Chapter 6
Seeing Bronte gave me the strength to resist collapsing back on the sofa.
Instead, I showered, dumped the quilt by the washing machine and made a plate of scrambled eggs and a pot of matcha tea, which I enjoyed while gazing out at the forest. Ernest also wolfed down an egg, before having a good sniff around my kitchen.
Suitably fortified, I took a seat at my glass desk, my new dog curled around my feet.
After squaring my shoulders, I switched on my phone.
Oof.
This was why I didn’t wait days without checking my messages.
I was reeling at the number of people who had sent a text or WhatsApp about the speech. They were mostly along similar lines.
Just checking in. Sending loads of love, and if you need anything – or just to talk – I’m here!
You were SO brAVE! More women need to admit when they’re struggling or have no one to turn to. Well done for making such a bold statement. Let’s catch up soon!
Darling – no friends? You know I’m always here for you!!!
Hey, beautiful. If you’re feeling lonely, I can help…
Most of these were people I barely knew. A good few I’d never even met in person. I did some furious deleting, scanning for anyone who actually mattered.
There was a flurry from Lacey, sent mostly on Saturday morning.
Alexis, what the hell? Most of your family can’t stand you? Can you blame us when you slag us off on NATIONAL TV?? What is going on with you?
Alex. This isn’t funny. Everyone’s pestering us about what’s happened. I’m stressed enough without having to deal with this crap. Are you going to bother filling us in?
I can’t believe you landed us in this mess and now you’re ghosting your own family. Bronte’s really upset.
Bronte was right about her mum being stressed. I did feel terrible about landing my sister in the middle of a media storm. I felt even worse when for a panicky moment I wondered whether she’d talk to a journalist if they paid her enough. Especially when, for Lacey, ‘enough’ really wasn’t that much.
I found the messages from Bronte asking if I was okay. None from my parents, or my brother, which was no surprise.
One from Nico:
Way to get your name out there, Babe! Spin this the right way and you’ll never be out of work again.
My depth of feelings towards Nico was confirmed when my biggest internal retort to that comment was that, actually, I had never been out of work before.
I skimmed through our most recent messages, seeing them in a new light, now. How had I convinced myself that a relationship with a man I couldn’t count on was my preferred option?
About to close the conversation down, I paused on the advert I’d sent him as a joke.
WANTED: FRIENDS
It turned out, the joke was on me.
Next, on to my voicemails. The inbox was full of yet more randomers hoping for gossip, some journalists who must have wrangled my number from someone, a couple of crew members offering vague, noncommittal statements that were worse than saying nothing, and, the inevitable – Carly, the Winning at Life director.
She was not happy.
‘Alex. Where are you?’
‘Alex, call me.’
‘You need to call me. Now.’
‘Seriously, if there’s any chance of avoiding complete disaster, we have to talk about it.’
‘Okay, so now I’m worried as well as fuming. If you don’t want to talk, fine. It’s your career. At least let me know you’re all right.’
Her final one was brusque and to the point.
‘Right. I’ve tried to help, now it’s out of my hands. I’ve emailed you the formalities. I genuinely loved working with you, Alex. You made the show magic.’
I deleted them all, blocked the numbers I didn’t recognise and moved onto emails.
These were the worst.
As well as the documents terminating my contract for Winning at Life, every client I’d been working with, or was in the process of discussing working with in the future, had followed Nico’s suit and ditched me.
Most of those who had signed contracts had invoked the get-out clause relating to ‘unprofessional behaviour likely to damage the reputation of either party’.
Some of them I wasn’t surprised about. Others stung.
Those I’d had a particularly positive relationship with explained it was nothing personal, they knew the stories weren’t true, but they had a brand/reputation/employee trust to consider.
They didn’t want this media sideshow overshadowing the project.
They were uncomfortable making demands on me when I was struggling.
Whew.
I sent a flurry of generic replies, not bothering to explain myself, or what happened, nor reassuring them I understood, it was fine, I accepted their decision.
I was done pretending things were okay when they weren’t.
It felt awesome.
After about ten seconds on social media, I deleted all my accounts. After more hesitation, because it was a much bigger deal, I did the same for my website.
Lastly, I took a deep breath and typed ‘Alex Nixon’ into my search engine.
It was neither worse nor better than I could have imagined.
Could anyone envisage what it’s like to see a clip of themselves saying ‘I am, in fact, losing at life’ twisted into a dozen different memes?
There were TikTok lip-sync videos, cruel parodies and, what really felt like a kick in the kidney, serious news articles discussing the speech, my being ‘let go’ from the show, and the rumours about my mental implosion.
They listed facts and figures about my business, previous accolades and quotes from ‘close sources’, which were somewhat oxymoronic given they described me as aloof and distant.
At least none of them mentioned my family. I never spoke about my past beyond the vague snippets shared with Winning at Life participants. My online profiles were all strictly professional, so I presumed no one had discovered anything personal worth reporting.
Some consolation, given how horrific the rest of it was.
Being a national laughing stock was one thing – that outrageous speech deserved to be made fun of. What I didn’t know how to handle was my business becoming a ghost town overnight.
I’d have previously assumed this would prove devastating.
Work was my life. Literally. I never took a day off.
However, along with ignoring my phone and emails, the possibility of simply not doing it any more caused a strange flutter that I thought might be nervous excitement, or was it even relief?
I sat for a moment, in a similar way to how I advised my clients, focusing on the sensation until it identified itself. Gradually, I figured out what it was.
Freedom.
Of course, the fluttering rapidly turned to sheer panic when I started thinking about the practicalities of a ghost business.
I catastrophised for a good hour, pacing about the house, Ernest merrily trotting after me.
My fear of sliding back into poverty meant I’d neurotically hoarded money throughout my adult life.
Apart from my house, my biggest outgoings had been my family.
This appeared to be the rainy day I’d subconsciously been preparing for, and I had enough savings and investments not to worry about money for the foreseeable future if I was careful.
I knew how to live on next to nothing, after all.
What scared me far more was what I was going to do all day, other than a slow-motion spiral into insanity.
Well, cancer probably takes up quite a lot of time.
I jerked to a stop in the middle of my study.
Bronte arriving, followed by turning on my phone, had been a temporary distraction from the stress of a potential diagnosis. But suddenly, the what-ifs had snapped up like a bear trap and pinned me to the spot.
Who knows how long the dizzying fear would have kept me there if a ping hadn’t startled me out of my brain-freeze.
Grateful for any distraction, I grabbed my phone off my desk and saw the sender was Dr Will.
I had three other ‘Wills’ in my phone and didn’t know the surname of the one from the doctor’s surgery, so this had been what I came up with in the stress of the moment. Without thinking, I opened the message.
Hey. I just wanted to let you know I deleted the photo.
I had mentioned meeting you to my son Jordan but obviously not the context.
For what it’s worth, I wish I could have accepted your invitation so you didn’t have to be alone that night.
I’m also deleting your number because I don’t want you to worry I’m a creep or a fame hunter, but please know this random stranger does give a damn.
I hope it’s not all as hideous as it looks.
I slowly sank into my desk chair, rereading the message.
From the midst of this hurricane, Will seemed like the nicest, kindest, safest person I’d ever met.
I closed my eyes and imagined myself sitting beside him again.
Pictured the genuine compassion in his eyes.
I desperately wanted to ask him not to delete my number, but that would make me the creep.
He had a family. Friends, surely. How could someone so lovely not have a wonderfully full life?
The last thing he needed was a famous failure he’d met in the doctor’s surgery – one with up to a 20 per cent chance of being seriously ill – latching onto him.
I deleted his number, turned off my phone and went to bed.
I had a proper best friend, once. Gemma joined our school when we were fifteen, at the start of our final GCSE year, having moved up to Leicester from London.
She was shy, sweet and had a wicked sense of humour, but most of all she had no idea who the Nixons were, or what had happened the previous Christmas.
My tiny sprout of self-confidence thanks to my job, the Top Shop bag I’d found in a charity shop and learning how to shape my now pencil-thin eyebrows propelled me into making a calculated swoop before any of the other girls could claim her.