Beyoncé was in the line at the club.
Six Beyoncés, to be precise.
Two had on variations of the tiered, sunflower-yellow dress she wore while blissfully twirling a baseball bat and beating the crap out of cars in the “Hold Up” video. Another Beyoncé wore the big-brimmed hat and braids from “Formation.” Another was in the pink pantsuit from “APESHIT.” And two others had on matching cutoffs and cropped hoodies from her Coachella performance.
“It’s Beyoncé night?! No way! This is the best birthday ever!” Willa squealed, now thoroughly drunk after sipping from Jen’s flask of vodka in the back of the Lyft.
“Yeah, bitch!” Jamie yelled.
Oh man, Willa thought, pouting out her lips. I woulda worn my vintage Destiny’s Child T-shirt if I’d known.
Ashley put her hands on Willa’s cheeks. “Do not worry about the line, you beautiful person,” she said, misunderstanding Willa’s Droopy Dog look. “Just come with us.”
The four women held hands like little kids on an elementary school field trip and stumble-marched past the two-dozen 20- and 30-somethings waiting impatiently in line.
“Hey, Max,” Jamie slurred at the doorman. “It’s my friend’s birthday.”
He waved them in.
“Hey, Johnny,” Jamie slurred at the guy they were supposed to pay. “It’s my friend’s birthday.”
He waved them in.
The word “club” was kind of a misnomer for this place. It was more like a dark dive bar with a great sound system and a hipster DJ who swung from the rafters at 3 a.m. Here, you didn’t feel like your butt was a magnet for every guy’s pelvis. During college, when Willa and her friends would go to clubs like that, they’d give each other chaste kisses in the hopes that guys would think they weren’t interested in men and would go away. Other women there did the same thing, but for the opposite effect.
As the bass thumped, Willa and the coaches weaved through the crowd and forced themselves into the center of the dance floor, joining the nucleus of a throbbing, blissed-out Beyoncé cell. Willa closed her eyes and raised her arms like a woman in church, because she was, and sang along:
Freedom, freedom, I can't move
Freedom, cut me loose
Freedom, freedom, where are you?
'Cause I need freedom, too
“Shots!” Ashley yelled in Willa’s ear.
Willa tried to focus on her watch. It looked like it maybe said 12:20 a.m. Or maybe it said rhinoceros.
Her psychiatrist — crammed inside a tiny, gray office decorated with old filing cabinets, a 1990s VCR-TV combo, and, oddly, a desk as ostentatious as the one in the Oval Office — had once tried to explain to Willa the science of drinking and its impact on the brain. Dr. Blankenship, a.k.a. “Beady Eyes,” had prattled on about how alcohol raises GABA levels and induces a feeling of relaxation, but at the time all Willa could think about was “Yo Gabba Gabba,” the LSD fever dream that passed itself off as a kids’ show.
“Alcohol also increases levels of dopamine and norepinephrine in the brain, sending pleasure signals and boosting arousal and excitement while lowering inhibitions and increasing impulsivity,” Dr. Blankenship had lectured while Willa looked out the window at the parking lot in an effort to avoid eye contact. “The sugar in the drinks? That ups arousal too.”
Willa hadn’t really processed those words as cautionary.
Now, pressed up against the bar with the coaches, Willa’s thoughts were like batter, thick and slow, stirred with a wooden spoon. Her good judgment went into the bowl like a teaspoon of salt, quickly overcome by the delicious mix of eggs, butter, flour, vanilla, and sugar.
All Willa had to say were four simple words: “No thanks, I’m good.”
Or at least just stop and have some water.
Why did she hesitate? Did she worry the coaches would think she wasn’t fun, wasn’t cool, wasn’t young enough to keep up? Yes, yes, yes. Didn’t she deserve to have fun on her 41st birthday? Yes! Did she want to just let go of everyone and everything, to be free, to be totally unfettered, for just one night? Yes, yes, yes!
“Yes!” she yelled, and threw back the tequila.
The rest of the night played like a series of jump cuts from “The Hangover,” minus Mike Tyson and the tiger and a baby and anybody quite as hot as Bradley Cooper. More tequila shots. A sniff of molly off the corner of a credit card. Dancing. Singing. Blundering over an imaginary tripwire and ending up in a heap on the beer-sticky floor.
Then, her head hanging out of the backseat window of a Toyota Camry, the wind blowing her hair into her lip gloss, bile rising in her throat.
“She better not throw up in my car,” the Lyft driver grumbled.
Jen was sitting next to Willa, a hand on her back. “We know. You’ve said that six times. She’s fine.”
Ashley, looking at her phone, said: “We’ll pay the cleaning fee if something happens.”
“It’s her birthday!” Jamie cackled.
The cold air felt good on Willa’s face, and she was sad when it stilled as the car came to a stop in front of her house.
As if it were part of their muscle memory, Ashley and Jamie and Jen worked as a team, with Jen holding on to Willa to keep her from tumbling out of the car when Ashley opened the door. Then Ashley and Jamie eased her out, each holding on to one arm and guiding her up the driveway.
They stood her in front of the door and took a step back with their hands out, ready to steady Willa if she started to sway.
“I’m fine,” Willa mumbled as she fumbled to put the code into the door lock. “Seriously. Thank you so much. This was so fun.”
“It really was!” Ashley stage-whispered as Willa went inside. “Text us tomorrow. And happy birthday!”
Epic birthday for Willa!