Page 5 of The Wilder Widows

Following my instructions, she settled back down onto the sofa and clutched her knitting basket to her chest.

“This really is boring, ladies.” Marge sat back, crossing her arms. “I mean, I appreciate having you in my life, but Sylvie is right. There must be more to life than what we’re doing. We’re not twenty anymore, but we’re far from dead.”

“Damn straight,” Alice agreed. “I should at least be traveling or something.”

“Why aren’t you?” I asked, genuinely curious.

Alice opened her mouth to answer but closed it and shrugged.

With a snort, Marge snickered. “Because she’d miss me too much. That’s why.”

“Oh yeah. That’s it.” Alice scoffed.

“So why?” I asked again.

“I guess I don’t want to travel alone.” She paused, and her voice softened as she finished. “And I don’t have any friends who would go with me. Other than you ladies, I don’t really have anyone in my life.”

As I watched the hardness in her eyes soften for a split second, I felt sad for her. Rich, beautiful, and yet still left unfulfilled in her life. I didn’t want to end up like that. I wanted to use this time in my life to do amazing things.

Just what they were, I had no idea.

“See. Because she’d miss me.” Marge’s smirk tightened.

“Well, there must be more than this,” I said. “We just need to put our heads together and figure it out.”

“Like what?” Doris asked.

“I’m not sure.” I shrugged. “But something.”

They stared at me with anticipation as I sat down beside Doris.

“It’s funny. I spent my whole life raising my daughter, taking care of my husband, and working my ass off to have enough money to retire and live the good life. But now that I’m here, I feel like I missed my life. All those years spent in service to others, and now that it’s finally my time with nothing standing in my way, I’m not utilizing the freedom.”

“I hear you, sister.” Alice raised her glass. “I had dreams—big ones. But then the little bun in the oven pushed them aside, and I never got to live the life I wanted. And now it’s too late.” She sighed and downed her martini.

“I certainly wasn’t planning on being a suburban housewife,” Marge said. “I had big dreams myself. Adventures I wanted to go on. But, with Percy’s war injuries, and then raising our daughter, we didn’t ever go on any.”

“Bruce and I traveled every so often, but between our jobs and raising Rachel, we didn’t get out to see the world like I’d always wanted.”

“Am I the only one who enjoyed just being a wife and mother?” Doris asked. “I never yearned for anything else. I really loved it. All of it.”

“It’s not that I didn’t like being a mother,” I answered, “but between being a wife, a mother, and my career, I didn’t get a lot of time for just myself to find things I’m truly passionate about. Now I feel like I’m running out of time.”

“Running out of time?” Doris laughed. “You’re what, fifty-five or sixty?”

I nodded. “I just turned sixty-one.”

“You’re like a spring chicken! I’m over ten years older than you,” she said. “I’m surprised you aren’t clucking instead of speaking.”

“A babe in the cradle,” Marge added, shaking her head. “What I wouldn’t give to be sixty-one again. Things really start to go downhill fast once you hit seventy. Everything aches.”

“I’m not a spring chicken.” I snorted.

“You’re not too old to have some fun, Sylvie. I still have fun and,” Alice leaned forward and whispered, “don’t tell anyone, but I’m older than you.”

We all faked a gasp, and Marge clutched her chest. “Say it ain’t so, Alice! You’re not forty like you’ve been telling everyone?”

Alice swept a look across the three of us as she lifted an eyebrow. “I can pass for forty.”