Chapter Eight
I have half an hour before my next client arrives, and I use the first few minutes of it to stare at the wall.
I’m fine, I have my health, the world has not ended.
I repeat it five times, feeling my breath slowing. Nothing is ever really as bad as it seems in the moment.
Except maybe my life right now.
No, not even that.
I take a few more deep breaths. I need to stay being the ‘other’ me.
The psychotherapist, Liv Carpenter; the calm, rational relationship expert who can face down any trauma with a cool head.
The version of me who can totally handle the humiliation of what just happened.
I am Liv, Laugh, Lose the Dysfunction. Not Liv, the ragey maniac – current laughing stock of the entire planet.
I take a seat behind my desk, wishing I wore glasses because I would feel so much more in character. I’d even take a pair of Jools’ Elton John glasses in this moment. I turn on my computer, robotically checking my emails.
Ah.
Ah shit.
My next client has cancelled.
So has the one after that.
Everyone else scheduled for today – they all have.
Oh my god.
Everyone booked in for tomorrow, too.
And for the foreseeable.
No no no no! How can this be? This can’t be real? Over some silly videos? Just because I had a very minor internet incident?
I’m not fine, I don’t have my health, the world has ended.
This is a disaster.
Fuck, there’s also an email from my agent, Fabian, asking why I’m not answering his calls. I pull out my phone. I’ve been avoiding it all weekend, but I suppose I need to face real life at some point.
Sigh. I thought your phone was supposed to be where we all went to avoid real life, not confront it head-on.
I open the call log, noting Fabian’s number in there on five separate occasions in the last forty-eight hours.
Things must be bad. He usually takes the whole of June off to summer in France, never mind working on a Sunday, trying to get hold of me.
I don’t give myself time to think – or listen to his voicemails – and quickly tap his name.
‘Liv?’ he answers after half a ring. ‘You absolute diva, why have you been ignoring me?’ Fabian always addresses me thusly, even when I’m not on the verge of career suicide.
‘Sorry,’ I tell him, meaning it. ‘I’ve been hiding all weekend.’
‘Darling,’ he sighs, ‘this kind of mess is exactly why you have an agent. It’s what I’m here for. It’s why I take so much of your money from you.’
‘Sorry,’ I say again pathetically. ‘I was hoping it would all die down on its own.’ I pause, feeling a tiny bit hopeful. ‘Do you think it will?’
‘Not without you doing something,’ he replies sharply, and the hope fades. ‘I spoke to that odious little man at Morning Tea – what’s his name again, darling?’
‘Ugh, Spencer,’ I supply.
‘Yes, Ugh-Spencer. He’s told me the plan.’
‘Plan?’ My stomach sinks.
‘We’re sending you to anger management.’
‘Oh, it’s anger management now, is it?’ I say hotly. ‘On Friday it was just plain old straightforward therapy.’
‘Tomato, potato,’ he says. ‘Who cares? It’s about what plays better for the public.’
‘But that’s why I can’t go, Fabian!’ I cry. ‘The public will never trust me again if they think I’m a therapist who needs therapy.’
‘Nonsense darling,’ he says, and I can picture him waving his hands about. ‘It’s relatable.’
‘I don’t need anger management, Fabian,’ I say, my voice all reedy and thin.
‘What happened in that restaurant was a one-off. An aberrance.’ I leap on an example.
‘Like, yesterday! My flatmate, Sam, said I had to stop reading internet comments and she dragged me to the cinema as a distraction. We were sandwiched right next to these horrible little teenagers, who were making out right next to us the whole way through – and I didn’t say a thing.
Then they started wanking each other off – right next to us, Fabian – and I still didn’t lose my rag.
I kept all my lovely, bubbly rage buried deep down inside me where it’s meant to stay.
I didn’t even lose it when I realised Sam wasn’t actually watching the film.
She was trying to order stuff off Temu and they wouldn’t let her check out without the ten thousand free gifts and prizes she’d ‘won’, so that had taken up the entire first half of the film.
Apparently, she hadn’t even noticed the teenagers being disgusting.
’ I pause but Fabian says nothing, so I continue, ‘Oh! And as we were leaving, the teenagers spotted me in the foyer and one of them screamed Tiramisu Girl at me – and I still didn’t say anything.
I just smiled and gave them a thumbs up.
Even when Sam told them not to call me that and I thought she was defending me, but then she said I go by Cheesecake Woman, which wasn’t funny at all.
So, you see, Fabes? What happened with Justin last week was just an anomaly; it wasn’t really me.
I don’t need therapy. I have an excellent, secure attachment style. ’
There is more silence down the phone.
‘Fabian?’
He’s suddenly back, his breath loud down the phone.
‘Sorry sweet cheeks, I didn’t catch any of that.
Michael’s trying to talk to me about the new coffee machine.
This is life or death stuff – we’ve been waiting months for a new one in the office – let me put you on hold.
’ Fabian doesn’t know how to put anyone on hold, and for the next two minutes, I listen to him berating his boss.
‘I don’t care if the coffee machines cost a thousand pounds or fifty thousand pounds, Michael!
That piece of trash isn’t even plumbed into the wall!
You cannot expect me to keep refilling the water, it’s inhumane!
This is why I should’ve gone to France last week after all, this is unacceptable. ’
I tap my foot impatiently, wondering whether to just hang up. I don’t want to have this conversation anyway. Because I. Am. Not. Going. To. Therapy. They can’t make me, and I don’t need it.
Fabian is back. ‘Darling, I’ll call you back in five. Absolute emergency here. You wouldn’t believe the coffee machine Michael bought for the office, it’s a travesty. A war crime in pod form. I am on the verge of throwing it – and Michael – through the window.’
‘Sure,’ I sigh.
‘You better answer when I call,’ he threatens, not waiting for my reply before hanging up.
I breathe out for a second, staring at the wall, trying to gather my thoughts. I’m interrupted by a knock at the door. Edward’s face appears in the frame.
‘Have you got a minute, Olivia?’ he says formally. ‘I saw your last client leave and there doesn’t seem to be anyone waiting to see you now.’ I bite my lip and he continues blithely. ‘I know you said you’re busy today but I just need five minutes.’
I suppress a huge sigh. I might have five minutes – I might have five hours or five days – but not for Edward. I don’t have the emotional or mental energy to sit across from someone this exhausting.
Even though Edward and I have known one another since university – and worked in adjoining offices for the past four years – we’ve never exactly been friends.
He’s just not my bag. He’s too… frigid. Too cold and distant; a little sneery, like he thinks he’s better than everyone else.
He walks around this building, all broad shouldered and freshly washed, with this jaw that is aggressively square.
Like, there’s no need for anyone to be that square-jawed.
It’s just unnecessary. There’s something grating about how together he is, too – how self-sufficient and organised, like he knows all the answers.
It’s why I call him Ed, even though I know he doesn’t like it.
It’s just my small, petty way of bringing him down a peg or two. An Ed or two.
For the record, he doesn’t have much time for me either.
He’s always made his dislike pretty clear.
I can practically hear the disdain dripping from his voice when my TV work comes up in conversation during our supervision sessions.
It’s obviously not proper or worthy enough for the likes of Ed and his three-piece suits.
I hate that he’s our clinical supervisor, tracking our work and expecting us to get his – I don’t know – approval on our sessions. Maybe that’s why I’ve been skipping out on them lately.
‘Um, my next client…’ I begin breezily but trail off.
I can’t say she’s about to arrive – his office is across from mine, and there’s a good chance he’d be able to see anyone coming or going.
But I can’t admit she’s cancelled on me, he’d think I’m a terrible therapist. On the other hand, I don’t want to lie and say I’ve cancelled on her, that makes me sound unprofessional.
‘Erm… my client is… she’s running late,’ I tell him.
He nods and settles into the chair across from my desk. It’s clear he’s taken this as permission to stay. Must be nice being a man. They don’t need to bother learning social cues like women do.
I try again. ‘But I am waiting for an important phone call!’ I glare down at my mobile, willing Fabian to ring me back.
I cannot handle being told off right now. I really can’t. Not by Edward of all people! I’ll lose my mind. And I’m definitely not up for a supervisory session. Imagine having to tell him what just happened with Wendy! No way.
‘That’s fine,’ he says. ‘I’ll be quick. I just want to talk to you about—’
Like an Avenger swooping to the rescue, my phone starts ringing on my desk. I suppress a cheer. ‘Sorry!’ I yell at him cheerfully. ‘I have to take this!’
He nods, but – surprisingly – still doesn’t move. Can’t this man take a hint? Or are his suit trousers so tight that he literally can’t stand up? We’ll need to have him craned out the window. Actually, I would pay good money to see that happen.
My phone continues to ring and Edward continues to sit, apparently unfazed.
Sighing, I answer at last, and Fabian immediately starts garbling in my ear.