Vidalia was always hearing other women telling her, “Don’t worry, you’re still young.” It took her a long time to understand how loaded, how menacing that “assurance” actually was. Intended to ultimately inform her, “Don’t worry, it hasn’t all hit you like an anvil yet.” The ravages of female aging, that is. So unlike male aging in every possible way. Not just in terms of how one’s “desirability quotient” diminishes immensely, but how there are all these hidden bodily transformations that few women talk about openly. The same way that few women talk openly about just how horrific pregnancy is (along with the bodily transformations that come with it as well). Maybe they’ve been secretly instructed by some unknown cabal not to talk about these things, lest they cause a mass of more youthful women to commit suicide as a result of being fully aware of what’s in store for them.

At the very least, however, Vidalia had never made the mistake of being conned into having a child. Though it wasn’t for a lack of pressure, both from her husband, other women and society at large. All of her so-called friends insisted that she didn’t know what she was missing, though it didn’t look, to Vidalia, as if she was missing much—apart from the sacrifice of her body and time to this “being” that you’d be stuck with for the rest of your life. No thanks, she said to herself every time someone suggested she ought to have a child before it was “too late.”

At last, it finally was. Vidalia was about to turn fifty-six years old. And though, sure, she had recently found out that the oldest woman to have given birth was seventy-four, that didn’t mean she wanted to push the limits of nature or her body just because “technically” it was still possible. Vidalia was fine with being “too late” to spawn. Maybe now, everyone would get off her goddamn jock about it. Just forget about her entire existence because she was too “old” to bother with anymore. No child-birthing ability, no value to anyone.

That’s certainly how her husband, Alexander, treated her. Though, to be “fair,” he had checked out of their marriage long ago. Probably somewhere around the time when he got the “seven-year itch” and began flagrantly committing adultery. But Vidalia refused to acknowledge his disgusting behavior. She knew, somewhere in the back of her mind, that he was doing it in part to get a rise out of her. To get her to file for a divorce. Little did he know how masochistically spiteful she could be, content to live in her own unhappiness in order to ensure his. Because, clearly, he didn’t want to be married to her anymore. Yet he also “needed” her because she was the one with the cashflow.

Granted, Alexander wasn’t aware of that when he asked her to be his wife; it turned out to be an added bonus when she confessed to having access to a sizable inheritance that would float them through life in the wake of Alexander getting laid off from his job. This being a piece of information that Vidalia almost immediately regretted telling him as it seemed to, in Alexander’s mind, give him free rein to do absolutely nothing. At first, he somewhat feigned that he was going to look for a new job, but, over time, it became quite obvious that he had no intention of ever working again.

Instead, his only goal appeared to be to have as many affairs as possible so that Vidalia would be pushed to her brink and want to divorce him. She wasn’t going to fall for that trap, knowing full well he would try to take her for half of what was rightfully hers. So instead, she would make him suffer as much as she was by choosing to stay in their loveless, passionless marriage. One that became even more passionless as Alexander patently grew less attracted to her because of “the change” she was undergoing. The one that began with the cruel phase of “entering old ladyhood” known as perimenopause. That punishing, merciless thing that seems to have a Frankenstein effect on a woman, turning her into a version of herself that is surly, foggy and generally so confused about what’s happened to her body that she feels obliged to bite everyone else’s head off about it.

Vidalia had only really started to worry about this “transformation” taking hold of her when, one day—years ago now—while visiting her aunt and cousin, the latter got to talking about how she had no idea that she was going to need to turn to hormone replacement therapy to regulate the intense mood swings and hot flashes she had started having a couple years earlier. This when she was only forty-one. Vidalia’s cousin, suddenly noticing the terrified look on Vidalia’s face, smiled and said, “Don’t worry, you’re still young.” That phrase which had been bandied about so much during this period of Vidalia’s life, which only made her feel as though she wasn’t actually that young anymore at all, if people felt like they needed to assure her that she was.

And even though, Vidalia was, in fact, six years younger than her cousin, the words didn’t feel that comforting; they felt ominous. Because, all at once, it struck Vidalia that she was running out of time. Not to have a baby, but to be considered hot, desirable, fuckable. All of the things in this life that women were told they had to be if they wanted to be “seen,” let alone considered “of value.” Once that quality disappeared with the advent of perimenopause and then menopause, all that Vidalia would have left going for her was her money. The one boon that allowed her to “keep” a man. But not really, since he openly cheated on her and pretty much everyone else knew it. It’s not as if he was getting more discreet as he, too, got older.

When Vidalia got home from her aunt’s house that day, she couldn’t help but stare at herself in the mirror. Examining her face to make sure that no major “alterations” had occurred. That time hadn’t fucked with her completely yet. Afterward, she tried to arouse herself. To get wet by imagining a sex scene from Showgirls. But it failed to work. No matter how furiously she touched and rubbed herself down there, it seemed to remain dry as a bone. She had understood this to also be one of the potential side effects of perimenopause, as her cousin had additionally stated this was an issue she didn’t expect to stuggle with. How could it be that it was happening now to Vidalia? Had the power of suggestion done it? Was Paul Verhoeven’s oeuvre no longer valuable “wanking material”?

Before she could examine these questions with much depth, she heard Alexander open the front door downstairs. Well, there was really no hope of getting wet now. Because if she was dry before, his presence made her even drier. Indeed, Vidalia decided that it wasn’t perimenopause’s fault at all; that, instead, her vag simply had an “Alexander detector” for whenever he was within five miles of her that suddenly made her “clam” close entirely. The same thing she told herself to this day, even after she had begun going through full-on menopause. Not that she would ever admit it to herself or anyone else, repeating internally, Don’t worry, you’re still young. It’s just Alexander who makes you feel totally sexless.