“When we filled out the forms for our readings, you asked for our date and time of birth. If a birth is planned ahead of time, do you think that messes up the baby’s destiny? Or what about the mother’s destiny?”
A previous Aimee would have ridiculed the idea that our fate was fixed by some unseen force. Old Aimee knew what she wanted out of life and did everything in her power to achieve it, from submitting extra credit for higher grades in school to breaking up with Adam when he didn’t propose on the right timeline. My specific actions led to my Columbia acceptance letter, and to Adam showing up the next week with a diamond ring. Nothing could have carried me somewhere I didn’t want to go. And nothing could have stood in my way of where I wanted to be.
Yet in the last few years, I’ve found myself believing more in woo-woo ideas like fate and karma. Even this very conversation feels like evidence of their existence. How many times has Farah seen a post of me and the girls go up on social media during the exact minute we’re outside her office having lunch? Enough to know I schedule content ahead of time, and she’s never once said she wishes she could pre-deliver a baby. Not until the moment I have an opportunity to ask an expert. An unseen force has to be at play.
“Aimee, you didn’t have C-sections,” Farah says, confused.
She’s right, obviously, but the question is a metaphor. Could I have made a choice a long time ago that altered this very moment, and I’m the idiot who thinks she’s still driving the bus? Are our futures determined by our pasts? I can’t bear to hear the answer to that direct question, so I ask about C-sections.
“What an interesting inquiry,” Rini says. I smile.
All I’ve ever wanted is a picture-perfect life. The recipe for which is a lot of hard work in the setup, dozens of tries to get it right, and a sprinkle of good lighting.
Place the devoted romance-writer husband by my side. Snap. One magazine-worthy duplex on the Upper East Side of Manhattan. Snap. One yummy baby. Snap. Another angelic girl. Snap. A third perfect daughter. Snap.
Me, front and center. The best light, the best angle. Snap.
Lately I’m scared that the next time I capture a shot, the camera shutter will close and—poof—it’s all gone. Collapsed under the weight of a mistake so old that it predates Instagram Stories. A choice that won’t disappear after twenty-four hours no matter how I try to archive it.
STARS HARBOR ASTROLOGICAL RETREAT
ASTRO CHEAT SHEET
GUEST NAME: Farah
SUN SIGN: Virgo
MOON SIGN: Libra
RISING SIGN: Leo
AGE: 38
OCCUPATION: doctor, ob-gyn
RELATIONSHIP TO OTHER GUESTS: married to Joe, best friends with Aimee
SPECIAL NOTES: dominated by Fixed and Earth signs. Is she incapable of change?
FARAH
Holding back from Aimee is as unnatural to me as posting on social media. I become awkward and two-dimensional. My tone never lands. The ride to Greenport alone with Aimee should have been the highlight of my weekend, and yet I feel a knot in my stomach that is both caused by Aimee and one I cannot untangle without her.
A mother’s intuition is different from other gut reactions. It’s something that cannot be tested until you have children of your own. I didn’t expect mine to be strong, because I’m too logical to listen to some vague “feeling.” But I also didn’t expect that intuition would never find me. Over eight years into motherhood and I don’t “know” things the way Aimee does. I’ve seen her look at Clara across a table and dash away for a bowl to place under the girl’s chin the very moment she throws up. Meanwhile, I had witnessed nothing more than Clara eating, playing, and laughing. What did Aimee know that I didn’t? What gene does she have that I’m missing?
Aimee knew I wasn’t telling her the whole story about Beckett, but she has no idea how much more I’m not saying. That’s why I welcome the existential argument she and I are having in the hallway of this astrologer’s house. When we’re talking about C-sections and fate, I don’t have to hold back for fear of what I’m missing that should be obvious.
“Are you suggesting we’re all here acting out some predetermined script, like dinner theater?” I scoff.
I don’t believe in destiny, and even if I did, scheduling C-sections for my work is not toying with the universe. The mother has as much free will in the date and time as I do. Life is made up by a series of concrete choices.
“I’m asking if the past determines our futures. And I’m asking Rini,” Aimee says.
We both look to Rini, who has a playful smirk pulling at her lips.
“Why don’t we move this conversation to my study?” she says. I wonder if we’re embarrassing her with our petty bickering and she’s trying to hide us.
Rini’s study looks remarkably like my office at work. Two green leather chairs positioned in front of a massive walnut desk. A tufted couch against the side wall. Hundreds of textbooks line the space behind Rini sitting at her desk. It smells like knowledge: woodsy with a hint of vanilla, the scent of decaying paper. Aimee and I sit in the chairs across from Rini.
“I want to try to answer your question. I do think the rise in C-sections will have a lasting impact on society,” Rini says.
“How?” I challenge.
“The Sun is the primary source of consciousness for people born during the daylight hours, while those born after sunset are led by the Moon. Very simply, the Sun represents father; the Moon, mother.”
“And she schedules C-sections between the hours of ten and four,” Aimee says.
“I’m a senior doctor. I can make my own hours.”
“I’m just saying, those are clearly daylight hours, even in the winter,” Aimee says.
