be my heterosexual girlfriend, would you?”

“This reporter says she’s been following you around,” said Britt-Shane. “Lorna O. Lee. Have you seen her?”

Jen shook her head. She hadn’t seen anyone following her around; in fact, she had been feeling blessedly, blissfully unfollowed. The thought that someone had been documenting her time in Michigan without her noticing—taking pictures, even—made her feel as violated as she had ever felt back in Los Angeles. Suddenly she wanted Britt-Shane to stop waving the magazine in her face.

Perhaps it wasn’t really the collage that had ended her fear of magazines, she thought. Maybe it was just the comfort of knowing that she wouldn’t be appearing in them any more. Now as she went through her days buying groceries and drinking tea in town or training at the school, she would always be scanning her surroundings for the reporter.

At least it gives me something to think about beside the fight, Jen told herself.

Once the competition had started, Jen and Britt-Shane sat in the warm-up room rather than watching the fights. Jen could hear the yelling of the crowd, and she wondered how many people were watching. She wanted to go out and look, but Britt-Shane advised against it.

“It will just make you nervous to see the fights and the crowd,” she said. “And you’ll be the first one fighting for our school, so there’s no one before you that you need to see. You can watch my fight and the guys.”

Before Jen could ask, Britt-Shane added, “And we’ll all come out to watch your fight.”

It seemed like only minutes later that Master Park appeared in the room and tapped her on the shoulder. “You’re up next,” he said, speaking close to her ear. Jen and Britt-Shane followed him out to the gym. Jen scanned the room: the bleachers were about half-full, and the folding chairs down near the fighting area were all occupied. Britt-Shane spotted the brown-belts and their blue-belt passenger, who were already in the bleachers, and climbed up to sit with them.

Master Park walked her towards the fighting area, stopping at the edge of the mat just in front of the folding chairs. She watched two young men trading kicks, back and forth, snappy kicks that made a loud noise but didn’t seem too painful.

“Stay light on your feet, bouncy,” Master Park was telling her. “Throw combinations, not just one kick. Back her up.”

Jen nodded.

“The most important thing is to stay aggressive,” Master Park said. “Don’t let her intimidate you.”

Then Jen saw the men leaving the fighting area and heard the announcer call her name: “From Master Park’s Taekwondo Academy in North Middleton, Jen Fo.”

That was the name Jen had decided to fight under, in honor of Thomas Fo, whose books on Zen had become Jen’s scripture. She had read the three books from Paula’s mother’s bookshelf several times each, as well as two others that she had had to special-order from the bookstore.

“Let’s go,” said Master Park, patting her on the back as she stepped onto the mat.

As the referee recited the rules of the fight, Jen tried to size up her opponent. It was difficult to make out much of her face through her headgear or her body under the chest protector. What Jen could see were shrewd eyes looking back at her through forcibly relaxed eyelids, long, scrawny arms, a mouth smiling a broad, confrontational grin, made all the more sinister by the black plastic mouthpiece that filled the space where her teeth should be.

Be aggressive, Jen thought, as the referee started the fight. She bounced on her toes, the girl bouncing across from her, each one waiting for the right moment for the bounce to launch her into a series of kicks.

Jen started to throw her first kick, saw the girl preparing her counter, and stopped herself mid-bounce.

A few more bounces, and the girl flew in at her. Jen let herself get chased backwards for a moment, then jumped and threw a spinning kick back at the girl, hitting her squarely in the center of her chest protector.

This isn’t so bad, she thought. Those kicks she just threw weren’t even hard.

She bounced a little, getting ready to make her move. Be aggressive, she told herself. Throw combinations of kicks.

Jen began to lift her leg, but the girl was already flying in at her, slamming her legs against one side of her body and then the other. Jen moved forward just in time to feel the girl’s heel strike the edge of her jaw.

She stumbled backwards, shocked. That kick was hard—that was all she could think. Hard. I’ve never felt anything that hard.

She looked back at the girl, who had retreated for a moment, still bouncing, her skinny arms raised in front of her. She looked a little blurry around her edges.

I’m going to kill you, Jen thought.

She moved in, and felt the confidence of her training come back to her. Combinations of kicks, hard as you can throw them, she told herself, hitting the girl in the stomach, the head, the rib.

The girl winced visibly, and Jen felt triumphant. She didn’t need anything more from this fight; that look was enough.

No, she thought. Move in while she’s off-balance. Like she should have done to me. That, thought Jen, was her mistake.

She followed the girl in, her leg loaded up in a fake, which the girl was prepared to act upon. Jen’s other leg was already shooting out to beat her kick. There was no way the girl was getting out of this one.

Right at that moment, in her peripheral vision, Jen saw a familiar face, a woman, sitting in one of the folding chairs at the side of the mat. Mousy, tired-looking, deep wrinkles around the eyes. Where had she seen that face before?

It was that reporter, she realized, even as her kick was connecting the girl’s body. The image still hung in her head, even though Jen had turned and couldn’t see the woman anymore. That reporter from the co-op all those months ago. Jen’s second and third kicks were hitting the girl’s body again, as the girl backed up to try to avoid them. What was that reporter doing here?

And then the girl’s foot hit Jen on the side of her temple, and all that Jen felt was vibration. She couldn’t see the girl anymore, just the referee standing over her, and then Master Park. I’m okay, she said, I’m fine. I can keep fighting. They didn’t seem to hear her, and actually, she couldn’t hear herself, either. She tried to raise her hand to show that she was all right, but her muscles wouldn’t move yet.

“Shhh,” said Master Park, as the referee waved his arms to call the fight.

Chapter 28

26. Only Half Real

"The absolute absence of a burden causes man to be lighter than air, to soar into the heights, take leave of the earth and his earthly being, and become only half real, his movements as free as they are insignificant." —Milan Kundera

During Jen’s first week on her own in Michigan, Becky left six messages on Jen’s cell phone. Since she didn’t get reception at the lake house, Jen checked the messages every evening as she drove to taekwondo class. She always swore to call Becky back on the drive home, but the class left her too tired for conversation.

Finally, on a Tuesday morning, Jen called Becky from the phone in the lake house, feeling guilty for running up Paula’s mother’s phone bill. She had some things on her mind, and while she wasn’t sure she wanted to hear Becky’s opinion about them, she felt that just talking to a friend might help her clear her head and think more rationally.

“So,” said Becky. “What have you been doing with yourself out there? Did you find a yoga class yet?”

“No,” said Jen.

“That’s too bad,” Becky said. “You will, though,” she added. “There’s got to be something.”

Becky’s chipper tone waned at the end of her sentence as doubt crept into her voice. “Well, if not in that town, somewhere in Michigan.”

“I’ve been going to this taekwondo class,” Jen said. “For about a week now.”

“Taekwondo?” Becky said, laughing. “Really?”

“Yeah,” said Jen, a little annoyed that Becky sounded so surprised.

“How did you get involved with that?” Becky asked.

Jen wasn’t sure what to say. She didn’t want to tell Becky the story of Rob, at least not yet; the disappointment and embarrassment were still too fresh. She couldn’t think of a reasonable lie that would be simple enough to make sense, though.

“The cashier in the grocery store recommended it,” she said.

“Oh, that guy at the co-op?” Becky asked. “He was cute.”

“Yeah, I guess,” said Jen.

To distract Becky from that line of conversation, Jen described the classes she had been attending religiously, every weeknight at six-thirty plus Saturday morning, for the last week.

Although the first day’s workout had made Jen so sore that she had been tiptoeing down the stairs from her bedroom like an old lady ever since, she not only continued to go to class each evening, but practiced her lessons every morning in the back yard. It was really quite lovely to get out of bed, make a cup of tea, and then do yoga and taekwondo outside by the lake. On the warmest day of the week, she had even gone for a swim afterwards. Then she would stay in the house reading (she had finished Zen for Times of Crisis and started on Zen for Everyday Living) or take a walk in the woods around the house.

She had avoided going into town for fear of running into the paparazzi again, instead living off the dry and canned goods that Becky had bought. There was plenty to eat, but the lack of fresh produce was becoming intolerable. The only place Jen knew to shop was the food co-op, though, and she didn’t want to see Rob any more than she had to. She kept intending to look for another store, but it always seemed easier to just stay at home and eat canned corn or beans.

By the time it reached six o’clock each evening, time to leave for class, she was restless and itching for human interaction. It was perfect timing; she didn’t mind the solitude during the day, almost enjoyed it, but the prospect of staying home in the dark forest alone as the sun went down seemed hopelessly depressing. She happily climbed into the S.U.V. and drove out to the strip mall at the edge of town.

Brittany had greeted her at the door each day. “Go warm up,” she would say, “and then we’ll work on your forms.” Jen had learned all of the first form, more stomping and blocking and punching, and was supposed to start on the second one this week. She had continued to work on her roundhouse kick, and had learned to throw a front kick as well. Brittany hovered around her like a personal trainer, giving Jen detailed corrections about the angle of her leg, the snap of her foot, ignoring all the other students, who took their instructions from Rob or Master Park.

Jen wondered how Brittany had time to teach class every single night. It seemed a weighty time commitment for someone so young, who presumably either attended college or had a day job.
And when did she do her own training, Jen wondered?

Even Rob took nights off. He had missed two evenings so far. Jen didn’t want to notice, but she couldn’t help it. Their contact had been minimal at the school. He said hello if they happened to cross paths, and she usually nodded in response, but otherwise they did not speak to each other.

With all the personalized attention from Brittany, Jen was advancing quickly. When she watched her own roundhouse kick in the mirror, it wasn’t half bad. Her foot even pivoted now, she had noted with pride and some awe just the other night. She looked over at the students in the general class, training with Master Park in the center of the room. None of their roundhouse kicks looked as good as hers, despite the fact that she was still segregated from the rest of the class as a “new student.” That boy Brittany had pointed out still couldn’t pivot his foot. Jen wondered when she would start training with the regular class; any day now, she imagined, she would be promoted.

The weekend was the only thing that had broken her routine; on Saturday, the beginners’ class was held at ten in the morning, and on Sunday there was no beginners’ class at all. Jen had gone to watch the sparring class instead.

It was the first time she had seen Brittany in action. She was one of only two women there; the other was small and skinny and wore a yellow belt. Jen watched in admiration as Brittany patiently but firmly overwhelmed the girl, throwing three kicks for every one that the girl threw, several times sending her flying across the floor with what looked like a donkey kick to her stomach.

Brittany went on to spar each of the men who had shown up to the class. Only one of them seemed to be better than her; it was Rob. Several times he landed what looked like hard kicks to Brittany’s face and stomach. Brittany appeared unflappable, bouncing right back up each time she was knocked over, but once Jen thought she saw her lower lip trembling just a little.

As Jen watched Rob spar the yellow-belted girl, Master Park seated himself on the folding chair next to Jen’s.

“What do you think?” he asked her.

It was the first time all week that he had seemed to notice or acknowledge her presence in the class. She wasn’t sure how to respond; she knew from the discussion about “health” that he was fussy about wording, and she didn’t want to say the wrong thing.

“Scary?” he suggested.

Despite her fear that this was a trap, she decided to agree.

“A little,” she said.

He leaned in a little closer towards her ear. “You’ll be doing this in three months,” he said to her.

That had been the first alarm. And then, just last night, something else had happened, something that showed Jen that she needed to make a decision, now, immediately, as to how involved she wanted to get with this whole taekwondo thing.

Brittany had finally mentioned something about her everyday life, that she was taking an economics class. As Jen had suspected, Brittany was a student at MNCMU.

“It’s amazing that you can do your homework when you’re over here so much,” Jen said. “Don’t you ever get a night off?”

“Sure,” said Brittany. “I usually only teach three nights a week."

Brittany was giving Jen that look again, that steady stare, like she wanted to tell Jen something important. Jen had seen it a few times since that first night of class. A nervous, sinking feeling was growing in her stomach.

“I’ve been coming in extra to train you,” Brittany said.

“I don’t date women,” Jen blurted out. Then, not wanting to sound bigoted, she added, “I mean, I don’t know if I date women. I’m just trying to be on my own right now.”

Brittany began to giggle. Her laugh was surprisingly high and bubbly for someone so boyish.

“Don’t worry,” said Brittany, slapping Jen cordially on the shoulder. “I don’t want you to be my girlfriend. I want you to be my training partner.”

“What?” asked Jen. That didn’t make any sense. “I don’t even know what I’m doing. I’ll never catch up to you.”

“You will if I teach you,” said Brittany. “I’m a really good teacher.”

These two brief conversations, the one with Master Park and the other with Brittany, had been troubling Jen all morning. She didn’t mention either of them to Becky as she described the taekwondo class. She tried to minimize the impact the class was having on her life, not wanting Becky to know how solitary Jen had been otherwise, how confused she was about this new activity that was trying to suck her in like a cult.

“Sounds fun,” Becky said, after Jen told her about the forms and kicking practice.

“Yeah, pretty fun,” Jen replied nonchalantly.

“So, aside from hearing how you’re doing, there are a couple of other reasons I needed to talk to you,” Becky said. Her voice sounded strained and apprehensive, and Jen had the feeling that bad news was coming. She braced herself to find out what Becky’s mysterious illness was.

“Yeah?” Jen asked in a casual, lighthearted tone that sounded entirely forced. “Like what?”

“Well,” Becky said, “you might not like this first one. It’s about Groundbreakers. They want me to do this survey, and I’m supposed to get people who know me really well to answer a few questions. I didn’t want to ask you because I know you hate Groundbreakers…”

“I don’t hate Groundbreakers,” Jen said, relieved but defensive, although she realized as she denied it that it was in fact pretty close to true.

“You know what I mean,” Becky said. “Anyway, I couldn’t think of anyone who knew me nearly as well as you do, so I hope you don’t mind.”

“Of course I don’t,” said Jen, feeling bad that Becky had hesitated to ask her. Didn’t Becky know that Jen would be happy to endure a little discomfort to help Becky out? “As long as I don’t have to go to any of those stupid seminars,” Jen said.

“Great,” said Becky. “Okay, here’s the first one.” She enunciated more clearly to indicate that she was reading from a paper: “What are my greatest strengths? Please be specific.”

Several mean jokes popped into Jen’s head as responses, but she opted for a flattering one instead: “Oh, well, how long do we have?” she asked.

Becky laughed uncomfortably. “Thanks,” she said. “I’m sorry you have to do this; it’s pretty embarrassing.”

“No, no,” said Jen, “This one is easy.” And she meant it. Despite the recent tension between them, Jen really could list Becky’s positive attributes all day long. “Let’s see. You’re supportive, caring, non-judgmental…”

“Hmph,” said Becky, seemingly disagreeing with this last one.

“Well, you’re a little judgmental,” Jen conceded. She remembered how she had slept with Skipper just to get into the tabloids and make Bradley jealous, how her plan had backfired and caused so much trouble for Becky. “But not without a good reason.”

“Okay,” said Becky, sounding as though she had just finished writing this down.

“Wait, there’s more,” said Jen. She thought of the quality she most admired about Becky, the one that she had so often wished she possessed herself. “If you want something to happen, you make it happen. You never sit around waiting or wishing for things to happen. You take action, and it always works out.”

There was one notable exception to this characterization of Becky, Jen thought, but she didn’t say it aloud. Becky’s weakness. But this was about Becky’s strengths, and there was no reason to ruin the good mood.

“Thanks,” said Becky. “That’s a very sweet thing to say.” Becky’s voice warmed for a moment with a flush of sentimentality that Jen had seldom heard from her.

Then she regained her business-like persona. “So the next question is: What aspect of my personality or behavior do you think could use improvement? Please explain how so.”

Jen hesitated for a moment, and Becky added, “You can be honest.”

Again, Becky’s weakness popped into Jen’s head. But it was something that would hurt Becky’s feelings. Really there was just no reason to bring it up. She had learned years ago that there was no point telling people about problems they couldn’t fix. She searched her mind for something that wouldn’t make Becky upset.

“You’re kind of bossy sometimes,” Jen said.

“I knew you would say that,” Becky responded before Jen had even finished her statement.

“Well, just sometimes,” Jen added.

“No, you’re right. I’m bossy,” Becky said. “You of all people know that about me.”

Jen was relieved that so far she had managed not to upset Becky. This is going pretty well, she thought.

“Okay, last one,” Becky said. “What would you tell me if you knew I couldn’t get upset about it? I’m not allowed to get angry or even ever refer to it again.”

Becky’s weakness. I’m not going to say it, Jen resolved. “Hmm, that’s tricky,” she said, stalling for time.

“It could be anything,” said Becky. “Anything you’d normally be scared to tell me.”

“What is the purpose of this again?” Jen asked.

“It’s to help me learn more about myself,” Becky said. “To help me face realities I might not notice or want to see.”

Jen’s resolve wavered. Sure, she hadn’t wanted to tell Becky about weaknesses she couldn’t fix, but that was when she thought Becky was looking for ways to improve her life. If she just wanted self knowledge, if that was what she really wanted…

“Okay,” said Jen. “You’re never going to be an actress.”

Jen could hear the sound of Becky sucking in her breath; then silence.

Jen felt the impulse to say something else, to qualify her statement in a way that would make Becky feel better. But instead she just let the silence stretch on, interrupted. She asked, Jen told herself, so she wanted to know.

Okay,” said Becky. Her voice sounded shaky, like she might cry.

Becky didn’t say anything else for a minute more. Jen waited.

Finally, Becky spoke again. “Why not?” she asked, her voice perky with forced interest, but Jen could hear that she was still upset.

Jen was silent for a moment more as she considered the question. She had always known: Becky wasn’t an actress. Becky was a yoga teacher. Becky was an accountant. Becky was a personal assistant. Becky was a public relations whiz. Becky made a killer lasagna; even the simple salads she prepared for Jen tasted so much better than the ones Jen made herself. There seemed no reason for someone like that to be running around to auditions, Jen reasoned, doing stupid commercials, when she actually had real skills to offer to the world.

It wasn’t an insult, Jen realized. It was a compliment. Being an actress was the insult, the lowly thing, the last resort. Becky had so much more to offer the world.

“You’re good at too many things,” Jen said. “You’re not desperate enough.”

“You’re just saying that,” Becky retorted. “To make me feel better.”

“No, I’m really not,” said Jen. “It’s the truth.”

“But you’re good at things,” Becky said. “And you were an actress.”

Becky’s use of the past tense stung a little, and Jen wondered if she had phrased it that way on purpose, to spite her. She decided to ignore it, though, since she had just hurt Becky’s feelings, and anyway this was supposed to be an honest conversation with no retaliation. Jen wondered if Becky was supposed to be arguing with her like this; it seemed to qualify as “getting upset.”

“I’m good at things like what?” Jen asked, wondering if Becky would come up with anything.

“You’re good at yoga,” Becky said.

“Not very good,” Jen said. “Not like you.”

“And you used to be good at some of your classes at school,” said Becky. She’s really in over her head here, Jen thought, almost feeling sorry for her. “You were good at English, weren’t you?”

“I was okay at it,” Jen said. “See, you’re just proving my point if you have to ask.”

A strange anxiety began to creep over Jen that she couldn’t quite identify, like she had just momentarily forgotten about some tragic news but would remember again in a moment. She searched her mind for a moment for the source of the feeling before deciding it was best to try to forget about it.

“Anyway,” Jen said, “This interview is about you. I’ve seen you at auditions, and you seem…”
Jen had to stop and think. She knew something seemed off about Becky’s performance, but it was difficult to put into words.

"Seem like what?" asked Becky.

Jen remembered her own early auditions. It wasn’t that she had been such a good actress; even in her own memory, she could remember forced lines, wooden delivery, exaggerated emotion. But she also remembered the desperation at those auditions, how she had absolutely nothing else to live for. Every last ounce of her will had been poured into her dialogue, her life preserver, saving her from having to figure out what she wanted to do with her life, what she wanted to be.

Jen returned to her earlier assessment: Becky wasn’t desperate, and that lack of desperation really showed.

“You look distracted,” said Jen. “You don’t seem like you’ve been awake for nights on end obsessing over the audition. You seem like you’ve just come from doing something else that was more important.”

“So what are you trying to say?” Becky asked, still in her hurt-but-brave voice. “Are you telling me I should give up? Stop going to auditions?”

“No,” said Jen in a patronizing voice, a voice meant to imply, “That’s not what I meant at all,” even though it was what she meant, truthfully. Now that the idea had been set free from its secret hiding place in her brain, Jen realized that she thought Becky’s acting career was a giant waste of her energy and talent.

“Well, I am going to stop,” Becky said.

“Becky,” said Jen.

“At least for a while. Not because of what you said,” she added. “Because of the other thing I need to tell you.”

This was it. Jen took a deep breath and waited for Becky’s news. Then she couldn’t wait any more; she blurted it out herself.

“You’re sick,” Jen said.

“I’m pregnant,” Becky said.

“Oh!” Jen exclaimed, her surprise pouring raw and uncensored into her voice. “That’s funny.” Jen slapped her hand across her own mouth before she could say any more; she had been about to note the odd coincidence that she had just found out she wasn’t pregnant.

Becky sounded as though she found this response suspicious. “Why’s it funny?” she asked.

“Oh, it’s not,” said Jen. “I meant surprising.”

Now that Jen had a moment to think about it, it really was surprising. Becky hadn’t been dating anybody, as far as Jen knew. Granted, they hadn’t been communicating well lately, but a boyfriend seemed like the sort of thing Jen would have heard about.

“With who?” she asked, realizing as soon as she said it that her incredulous tone was horribly offensive.

Trying to mitigate her rudeness, she added, “I mean, who have you been…You haven’t…” Damn, Jen thought. She was getting this conversation all wrong. There must be a correct way to construct this sentence, but she couldn’t figure out what it was.

“Chase,” said Becky.

“Chase?” Jen repeated, no longer making any effort to hide her astonishment. “Isn’t he gay?”

“Yeah, so?” Becky said. “Gay men have sperm just like straight men.”

“But did you guys have sex?” Jen asked. The clinical nature of Becky’s statement had her wondering if perhaps they had made some sort of alternate arrangement.

“A few times,” Becky said. “Right when we started hanging out together. We were drinking a lot,” she added, by way of explanation.

“I was so worried about you,” Jen said. “You looked so sick when you were here. I thought you were dying or something.”

“I’m sorry to scare you,” Becky said. “I wanted to tell you earlier, but I wasn’t sure if I was going to keep it.”

“So you’re keeping it?” Jen said. Damn, more rude questions, she chastised herself. It was so difficult to talk about pregnancy; there were more impolite things to say than acceptable ones.

“Yeah,” said Becky, evidently not offended; she sounded as though she herself found it a bit surprising. “I talked to Chase about it, and he’s ready. He actually seems pretty excited to be a dad.”

Jen tried to envision Chase cradling an infant in his oversized arms, but the image that came to mind was him accidentally crushing it—she thought it might be a scene from a book but couldn’t remember which one. “I squished the little baby,” Chase-in-her-mind said sadly, waving it around by its foot.

“Us raising a kid together, it’s the ideal set-up, if you think about it,” Becky was saying. “I mean, I’m not sleeping with him.”

“Anymore,” Jen said.

“Right,” Becky said. “But we spend all our time together. He’s my best friend. I mean, beside you,” she added quickly.

“Right,” Jen said.

“I mean, kids ruin marriages,” Becky said. “But we won’t be married, or living together, or even a couple. So we can really focus on the kid without worrying so much about our relationship.”

“It does sound nice,” said Jen, in part to appease Becky, although in reality Jen could see the value in her reasoning.

The more Jen thought about it, once they had said their goodbyes and promised to talk again soon, the more she really did see what a good arrangement Becky had stumbled into. A gay best friend father wouldn’t leave you for another woman, couldn’t cheat on you and destroy your family. When Jen used to envision herself having children with Bradley someday, she had always worried how a child would affect their marriage. She had seen so many women’s husbands become frustrated with the hectic home life, the mother’s focus on the children instead of the him, the lack of sex—and there was the nanny, so young and cute and available. A gay father, Jen thought, was probably the best way to ensure that he would always be in the baby’s life, as well as the mother’s. What a happy life it would be for Becky, what good news.

Jen realized with surprise that she was jealous. Up until this moment, she hadn’t been sure how she felt about her own potential pregnancy; now she was starting to feel pretty sure that she was a little bit devastated to have lost the baby she hadn’t quite admitted to herself that she was expecting.

And something else about that conversation was bothering her, she thought, staring pensively at the living room wall as she paced the floor. In a tribute to Thomas Fo, she had begun to cut out the most embarrassing passages from the magazines and tabloids she had purchased last week and tape them to the wall across from the sofa. She was fashioning a collage of shame to remind herself of her old life, just like Fo’s stack of video cassettes.

Her eye fell on a shiny clipping: “Jen’s lackluster performances over the last five years have caused film critics to speculate that she may be developing a serious drug habit.”

Though she had read this sentence at least ten times already, Jen still winced. The fact that she had quite decidedly not been on drugs made the criticism all the more cutting, especially since the other part of it was the truth: Jen’s recent performances, while not flops, had all been categorized by the press squarely as disappointments.

Suddenly she remembered what was making her uneasy. It was all that talk about her not being good at anything. What had always been an abstract source of self-criticism was about to become a concrete obstacle in her life: if she wasn’t going to act, what would she do? She wanted to work at something, to become really good at something, to dedicate herself with the level of attention that she so admired in Becky.

It’s taekwondo, she said to herself. I’m really going to do it.

She headed to the back yard to practice her forms and kicks. All of her earlier doubt and anxiety about the class became irrelevant in an instant; she had decided.

Chapter 27

25. As Much as a Man

“I have ploughed and planted, and gathered into barns, and no man could head me! And ain't I a woman? I could work as much and eat as much as a man—when I could get it—and bear the lash as well! And ain't I a woman?” —Sojourner Truth

Master Park’s Academy of Taekwondo. If she hadn’t seen the sign, she wouldn’t have believed she was in the right place.

It was exactly six fifteen when Jen pulled into the parking lot of a forgotten-looking strip mall. She double-checked the address she had found in the phone book, hoping she hadn’t messed up reading the map that she found in the car.

She drove the length of the mall, reading the names on the signs above each storefront—Davidson’s Vacuum Repair, Sew Mart, North Middleton Medical Supply and Wheelchair Outlet, none of which seemed to be open for business—before finding her destination at the far end of the parking lot: a retail space marked only with a small sign in the window. Behind the sign, the bottoms of the windows were blocked with bamboo and paper screens, obscuring the view. Still, she could see the vague silhouettes of bodies moving inside.

“So this is really it,” she said to herself, taking her choice of spaces in the vast, vacant expanse of the parking lot.

As she walked up to the storefront, she felt her stomach turn over. The thought popped into her head, unbidden: there’s still time to leave. “Don’t be silly,” she said aloud, looking behind her as soon as the words had left her mouth to make sure no one was there to witness her talking to herself.

She opened the door and was engulfed by the steamy smell of sweat and bleach. She walked into a single, long room, the length of a regular store. One side of the room was a solid wall of mirrors; other mirrors were placed around the room at sporadic intervals.

There was a small reception desk right next to the front door, but no one was sitting at it. Jen scanned the room but saw no sign of Master Park. She looked around for a door that might lead to a back room, but could only see a bamboo screen in the back of the room, similar to those that blocked the windows in the front. There was a set of cubbies by the desk, with shoes in them. Jen balanced on one foot and then the other to remove her own sandals.

Along the edges of the room near the mirrored walls, a handful of students in white taekwondo uniforms were doing stretches on the scuffed linoleum floor. One girl’s eyes widened as she stared longways at Jen from her side-stretch; she appeared to be about fifteen years old. Another girl sat up from her forward bend to look. One young man, perhaps in his early twenties, glanced at Jen quickly before returning his focus to an obviously painful attempt at the splits. The few other students, also male, continued stretching without seeming to notice her. Their exaggerated seriousness reminded her of her yoga classes, except with a reversed ratio of male to female students.

Jen was about to sit down on one of the folding chairs by the front desk when Master Park appeared, wearing his taekwondo uniform, from behind the screen in the back of the room, followed by two students. The first student appeared for a moment to be a prepubescent boy, yet he was almost as tall as Master Park. Jen squinted her eyes—her distance vision was not strong as it used to be, she noted—and realized that the student was actually a young woman with broad shoulders and very short, stylishly mussed brown hair.

The second student who emerged, although it took Jen a moment to recognize him in the white uniform rather than his usual dark t-shirt, was Rob. She had hoped not to see him here, in the beginners’ class; she realized with dismay that he might be teaching. As he crossed the floor towards the group of stretching students, he caught Jen’s eye, looked startled, and then gave her a kind of cursory smile that looked more like a grimace before turning to walk towards a group of male students.

Master Park approached the front of the room with an air of professional formality. Jen started to say hello to him, but he turned and walked behind the desk, only beginning to speak to her once he had seated himself.

“So, your first class,” said Master Park, in a friendly but detached tone, as thought he might or might not remember that he spend two hours with her just yesterday.

He handed her a clipboard and a pen. “Please fill out this student information sheet.”

She sat down on a folding chair and began filling in blanks. Most of the questions were fairly standard--her name, her age, her method of payment. Two questions at the bottom, however, could not be answered so straightforwardly.

“Have you studied martial arts in the past?” the first question read.

She paused to consider whether yoga counted. Then she decided to err on the side of greater simplicity and less disclosure.

“No,” she wrote.

The second question asked, “Do you have any medical conditions, such as epilepsy, heart condition, broken bones, or pregnancy, that would affect your ability to undertake a rigorous course of exercise?”

Although she knew immediately what her answer would be, she felt bad writing it down, in one case because she was lying and in the other case because she was not.

“No,” she wrote again.

Just as Jen was putting the clipboard down on the desk, Master Park began to address the class in a voice that seemed both commanding and surprisingly quiet at the same time.

“If it’s your first week, please come to the front,” Master Park announced. Two of the boys stood up from their stretches and came to join Jen by the desk. Though Master Park hadn’t said anything to them, Rob and the boyish girl came over as well. Rob stood slightly behind the girl, so that Jen could not see his eyes. She looked at the girl instead; up close, Jen could see a patch of tattooed skin peeking out from under the girl’s collar. Jen looked down at their uniforms and noticed Rob had a black belt, while the girl’s belt was brown. She knew black was above brown, but didn’t know by how much. She hoped that it wasn’t very far above; hoped, in fact, that this girl could secretly kick Rob’s ass if she wanted to. She looked pretty strong and not so much smaller than him.

“This is Jennifer’s first day,” Master Park said to Rob and the girl, nodding his head towards her. Jen groaned inwardly at this confirmation that Rob was a teacher for the new students.

“I’ll work with her,” the girl said quickly. Jen let out an involuntary sigh of relief, which she tried to disguise by clearing her throat loudly.

“Great,” said Master Park. He turned towards Jen. “Brittany is a senior student here. She will be leading you through your first lesson.”

“You two can work with Rob,” he said to the boys. Rob turned and shrugged at Jen in a way that was almost apologetic before whisking the boys off to a far corner of the room.

Brittany led Jen into the workout area. “After class we’ll get you a gi,” Brittany said. She had a rough, gravely voice that made her sound older than her creaseless face would suggest. The voice projected confidence and something like wisdom that made Jen feel eager to impress her, even though they had only just met. Unfortunately, Jen couldn’t understand the meaning of the girl’s sentence.

“Um, what?” Jen asked, feeling like an awkward teenager in the sight of this girl who very likely was a teenager.

“A gi,” Brittany repeated a bit more loudly.

“I don’t know what that is,” Jen said.

“Oh, wow,” said Brittany. “Right. That’s the thing I’m wearing.” She crossed her arms, grabbed her own sleeves, and shook the fabric a bit. The uniform flapped stiffly over her muscular shoulders. “We might have one your size in the back.” She looked Jen up and down, skeptically. “Or maybe not. You’re pretty skinny.”

Jen looked down at her thin arms and ankles sticking out from her t-shirt and yoga pants, and felt, for the first time that she could remember, that she was in fact too skinny, despite the fact that she had gained back most of the weight she had lost during her fast.

“Don’t worry, you won’t need it for a while,” Brittany said, reassuringly. “Go warm up with the rest of the class, and then you’ll work with me when they split up.”

Jen walked to the middle of the room where more students had now accumulated; even more were streaming in through the door. The clock on the wall read six twenty-nine. Jen wondered if the warm-up Brittany had mentioned was just individual stretching, or if someone would lead the class in a formal warm-up. Just in case, she decided to follow the lead of the other students and do some stretching on her own. She did a quick forward bend to loosen up, then lowered herself into a deep forward split. Her hamstrings felt a bit tighter than they had when she was practicing yoga every day, but she could still get pretty low to the floor.

“Nice,” said the boy standing above her, the same boy who she had just seen struggling to get into the same position, in an approving voice.

“Thanks,” she said, surprised to be complimented on her stretching ability. In all her years of yoga classes, barely anyone had ever spoken to her, and certainly not to remark on her skill at yoga. Yoga was a non-judgmental practice, after all, so the assessing of others was something that had to be done covertly and in silence.

Suddenly Master Park appeared in front of one of the mirrored walls. All the students turned to face him. Jen pulled herself to her feet.

“Push-ups,” he said.

Immediately, the students around Jen lowered themselves back to the floor and into position. Jen quickly joined them. As Master Park began to count, Jen turned her head to the side and was relieved to see that at least one other woman was doing the push-ups from her knees rather than her feet.

After two sets each of twenty pushups and twenty sit-ups, Master Park said, “Line up for forms practice.” Jen stood up and stumbled back a bit, feeling tired already just from the warm-up.

She felt a hand on her shoulder and turned to see Brittany standing just behind her. “Let’s go over there,” she said, jerking her thumb towards some open space in the far corner of the room, near the screen from behind which she, Rob, and Master Park had just emerged.

“So, the first thing you’ll learn is the beginning of the first form,” Brittany said. Jen remembered Rob using that term to describe part of the class they had watched at the Snail Plant, but couldn’t remember what it meant. Brittany showed her a few movements: a stomp, a block, a step, and a punch. It seemed pretty simple. “Practice that,” Brittany said, as she walked towards the bamboo screen and disappeared behind it.

Jen craned her neck and tried to see what was behind the screen. If she walked over to it, she could look behind it, but she didn’t want to draw attention to herself. Still, she was getting curious. I’ll look later, she told herself, drawing her focus back as best as she could to the four moves she was supposed to be practicing. Stomp, block, step, punch. Stomp, block, step, punch. It was boring, but her yoga classes had taught her to look especially engaged when doing the most menial task. That would show the teacher you were serious.

I saw Karate Kid, Jen said to herself. I know a test when I see one.

Stomp, block, step, punch. It’s probably just the bathroom, she thought, looking over at the screen again. She didn’t see one anywhere else in the room. Except why would Master Park, Rob, and Brittany all have walked out of the bathroom together at the beginning of class? Maybe it was a hallway with offices and a bathroom.

As she stood staring at the screen, Brittany suddenly appeared from behind it. Jen quickly returned to her four moves, although it was obvious she had been busted not practicing.

Jen was relieved when Brittany graciously overlooked her transgression. “Okay, champ, let’s see it,” Brittany said, walking over to her.

Jen dutifully performed her moves, while Brittany watched, stony-faced, then said, “Good,” and gave Jen a few small corrections: bend your knees more, twist your body on the block, throw the punch straight out from your side.

“Okay, that’s enough forms for today,” Brittany said, finally. “I’ll show you more next time. Now we’re going to work on your stance, and I’ll show you one kick.”

Jen wondered if a “stance” was what it sounded like: a way of standing. It hadn’t occurred to Jen that such a thing would need to be taught.

“So, the taekwondo stance is like this.” Brittany stood in front of Jen with her feet wide apart, knees bent and bouncy, her hips thrust forward, and her hands up in front of her face. Jen’s mind immediately traveled back to the boys fighting in the school yard; they had stood in just the same way before they began kicking each other. Really, just the same, Jen marveled; it was uncanny that such different-looking people could look so similar.

“Like this?” Jen asked, trying to mirror her body. Her legs felt awkward in the bent position.

“Don’t stick your butt out,” Brittany said. Embarrassed, Jen pulled her buttocks as far forward as she could.

Brittany shot her an assessing scowl. “Now you’re curling your hips up weird. Just try to stand straight.”

Jen shifted her body around, trying to figure out how to stand straight while keeping her knees bent.

“You should feel like you can keep your balance really well in this position,” Brittany said, coming over to Jen and shaking her around by her shoulders. Jen was startled by the power in this small gesture; Brittany was hardly moving, but Jen felt like she was about to fall over.

“See, you’re not balanced. You should feel really comfortable, really balanced.” Brittany repositioned Jen’s body, pushing her hips in a bit, pressing on her shoulders to make her bend her knees more. Still, it seemed the more times Brittany said the word “balance,” the more Jen felt like her legs were about to collapse out from under her.

“There, that’s not too bad,” Brittany said finally, surveying Jen’s rigid, awkward posture with the approving eye of a sculptor. She pressed her palms to the front of Jen’s shoulders and pushed. Again, Jen felt like she was about to fall.

“Feel balanced?” Brittany asked. “Comfortable?”

“Yes,” Jen lied, feeling fairly certain that she would never feel comfortable or balanced in any position with her knees bent and her arms up in the air. If that’s what Brittany was waiting for, this would be a long lesson.

“Okay, good,” said Brittany. “The first kick we’ll do is a roundhouse kick.”

Jen watched Brittany’s powerful physique as she kicked the air, her leg lifting up and then snapping around in a perfect pirouette. It was incredibly beautiful, Jen thought, so graceful, more like a ballet dancer than a fighter, despite Brittany’s rugged physique.

I will never be able to do that, she thought to herself.

“Okay, you try,” Brittany said.

Brittany coached Jen through a few feeble attempts at the kick before leaving her to practice it on her own. Jen moved over a few paces so that she could watch herself in the mirror. She saw her reflection step out tentatively with one foot and then awkwardly lift the other leg into the air, where it snapped out in a crooked line and then fell straight down to the floor.

That looks horrible, Jen thought, shuddering. She considered moving back to her original spot away from the mirror, but then realized that it might be worse not to know how ridiculous she appeared. Instead, she forced herself to watch the offending kick over and over. I’m sure this builds character or something, she told herself, trying to assume an air of detached amusement at her own incompetence.

By the time Brittany returned a few minutes later, Jen’s leg was exhausted and her side was cramping up. She hoped Brittany would tell her that this part of the lesson was over, but instead she offered more corrections.

“Try to pivot on the ball of your foot,” Brittany said.

Jen stepped and kicked with her right leg, but her left foot stayed planted firmly on the floor.

“You didn’t pivot,” Brittany said. “Try it again.”

Jen threw the kick again, this time willing her foot to move. Pivot, she said forcefully to her foot as her opposite leg swung around. Still, nothing happened.

“Sorry,” Jen said, feeling worried that Brittany would think she was willfully disregarding her instructions.

“Don’t say ‘sorry,’” Brittany told her in a rote tone of voice that suggested she had said these same words many, many times. “Just do it right.”

Jen tried again, three more times, but her foot still didn’t move.

“I’m terrible at this,” she said.

“Don’t complain,” Brittany shot back, before the words were fully out of Jen’s mouth. “No one gets everything right on the first day. It’s stuck up to think you’ll get everything perfect right away.”

Brittany pointed at one of the students who were taking instruction from Master Park in the middle of the room, concealing her gesture behind her other hand. “Look at that guy. He’s been here three months, and his feet aren’t pivoting either.”

Jen felt comforted as she watched the boy throw a series of awkward kicks (though not as awkward as hers, she knew) at a target that looked like a ping-pong paddle, which a fellow student was holding up for him. Looking at his foot, she saw that Brittany was correct; it did not move a centimeter as he kicked.

“So everybody is this bad at first?” Jen asked.

Brittany appeared to consider the question seriously for a moment. “No, you’re worse than average,” she decided.

“But don’t worry,” she added encouragingly. “You’ll get it. It just takes time.”

Jen practiced her roundhouse kick until the end of class, when Master Park reconvened the students for one more set of push-ups and sit-ups, followed by a few stretches. Jen sank gratefully into a forward bend, happy to finally be doing something that didn’t make her muscles exhausted.

“So, what did you think?” Brittany asked Jen, meeting her as she walked to the cubby to put on her shoes.

“Fun,” Jen said, feeling too tired to elaborate.

“Do you think you’ll be back next time?” Brittany asked.

“Sure,” Jen said, realizing that she had no idea when next time would be. “Is there a…” She paused to search her exhausted brain for the applicable word: “…schedule?”

“Oh, sorry,” Brittany said, picking up a folded pamphlet from the desk and opening it to show a small calendar to Jen. It was marked with colored squares indicating the classes offered at different times. Brittany ran her finger along a stripe of blue boxes. “Beginner’s class is every weekday at six thirty and Saturdays at ten.”

She pointed at the last day of the week, which was marked with one tall, red box, indicating a single, long class. “Sunday is all sparring,” she said. “You won’t start doing it yet, but it might be good to come and watch.” She handed Jen the pamphlet.

“Okay,” said. Jen. “I’ll be there. I’ll come every day.” After all, I have nothing else to do, she added to herself.

She thought this ambitious plan might surprise Brittany, but she didn’t have any noticeable reaction. “Good,” she said, quickly. “Oh, and I checked, and we don’t have any small gis in the back, but I’ll order you one. It should take about a week. Any other questions?”

Yes, thought Jen. What’s behind that bamboo screen? She didn’t know what was making her so curious, but she couldn’t stop thinking about it.

“Is there a bathroom?” she asked, hoping to be directed toward a door behind the screen.

Instead, Brittany pointed at a large hook on the wall behind the front desk. It had a key hanging off of it, attached to one of the kicking paddles that was acting as a keychain.

“It’s out the front door, turn right, past the sewing store,” Brittany said.

This was disappointing information for a number of reasons: first, because she would not get to check out what was behind the screen, second, because now she would have to walk halfway across the strip mall every time she wanted to use the bathroom, and third, because she didn’t actually have to use the bathroom now, but she would need to walk down there anyway or risk seeming like she had lied.

As she walked, she thought about the class, marveling that, aside from a few double-takes early on, no one seemed to make any fuss about her presence there. It was nice to feel like just any other student, Jen realized. That was one thing she had always loved about yoga, that once class began, she could lose herself in being not a celebrity, but just a person doing yoga. She hadn’t even really noticed Rob that much, she realized. She had been so busy trying to do that roundhouse kick that she had forgotten all about him.

By the time she returned from her excursion to the bathroom, which unfortunately didn’t exceed her expectations for cleanliness or pleasant smells, the other students had all left and the room appeared abandoned. Jen ducked in, hoping to drop the key off and sneak out again, unnoticed, but once she was inside, she realized that Brittany was sitting on the chair behind the desk. Jen stepped behind her and hung the key back on its oversized hook.

“Bye,” she said to Brittany.

“You know, it’s funny,” said Brittany.

“What?” Jen asked.

“I knew you’d come in here,” Brittany said. “I just knew it.”

“Huh,” said Jen, not sure how to respond to this. She and Brittany stood looking at each other for a moment. Jen was struck again by how boyish Brittany looked—like a very athletic, pretty boy, with muscular shoulders and cute hair, the kind of boy that made fourteen year old girls swoon with desire. Brittany didn’t say anything further, just sat, steadily returning Jen’s gaze, until Jen could feel her own face turn red.

“Okay, goodnight,” Jen finally said. She turned abruptly and stumbled over her own shoes on the way out the door.

Chapter 26

24. Arrows, Rifles, Spears and Swords

“Every day when one’s mind and body are at peace, one should meditate upon being ripped apart by arrows, rifles, spears and swords, being carried away by surging waves, being thrown into the midst of a great fire, being struck by lightning, being shaken to death by a great earthquake, falling from thousand-foot cliffs, dying of disease or committing seppuku at the death of one’s master.” —Yamamoto Tsunetomo

Jen sat in bed for a long time after finishing the first chapter of Zen for Times of Crisis. She didn’t feel like reading any further just yet. Thomas Fo’s story of abandoning his acting career read like an episode from her own life. It motivated her to focus on her task here, despite her discouraging encounter with Rob last night.

She had gone to bed feeling like she had failed at her new life before it had even begun. After reading Fo’s chapter, she reminded herself of everything that she was supposed to be doing in Michigan, none of which included finding a boyfriend. Quite the contrary. She had come to focus on herself, to shed her old life, to find some space and some peace so she could focus and think.

And for one other reason, she thought, with a grimace, wrapping her arms around her stomach. She hadn’t wanted to think about it. With Becky and Paula to distract her, she had almost succeeded in forgetting all about it.

She remembered Fo’s words. “Even as I write, the tapes stand facing me…a reminder of the life I once lived, and of why I must never return to it.”

Today is the day, she resolved. Today I will think about all the things I haven’t wanted to think about. There was one thought in particular that she had been evading for weeks and weeks; now was the time to confront it.

“I think I’m pregnant,” she said aloud. She started a bit, surprised at hearing the words that she hadn’t even shaped in her head until now. She had been nauseous every day for weeks, and her period still had not returned. And here she was in Michigan, thousands of miles from home, in a place where a baby could grow inside of her without, she had hoped, any attention or notice; that was truly why she was here, she told herself, relieved to finally admit the truth. But admitting it didn’t make her future any more known. She decided that this uncertainty would not haunt her any longer; today she would discover her future.

With new drive, she rose from the bed, quickly dressed herself in sweatpants and a t-shirt, and found the keys to Paula’s mother’s SUV. It was her first time driving in Michigan; Paula and Becky had done all the driving until they left, and yesterday Jen had walked into town and gotten a ride home from Rob. Maneuvering such a large vehicle felt strange to her at first, but soon she got used to it and was able to appreciate how it smoothed out the bumps of the uneven road into town.

She parked in front of the drug store, scanning the sidewalk for paparazzi, but she didn’t see any; apparently the food co-op was their main point of attack.

Safely inside, she walked straight to the back of the store, to the aisle marked “contraceptives,” which, she remembered from her earlier visit to this store, seemed to be shorthand for any paraphernalia necessary for dealing with sex or its consequences. Alongside the condoms and spermicides, there were plastic bottles of neon-colored lubricant, a few containers of flavored “body paint,” ointments for reducing the discomfort of genital herpes, and, next to those, the pregnancy tests.

Jen spotted the box labeled “Know For Sure,” her favorite name of all the brands, and grabbed it quickly from the shelf.

Carrying it low in her hand with the label facing in towards her thigh, she began to search the store for the other embarrassing item she needed: magazines. She remembered seeing them in passing as Paula whisked her around the store, but couldn’t recall where exactly.

She passed through the long row of greeting cards, and then, next to those, found the rack of magazines. She was pleased to see that they had a decent selection covering topics from music to golf to knitting. Right in the center of the top shelf she found the section she was looking for, a large spread of celebrity magazines with more titles than she had known existed. Only one of them mentioned her on its cover. She perused the tables of contents in the other magazines—rolling her eyes at how inevitably difficult it was to find the contents page amongst the pages and pages of advertisements—and discovered three other magazines containing short articles about her.

The real tabloids, the ones with the pixilated photographs on cheap newsprint, were on a shelf at the bottom, near Jen’s feet. She knelt down to sort through them and found two that featured her on the cover, though neither as the main story. Flipping through the other tabloids, she found three more stories about herself.

She walked to the counter, where a single cashier, a blond, pimply-faced boy who was most likely a MNCMU student, awaited her. Blushing, she placed her assortment of purchases on the counter: a neat pile of four celebrity magazines, five trashy tabloids, and topping the stack like a cherry on a sundae, the pregnancy test. She had thought about adding some other purchases to dilute these embarrassing items, but she could not imagine how many bottles of shampoo and multivitamins it would take to distract the cashier from such a preponderance of humiliation.

Jen’s inclination was to bow her head as the cashier scanned the magazines and placed them into a plastic bag, but instead, she attempted to make eye contact with him. After all, he was only a kid, and he probably wouldn’t even notice what she was buying. But his shy smile and refusal to return her gaze convinced her that he did indeed notice, and that he couldn’t wait to report this exciting news to his friends.

It doesn’t matter, she told herself, as she walked out the door with her shameful bag wrapped around her wrist. The whole point is to confront the things that embarrass me. But she could feel her face glowing hot and red and she returned to the SUV, and she was certain that everyone on the sidewalk was staring at her.

Back at the lake house, she placed the magazines and the pregnancy test on the coffee table. Then she made some tea, taking a long time tidying up the kitchen and washing a few dishes that were in the sink. Finally, when she could find no further diversions, she carried her cup of tea into the living room and sat down cross-legged on the floor next to the coffee table. She would start with the magazines, she decided, and then the tabloids. Then, when she could stand no more of her public persona—the thing she had been trying to avoid for years, that she had moved to Michigan to escape—she would move on to the pregnancy test, and then finish the rest of the magazines, after which her project of self-knowledge would be complete for the day.

The top magazine on the pile had a two-page spread near the middle devoted to Jen’s yoga injury. There was a large photograph of her being rushed out of the health club lobby, clutching an ice pack to her side. “Addicted to Asanas,” the headline read, and below that, “The ‘health’ routine that’s tearing Jen’s body apart.” A smaller inset picture on the opposite page showed a picture of Jen with her long hair, taken at the height of her fast she was fairly certain, looking emaciated and haggard as she wrapped her arms around herself on a Los Angeles sidewalk.

Jen winced in embarrassment as her hand reached down reflexively to slap the magazine closed. But she pulled it back to her tea cup, took in a long, calming breath through her nose, and vowed to fulfill her plan of reading the article, and all the articles about her, all the way through.

“On the big screen, Jen appears to be the model of physical fitness, with that lean physique that many women try to emulate through their own diet and exercise regimens. However, as so often happens in Hollywood, Jen’s slender figure comes at a price—and now those close to Jen worry that her extreme lifestyle might be destroying her health.

“Hollywood insiders have noted that Jen’s appearance has gone from skinny to scary as her weight has plummeted in recent months.

“Physician Camilla Jones confirmed that Jen broke her rib after fainting during a yoga class. ‘The fracture was a direct result of Jennifer being dangerously underweight,’ said Jones, who treated Jen at the scene of the accident.

“Students in the yoga class found themselves unwitting witnesses to the shocking mishap. ‘She just turned white and fell over,’ said a woman who was doing yoga next to Jen at the time of the injury. ‘It was really freaky.’ The woman described Jen’s disheveled appearance during the class, noting that her hair and clothing were messy and that her face looked tired.

“The yoga teacher supervising the class, who is also a personal friend of Jen’s, cited concerns about Jen’s health, agreeing that ‘Jen has been engaging in some rather extreme dietary restrictions.' A dietitian who has not worked with Jen personally speculated that she may have been practicing one of several ‘cleanses’ that have become popular with celebrities eager to lose weight.

“One well-known actor who is a frequent visitor to Jen’s house discussed possible reasons behind Jen’s weight loss. ‘She’s been having a rough time,’ said the actor, who did not want to be named. ‘There has been some tension between Jen and her best friend, and it’s causing her a lot of stress.’

“Other friends speculate that Jen may be distraught over the ending of her brief relationship with Skipper Engels, the San Francisco based pornographer who has been rumored to have involved Jen in an illicit party scene of drugs and prostitution, although those close to Jen claim that these rumors have been exaggerated. ‘Jen’s not into that kind of thing,’ said a friend who has known Jen since childhood.

“Whatever the reason, one thing is clear: Jen’s weight is dangerously low, setting a bad example for girls and young women who idolize her. ‘Jen’s unfortunate experience breaking her rib should send a message to her fans, and all women who seek to maintain an unreasonably low weight,’ said the dietitian we consulted. ‘We all want to be thin, but when we go to extremes to get there, we are hurting our bodies more than helping them.’"

Jen had been eager to get to the end of the article so she could close the magazine, but now that it was over she just sat and stared at the words on the page. She felt angry and embarrassed that this was how she would appear to the public, as a neurotic anorexic who was a bad role model for women.

That’s not fair, she said to herself, grasping for the explanation of why not, exactly. I wasn’t on a diet, she said to herself; it was a fast.

Still, she had to concede that to most of the public, this distinction would be meaningless. In fact, nothing in the article was untrue; the information was simply presented through a filter. Still, it was a filter that Jen highly disliked.

How could that doctor say those things to the press, she asked herself? Jen remembered the imposing woman at the health club, lecturing her about her bone density as she sat clutching ice to her broken rib. Despite the doctor’s rather cold, clinical manner, Jen had trusted her, felt instinctively that this outsider, the only African American and the only woman over forty in the class full of gym princesses, had her best interests in mind.

And Paula, who was supposed to be her friend, and Chase—and even Becky seemed to have given a statement. Jen fumed for a moment, vowing to confront her friends as soon as she got a chance to call them up in LA.

But truthfully, she knew how the reporters had gotten their quotes, through bombarding their so-called informants and startling them into speech. She thought of the reporter at the co-op: “What do you think about Bradley’s baby?” If Rob hadn’t intervened, who knows what she would have said. She could just imagine one of them barging into Paula’s yoga class, asking “Don’t you think Jen has been engaging in extreme dietary restrictions?” with Paula’s affirmative nod interpreted as “agreement.”

Tired of looking at the skinny picture of herself, Jen finally closed the magazine and pulled one of the tabloids over. This one had a headline that promised to be more lighthearted: “Jen to Her Pimp Boyfriend—It’s over!” There was a photograph of Skipper at a party, wearing the same yellow cowboy shirt he had worn at the bar with her. She was startled to see his face, and realized that she had forgotten what he looked like, aside from a vague caricature of a scrawny rag doll in flamingo shorts. The article also featured several unflattering pictures of Jen appearing to be screaming or crying, although she was pretty sure the photographers had just caught her in a yawn or a sneeze.

“After discovering Skipper in the arms of yet another woman, Jen finally decided enough was enough and told the infamous pimp to leave her Los Angeles mansion, where he had been living for the past month during their brief, tumultuous affair.

“‘Things were pretty crazy over there,’ said a neighbor, describing the scandalous orgies that Skipper held at Jen’s house several times a week. ‘Limousines would be pulling up at all hours of the night. There was always loud music and all these naked girls running around outside everywhere.’

‘It’s no wonder Jen would get sick of that,’ the neighbor added.

“Other neighbors said that Jen had been seen fighting with Skipper outside the house, and that she had frequently stormed away in tears. ‘It was pretty obvious it wouldn’t last,’ said Jen’s housekeeper.”

Jen was almost done with her second article. This isn’t so bad, thought Jen, although her hands were shaking and the room seemed to be spinning slightly. In fact, reading such flagrant lies helped her gain perspective on the previous, more accurate article. Both articles are interpretations, she thought, and neither one is the truth. Heartened, she read the final lines in the tabloid.

“Although the two have split, Jen’s troubles may not be over yet. Jen’s friends fear that she is carrying Skipper’s baby. ‘That would be a true nightmare,’ said a mutual friend of the actress and the pimp. ‘Neither one of them is fit to be a parent.’”

Jen sucked in a sharp breath and looked up at the box lying on the coffee table. “Know early, and Know For Sure,” it said. Yes, she thought. It was time to know. She took the box into the bathroom, feeling every bit as humiliated as the only other time she had used one of these tests, when she was nineteen years old and terrified of having to have an abortion, though now she was a grown woman who had every intention of keeping the baby. Really, there’s no reason to be mortified by this process, she thought angrily; you’d have to find out somehow or other.

While she waited for her little plus or minus sign to appear, Jen passed the time by reading another tabloid article: “Jen Hires Assassin to Take out Bradley.” The photograph illustrating this story—one of Bradley looking nervously over his shoulder, the other of her whispering into the ear of an ominous man in a dark suit who happened to have been a lawyer from the divorce, though the article didn’t identify him—made Jen think of Bradley again and wonder if his girlfriend was really pregnant.

It would be so odd, she thought, if we had babies at the same time. She wondered whether the babies could be friends, once they were a little older, and whether she and Bradley could also become friends when they were both parents. She had heard that the birth of a child could negate all kinds of longstanding hostilities, could unite estranged families and heal wounded friendships. Maybe the adorable innocence of a tiny baby would purify the foul murk hanging between her and her ex-husband.

She still had three minutes left, according to the clock on the living room wall. She looked back down at the article. “Furious at rumors that he has impregnated his girlfriend, Jen vowed to take revenge on her movie-star ex, but friends never suspected that she would go to these extreme lengths. We spoke with a hit man who says that Jen paid him fifty-thousand dollars in cash to ‘do what you have to do,’ as she put it.”

When she went to the bathroom and picked up the little white stick, the mark was as clear and dark as fresh ink: minus. That meant no baby. “No baby,” she said aloud. She wondered whether she should make an appointment with a doctor to get a second opinion; but she also knew that two months into a hypothetical pregnancy, the results were pretty reliable.

She walked back into the living room and stood by the coffee table. She stared at the stack of magazines and tabloids, her project for the rest of the day. She looked down at the article still open on the table. “Jen would do anything—and I mean anything—to keep Bradley from having that baby,” it said. She bit her lip and sat down on the couch.

Well, she told herself, with a sigh, now I really have no excuse to skip taekwondo tonight.

Chapter 25