A Body Out of Time
Past certainty, somehow undone
Unmarried and childless. By will, and happy. Old in number, but time is just a concept and age is just a number.
Neither young nor old. Just suspended. My body refused to obey time in the way everyone else’s did. Menopause had come and gone years ago. I had mourned it briefly, not for motherhood, (I had never been sentimental about that,) but for the quiet closure of a door. A chapter sealed. I moved on. Or rather, I moved upward.
Life had lately been sharper, richer, more intentional. The men changed too. Older men bored me. Too predictable, too aware of themselves. I preferred younger men. (Not boys, never that.) Men in that precise window where strength peaks and self-awareness hasn’t dulled it. Something almost architectural about them. Broad shoulders, unspent energy.
And as for me, I fit into their world more easily than I should have. Too easily.
Friday nights were still mine. Private lounges, rooftop bars. Lighting, conversation. My friends were women who had perfected the art of living well. Silk at brunch, diamonds that didn’t scream as much, laughter that carried just enough edge to command the space.
That night was just like any other. Or so I thought. The rooftop was washed in amber light, the city stretching beneath us. I wore silk, deep garnet, cut low at the back. I didn’t ask for attention but received it anyway.
I noticed him before he noticed me. I always do. Late twenties, maybe early thirties. Easy physical confidence.
“You don’t belong to this place,” he said.
I smiled. “Neither do you.”
We danced. Music has a way of collapsing decisions into inevitability. Such steady warm hands he had. Mine were practiced. Touching the right places in just the right way. So much laughter. Drinks blurred the edges just enough to make everything feel intentional even when it wasn’t.
After that, the night dissolves. The nepo babies have their own places. Well off and confident enough to offer the night space. As for the others, I understood. I didn’t mind hosting. I however have never fancied the idea of getting a room for two. For some reason. Just never seemed right.
And that was normal for me. That was life.
Until it was not.
Irritation. Subtle. Easily dismissible. My body felt so unfamiliar. I blamed food, then sleep, then stress. Though I don’t really allow stress into my life in any meaningful way.
But the feeling persisted. One morning, I stood in my kitchen, marble countertops, sunlight pouring in. The wave of nausea was so sudden that I had to grip the edge of the counter. I laughed. Actually laughed.
There was only one explanation. But that didn’t apply to me. It could not. Menopause had closed that door, locked it and burned the key. Still I bought the test.
Positive. I frowned.
Another one. Two lines. Positive.
I suddenly felt disoriented. Like stepping into what you think is solid ground then feel it giving in slowly beneath you.
Third time’s a charm. Positive.
And then it hit. Violently. I sat down on the cold kitchen floor, silk robe pooling around me, and said it out loud just to hear how absurd it sounded.
“I’m pregnant.”
Past menopause. Pregnant.
I contained it. No one knew. And yet everything was different. At a gallery opening three nights later, I stood with a glass of champagne I barely touched, listening to someone explain a piece I was not really looking at. A young man beside me leaned in slightly as he spoke.
I watched his mouth move and thought, irrationally, it could be you.
That thought was so absurd I nearly smiled.
I moved through the room like I always did, graceful and composed. But internally everything had shifted. Every interaction carried a shadow of possibility.
The night with the rooftop blurred into others. Faces. Hands. Laughter. Nothing definitive.
That was the worst part. Not knowing didn’t feel scandalous rather careless.
And I am not careless.
I couldn’t do it. Not at my age. With this life. With this level of uncertainty. I had spent years building a life that was intentional and precise. This was the opposite.
Beautiful, perhaps. Miraculous even. But not mine to keep. The decision settled in me as soon as it formed in my mind.
Money makes things quieter. The right amount can move the seas. The woman at the clinic’s front desk smiled. Not pity. I truly appreciated that.
Forms signed. Tone-neutral questions. The normal kind doctors ask. Dates I didn’t want to calculate and details I didn’t want to revisit.
“Do you have support?”
I paused. I could’ve named ten people. Women who would show up immediately, bring wine, sit beside me and make it lighter.
But this didn’t feel like something to share.
“I’m fine,” I said.
And I was.
It was quiet afterwards. Emotionally. It is quiet.
I expected something louder. Regret, perhaps. Or overwhelming relief. Instead, I got stillness. I went home in the back of a car, watching the city move past me as if nothing had happened. Because to everyone else, nothing had.
My body, which had defied time in one direction, had now corrected itself in another.
I went out again sooner than I had expected. The rooftop welcomed me the same way it always had. Music. Laughter.
A young man approached. My type.
“You look like trouble,” he said.
I smiled slowly. Seductively.
“Only if you don’t know what you’re doing.”
We danced. And as I moved, my body returned to its rhythm. I could feel it. I had just taken a brief intermission.
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nice one brosquito