Nathan peered at me over the top of his phone. ‘Why would the council name a leisure centre after a loser?’
‘It’s not the whole centre, just the pool. And who else did they have? The only other famous local is a convicted serial killer. It was probably a close vote.’
‘You were a top UK athlete. People loved how you connected with them. And at eighteen, under enormous pressure, you handled a very difficult situation as best you could. If that makes you a national loser, then I dread to think what it means for the rest of us.’
I shook my head, refusing to be coddled. ‘I’m worse than a loser.’ Nathan frowned as my voice broke. ‘At least a loser actually takes part. And I don’t just mean the Olympics. What am I supposed to say when Moira Vanderbeek asks me where I’ve been all decade?’
I squinched my eyes shut, furiously trying to force the tears back inside my head where they belonged.
‘Okay, so I don’t know who Moira Vanderbeek is, or what she has to do with it, but look at all you’ve achieved the past few months, Amy. How can you still think of yourself like that? This is putting a serious dent in my professional credibility.’
I whipped down the blanket. ‘Getting dressed and going outside under the cover of darkness is not an achievement. “Walked around the village, and even once –once –left the village to visit a nearby club” is hardly going to make it onto my Wikipedia page.’
Nathan was quiet for a while. ‘Over 1.3 million people in the UK suffer from panic disorder. Around a third of them will develop agoraphobia. I think that they, and their families and friends, all the health professionals working in mental health, would be really interested to hear what you’ve overcome.’
Note to self even while in midst of frenetic battle with inner anxiety monster:Nathan Gallagher has been doing his research.
‘I’m hardly a poster girl for mental well-being.’
‘You will be.’
I pulled a tissue out of the box on the coffee table, unwittingly dragging out about six more with it. ‘This isn’t about me, though. It’s for Tate, and for all the other people who long to go outside and get stuck into life but are constantly hampered and obstructed by a society designed with them completely left out of the equation or the budget. They deserve this to be about them, not me providing fodder for TV panel show comedians.’
‘So answer the obvious questions, don’t make living a quiet life in the countryside, taking care of your son and doing a job you enjoy a big deal. Then shift the focus where it needs to be. You make a living out of persuading people to believe in companies and organisations. That must include skimming over the less desirable aspects and bigging up the stuff you want them to notice.’
‘I’m pretty sure your ancient crush has coloured your perspective. But thanks for the encouragement. I’ll think about it.’
And I did, for half the night. My anxiety feeding me impressively creative worst-case scenarios, one of which resulted in Joey moving to Colorado, refusing to answer the letters scrawled from my hospital bed. But I knew that while I continued to hide, the fear of being exposed, judged, ridiculed and rejected still held me in its power. What was the point in being able to go anywhere, anytime, if inside my head I constantly looked over my shoulder in dread of someone finding out who I really was?
I had to face this at some point. And I knew where to start.
* * *
The other half of the night, it goes without saying, I thought about a whole twelve hours spent with another person, who wasn’t my son. I thought about how there hadn’t been one moment where I felt uncomfortable or inadequate, oranxious. For so long, so many of my thoughts and feelings had stayed in my head. With Nathan, I was learning to let them out. To laugh about them, and weep over them. I was remembering the value of listening – to someone else’s opinion, and to stories and problems and circumstances outside of my own boxed-in world. Nathan had this incredible ability to make me feel like his equal, not a client trying to get to grips with basic life skills. I supposed this was what having a friend felt like. In summary, it felt blummin’ gorgeous.
Phew. I hoped thoseotherfeelings – the ones that tap-danced in my stomach and frolicked up and down my ribs before oozing dreamily through my arteries like warm caramel – I hoped they didn’t go and ruin it all. If past experience was anything to go by (and let’s face it, what else did I have?), allowing those feelings any credence, any say at all, would not turn out well.
43
Stop Being a Loser Programme
Day One Hundred and Ten
Christmas Day was, well, different.
Joey had a whole list of reasons prepared about why his dad should spend the day with us, rather than alone in his apartment. Shuffling through Christmas Eve, too tired to argue and deciding that another man in my life could only help in the Battle to Annihilate the Stupid Feelings, Joey was bamboozled by how easily I gave in.
‘It’s a Christmas miracle!’ he assured Cee-Cee, as they helped prepare lunch. ‘Who’d have guessed my dad would be here!?’
‘Not me,’ Cee-Cee muttered, ferociously scraping a parsnip. When the doorbell rang, she ignored it, despite me being elbow-deep in chestnut stuffing, the corner of one eye twitching as she scraped harder.
In actual fact, the day wasn’t terrible. Sean brought presents, and after a couple of glasses of fizz, I decided I might as well enjoy them. He gave me a fitness watch – an expensive one, which played music, workouts and probably the pipe organ alongside monitoring my steps and distance.
‘Easy-to-read calorie counter?’ I mused. ‘Are you saying I need to lose weight?’
But I knew that he wasn’t. And the wry smile confirmed quite the opposite – this was Sean encouraging me. Acknowledging the woman I really was, underneath my illness. Offering a token recompense for his contribution to her demise. To Joey, he gave the predictable far too many, far too expensive things. To my surprise, I shut down Cee-Cee’s tutting disapproval with a glare: it was Christmas. Joey had spent enough years being grateful for the paltry presents I carefully selected to stretch my budget as far as possible. He was owed thirteen years of successful-business-owner dad presents. And like Mel had said back when I first freaked out about the thought of Sean, Joey was not going to be spoiled by a few flashes of a credit card.
Sean insisted on Joey helping him to do the post-lunch clean-up before they went out to play with his new drone, leaving Cee-Cee and me to undo the top buttons on our jeans and fall into a calorie-induced trance on the sofa.
