We sit in silence, breathing with the music. Until she leans forward and says, “I was going to ask if you’re okay, but that feels like bullshit.”
I huff a soft laugh. “Yeah. It kind of is.” I pause before meeting her eyes. “Fuck, Jules.”
“I know, babe.” She pulls me into her arms and lets me cry.
Even though she’s smaller, she holds me like a wall, fierce and unwavering.
“Syd, when I asked you the other night if you were happy, it wasn’t a question. I see you. I see the distance between you and Mason. How much you’ve changed. And from experience?” She stops, gathering the words to say: “Babies don’t fix what’s broken in relationships.”
“How can I be a mother when I feel so lost?”
“Do you know who I see when I look at you?” She asks, brushing tears from my cheeks. “I see a woman who survived a shitty childhood. Who clawed her way out of a frozen house. Who wasn’t carved from stone like her parents. Who loveshard.”
Her words wreck me, my tears falling freely. I wish I could see that version of me, too.
Maybe Jules sees who I could be. Maybe she’s holding up a mirror to my potential, not my reality. The question is whether I’m brave enough to become that woman, or if I’ll keep hiding behind fear.
“Do you ever get lonely?” I whisper, because it feels wrong to say out loud.
“All the time,” she admits without hesitation. “Even with a good man. Even surrounded by love. Because no one can fill you up…but you. I had to learn that the hard way too, babe.”
“I don’t think I’ve ever wanted something just for myself.”
“Syd, the woman I saw ice skating, she was alive and free. When was the last time Mason made you feel the way you looked out there? When was the last time he even tried?”
I stare into my cold tea, unable to answer. We both already know the truth.
She disconnects my music from the speaker and throws on “Good as Hell” by Lizzo.
“Maybe it’s time you let yourselflive.” She shimmies toward me. “But until you’re ready to claim what you want, we’re dancing this shit out.”
“I don’t think this is…”
But she’s already pulling me to my feet as the beat pulses through the room. My resistance lasts about three seconds before I let go, a little.
She twirls me until the room becomes streaks of color and light. We dance until sweat dampens our shirts, until a genuine smile spreads across my face. Until I almost believe in the strength Jules swears I have.
All that’s left is to bury the pieces of this week so deep that someday I can lie to myself and pretend he never mattered, that this beautiful week was never supposed to be anything more.
From the window, I watch Bell bounding toward the forest. She pauses at the tree line, ears perked, tail wagging, suspended in a moment of possibility. My heart seizes at the glimmer in her eyes.
What’s out there? What if she keeps going?
But she turns back, trotting toward the house with her tail wagging.
2020
The bird with a chick to protect
forgets how to trust the wind,
choosing the withering branch
over the storm that might teach them both to soar.
Ten
Exhaustionseepsintomybones.
