It’s just sex. Millions of people in the world are probably having sex right this minute. It can’t be that hard. I’d say that Nick and I are above average intelligence when it comes to most things. We’ll figure it out.

I check on the period situation. It seems like I’m done with that, just in the Nick of time.

“Abby’s going to spend the day with Josie,” I tune in to Mom saying. “There’s a kid day on the beach, and I said she could go with the Wongs. Jenny should be here to pick her up in just about—”

There’s a knock on the door: Jenny. Abby squeals and goes off arm in arm with Josie. Afton slips out as the door is closing, muttering something about shopping. She was in a foul mood all last night, tossing and turning and keeping me awake, too. This morning there are dark circles under her angry blue eyes. Maybe I should be concerned, but I am relieved to see her go.

“It looks like it’s just you and me today,” Mom says, after they’ve left.

“Don’t you have to be at the conference center soon?”

“I have the day off,” she says, rolling her neck from one side to the other. “I could use a break. You girls have been having all the fun without me this week.”

I bite my lip to hold back the words, Well, not all the fun, though, right?

“You should call Pop,” I say instead. That’s my new strategy: to remind Mom that she still has Pop to think about, that he loves her, that we are all counting on her to love him back.

She smiles obliviously. “I’m going to the morning yoga class in the wellness center in a few minutes. Come with me?”

I try to think of an excuse but come up empty. One-on-one time with my mother at this juncture is a terrifying idea, like walking around with a lit match into a room doused with gasoline. But if I go to yoga with her, at least we won’t have to talk.

“Okay,” I say.

Thirty minutes later we’re each sitting on a mat in a cool, sunlight-dappled room, celestial music rolling over us as we twist, flex, stretch, and roll.

“Breathe into your feet,” the instructor says.

“My feet don’t breathe,” I whisper to Mom.

“Don’t be a smartass,” she whispers back.

“My ass isn’t smart” is my reply.

She snorts. “Just relax, all right?”

“Fill yourself with silence,” the instructor says a bit sharply. “And reach.”

Here’s what I learn at yoga when I’m supposed to be finding my inner calm and lifting my heart and acknowledging and exhaling my pain: first, my mother is incredibly flexible.

I am not.

I could call that a metaphor, too.