Fishing in Beirut

Karen told Michel they had a problem. He was crying when she hung up the phone. She had got right into it, her suspicions and her fears, and she knew by his reactions that she’d caught him unawares. Had ambushed him.
She cried a little herself, re-casting her mind over the conversation. She thought she’d been quite harsh, tetchy. Still, it was killing her. Drugs was a subject foreign to her, irrelevant really, but the change in his energy and mood was devastating and weird. Once she’d noticed it, it was everywhere.
He had protested meekly like an infant, had pleaded with her, but she could tell. What kind of drug was it anyway? She knew of cocaine, speed, and these were fast and kinetic – was it one of these he took? She hadn’t asked, hadn’t wanted to right then, but now she did, now she wondered. He put this stuff in his body.
She got up and went to the kitchen. What was her next move from here? He would call of course, but how to handle it. She didn’t know who might advise her.
She drank some water and thought furiously. Her mind was racing around. The water enveloped her tongue, its coldness bringing clarity, and she took deep breaths until her brain had quietened. She heard a man laughing.
I’ll just let things relax, she thought. I’ll just have to see where this one goes. The man laughed again from wherever.
Sitting on the couch she felt all stressed again, so she got up and rolled her neck. Then she kneaded her fingers. These little exercises never failed to produce results, putting her back in touch with herself, and her priorities. Worry was counter productive.
She felt the air in her nostrils, the softness of it, and she moved her hands. Her wrists bent. Her left elbow cracked as she extended her arm, feeling power and calm. Her neck grew warm and she sensed it. The hairs on her head came alive, the muscles in her calves went tight. Then her hip shuddered.
She went loose, weightless, and the pain passed. Slowly she commenced again. Her knees and thighs braced, bearing weight while she pivoted. Her spine was gently aligned.
As anxious energy vanished, she surrendered completely to the movements. Her mind didn’t think or create. It was empty, hollow, a space alive with peace. The tempo of the world was slower. She stretched and swayed hypnotically, or that’s the way it seemed, no separation of her consciousness. She joined with the nothing outside.
Michel would call when he was ready to. Then she would know what to do.