That Summer

by Jennifer Weiner

It felt like another painful reminder that, however happy she felt, however safe and protected, there was always misery, crouching in the nearby shadows, waiting around the corner, and nothing could keep it away.

She pressed her lips together, then said, “I wanted a lot of things when I was your age.” Beatrice looked unhappy at that answer. Diana wondered what she was thinking, if she was coming to the conclusion that adulthood was just one long process of settling for what you’d gotten, whether or not it was what you’d wanted.

a world where being born female meant spending years of your life at risk, and the rest of it invisible, existing as prey or barely existing at all.