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Pod
Golden hour never looked so beautiful, she thought as warm, ginger sunlight haloed around the emerald firs and cobalt waters of Puget Sound. In the distance, snow-peaked mountains jutted into the sky.
She was the lone person sitting on the rocky shoreline that evening. She only had twenty minutes or so before she’d have to leave to meet the girls for cocktails at some expensive downtown restaurant. She’d forgotten the name, and had vowed not to look at her phone until the sun had set. Not even to take a photo. She didn’t have much storage left anyway from all the drunken shenanigans that weekend she had felt compelled to record. Just a bunch of moms gone wild — a reunion weekend with her college sorority sisters — women who were all married with children, bogged down by stressful jobs and never-ending piles of laundry, who needed a few carefree days pretending they didn’t have any responsibilities.
But she wasn’t a very good actress, and she’d left her days of make believe behind her. It was hard to pretend to be carefree, even when she’d flown halfway across the country to the stunning Pacific Northwest, surrounded by natural splendor and manmade novelties. All the artisanal chocolate, richly brewed coffee, and indulgent cheeses didn’t do the job she’d expected them to; she still couldn’t shake this feeling that had settled deep within her bones.
