But Linus doesn’t look offended. He looks worried. ‘Frank doesn’t blame me,’ he says quickly, and I realize they must have had a conversation about this. ‘I mean, he wouldn’t expect us all to give up playing LOC just because he’s had to. He said he’d do the same if it was him.’
‘So who’s the fourth?’
‘This guy Matt,’ says Linus without enthusiasm. ‘He’s OK.’
‘Dad made Frank play bass with him in the garage,’ I tell him. ‘He thinks that’s a better interest.’
‘Does Frank play bass?’
‘Barely.’ I snuffle with laughter. ‘He plays, like, three chords and Dad does ten-minute solos.’
‘You think that’s bad? My dad plays the recorder.’
‘He what?’ My laughter dies away. ‘Seriously?’
‘You can’t tell anyone.’ Linus looks suddenly vulnerable, and I feel a wave of . . . something. Something strong and warm. Like when you put your arm round someone and squeeze.
‘I won’t tell. I promise.’ I take a sip of Frappuccino. ‘Like, the kind of recorder kids play?’
‘A grown-up kind. Wooden. Big.’ He demonstrates.
‘Wow. I didn’t know that existed.’
We sip our drinks and smile at each other. Thoughts are racing through my head; crazy thoughts like I’ve made it! I’m in Starbucks! Go me! But there are other weird, random thoughts popping up, like Everyone’s looking at me and I hate myself. And then, suddenly, I wish I was at home right now, which is just weird. I do not wish I was at home. I’m out with Linus! In Starbucks!
‘So what do you want to ask me on your documentary?’ he says.
‘Oh, I don’t know. Stuff.’
‘Is this part of your therapy?’
‘Yes. Kind of.’
‘But do you still need therapy? I mean, you look fine.’
‘Well, I am fine. It’s just this project . . .’
‘If you just took off your dark glasses you’d be, like, totally back to normal. You should do that,’ Linus says with enthusiasm. ‘You know, just do it.’
‘I will.’
‘But you shouldn’t wait. You should do it, right here, right now.’
‘Yes. Maybe.’
‘Shall I do it?’ He reaches over and I recoil.
My bravado is melting away. His voice feels hectoring, like he’s giving me an interrogation.
I don’t know what’s happened in my head. Things have turned. I take a sip of Frappuccino, trying to relax, but all I really want to do is grab a napkin and shred it into little bits. The voices around me are getting louder and louder; more and more threatening.
At the counter, someone’s complaining about a cold coffee, and I find myself tuning in to the only side of the argument that I can hear.
‘Complained three times . . . don’t want a free coffee . . . not good enough! Just not good enough!’
The angry voice is like a chisel in my brain. It’s making me flinch and close my eyes and want to flee. I’m starting to panic. My chest is rising and falling. I can’t stay. I can’t do this. Dr Sarah’s wrong. I’m never going to get better. Look, I can’t even sit in Starbucks. I’m a total failure.
And now darker thoughts are circling my head, dragging me down. I should just hide away. I shouldn’t even exist. What’s the point of me, anyway?
‘Audrey?’ Linus waves a hand in front of my face, which makes me flinch even more. ‘Audrey?’
‘I’m sorry,’ I gulp, and push my chair back. I have to escape.
‘What?’ Linus stares at me, bewildered.
‘I can’t stay.’
‘Why?’
‘It’s just . . . too loud. Too much.’ I put my hands over my ears. ‘Sorry. I’m so sorry . . .’
I’m already at the door. I push it open and feel some small relief as I make it outside. But I’m not safe. I’m not home.
‘But you were fine.’ Linus has followed me out. He sounds almost angry. ‘You were fine just now! We were chatting and we were laughing . . .’
‘I know.’
‘So what happened?’
‘Nothing,’ I say desperately. ‘I don’t know. It makes no sense.’
‘So, just tell yourself to snap out of it. You know, mind over matter.’
‘I’ve tried!’ Angry tears rise in my eyes. ‘Don’t you think I’ve tried snapping out of it?’
My head is a whirling mass of distress signals. I have to go. Now. I never hail taxis, ever, but right now I don’t even think twice. I stick my hand out and a black cab comes trundling by. Tears are filling my eyes as I get in – not that anyone can see them.
‘Sorry,’ I say to Linus, my voice a little thick. ‘I really am. So. We should forget the film and everything. So. I won’t see you, I guess. Bye. Sorry. Sorry.’
At home I lie in my bed, totally still, totally silent, with the curtains drawn and earplugs in. For about three hours. I don’t move a muscle. Sometimes I feel as if I’m a phone, and this is the only way I can recharge. Dr Sarah says my body is on an adrenalin roller coaster, and that’s why I lurch from totally wired to totally fatigued, with nothing in between.
At last, feeling wobbly, I head downstairs for something to eat. I write a text to Dr Sarah – I went to Starbucks but I had a meltdown – and send it off. The dark, ill thoughts have gone, but they’ve left me feeling weak and jittery.
I drift into the kitchen, and wince as I pass my reflection in the mirror. I look pale and kind of . . . I don’t know. Shrunken. It’s like the flu. It attacks you and your whole body takes the hit. I’m just considering whether to make a Nutella sandwich or a cheese one when I hear a rattling sound from the hall, and something dropping onto the mat, and I jump a mile.
For a moment there’s silence. I’ve tensed up all over like an animal in a trap, but I tell myself firmly, I am safe, I am safe, I am safe, and my heart rate slowly drops, and at last I wander out to see what it is.
It’s a note, on the doormat – a piece of lined paper torn out of a notebook with Audrey written in Linus’s handwriting. I open it to see:
Are you OK? I texted but you didn’t reply. Frank didn’t reply either. I didn’t want to ring the doorbell and shock you. Are you OK??
I haven’t even looked at my phone since I texted Dr Sarah. And Frank’s at the garden show, in the countryside. He probably hasn’t got any signal. I imagine Frank, grimly tramping around some field, and raise a faint smile. He’ll be in such a bad mood.
Through the ripply glass of the front door I suddenly notice a kind of shadowy movement, and my heart catches. Oh God. Is that Linus, there? Is he waiting? For what?
I reach for a pen, and think for a moment.
I’m fine, thank you. Sorry I freaked out.
I push it back through the letter box. It’s a bit difficult because there’s a spring, but I manage it. A moment later, it reappears.
You looked really bad. I was worried.
I stare at his words, my heart falling like a stone. Really bad. I looked really bad. I ruin everything.
Sorry.
Somehow I can’t find anything to put except that one word, so I write it again.
Sorry. Sorry.
And I post the letter back through the letter box. Almost at once the page is pushed back with his reply:
No, don’t be sorry. It’s not your fault. In Starbucks, what were you thinking?
I wasn’t expecting that. For a few moments I don’t move. I’m hunched on the doormat, thoughts running through my head like ticker tape. Do I answer? What do I answer?
Do I want to tell him what I was thinking?
The voice of that therapist from St John’s keeps running through my head; the one who used to take the ‘Self Assertion’ workshop. We do not have to reveal ourselves. She used to say it every week. We are all entitled to privacy. You do not have to share anything with others, however much they may ask you. Photos, fantasies, plans for the weekend . . . they’re yours. She used to look around the room almost s
ternly. You do NOT have to share them.
I don’t have to share with Linus what I was thinking. I could walk away. I could write, Oh, nothing! Or You don’t want to know!!!;) Like it’s all a big joke.
But somehow . . . I want to share. I don’t know why, but I do. I trust him. And he’s on the other side of the door. It’s all safe. Like in a confessional.
Before I can change my mind, I scrawl,
I was thinking, ‘I’m a total failure, I shouldn’t exist, what’s the point of me?’
I shove it through the letter box, sit back on my heels and blow out, feeling a strange satisfaction. There. Enough pretending. Now he knows just how weird the inside of my mind is. I hold my breath, trying to glean his reaction on the other side of the door, but there’s silence. The ripply glass is still. I can’t detect any response at all. I think he must have gone. Of course he’s gone. Who would stay?
Oh God, am I nuts? Why would I write down my most warped thoughts and post them through a letter box to the one guy I actually like? Why would I do this?
Totally deflated, I get to my feet, and I’ve reached the kitchen door when I hear a rattling. I whip round – and there’s a reply on the doormat. My hands are trembling as I grab it and at first I can’t focus properly. It’s a new page, covered in writing, and it begins,
What’s the point of you? Try this for starters.
And underneath there’s a long list. He’s written a long, long list that fills the page. I’m so flustered, I can’t even read it properly, but as I scan down I catch beautiful smile and great taste in music (I sneaked a look at your iPod) and awesome Starbucks name.
I give a sudden snort of laughter that almost turns to a sob and then turns to a smile, and then suddenly I’m wiping my eyes. I’m all over the place.
With a rattle, another note plops through the letter box and I jerk in shock. What more can he have to say? Not another great big list, surely? But it says:
Will you open the door?
A flurry of alarm races through me. I can’t let him see my shrunken, pale, ratty self. I just can’t. I know Dr Sarah would tell me I’m not shrunken or ratty, I’m imagining it, but she’s not here, is she?
Not quite up to it. Another time. Sorry, sorry . . .
I hold my breath after I’ve posted the page. He’ll be offended. He’ll leave. That’s it, all over, before it even began . . .
But then the letter box rattles yet again and a reply comes through:
Understood. I’ll be off then.
My spirits plunge. He is leaving. He is offended. He hates me, I should have opened the door, I should have been stronger, I’m so stupid . . . I’m just trying desperately to think what I can write when another page drops onto the mat. It’s folded over, and on the outside is written:
Had to give you this before I go.
For a few moments I don’t dare read it. But at last I open it up and stare at the words inside. My head is prickling all over with disbelief. My breath is jumpy as I read it. He wrote that. He wrote that. To me.
It’s a kiss.
At St John’s, they tell you not to keep rewinding your thoughts and going over old ground. They tell you to live in the present, not the past. But how are you supposed to do that when a boy you like has just kind of, virtually, kissed you?
By the time I see Dr Sarah at my next session I’ve replayed the scene like a million times and now I’m wondering if the whole thing was just him winding me up, or having something to laugh about with his friends, or was he just being polite? I mean, does he feel sorry for me? Was it a pity kiss? Oh God. It was so a pity kiss. (Not that I’m an expert on kisses. I have kissed precisely one boy in my life, which was on holiday last year and it was gross.)
Dr Sarah listens politely for about half an hour as I blabber on about Linus. And then we talk about ‘mind-reading’ and ‘catastrophizing’, just like I knew we would. I think I could be a therapist myself, sometimes.
‘I know what you’ll tell me,’ I say at last. ‘I can’t read his mind and I shouldn’t try. But how can I not think about it? He kissed me. I mean . . . sort of. On paper.’ I shrug, feeling a bit embarrassed. ‘You probably think it doesn’t count.’
‘Not at all,’ says Dr Sarah seriously. ‘The fact that it was on paper doesn’t lessen it. A kiss is a kiss.’
‘And now I haven’t heard from him and I have no idea what he’s thinking, and it stresses me out . . .’ Dr Sarah doesn’t reply immediately, and I sigh. ‘I know, I know. I have an illness and it’s fully treatable.’
There’s another long silence. Dr Sarah’s mouth is twitching.
‘You know, Audrey?’ she says at last. ‘I hate to break it to you, but getting stressed over what boys are thinking after they’ve kissed you may not be fully treatable. Not fully.’
And then, three days after Starbucks, I’m sitting watching TV peacefully on my own when Frank comes stomping into the den and says:
‘Linus is here.’
‘Oh, right.’ I sit up in a fluster. ‘Really? He’s here? But . . .’ I swallow. ‘You’re not allowed to play LOC, so . . . I mean, why is he . . .?’
‘He wants to see you.’ Frank sounds fairly unimpressed by this fact. ‘Is that OK? You won’t freak out?’
‘No. Yes. I mean . . . that’s fine.’
‘Good, because he’s here. Lin-us!’
Some brothers would give their sister a chance to brush their hair. Or at least change out of the scaggy old T-shirt they’ve been in all day. I’m sending murderous thought waves to Frank as Linus comes into the den and says cautiously, ‘Hi. Wow, it’s dark in here.’
Everyone in the family has got so used to my darkened den, I forget how it must look to other people. I keep the blackout curtains closed and the lights off, and the only illumination is the flickering telly. And then I feel safe. Safe enough to take my dark glasses off.
‘Yes. Sorry.’
‘No, it’s fine. You really are rhubarb.’
‘That’s my name.’ I see him smile through the darkness. There’s a glow on his teeth from the TV, and his eyes are two shining chinks.
I’m sitting in my customary place on the carpet, and after a moment he comes over and sits down next to me. I mean, not right next to me. He’s about thirty centimetres away. I think my skin must be able to send out signals like a bat, because I’m totally aware of his position in relation to mine. And all the time my head is buzzing with the thought: He kissed me. On paper. Kind of. He kissed me.
‘What are you watching?’ He stares at the telly, where a woman in a tailored dress is trying to find things to say about kelp shampoo. ‘Is that QVC?’
‘Yes. I find the conversations soothing.’
QVC is the most calming TV I know. You have three people in a studio and they all think the moisturizer is great. No one argues the point or raises their voice. No one discovers they’re pregnant or gets murdered. And there’s no studio laughter – which, believe me, can sound like a drill in my head.
‘Don’t worry, I know I’m nuts,’ I add.
‘You think this is nuts?’ says Linus. ‘You want to meet my granny. She’s really nuts. She thinks she’s twenty-five. When she looks in the mirror she thinks we’re playing tricks on her. She can’t see reality. She wears mini-skirts, she wants to go out to dances . . . She wears more make-up than any granny you’ve ever seen.’
‘She sounds awesome!’
‘She’s . . . you know.’ He shrugs. ‘Sometimes it’s funny, sometimes it’s sad. But the point is, she’s not twenty-five, is she? It’s just her sick brain telling her that, isn’t it?’
He seems to expect an answer, so I say, ‘Right.’
‘I meant to say this to you, before. After Starbucks. Do you get what I’m saying?’ He sounds emphatic. ‘Gran’s not twenty-five, and you’re not . . . whatever all that bad stuff in your head was telling you. You’re not that.’
And suddenly I see what he’s doing, what he’s trying to do.
?
??Right,’ I say again. ‘Yes. I know.’
And I do know. Although it’s easier to know when the bad thoughts aren’t rushing through your head like a river.
‘Thanks,’ I add. ‘Thanks for . . . you know. Understanding. Getting it.’
‘I don’t really get it. But . . .’
‘You do, more than most people. Really.’
‘Well.’ He sounds awkward. ‘Anyway. So, are you feeling better now?’
‘Loads better.’ I smile in his direction. ‘Loads and loads better.’
The ladies on QVC have moved on to a vegetable chopper, and for a while we watch it demolishing carrots and cabbages. Then Linus says, ‘How’s the shoe contact coming along?’
At the word contact I stiffen inside. Contact. Not just on paper, for real.
Don’t think I haven’t thought about it.
‘Haven’t tried it again.’ I’m trying hard to sound casual.
‘Do you want to?’
‘OK.’
I shift my shoe over till it’s touching his. Shoe to shoe, like we did before. I’m poised for a meltdown, for a freakout, for some totally embarrassing reaction. But the strange thing is . . . it doesn’t happen. My body hasn’t squirmed away. My breathing is even. My lizard brain is, like, all Zen and relaxed. What’s going on?
‘It’s the darkness,’ I say out loud, before I can stop myself. ‘It’s the darkness.’ I feel almost heady with relief.
‘What is?’
‘I can relax when it’s dark. It’s like the world is a different place.’ I spread my arms out in the dark, feeling it against my skin like a soft, enveloping cushion. ‘I think I could do anything if the whole world was dark the whole time. You know. I’d be fine.’
‘Then you should be a potholer,’ suggests Linus. ‘Or a caver.’
‘Or a bat.’
‘A vampire.’
‘Oh my God, I should so be a vampire.’
‘Except the whole eating-people thing.’
‘Yerk.’ I nod, agreeing.
‘Doesn’t it get monotonous? People’s blood every night? Don’t they ever want a plate of chips?’