Boring Berry looks at me. ‘I see. What you mean is, why am I just sitting around all day waiting for someone else to make life more exciting, instead of getting up and doing things for myself.’
I remind him that sometimes we need to be the instigators. ‘We need to issue the invitations to do things with family and friends. We need to reach out.’ I push a leaflet into his hand. ‘I picked this up for you after one of your sessions with Nidi.’
He looks down at the leaflet and back up at me, then down at the leaflet again.
‘I want you to join this group, Berry. It might not be your cup of tea, but I’ve explained that you are widowed and severely lacking in conversation. Just go along and have some fun with other people.’ I fix him a determined look.
His eyes go all watery, like old people’s eyes do, and tells me today is the anniversary of his wife’s death. He says his heart aches without her, even after all of these years, and that when he woke up this morning, he prayed to her to help him get through the day.
‘But today,’ he says, taking my hand unexpectedly, ‘I asked her to give me a sign that she is still here, watching over me, waiting for me.’
I dare to look into his wet face, as he explains, waving the leaflet at me. ‘I asked her to help me get back into playing bowls like I used to before she… before she…. and now here you are, giving me this, telling me to go and play bowls!’
I’m not sure where to go with this. I don’t really want to burst his bubble and for all I know perhaps itwashis late wife who put the idea into my head. Maria-José-Inmaculada-Carmen watches Boring Berry leave, sniffing up the last of his tears. She glances in my direction. I would stake my life on her thinking that it is me with my terrible Life Coaching that has reduced him to tears.
‘Well, thankfully, apart from Jiff, Berry will be the last proper client I do before Nidi gets back,’ I say relieved. Life coaching is a huge responsibility. People are relying on me to help them achieve their goals. Their life goals. For the one and only life they’ll ever have. I let out a gusty breath, feeling the enormity of the pressure deflate. I close my eyes and pinch my nose, grateful that Nidi will return in a few weeks.
‘Yes,’ Maria-José-Inmaculada-Carmen agrees. ‘The last one for today.’
An ominous prickle creeps up my back. I count to three in my head before speaking.
‘Meaning?’
‘It is this computer. It is allowing all the people to book sessions. Even the clients I tell not to come. See? It is the computer’s fault.’ She turns the monitor to face me, sits back and folds her arms accusingly. ‘It’s why this book is much better. I will use the book instead.’
I stare at a packed diary for tomorrow as anxiety sweeps me up. Names and times swim before my eyes. While she has been burying her head in the sand, clients have been booking sessions willy-nilly. There isn’t enough time left in the day to ring every single one of them and reschedule.
‘Some of these slots are double booked,’ I say. ‘The names on the computer don’t match the names of clients you have booked in the diary.’
‘Si.’
She has a defiant look on her face. It is clear that Maria-José-Inmaculada-Carmen won’t be offering a solution any time soon.
‘And also,’ she says, moving the conversation on. ‘We have many bookings forThe Coach Trip. People are excited to know where we are going. Will the coach have air conditioning and toilets?’
‘Coach trip?’
‘Yes. The singles coach trip you are organising.’
‘You meanweare organising? And it’s not a coach trip. It’s a coaching sort of journey.’
‘Si. Journey as in trip?’ she waves Google Translate at me on her phone.
Gaaah!
‘No. It’s not a trip. It’s very much a journey.'
'What is the difference between a trip and a journey?'
I stop to think. I have been speaking this language since birth, and yet I have no clue how to answer her.
'Erm, the difference is that one is more of an actual trip to somewhere, and the other is more of a journey to somewhere.'I'd never make a teacher.'Actually, no. It's the context. A journey can be a spiritual… no, what we are organising is much more of an event, really. It is a life coaching event to take people on a journey but without physically moving.’
Maria-José-Inmaculada-Carmen looks understandably confused.
‘Please tell me you have not been booking people onto an actual coach trip. You’ve explained that it is more of a coachingexperiencewith some singles and business activities involved?’
Whatever the heck that means.
