Chapter 9
Kit didn’t keep her waiting long. Perhaps he knew she’d run away if he did. His counsellor antennae were probably tuned into such things. Right now they must be twirling round at ninety miles per hour. She glanced nervously at him as he sat opposite.
‘So how have you been?’ he asked easily. ‘Had a good week?’
‘Yes, thank you. I’ve done stacks of work,’ she said, knowing that wasn’t what he meant.
‘What is it that you do, Sarah?’ He sounded interested – far too interested for her liking.
She waved a hand airily. She wasn’t falling for that one. If he knew what she did he might be able to find out her real identity and tell her employer who might feel the need to sack her.
At the very least he could weasel his way into her head. ‘Oh, this and that – you know… office work. I’m a PA.’
‘Do you enjoy it?’
‘Mmm, I love it. It’s a great company. I’ve been there since I left college.’ There was a small silence as he waited for her to elaborate, but she couldn’t without telling more lies.
The silence dragged on. He was looking at her, his gaze steady. She had the horrible feeling he could see right inside her head.
‘It helps if you enjoy your work.’ Phew! Maybe he couldn’t. She relaxed marginally, which meant that on a scale of 1 to 100 – 100 being very stressed – she was down to about 98.
‘How’s the cutting down going? Did you manage to stick to your target?’
If she said yes, no problem, actually she’d stopped altogether so she obviously didn’t need to come here again, then she might be able to turn things around.
He surely wouldn’t want to talk to her about how much she hadn’t drunk.
That would be wasting both their time and she could escape and go and find Tanya.
If she told him the truth and said she’d actually drunk more since she’d tried to cut down, he was probably going to be pretty annoyed.
Last week he’d said if she carried on as she was, she’d end up in a treatment centre.
She knew nothing about treatment centres, apart from the fact they weren’t likely to allow wine with dinner – which was one very good reason to avoid them.
‘I had a word with my husband. He doesn’t think I’ve got a problem at all.’ Hah – put that in your pipe and smoke it, Mr Counsellor.
‘I know this might be a silly question, Sarah, but did you tell him what you told me?’ Kit frowned, as if trying to remember something. ‘Didn’t we work out you were drinking six or seven times the recommended number of units for women?’
‘Mmm,’ she said, his gentle question hitting her with the same force it had the previous week – but this time a wave of guilt washed over her, too.
It reminded her of a moment back in her misspent youth when she’d been called in to see the headmaster, who’d asked her if she’d attended her maths class that morning, when both of them knew perfectly well she’d been spotted in town playing truant.
‘I don’t think I actually told him the details – no,’ she whispered.
‘So he might not be aware of the true situation. I think we talked about this before, didn’t we? It’s very important you get his support. You are going to need his help. I can’t reiterate that strongly enough.’
‘Yes,’ she said, glancing at the door. She could probably just walk out. She wasn’t committed to staying. Racking her brains, she tried to remember what was on that confidentiality agreement she’d signed. Nothing that meant she’d committed herself to a certain number of sessions, she was sure.
‘You don’t have to talk to me…’ he went on gently. Why did he have to be so damned reasonable all the time? It made it ten times harder to walk away. ‘…But it might be a good idea if you talked to your husband.’
There was another little silence and he went on thoughtfully. ‘Actually, I didn’t expect you to come back this week.’
SJ glanced at him quizzically. He’d got that right. If Tanya hadn’t bullied her into it she’d still be safely at home doing lesson plans. But perhaps that wasn’t what he meant. ‘Why did you think I wouldn’t come back? Did you think I didn’t need to?’
A wild surge of hope rose in her as he smiled unexpectedly.
He had a lovely smile, full of warmth and humour.
She was on the verge of telling him he should do it more often when he went on.
‘No, as I said last week, it’s not up to me.
Only you know whether you want our help or not.
And only you can make the changes. But it takes a lot of guts to come in here – and I could see you weren’t very comfortable. You’re not now, are you?’
‘No, these chairs are bloody hard – they kill your back, don’t they? It must be hell sitting in one all day.’
He laughed and she found herself laughing with him and a lot of the tension evaporated.
Then he stood up, and she thought for a moment he was going to suggest they sat on the floor instead. But he strolled across and gestured to a pie chart pinned on the wall behind her.
‘Did we go through this last time?’
‘No.’ She joined him, relieved at the diversion. The chart was split into segments, each with a heading. She read them curiously. Pre-contemplation; preparing to change; making changes; maintaining changes; lapse/relapse.
‘Which stage do you think you’re at, Sarah?’
‘Preparing to change,’ she said thoughtfully, but her attention had been caught by the last section of the pie chart.
The relapse section. She hadn’t noticed it last time.
She felt like cheering and doing a little dance round the room, but she didn’t realise she was smiling until he raised his eyebrows and gave her a sideways glance.
‘What’s on your mind?’ He was standing quite close and he used a similar cologne as Tom – something woody and expensive.
Suddenly it was all she could smell and, feeling a strange mixture of trust – because he smelt familiar – and nervousness – because he was so perceptive and Tom wasn’t.
Tom never picked up on her thoughts – she told him exactly what was on her mind.
‘I was wondering how many times I could go round. How often could I relapse? Would that be as many times as I liked? Or would you only give me so many chances before you washed your hands of me?’
He bit his lip and she realised he was trying hard not to laugh.
‘You can go round as many times as you like, but relapse isn’t supposed to be a good thing. Although I understand it might seem like that right now.’
‘Do you?’ She wondered whether she should ask him how he understood that.
It was on the tip of her tongue to say, ‘So you used to be an alcoholic too, did you?’ But she couldn’t bring herself to say the words.
She knew she’d be disappointed if he said he hadn’t.
Most of the time she did feel he understood – either that, or he was a very good actor.
In fact, if they’d met in different circumstances she was sure they’d have got on well.
‘Do you want to cut down – or are you happy to go on the way you are and increase the harmful effects alcohol has on your brain and central nervous system – not to mention the harm it will do to your job and relationships?’ He’d got his serious face back on now, but suddenly she felt as though she did want to cut down.
It was no fun having hangovers every five minutes, and seeing the chink in his counsellor armour had made her want to tell him the truth.
‘To be honest, I’ve had a totally crap week,’ she confessed, meeting his eyes and reassured to see no recriminations. ‘I’ve had well over a bottle most nights. Even though I did plan to cut down – I really did – but… well, it was a lot harder than I thought.’
Bugger! That had probably been too much honesty, even for her. The same thing had happened last week; perhaps they put some sort of truth drug in your coffee. Yes, that had to be it. She resolved not to drink coffee if she ever came here again.
‘Sorry,’ she added, as an afterthought. ‘I’m wasting your time, aren’t I? I’m a hopeless case. Perhaps I should go now and you can concentrate on someone more deserving.’ She took a step towards the door.
‘Hang about, Sarah.’ He gestured they sit down once more, and nervously she complied and waited for the lecture, which surely must be coming. It must be blatantly obvious she hadn’t taken this seriously.
He wasn’t quite smiling, but he didn’t look disapproving either.
Come to think of it, he never did. He leaned forward.
‘You’ve been honest with me, Sarah. That’s a very good start.
You could have strolled in here and said, “Great news, Kit, I’ve stuck to my target.
” I wouldn’t have known the difference.’
‘No, I suppose you wouldn’t.’ She sighed.
‘You could have stayed away. I think because you didn’t do either of those things it proves you really do want to change. That takes guts.’
God, he was an optimist. Obviously the type of person who could see good in everyone – even when they were lying through their teeth, like she was. She held up a hand. It was no good. She couldn’t accept credit where it wasn’t due.
‘I wasn’t going to come back today, that’s the truth.
The only reason I did was because a well-meaning friend dragged me here, kicking and screaming.
If it hadn’t been for her, I’d still be at home, sorting out my teaching stuff.
’ She blushed madly; she hadn’t meant to say that last bit.
Now he’d know she was a complete and utter liar. She was right. He zoomed straight in.
‘So you’re a teacher? Not a PA?’
‘Mmm – yes, I do a bit of teaching. Adult education, not children.’ Deciding she might as well go the whole hog, she added, ‘My name isn’t exactly Sarah either, it’s Sarah-Jane, but everyone calls me SJ – it’s a nickname.’
‘More honesty!’ To her amazement he was smiling again.
‘Then I reckon, SJ…’ His eyes danced with amusement and she wondered if he’d known all along Sarah wasn’t her real name.
Or perhaps Tanya was right and it hadn’t been such a clever alias as she’d thought.
‘…That we’re making pretty good progress, aren’t we?
So how about we go back to the form I asked you to fill in. Did you bring it with you?’
‘Mmm,’ she said again, not that she’d put much on it. She certainly hadn’t put anything in the thoughts and feelings section. Neither had she put anything very truthful in the totals section, thinking that might be a fast-track route to one of those awful treatment centre places.
‘You don’t have to show me what you’ve written. That’s personal to you. But I want you to think back to the time when you first started drinking more than socially. How long ago would you say that was?’
She considered this. Factual questions were a lot easier than thoughts and feelings ones. ‘About three years, I guess.’
‘And did anything happen around the same time – any major life-changing event you can think of?’
‘I got married. I suppose that was pretty life-changing.’ She stared at him in alarm as she realised what she’d said and began to backtrack hastily. ‘Getting married had nothing to do with me drinking more – definitely not. Tom’s lovely. Not a bit like my first husband. He was a total bastard.’