Aria had stayed silent during our tiff, but I could sense her seething. She followed me to the kitchen with her plate and deposited it in the sink.

“Mom, mind if I skip and catch up on some reading? I’ve almost finished Doctor Sleep. We’ll work out together some other time,” she said. She gave me a quick peck on the cheek, adding, “By the way, Mom, I think you’re beautiful.”

I needed that. God, how I needed that!

As I placed my dirty dishes in the sink, Owen’s footsteps padded behind me. His arm draped across me, pulling my back against his chest. His breath tickled my ear as his lips kissed my earlobe.

“C’mon, it’s raining and miserable out. Stay home and watch a movie with me,” Owen whined. “Besides, it’s not safe for a woman to be out after dark alone. Not every husband loves spending time with his wife as much as I love spending time with you, Mac. You should be grateful.”

“I am grateful, I just . . . I need time out of the house. Being here all day, every day, well . . . sometimes I need to get out. Be with friends.” See that? I had slipped a truth in with the lie. He didn’t know I had spent the morning gossiping with the girls, and I wouldn’t tell him either.

“Mac, you’re acting awfully strange tonight. What’s going on?”

Cold apprehension snaked up my neck. Did he know what I was up to?

“Nothing’s going on. I’m just worn slap out. And, you know, my usual anxiety that I’m trying to work on—remember? I can’t fix it if I don’t face it. Please don’t fight me on this.”

Another defective thing about me was my social anxiety. I had self-diagnosed when looking up the symptoms on WebMD one day. It had started off innocuously at first, right after I’d given birth to Aria. Breaking out in a cold sweat when I went grocery shopping alone. Pulse racing when heading to Mommy and Me activities. Hives spreading across my neck when talking to the bank teller.

As dread of leaving the house weighted my feet down, I nursed the anxiety to life by quitting Mommy and Me and isolating myself from everyone. That’s when my friends took notice and begged me to get help. You need to get out and have some fun, Lily had scolded me in her protective Italian mamma way. If you don’t take control of your life, you’re going to crack, Robin had warned. Boy, were they right. After all, it wasn’t normal to break out in hives when talking to people, was it? Days before a planned outing, I would stress and worry myself into a migraine, until I lost every part of my life outside my four walls.