Chapter 3
T he moon was full, which meant two things.
One: I’d accidentally left my crystal charging grid on the windowsill at home again, which meant my smoky quartz was probably absorbing UV instead of divine feminine power.
And two: I had ten women coming over to burn shit in my backyard.
Technically, we were calling it a release ceremony. But let’s be honest—it was a glorified adult bonfire with kombucha, essential oils, and feelings. So many feelings.
This was who I was, down to the compostable cups and the playlist of feminist folk anthems queued up on my Bluetooth speaker.
My idea of community organizing was part potluck, part consciousness-raising circle, and part therapy session without the copay.
My politics had grown up alongside my personal life—fed on equal parts Gloria Steinem quotes and the stubborn belief that the world could, in fact, be remade if enough of us just stopped buying fast fashion and voted in every election.
I knew my senators by name and my farmers by handshake. I could filibuster anyone into a reusable water bottle. And yes, I’d been called “intense” before—usually by men who found out I’d once written an op-ed about the inherent patriarchy of wedding registries.
I didn’t see it as radical. To me, it was common sense, the logical outcome of a life spent learning that if you didn’t protect your own boundaries, someone else would happily redraw them for you.
My work as a doula, my shop full of postpartum wraps and perineal ice packs, my devotion to women’s circles and birth justice—it was all part of the same gravitational pull.
I wanted women to feel safe in their bodies, in their choices, in the messy beauty of their lives. And if that meant I scared off a few fragile egos along the way, well … bless their hearts.
I was already sweating, even though the sun had dipped low behind the trees and cast the backyard in a soft indigo hush. Charleston humidity didn’t care about your plans. It wrapped around my waist like a clingy ex and whispered, you sure you want to wear that gauzy linen robe, babe?
Yes. Yes, I did.
Because nothing said “sacred feminine channel” like a floor-length wrap with bell sleeves and embroidered stars that got caught on everything. Including my citronella candles.
I adjusted the hem and lit the last of the tea lights around the fire pit, then stepped back to admire the scene. Twinkling string lights. Blankets in a circle. Mason jars full of herbal mocktails. The musky scent of sandalwood and old pine rising from the smudge bowl in the center.
It was giving woman. Witch. Womb wisdom. The whole crunchy trifecta.
“Okay, Moon Mamas,” I said out loud, mostly to myself. “Let’s make some woo-woo magic tonight.”
My phone buzzed on the porch railing.
Alana: Running late but bringing the cacao and my divorce papers
I smiled. Alana Smotherman was a goddess in yoga pants who could crush a man’s soul with her words and then offer him a healing tincture after. She was going to read a poem about rebirth, cry about the end of her marriage, and lead us in a chant.
We’d been close since our College of Charleston days, back when I was majoring in Women’s and Gender Studies and she was deep in Holistic Health Sciences—a program so crunchy the senior seminar required brewing your own kombucha and defending it like a thesis.
We’d met at a student-run herb walk in Hampton Park, where she was explaining the spiritual properties of mugwort to a circle of freshmen while I heckled her from the back about how it also kept moths out of sweaters.
She’d narrowed her eyes, handed me a sprig, and said, “Smell that and tell me it isn’t magic.
” She’s been proving me wrong—and keeping me honest—ever since.
We were the kind of friends who could share a silence as easily as a protest sign, who’d stood side by side at marches and one very memorable silent retreat that ended when we both got kicked out for giggling during meditation.
More arrivals trickled in—some barefoot, some braless, all radiating strong feminine energy. The circle filled with laughter and hugs and wafts of patchouli.
I lit the center candle. “All right,” I said, settling onto my woven cushion. “Welcome, sisters. Tonight, we gather to release the narratives that no longer serve us?—”
“Like my mother-in-law’s belief that boundaries are optional?” Kat Drummond interrupted, dropping into her seat with a huff.
I grinned. “Exactly.”
Alana appeared behind her carrying a tray with a bowl of thick, dark cacao and a bundle of dried sage. “And to honor the new stories we’re writing,” she said in her deep, theatrical voice. “The ones where we don’t apologize for being the main character.”
She was one of my ride-or-die people—the kind of friend who knew the names of my childhood pets, my most shameful high school crushes, and exactly how many stitches I’d gotten the night we decided to skinny-dip off Folly Beach and I cut my foot on a shell.
Alana had a knack for seeing straight through people—like X-ray vision, but for bullshit—and she wielded it with a mix of wit, warmth, and a little witchy menace.
The woman could deliver a TED Talk on trauma bonds, read your birth chart from memory, and make you laugh so hard you’d pee a little …
all before finishing her first glass of wine.
Applause rippled. We were all the main characters tonight.
The ceremony unfolded the way they always did: journaling, sharing, a little ugly crying. Someone brought a ukulele. Someone else passed around a spray labeled Moon Mist. We howled at the moon—not metaphorically. Literally.
And I meant every second of it.
Because I was that bitch.
I composted. I bought local honey. I carried reusable straws and believed in reclaiming the sacred feminine. I read bell hooks and called my senators. I’d led three post-abortion support circles and once doula’d a birth that involved whale sounds and tantric breathing.
And still.
Still, somewhere under all that intentionality, a part of me was coiled tight like a spring. Like I was walking around on a trampoline, trying to look graceful while my core trembled from the effort of staying upright.
Which is probably why I couldn’t stop thinking about the request.
The one I’d sent to Alpha Mail.
The one I hadn’t told anyone but Stephen about—not even Alana.
I stared into the fire, pretending to be enraptured by Kat’s monologue about reclaiming her cervix, and imagined what would happen if an alpha male actually showed up. If the fantasy I’d scrawled in the dark came to life and knocked on my door like it belonged there.
What would he say?
What would he do?
Would he laugh at my moon robe? Would he tear it off?
Would he make me forget my name?
“Simone,” Alana said gently.
I blinked. “What?”
“You’re next.” She passed me a slip of paper and a pen.
Right. Time to write my release intention.
I scrawled one word: Control .
Then, as the group passed the metal bowl, one by one tossing their folded paper into the flames, I stood and stepped to the edge.
“I release,” I said, loud and clear, “my need to carry the whole damn world on my back.”
Then I dropped the paper into the fire and watched it curl.
The flames flared, and something in my chest cracked open.
Maybe it was the smoke. Maybe it was the wine spritzer. Maybe it was just the weight of being the one who held space for everyone else, every day.
But suddenly, all I could think about was being undone.
Not in a poetic way. In a filthy one.
Like—Alpha Mail showing up in the middle of this backyard ceremony, stepping through the circle of women like a god of war, dragging me behind the shed, and?—
“Simone,” Alana whispered, elbowing me. “You’re smiling like a villain.”
I snapped out of it. Cleared my throat. “Just thinking about my new narrative,” I said sweetly.
She raised a brow, but let it go.
After the fire died down, we lay on blankets under the stars, half-drunk on cacao and catharsis, whispering dreams we were afraid to say out loud.
“I want to run a birth center in the mountains,” said Dana Walsh, eyes misty.
“I want to start a podcast about moms who fake their own deaths,” said Kat.
Random. But okay.
“I want to have sex without making a Google doc afterward,” I said.
Heads turned.
“What?”
Alana snorted. “Simone, you write debrief notes?”
“Only sometimes!”
The circle dissolved into laughter.
But later, after the last of the women had wandered home, I sat alone on the back steps, robe unbelted, golden curls frizzed from the fire, and stared up at the sky.
The moon was full and shameless, casting silver over the fig tree and the cedar fence and the last ember in the pit.
I poured myself one final glass of lavender rosé and whispered, “If you’re real, Alpha Mail … I’m ready.”
The breeze shifted.
A dog barked in the distance.
And the tiniest shiver ran down my spine.
Because something had changed tonight.
Something I couldn’t name yet.
It was coming.
And I didn’t know if I was going to rise with it—or burn.
Either way, I was ready.
My phone buzzed the second I finished my rosé. Of course, it did.
On-call ringtone—gentle chimes that lied about how chaotic birth could be.
“Hey, Simone? It’s Talia Graham.” Her voice was breathy, excited, a little terrified. “Um … my waves are five minutes apart. I didn’t want to bother you if it’s false labor, but?—”
“It’s not false,” I said, already on my feet, already knotting my robe back around my waist as if modesty mattered to the moon. “Full moon babies love to make a point. How long has it been like that?”
“An hour? Maybe more? I … I lost track.”
“Good,” I said, pacing for no reason, brain flipping the doula switch I keep next to my heart. “Drink some water. Pee. Slow dance with the doorframe if that feels good. I’m throwing on clothes and I’ll meet you at Palmetto Birth Center.”
“Should I wait or?—”
“If your body says move, you move. If not, wait for me.” I softened. “You’ve got this, Talia. Tonight’s a good night to be born.”
I hung up, stared at the scattered remnants of the ceremony—the half-burned sage, the sticky cacao bowl, the Moon Mist—and muttered, “Should’ve known.”
Every doula knows the full moon is part myth, part mischief. There’s no research that satisfies the internet warriors, but my text log says otherwise. Babies love drama. The moon is drama. Ergo: here we go.
I swapped the robe for leggings and an oversized tee that said brEATHE, grabbed my on-call bag (rebozo, honey sticks, tennis balls, essential oils, electrolyte packets, snacks, spare scrunchies), and slid into sandals.
On my way out, I tossed the spent tea lights in a bowl of water and whispered, “Thanks for the vibes. Please don’t burn the house down.”