Chapter 10
There was a long pause and SJ would have given up at least a day’s wine allowance – maybe even a couple of days’ worth – to have been able to rewind the conversation and retract that last comment. Now Kit had an unresolved issue to beat her over the head with.
The silence stretched on and she looked at the floor and clamped her mouth shut so she wouldn’t be the first to break it.
She knew all about long silences – and how stressed-out people would gabble on about any old rubbish, rather than let them go past a certain point.
She could feel her face burning and her throat was raw with vulnerability.
It was an immense effort to drag her gaze away from her shoes and meet Kit’s eyes without speaking.
‘There’s usually a reason why we drink,’ he said. ‘But you don’t have to tell me what it is. That’s not why we’re here.’
She breathed a huge sigh of relief. She felt like a fish that had been caught by a sportsman, carefully measured, then laid on the riverbank just long enough to think its time had come before being put gently back into the water – the wonderful, life-giving haven of its natural element.
She almost felt like giving a little wriggle before she sped away downstream.
Instead, she took the lifeline he’d offered. ‘I’m sorry. I don’t know what’s the matter with me. I’m not usually like this.’ She wanted to tell him she was scared, so scared that she really did have a problem, but instead she coughed and said, ‘Does it get easier to cut back after a while?’
‘Yeah, it does.’
‘Are you sure about that?’
‘Yeah.’ And a smile, this time, to go with it.
‘Are there things I can do to make it easier – in your experience?’ This was better. Her sensible head, her professional head was back in control.
‘Yes, there are things you can do. We can go through some of them now, if you like?’
‘Yes, I would like.’ She was full of conflicting emotions.
It would be good to know she need never drink more than she’d planned to again – although there was another part of her that thought it would have been better if there was simply a pill you could take to prevent you drinking too much.
If someone invented a pill like that they’d be a billionaire, multi-billionaire even.
Perhaps some scientist somewhere was working on it at this very moment.
Locked away in a white coat in some laboratory, and tomorrow’s headlines would be ‘Miracle Hangover Prevention Cure. Imagine the rest of your life without hangovers’.
Brilliant. Obviously it would be better if someone came up with a miracle cure for cancer or AIDS, though.
‘Cutting down is easier if you put some strategies into your life.’
‘What sort of strategies?’
‘Well…’ He leaned back in his chair, utterly relaxed. ‘Things that delay you having that first drink – like, say – you could go to the gym of an evening.’
She thought about the joint gym membership she had with Tom before they got married. It had been bad enough then, squeezing herself into tight shorts and T-shirts and hoping her legs didn’t wobble like out-of-control blancmange on the running machine. She was two sizes heavier now. She swallowed.
‘I don’t think gyms are my thing.’
‘Have you got any other hobbies? Preferably things you can do in the evening as that seems to be your danger time. They’d be things you can’t do with a drink in your hand.’
‘I run a class called Poetry and a Pint.’
He raised his eyebrows. ‘That doesn’t sound all that promising, I have to say.’
This time it was SJ who laughed. She was starting to warm to him again.
And things couldn’t be too bad if she could find humour in the situation, surely.
That must mean she wasn’t too far down the slippery slope.
What a good job she’d realised she might one day have a problem while it was still soon enough to nip it in the bud.
Then he said something that brought reality crashing back into the room. ‘When you stop altogether, SJ, you’ll find it very useful to have these strategies in place.’
For a moment she thought she must have misheard. ‘What do you mean, stop altogether? I thought I was just cutting down.’
‘The idea is that you gradually wean your body off alcohol. At the levels you’ve been drinking – and that’s if you’ve told me the truth…
’ That was a cheap shot – of course she’d told him the truth.
‘…Then you’ll have developed a certain tolerance.
What I mean is that your body will be expecting a certain amount of alcohol. ’
‘I know what tolerance means,’ she said huffily.
‘Yeah, sorry – course you do.’ He smiled and she could have sworn she saw little horns sprout on his head, whereas earlier there had been the distinct possibility of a halo.
She dragged him back to the question in hand – the important issue. The big issue. ‘Are you saying I have to stop – I mean stop altogether? No more alcohol ever again?’
After an imperceptible pause he nodded.
‘You mean, not even at parties or if I’m celebrating, or if it’s someone’s birthday?’
Another nod.
‘Not even if it’s my birthday?’ This was outrageous. She could feel the hairs standing up on the back of her neck in protest.
‘I’m afraid not.’
‘What about at Christmas?’
‘Nope.’
‘New Year?’
‘Nope.’
‘A girlie night out?’
‘Nope.’
‘You’re saying I can never drink anything again – ever?’
‘Yep.’
‘Shit!’
He didn’t answer this, just continued to hold her gaze, his eyes serious.
‘Are you sure?’
‘Absolutely sure.’
A shadow had fallen across the room, velvet soft, like some great black shroud wrapping her tightly so it was difficult to breathe.
She could feel her head dizzying with shock.
She had to get the conversation back on an even keel.
She hadn’t misheard him, so perhaps she’d misunderstood him.
She was just trying to think of another way to ask the question when he pre-empted her.
‘How does that make you feel?’
‘Terrified,’ she said without thinking.
‘That’s what everyone says. But don’t worry about that now. All you need do for now is cut down.’
He glanced at the clock and she realised her hour was almost up.
‘So this week, how about trying again to restrict yourself to three-quarters of a bottle a night. Do you think you can manage that?’
‘Nope.’
‘Give it a try.’ He handed her another form and she tucked it in her bag. She had never felt so vulnerable in her life. She couldn’t meet his eyes. She leapt up from her chair and hurried out of the room before she burst into tears and made a fool of herself.
Not that it would have mattered if she had, as this was the last time she was going to see him.
Because at some point during the conversation they’d just had – she wasn’t sure whether it was when she’d inadvertently called Jacob a bastard, or when he’d started laying down the law about never enjoying herself again – she’d made a decision.
Nothing on earth would induce her to set foot in this place again.