best for FICTION
Anna isn’t sure she’s very good at yoga. As the instructor comes to check on her pose, she feels embarrassment curl inside her stomach, as though she’s a teenager in PE again, not a 66-year-old woman reeling from a divorce who’s come on this yoga retreat to try to recover.
‘Stomach in, arms up,’ the instructor says. Anna duly sucks in her core (she’s never heard the word core as many times in her life as she has this week) and lifts her already aching arms towards the bright-blue sky.
‘Excellent,’ Yassica nods with approval, and Anna feels a dart of pride. Perhaps she can do it, after all? The sun’s scorching today – they’re having to practice in the shade of an orange canopy that Yassica has stretched out between the trees. Italy feels a million miles from South London – and for that, Anna is grateful. Well, that and the copious amounts of white wine the group have been drinking each night, too.
It had been her friend Melinda’s idea to go on the retreat.
‘You need a break,’ she’d told Anna, frowning sternly at her over the pizza they were sharing in the local Italian down the road from Anna’s new flat (rented, just off Brixton Road – Chris had kept hold of their shared house, for now). ‘You’ve had a tough year, and being in rainy old London isn’t doing you any good. You need to relax.’ She’d reached across the table, put her gold-ringed hands on Anna’s shoulders. ‘You’re so tense all the time.’
Anna had groaned when Melinda had pulled up her phone and shown her the website for the retreat in Italy.
‘I’ve never done yoga in my life! I’m not that sort of person.’ But Melinda had just snorted. ‘Of course you are. Anyone can do it. Besides, you might need to get a bit more flexible if you’re going back out on the dating scene!’
‘Don’t be ridiculous.’ Honestly, the thought of dating was about as far from her mind as anything possibly could be. But the more Anna looked at the photos of tall, bendy-looking women saluting the sky under the warm Italian sunshine, the more she began to imagine it. Perhaps a trip was what she needed, after all?
And now it’s a month later and she’s here, she’s really here. She’s eaten delicious, home-cooked pasta every night, learned what downward dog is and managed to stop thinking about the divorce in every waking moment – turns out it’s quite hard to focus on heartbreak when your thigh muscles are vibrating with tension and the yoga instructor is inches away from your face.
The other guests are lovely, too, and Anna has to admit it – she’s having a pretty good time.
That evening, after Yassica has given her the green light on her poses, she’s lying on one of the sun loungers by the pool when Sophia, a younger
