Chapter Six
By Monday I have pretty much convinced myself that everything will be okay.
Ish.
I spent the entirety of Sunday repeating a series of mantras on a loop: I’m fine, I have my health, the world has not ended.
The furore is going to die down online this week.
By Friday, frog-face Spencer will have realised what a doofus he’s being, and be begging me to return to Morning Tea.
This therapy idea will get the thorough binning it deserves.
I will graciously accept his offer to come back, and in the meantime, I will focus on my other work – my clients and my book, Orange Flags.
Oh, and – just for good measure – Justin is also going to come to his senses, realise what a brilliant girlfriend I am, and propose.
At which point I will of course tell him to get lost.
Probably.
Maybe.
‘How do you think curiosity actually did kill the cat?’ Walking along at my side, Sam starts thinking out loud.
It’s one of her amazing non-sequiturs – she does this a lot.
‘I mean,’ she continues, ‘like, what was the cat so curious about that he got murdered for it?’ She looks thoughtful.
‘What could be so bad that someone would off a poor little pussycat?’
‘She probably witnessed a murder,’ I supply sombrely. ‘That’s the kind of curiosity that gets you killed, right?’
‘Who would she tell?’ Sam looks at me seriously. ‘Liv, it’s a cat.’
‘Okay, fair point,’ I acknowledge. ‘So maybe it’s more like, the cat was curious about the edge of a building and fell off?’
She gives me a withering look. ‘Have you never met a cat? Firstly, they always land on their paws. And secondly, they’re not fools. They wouldn’t just fall off a building like some kind of clumsy dog. Most cats have a higher IQ than the average politician.’
‘Another excellent point.’ I nod, as we reach the office block. I tap in my code and the door beeps an acknowledgement. I hold it open for Sam, and she slips under my arm and into the foyer.
‘The only thing I can think, is that maybe curiosity is a codename for the mob, or maybe some kind of serial killer?’ She unbuttons her coat halfway, shaking hair off her shoulders. ‘And don’t they say most serial killers start by killing cats? I think curiosity is a euphemism for serial killer.’
‘Or’—I check the wooden box by the door for any post addressed to me—‘maybe it’s yet another one of those shitty sexist sayings designed to shut down little girls.
I don’t think we tell boys off for being curious, just girls.
Like, don’t ask any questions, know your place, you little pussies!
’ She frowns at this, then nods after a moment, accepting its truth.
We head for the lift as I rifle through a pile of pure junk mail. Ooh, fifteen per cent off at Optical Express!
Sam travelled into the office with me today as she’s scheduled for a therapy session on the first floor. I work on the third floor, which we’ve decided is enough professional distance between us to be just fine.
I work here in this West London office as part of a sort of therapist collective, along with four other therapists: Edward, Fran, Jamal and Arshiya.
We all met when training at university – a many-year’d hell that would bond anyone for life.
After we qualified, we initially all went our separate ways, spinning off into different areas of psychotherapy.
We’d mostly lost touch until about four years ago, when we reunited as a group to set up an office together.
We decided to call it a therapy collective, mostly because it sounds cool, though there was much back and forth about the possibility of the term ‘therapy cooperative’.
Edward argued for that one while I explained – as nicely as possible when someone is being a total arse – how that made us sound like a hippy-dippy many-sister-wived commune.
That particular conversation aside, the four of us mostly rub along very nicely, all offering something slightly different to clients in the convenient framework of one building.
There’s Arshiya on the first floor, who helps people with grief, anxiety and depression management.
Jamal on the second floor specialises in family dysfunction and addiction.
Fran works in the office next to Jamal, and their niche is psychosexual and identity issues.
Then there’s me, of course, the relationship expert on three.
But these days, I only see a handful of patients, and just on a Monday and Tuesday.
Oh, and then there is the previously mentioned arse, Edward. He works in the office across from me, dealing mostly with trauma and anger issues.
We call the lift and Sam turns to me, pouting.
‘Are you sure you don’t want to blow off your day and come hang out with me?
’ she asks for the fiftieth time. ‘Your patients won’t care!
They’ll totally understand after what’s happened with the videos and all that.
Any normal person who’s been publicly shamed would be getting day-drunk with me and maybe looking for some daytime hook-ups.
Get the taste of Justin and his stinky laundry out of your mouth. ’
I frown at her. ‘I’m not sure any of that is a good idea…’ I hesitate.
Usually I can ignore Sam’s terrible life advice, but today it is a little too tempting.
The prospect of spending today trying to work, knowing the entire internet – or, okay, what feels like the entire internet – is talking about me does not especially appeal.
Maybe I should torpedo my professionalism for booze and my best friend?
I shake my head, trying to be my own shoulder-angel.
‘No,’ I say with finality as she pouts. ‘It’s a cardinal sin to cancel on clients.
And if I’m going to be ousted from Morning Tea, I’m going to need them more than ever.
’ I sigh. ‘Plus, I need to meet with Edward, he’s—’ Oh shit, speak of the uptight devil. Here he comes now.
‘Can you hold the lift!’ His deep voice echoes down the corridor. He’s got one of those actor timbres that projects even when he’s not trying. Sometimes I can hear it through the walls of our offices and it makes my brain reverberate in my skull. I don’t know how his clients can stand it. Or him.
‘Of course!’ Sam yells back in a high voice as I repeatedly jab at the close doors button.
It’s too late. His fingers close around the edges and the traitorous lift doors spring back open.
‘Samira, Olivia.’ He nods at us both, moving to a position as far into the corner away from us as possible, and turning his back.
‘Hi Edward,’ Sam says throatily. She fancies him, which is unusual for her.
She doesn’t usually much like men. Sam dates all genders, but mostly women, because men are the worst. She doesn’t call herself bisexual though, because she doesn’t like labels.
Except slag. She likes the label slag. She says it’s pure 90s nostalgia and the word is making a comeback.
Either way, apparently there’s something unusual about Edward that she finds appealing.
I can’t see it, but then, I’ve known him forever.
Maybe it’s his hair? He does have undeniably good hair.
It’s all thick and dark and wavy – any woman I know would kill for Edward’s lustrous hair.
I asked him once if he uses heat protection spray and he looked at me like I’d shat on his desk. He’s very uptight.
Whatever it is, Sam can’t get enough of him.
In fact, when she first started talking about having therapy, she said she wanted to start working with him.
I told her it would be incredibly unhealthy to start seeing a counsellor you have a crush on.
I mean duh. It would be sooo unprofessional, never mind the high chance of transference.
That’s when a person starts to redirect their feelings onto someone else – their therapist being a common recipient.
It can be feelings of rage or distrust, but quite often it ends up being love or dependence.
It’s not real but it feels super real, and it’s something we’re all trained to watch out for.
‘Ooh, weird energy in here today,’ Sam says, always one to point out any elephants in the lift. I fight an urge to throw my handbag at her.
‘Shut up,’ I hiss, and she grins at me loopily, enjoying my discomfort. Of course, she’s right. There is a weird energy, but it’s not wholly my fault.
Edward is being extra clenched-jawed towards me today because I maaaay have missed our last few sessions of clinical supervision. But like I said, it’s not my fault!
When you qualify as a therapist, as well as undergoing about a thousand hours of personal therapy, the UKCP – otherwise known as the UK Council for Psychotherapy – basically insists you regularly sit down with another counsellor, to talk through your client work and reflect on how everything’s going.
It’s supposed to give you some perspective and keep you forever working towards best practice.
Since Edward was such a goody-two-shoes at university and always got the best marks, we elected him as our clinic supervisor at the therapy collective.
He’s basically our therapy House Mother.
Which makes me his least favourite child.
But hey, it’s yet another reason it’s totally absurd that Morning Tea wants to send me to therapy. I’m pretty much already in therapy with Edward, thanks to the supervision.
Except, yeah, I haven’t been to many of our sessions lately because I’ve been very busy with my TV work and the book.
And I don’t even see that many clients these days to talk about with him.
Oh, and – most importantly and as previously mentioned – Edward is an arse, so I do not need supervision from him.