Chapter 3
Donuts tower into a birthday cake, covered in pink sprinkles and old-fashioned glaze.
They’re the centerpiece on a high farmhouse banquet table.
Giant clear balloons float around us like bubbles.
Seated on barstools, we overtake the country club’s patio stretching above the pickleball courts.
The sky is cloudless and crayon blue. Friday has come.
My birthday eve. I toss a look to Sierra across from me: Thank you, friend.
As this week has ticked on, I’ve found myself increasingly in need of my closest friends and assurance that I’m not dying.
Not physically dying, of course—my health is fantastic, thanks to good genes and Peloton.
But suddenly dying on the inside feels like a threat.
Max has uttered exactly four words to me in the last forty-eight hours, amounting to: You’re crushing my life.
I haven’t heard a peep from the Rich and Famous Millennial Haters since our big pitch meeting.
And Reid’s flight left for New York (again) early this morning.
My social media stalking spiral hasn’t helped matters.
It began with an innocent peek at Gigi McGowan, TikTok design star, my younger rival.
One click on her latest “day-in-the-life” vlog made me angry enough to gnaw on a pickleball—and maybe give in to cold plunging.
Forty grams of protein in her hot breakfast, Pilates, a twelve-dollar green juice, one full hour of “creative centering,” thirty minutes with her gratitude journal and with her red-light therapy mask, all before showing up at her office in what looks like a professional blow-dry?
All without a pore to be seen? What does that much self-care even do to a woman?
Gives her the glow of a thousand sunbeams, that’s what. Lands her all the good projects. Makes forty-year-olds disappear.
Dripping with envy and itching with rage, I figured, why not also look up Holden again while I’m at it?
Just one little time? Quinn had blocked him on Facebook, yes, but not Instagram.
My stomach relaxed in mild relief, though, when I saw that his account was set to private.
Of course this didn’t keep me from staring at his one profile picture for far too long.
I remembered that jaw; I remembered his hair.
And it was so typical Holden to have a quote in his bio:
Of all sad words of tongue or pen,
The saddest are these: “It might have been!”
—JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER
What does that mean, though? Adventurous cool guy, carpe diem—or beholder of real regret? I’m not delusional enough to think I inspired the quote, but then again, he is alone in his picture. Divorce seemed more and more likely. I hated myself for being so curious.
Yes, I fear I might, indeed, be withering on the daily into the very kind of woman (raisin) I do not wish to be. Jealous of Gen Z? Stalking my ex? Who am I?
I’m still in here, I promise—and possess the sudden urge to walk around saying so. I’m still something, aren’t I? My friends are here for me, no matter what, insisting they’ll help with the birthday party hosting duties on Saturday. So, just in case I am in fact dying, at least it won’t be alone.
In her hot-pink polo dress and matching visor, Sierra clasps her hands and prepares to address the school moms surrounding me.
They’ve become my closest friends, collected like gemstones through my years as a mom with three kids at Coast Academy.
Most of us also attend the same church, and these havens are two of my greatest blessings.
Spanning ages thirty-two to fifty-four, my friends from both places epitomize womanhood to me.
Strong and funny, selfless and wise. And today they’re all in hot pink, for me, my favorite color.
Meanwhile, I’m in bright white, feeling more bachelorette than forty-year-old, but I’ll take it.
“Keep enjoying your treats and beverages!” bellows Sierra. “Before we pickle, I wanted to say a little birthday blessing for our girl. Then, it’s time! I hope y’all are ready to get your tushes kicked by me and the birthday queen!”
Everyone lifts their donuts and coffees in cheers. I grow instantly shy as the heads bow around me, Sierra’s prayer floating into the sky:
“Dear God, I want to thank you for Sutton. Thank you for the gift that she is to all of us—the amazing mom, wife, designer, and friend. I want to ask that you would bless this birthday more than any other birthday she’s ever had.
Fill her with the reminder that every single choice she has made until now has made up her wonderful life—and we are so lucky to be a part of it.
As she looks ahead to this new decade, may she both reap the rewards of all these choices and keep growing into the woman you’ve called her to be.
I pray she feels loved, and happy, and free.
We love our girl, God, and we love you! Happy birthday to Sutton. Amen!”
When everyone’s eyes pop open, Quinn lights the 4 and the 0 topping the donut cake. I am still not used to those numbers as my ladies burst into song.
My swallow is thick as they serenade me.
I’m humbled by Sierra’s generous words—but do they tell the whole truth?
If my choices have been so wonderful, then why am I weary and worn?
I hardly even feel worthy of such a beautiful celebration.
I want to be sitting here fully confident in my kids’ love for me, gratified in my accomplishments, satisfied in my marriage.
Instead I’m wondering where I might’ve gone wrong. Could there have been other choices or versions of me, ones that led to more contentment and peace? Happiness?
“Happy birthday to you!” they finish, and cry: “Make a wish!”
Well, now. What do I wish from here? I should probably wish for the best new decade ahead—that I might live it worthy of Sierra’s kind prayer.
But in this moment, I suddenly don’t want to do it. Get one day older, that is. I’m not ready to see a four at the start of my age—then a five, then a six, then a seven, on to the end . . . My heart skitters at the notion.
I’m just not ready, I realize, and to my own shock, out of nowhere, I find myself desperately missing my mom.
I make a note to call her right after this; she always makes me feel young again.
And I really want to feel young again. I already feel .
. . so mature, and not in a good way. This life, these responsibilities.
More divorces than weddings. Best friends getting hysterectomies instead of sharing pregnancy news.
I count a few of each around the table in a matter of seconds.
Children who think I’m lamer than the man at the pool of Bethesda.
My business struggling. My marriage stagnating. My heart constricts. It’s too much.
I glance down to see spots and wrinkles, thinking, Even these hands.
Why didn’t I wear more sunscreen back then?
Married at twenty-two, mother at twenty-six .
. . I did it all so young, a practical infant.
Who and what and when would have happened if I didn’t grow up so fast?
Who would that girl have become? She walked right away from her theater dreams, to the melody of the bridal march.
What might have been, after all?
I ponder wistfully that, no, she never did ski the Matterhorn. She never even lived on her own. And so, right here on this patio, I wish to be young again. Not to merely feel loved, happy, and free, but to embody those definitions.
Poof!
The candlelight flickers to smoke.
“Hit it to Dalia,” Sierra hisses at me, snapping down the bill of her visor. Her blue eyes blaze. We’re tied with Sara and Dalia in the final game. Winner takes the whole day. “Keep it away from Sara.”
“When did she get so good?” I whisper back, peering over the net to our compact and mighty brunette friend, with her razor-cut biceps and friendly smile—the smile that made us let down our guard. Dalia is a solid player, but Sara is playing at a whole other level today. She’s out of her mind.
“I’ve seen her taking some lessons here and there, but dang, girl.” Sierra shakes her head. “They are not going to beat us. You hear me? This is your birthday! Keep the ball low. Get to the net. Play the patience game. We got this.”
I nod in agreement, frightened, frankly, to let her down.
Sierra assumes her spot at the baseline and bounces the hot-pink pickleball—pink, just for me today—on the court. One, two, three. Then she holds it out, ready to serve. Winner must win by two.
“Ten-ten-two,” she calls. She smacks the plastic ball with the full blast of her feisty strength.
Knees bent, feet apart, I hold my paddle in ready position, diagonal at ten o’clock. I wait.
Sara returns it with dynamite power, directly to me, and deep. A perfect return, of course. I’m ready for my third-shot drop, though. Soft hands. I scoop, lift, deliver.
As planned, the ball drops neatly, low, just in front of Dalia, while I run as fast as I can up to the kitchen line.
Dalia is dead ready too. She dinks it back to Sierra, who is poised like a tiger with the perfect dink back, once again to Dalia.
Keep it away from Sara, I remember. Keep it away from Sara.
Dalia dinks it back to me, crosscourt, and my paddle is ready.
I make contact.
But no.
No, no, no!
I was not expecting her spin. The ball catches the edge of my paddle at the perfectly incorrect place, and now—
It sails high—much too high—right in Sara’s direction.
Come on, pickleball, I beg. Get low, get low, get low. Let’s go, Lil Jon. It’s my millennial fortieth birthday!
The ball does not, in fact, get low. Instead, it glides right to the pocket of Sara’s explosive high backhand. It’s the opposite of a bull’s-eye, squarely hitting the single spot where we do not want the ball.
My face to the sun, my eyes mere cracks, my toes teeter against the kitchen line as I wait.
And stare.
And wait and stare.
Sara assaults the air shot with all the power of those boot-camp arms.
Her ball smashes straight to the center of my thirty-nine-year-old face.
Blackness.
Heat.
I collapse.