Flirting with Fifty

“Because I refuse to wear rose-colored glasses any longer. Maybe when I was a little girl I believed in fairy tales, but I don’t anymore. I haven’t in a long, long time.”

“I don’t, either.”

“Elizabeth, you read romance and I read true crime. You believe in happy endings. I believe no one’s to be trusted.”

“You’re not that cynical.”

“I’m getting there.”

“Just tell me this, why is it such a bad thing to like Jack? No one is saying you have to date him. But you can be friends. You’re friends with Greg.”

“That’s different. He’s not single. Being overly friendly with single men leads to complications. Every time.”

“Because men want to sleep with you, and you don’t want to get naked with them.”

“Ugh. Just the very idea of getting naked with an old guy. Yuck.”

“You’ve plenty of younger men interested. Remember that new art professor? The one from New York? He dug you big-time.”

“I don’t date colleagues.”

“What you mean is, you don’t date.”

“Yes. That is what I mean.” Paige signaled, taking the exit off the 5 for Dana Point. “Are we going to barre in the morning? You’ve bailed on me twice now.”

“I can’t tomorrow morning. But maybe Sunday?”

“You’ll bail on me. You’re going to go to church and then brunch somewhere.”

“Maybe.”

“Elizabeth.”

“Love you.”

“Grr. Love you, too. Good night.”

Paige parked in her garage and walked up the stairs to her second-floor apartment. It was dark and warm when she unlocked the door but would cool quickly once she opened windows and let in the breeze coming in from the sea.

She’d spent her first three years at Orange in an apartment complex close to campus, thinking it would save money to walk instead of drive, but in the end, she’d rarely walked since so many of her classes ended late and she felt safer driving once it was dark. Every time one of her daughters would visit, they’d want to go to Laguna, and so she’d found a place close to Laguna without paying the high Laguna Beach rent.

Paige filled a glass with water from her refrigerator and carried it to the balcony. She had a sliver of a view of the ocean, but it was better than of a parking lot. She sat down in one of the folding chairs, took off her shoes and propped her bare feet on the railing, and thought about her weekend. She’d take an exercise class in the morning, read through the syllabus for Jack’s class, check in with the two students she’d tutored all summer and see if they needed anything before they started school next week. Not a bad weekend. There’d be time to finish the book she was reading and maybe even watch a couple episodes of Dead to Me. Michelle had gotten her hooked on it but Paige didn’t like to watch only one episode, so she’d saved them up so she could binge on two or three.

Little joys, she thought, smiling faintly.

A barre class.

A sliver of the ocean.

Two saved episodes of Unsolved Mysteries or Dead to Me.

It might not sound like much to someone else, but these things all represented freedom. Peace. Her little apartment was a haven of security and calm. She no longer had to play the game of the Emperor’s New Clothes. There was no more ignoring the elephant in the room, no more pretending that she wasn’t walking on eggshells, or pretending she had a satisfying marriage. She was free. Free of placating an alcoholic husband. Free of biting her tongue to keep from protesting just how angry she was at how her marriage, and life, had been hijacked, and her hijacker was none other than the man she’d once loved more than anything.

But a hard marriage squeezed the love out of you.

A hard marriage made love feel like torture.

So, no thank you. No dates. No men. She was good. Maybe not ecstatic, but content. And after the past twenty years, a tough twenty years, content was enough.