We just sat down to talk, you know two gals sittin’ around the pool tanning on a hot summer day. The air was sticky, I remember how our bare bottoms peeled off the bench like tape. There was a wind, though. It came behind us cooling the pool water and sweat from our backs. I shivered, I think and hugged my knees closer. Joan did the same. We were just gossiping, you know my boyfriend Glen’s been coming home later and later…I think he’s cheating. I’m sure of it actually. I guess it doesn’t matter so much anymore. So anyway we’re sitting there hunched over and Joan’s all, “Let’s do some yoga.” Naturally I groaned but she’s promised me nothing fancy, you know, just some sun salutations. So she starts showing me this ridiculous move where you stretch your arms behind your back, then inhale through your nose real fast and pull your arms over your head and look over your shoulder to get your back—nothing fancy right? So we’re in this position, side by side, and we see this creep behind us, in my backyard and, get this, he’s just staring at us. Now I have no idea how long he’d been there but he was wearing this weird robe and a funny pointed hat. I thought he was part of the KKK, he was muttering something under his breath I couldn’t understand. Then I thought maybe it was our new Iranian neighbors that didn’t get the whole “good fences make better neighbors” or something. But he was all in blue, with these ridiculous stars speckling his gown and robe and these silly big sleeves. Honestly, I don’t know where he shops. So he keeps muttering and just as I’m about to get up and tell him how we do things in California I can’t. I’m tugging at my arms and can’t move a muscle. I can’t even speak. Now I’m thinking, crap I’ve torn a muscle and I’m paralyzed. I try to look at Joan to yell at her but all I can see out of the corner of my eye is that she’s stuck too. Then the robed guy starts laughing this deep belly-roaring laugh and I’m getting a little freaked out. The sun is just beating down on us and I feel like my skin is flaking off. This smell is rising between us and I’m a little self-conscious with my fat ass hanging out and sweating up a storm. I feel my hair crisping above me in this crown and my hands feel like their crumbling to sheets. I can’t bend to look. My face is frozen and I can’t even move my eyes now. Turns out the robe guy wasn’t the Iranian neighbor but some kind of demented magician-artist. So I’m stuck like this, exposed to the world as part of a two-woman onion sculpture. Frankly I blame Joan and her stupid sun salutations. Word to the wise, lock your gate before you naked tan and do your yoga inside.