40. Forty
Forty
“What the hell is this pose supposed to do?” Libby hisses in a whisper from her yoga mat next to mine. Balancing on one leg, arms flapping in the air, she’s so wobbly it’s a miracle she isn’t on the floor.
I stifle a laugh as a woman from the row ahead of us levels her with a frustrated glare, which Libby ignores, but I respond to with a mouthed silent, sorry .
Our first time taking a yoga class together and I can say for a fact I’ve never laughed so much while in downward facing dog. Like her husband, she has absolutely no filter. It’s incredible.
After class, out of the studio and as we walk into the restaurant next door, every step she takes toward the table she does with a sort of squat in between. “Christ, Birdie. I can’t feel my ass. And who the hell needs open hips anyway?”
Sliding into the booth, I laugh. “It wasn’t that bad. ”
“How many times a week do you do that?” she asks, sucking down her water as soon as the waitress hands it to her.
“Usually three,” I tell her, sipping from my own glass.
“It’s so hot in there!” Her eyes go so wide it makes me bark out a laugh. “I’m serious, Birdie. Was it, like, a million degrees in that room?!” She lifts her empty glass toward the waitress across the room, signaling the need for a refill.
“Ninety-three, but close,” I tell her over the menu I already know by heart.
We’re at Mountain Farm, the healthiest restaurant in Laurel Hills. I don’t eat out often, but when I do, this is my favorite place to come because something on their menu always works for me.
“Have y’all had a chance to look over the menu?” a perky waitress with blonde curly hair and purple fingernails asks.
“Do you know what the oil base of the new salad dressing is?” I ask.
She scrunches her nose. “Sorry, I don’t think so. I can ask…? I know the ranch dressing is house made…”
“Do you know who’s on the grill tonight? When Buddy is here, he makes my chicken in butter instead of oil.”
Her mouth twists to one side. “Umm…”
“You know what?” I hand her my menu. “I’m feeling crazy, let’s not worry about it. I’ll have the grilled chicken salad, no bacon, no salad dressing”—I reach into my purse and pull out my emergency bottle and wiggle it in the air with a smile—“with the vegetable soup. No croutons or crackers. Instead, I’ll have one slice of sourdough, but using the real butter please, not the margarine. ”
I smile, but her expression is frantic as she scribbles in her notebook. When she’s finished, she looks at Libby, almost nervous as she waits for her order.
Libby smiles. “Yeah, so I’ll make it easy on you—I want the cheeseburger cooked medium with fries and a local beer. I just went to hot yoga, I need to replenish whatever I lost in that torture chamber disguised as fitness.”
The waitress laughs under her breath, relieved, and writes the order down before leaving our table.
“Okay,” Libby says folding her hands on the table. “Your order was the most exhausting experience of my life. Explain this to me.”
I chuckle at her honesty.
“The genetic mutation I have puts me at higher risk for cancer. Me closely watching my diet makes me feel more in control of what little bit I can control.” I shrug with a smile. “I know it seems crazy, it’s just second nature to me now.”
“So—and I’m not attacking you here, I’m trying to understand this—you think if you order a basket of fries instead of your salad with your purse salad dressing stash, you’ll get cancer?” she asks, taking a sip of her beer after the waitress drops it off.
“Not one basket of fries, no. But it’s a slippery slope of habits and anxiety for me, so it’s easier to always stay on, so to speak. I plan my meals, where I eat when I eat out…” I pause, trying to think of how I can explain it in a more understandable way. “When I lay down in bed at night, I know that I still might get cancer tomorrow, but at least I’ll know I tried everything within my power not to today. I know your fries will be delicious, but so will my salad. At some point, that has to just be enough for me.”
Her usual bright red lips, now faded from yoga and her drink, smile. “You’re kind of a badass,” she says, tilting her glass slightly toward me.
I laugh too loudly, organizing my silverware on the table. “Badass, I am not.”
“I’m serious!” she cries. “You have a chest covered with ink, the balls to manage your risk of cancer the way you do and were the most flexible person in that yoga class. And that last one?” She clicks her tongue. “I’m sure Bo really appreciates.” She cocks an eyebrow as a wicked grin cuts across her face.
When my cheeks heat, she cackles.
“I knew it!” she yells, smacking her hand down on the table, causing people from nearby tables to turn and look.
And, for the first time since I was in college and not forced by work, I have dinner with a friend.
She tells me about how she opened a bar: “I thought, why the hell not, I hate working in a bank!”
How her and John met: “I told him if he let me off with a warning, I’d have a beer with him.”
By the time she’s finished telling stories, my cheeks hurt from laughing.
Standing by our parked vehicles, she gives me one of her hugs that I think she should be famous for. She’s thin, lean, and gorgeous, but she hugs like a boa constrictor. If I were thirty years younger, I’d tell her she was my best friend and rush home to make us matching bracelets.
“I hated yoga,” she says, opening her car door and dropping into the driver’s seat. “But let’s do this again next week.”
I almost can’t wait.