I am sitting between my two teenage daughters at a Taylor Swift concert. From the outside, it looks like the perfect moment: a mother with her girls at the show of a lifetime, surrounded by screaming fans dressed in costumes from every era of Taylor’s musical journey.
But inside, something is wrong. A kind of dread rises in me as I watch the massive clock on the stage counting down the seconds until Taylor appears, as if her arrival and my survival are somehow linked.
The truth is, I don’t want to be here. I tried to get a friend to take my kids, but he insisted I go. “You have to!” he said. What I couldn’t explain to him — even to myself — was that I was certain if I went to this concert, something terrible would happen.
The clock strikes zero, and the crowd erupts. My two teenage girls turn toward me, smiling. I smile back and nod. Yep, having fun. But I’m not. A queasy cocktail of emotions explodes inside me, and the only thing I can do — short of running from the stadium — is collapse onto my seat.
Hidden below everyone else on their feet — cheering, dancing, and singing — I search through the gaps in the crowd like a small child looking for somethi...
English (US)