I pretended to concentrate on a tight junction, wary of scraping the sides of the truck.
‘Why is your soul flailing, Jenny?’
Could I ignore this until she fell asleep? I guessed not. And there wasn’t much point arguing with her, either.
‘Probably several reasons.’ I sighed. ‘Where do you want to start?’
‘At the beginning? I always find things less confusing that way.’
‘We’ve only got an hour and a half.’
‘Talk quickly, then. Cut straight to the chase.’
‘I’m not sleeping very well, since the burglary. And feeling jumpy. I can’t decide whether to sell the house, which feels a bit like running away. But isn’t running away the most sensible option sometimes? So, instead of starting to redecorate, getting an electrician in and all the other million jobs that need doing whether I’m staying or going, I’m hovering in this limbo of inactivity and indecision.’
‘Hmm.’ Frances looked dubious.
‘I really don’t like myself right now.’
‘Ah, that’s more like it.’ Frances perked up at this, which I felt was a rather inappropriate response. But, hey, she could get away with it.
‘Why not?’
‘I’m making bad choices about how I spend my time, getting nothing done, avoiding making a decision.’
‘No. That’s not it.’
I spent a mile deciding whether to be annoyed or not.
‘Try again,’ Frances said.
I thought about it. Not why. I knew why. I thought about whether to tell Frances. ‘I’m angry at myself for doing a stupid, selfish thing and hurting a friend. They’ve moved away, so I don’t even know if they forgive me, I can’t do anything to make it up to them, and I miss them so much it makes me ill. Which means I feel even worse, because I have no right to miss them like this. I’m a horrible person. And fighting this guilt, trying to ignore the hurt, I feel like I’m going mad.’
‘Go on.’
‘That terrifies me, because I’ve only just begun feeling like a person I can live with. I can physically feel it, a black shadow wrapping itself around my heart, my brain, my lungs. Everywhere. Like something offDoctor Who. And I’m trying to fight it off, but it’s exhausting. I’m so tired. And even now I have amazing friends for the first time ever, I’m still so lonely because the shadow is cutting me off from everything. So, yeah, I hate myself right now.’
Frances handed me a lace handkerchief.
‘You need to forgive yourself,’ she said quietly. ‘Whether Mack forgives you or not is meaningless if you can’t forgive yourself. That will help you vanquish the shadows.’
Ur, I didn’t remember mentioning Mack…
‘But I don’t deserve forgiveness,’ I said, my voice breaking. ‘I did an awful thing, and am still feeling wrong things about Mack. Which makes me think wrong things. How do I stop that? I’m the worst type of person. I hate people like this. I don’t want to forgive a person like that.’
‘If Sarah told you she’d discovered her HeartBaker friend was married, and she was therefore trying to erase her feelings for him, which she felt dreadful about, but was struggling to do so, would you hate her for it?’
I sighed. ‘No.’
‘What would you say to her?’
I shrugged. ‘I’d probably give her a big hug and tell her that as long as she stayed away from him from now on, she’d be okay.’
‘There you are, then.’
‘But if I forgive myself, isn’t that saying it’s all right, what I did?’
Frances laughed. ‘No, it is not. It is saying you choose grace, anyway. If what you did is all right, there’s no need for forgiveness.’
