by Liz Fenton
Soon after Jessie and Grant had officially reconciled, Claire and Jessie had taken their kids to the beach. As they leaned back in their folding chairs and watched Emily and the twins burying Lucas in the sand, Jessie had asked Claire if she thought it was fair.
“Is what fair?”
“That we got a second chance. Most people don’t. They have to live with the consequences of their actions. Is our karma going to be all screwed up now? Are we going to die in some freak accident?”
Claire tipped her sunglasses down her nose. “I told you not to watch that stupid movie!”
“Final Destination? I had to!”
Claire shook her head. “I don’t get your fascination with horror movies.”
Jessie rolled her eyes. “Will you listen to me, please? I had a nightmare about this last night. What if the universe is going to punish us in some way? For not having to pay the price everyone else does?”
Claire took a sip of her water before answering. “I don’t know, Jess. I think we’ve faced plenty of demons in this life too.” She nodded toward Lucas, the girls begging him to stop putting sand in his mouth, then giggling when he didn’t. “You fought like hell for your marriage and your family. You had to sit your daughters down and tell them you had a baby with another man. You had to face the rage of that man’s wife.”
“I did.” Jessie took a deep breath. It had been incredibly difficult, but confronting her secrets had been her penance, and the only way to truly start over. “And you still lost your mom all over again.” Jessie squeezed Claire’s hand. “And Gabs never did get her baby.”
“I’ve thought about it a lot. And I think the point of going back to that year wasn’t to make everything perfect. It was to learn how to face things head-on, instead of running from them or hiding from them. Every single secret we held came out. And you know what? We’re all stronger for it.” Claire paused, thinking about Mona again. Even though it was devastating to go through her death a second time, she wouldn’t have given up having that year with her again for anything. And she got to fix the mistakes she made with Emily, giving her daughter the life she always deserved.
“Did you guys start the festivities without me?” Jessie’s voice rang out from inside. She watched as Lucas barreled toward the pool and dove in, Gabriela laughing as water sprayed her. Jessie dumped all her purchases except one on the counter and grabbed a pitcher of mimosas from the fridge, while Grant helped Madison and Morgan pull plastic cups from the cupboard. Morgan’s blond hair had recently been chopped off into an asymmetrical bob, yet another new haircut in a matter of months, but Madison’s was still long and parted down the middle, the way it always had been. The girls remained so similar to the way they’d been as little girls—Morgan outgoing and direct, never mincing words to make her point, Madison more reserved, saving her voice for when it would be impactful. But both laughed and rolled their eyes when their father teased that he should make them a virgin cocktail, even though they were twenty years old and the legal drinking age in Mexico was eighteen.
“Happy birthday, Claire!” Jessie said as Grant poured the drinks and handed them out. “To fifty! It’s the new twenty-five, right?” Jessie said, looking at Emily, who was nearly there, and everyone held their drinks high in the air.
“I wouldn’t go that far!” Claire said. “My headache would argue otherwise!”
“Whatever, lady! Drink up. Hair of the dog, right?” Jessie laughed, then added, “I have presents!”
“I don’t need a set of maracas, Jessie,” Gabriela teased.
“Oh shut up!” Jessie said. “Seriously, both of you come over here.”
Gabriela and Claire sat down next to Jessie and waited patiently as she carefully unwrapped the tissue paper to reveal three necklaces, each with a small bottle of sand and a charm with the number forty dangling from it. “So we’ll always remember the year we turned forty,” Jessie said, so quietly only her best friends could hear her.
Each woman picked up her necklace and let it dance between her fingers, reflecting on the journey that had led them to exactly where they were today. Gabriela learned to fail and rise back up, stronger than she was before. Claire discovered she didn’t have to sacrifice her own happiness for everyone else’s. And Jessie found out that sometimes you have to fight like hell for something, even when you doubt whether you still deserve it.
“Wait,” Emily said as she leaned over Claire’s shoulder. “You messed up. That says forty. You’re fifty!” She glanced at Morgan and Madison and smirked. “God, I hope early senility doesn’t run in our families!”
“No, it’s perfect, just the way it is,” Jessie said, glancing back at Grant before grabbing Gabriela and Claire and pulling them into a group hug.
Madison shook her head. “I don’t get you guys sometimes.”
“That’s okay,” Claire said, wiping the tears from Jessie’s cheeks with her thumb. “We get each other. And that’s all that matters.”
Acknowledgments
What a fun ride this has been!
Thank you to Greer Hendricks for taking a chance on us four years ago. You didn’t have to read our manuscript, but you graciously did. We’ll always be thankful to you and our wonderful publisher, Judith Curr, for believing in us.
Sarah Cantin! How can you continue to be so incredibly fabulous and nice? It really doesn’t seem fair. Thank you for always advocating for us. We want to be you when we grow up.
Elisabeth Weed, you continue to be the best agent anyone could ask for. We appreciate when you discreetly look away when we get into arguments in front of you. At dinner. After a bottle of wine. (Long story!)
And Dana Murphy—you are outstanding and we heart you.
Ariele Fredman, we are so in love with you. Can you feel it? You are amazing and we are so thrilled with everything you and the lovely Kathryn Santora have done for TSOAT.
To our friends and family—thank you for preordering our books and hauling your bad selves to our book signings. One day, we promise to have people we don’t know in those seats and you’ll be off the hook.
To the incredible book bloggers who have championed us along the way—it’s hard to put into words the gratitude we feel. Word of mouth is everything and we appreciate every single mention. Hugs to Jennifer Tropea O’Regan from Confessions of a Bookaholic; Andrea Katz from Great Thoughts, Great Readers; Natasha Minoso from Book Baristas; and of course, Melissa Amster from Chick Lit Central—we owe y’all some serious cocktails!
To our readers—thank you doesn’t seem like enough. We are literally nothing without you. We love to hear from you and read your reviews. Keep ’em coming!
Liz would like to send love to her father, Bill, who passed away while writing The Year We Turned Forty. You always said tough times build strength, and as usual, you were right. You are missed every single day.
And last, but not least, thank you to Mike and Matt. You guys could’ve told us this would never happen. But instead you encouraged us to dream big. You could have asked us to quit to make your lives easier. But you never did. Know that every word we write is because of you guys. We love you! PS: Now let’s go to Vegas! (After a shout-out like that, we deserve it, right? #stringsattached #sorry #notsorry #weloveyouthough)
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LIZ FENTON & LISA STEINKE have been best friends for more than twenty-five years and survived high school and college together. Liz lives in San Diego with her husband and two children. Lisa, a former talk show producer, now lives in Chicago with her husband, daughter, an
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Washington Square Press
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This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are products of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2016 by Liz Fenton and Lisa Steinke
Cover Design by Connie Gabbert Design
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First Washington Square Press trade paperback edition April 2016
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Fenton, Liz, author. | Steinke, Lisa, author.
Title: The year we turned forty : a novel / Liz Fenton and Lisa Steinke.
Description: First Washington Square Press trade paperback edition. | New York : Washington Square Press, 2016.
Identifiers: LCCN 2015041738 (print) | LCCN 2015044930 (ebook) Subjects:
BISAC: FICTION / Contemporary Women. | FICTION / Family Life. |
FICTION / Humorous.
Classification: LCC PS3606.E5844 Y43 2016 (print) | LCC PS3606.E5844 (ebook)
| DDC 813/.6—dc23
LC record available at http://lccn.loc.gov/2015041738
ISBN 978-1-4767-6344-6
ISBN 978-1-4767-6345-3 (ebook)
