P.S. You’re the Worst

Chapter 1

Twenty-nine. I count to twenty-nine on my fingers.

That is a lot of fingers. Have I really lived through twenty-nine years?

How can that be?! I still have pink-tipped hair, for God’s sake.

I still sometimes buy WKD and listen to Britney Spears.

No one who still listens to Britney Spears can be twenty-nine . . .

. . . Except, that’s exactly how old people who listen to Britney are. Because “the youth” don’t know who she is . . . do they? I start googling “do the youth know who Britney Spears is?” and then stop in my tracks. Anyone googling facts about “the youth” is indisputably no longer “the youth.”

I just don’t know when it happened. I swear to God, I blinked and ten years passed.

Ten years ago I was still nineteen. Just a naive simpleton waiting expectantly for her cocktail parties, exciting career—was always nebulous as to what exactly it would be, but I knew it would be exciting—and sophisticated dates.

I’ve never been to a cocktail party, my boss still sends me to buy her sandwiches from Pret, and the last date I had asked me if I’d rather have a beard or feathers for pubic hair. (I opted for the feathers.)

I groan, remembering him taking off my underwear and

“checking for feathers.” And I still slept with him. Sometimes it’s like I’m actively trying to lower my self-esteem.

“Becky!” Mum calls. “The car’s waiting!”

Oh God. Is it time already? I look at myself in the mirror.

I have one eye made up perfectly and the other is still naked.

I look ridiculous, but there’s nothing I can do now.

Mum gave me three warnings twenty, fifteen, and ten minutes before the taxi was supposed to get here.

If I keep her waiting now, there will be an atmosphere for the rest of the evening. At least I’m wearing clothes.

“Becky!” Mum calls again, sharper this time. “Did you hear me?”

“Coming!” I yell, grabbing my handbag and racing downstairs. I’ll have to finish my makeup in the loos when we get there. It’s fine, I tell myself. We’ll have ages, because Mum is chronically early for everything. The party doesn’t even start until eight.

When I get downstairs Mum looks at my face and sighs deeply. “Honestly, Becky . . .”

I consider telling her this is just how young people do their makeup now. Make her feel really old as revenge for making me feel so useless. But then I’d have to walk around like this all evening and that would probably be cutting off my nose to spite my face.

“I’ll do it later,” I mumble.

She’s stopped listening and is midway through setting the alarm. It beeps ominously.

“Five seconds!” she urges, ushering me out the door.

As if I don’t know. The sound of those little beeps has filled me with pure, unadulterated dread every day for the last twenty-nine years.

What would happen if we didn’t get out the door before the beeps stopped?

We’d anger the home security gods and they’d punish us by weakening our door reinforcement hardware?

I suspect—and have suspected for some time now—that moving back in here was the wrong call.

I’d suffered through so many years spending two-thirds of my paycheck to live in moldy hovels with housemates who eat weird amounts of mushrooms or try to get you to go for group runs that, when Mum offered, it seemed like a sensible alternative.

I thought if I wasn’t paying rent I’d be able to save a decent amount and work toward getting my own place one day.

But in between the cost of living skyrocketing, trying to keep up with my wealthier friends’ lifestyles because I’m too embarrassed to say “Sorry, I can’t afford that,” and the ever-rising price of London flats, that day still feels very far away, and living with Mum has turned out to be worse than the group runs.

At least then I had some modicum of self-respect and didn’t get out of breath walking up stairs.

On the ride to the restaurant Mum is deathly quiet.

The driver asks us where we’re off to and a look of confusion crosses his face when she answers “Birthday party” in the reverent tone one might use if they were going to a funeral.

We hit some traffic and she starts looking at her watch, muttering about “not setting off on time.”

“What?! Do you mean that ten seconds it took me to come downstairs?” I demand.

“I don’t know why you can’t just be waiting at the door,” she mithers.

I don’t know why you keep organizing events when they make you so anxious, I think.

It’s definitely not for my benefit. I’d much rather have stayed in and watched Heathers for the tenth time—you can never watch Heathers too many times—and eaten my body weight in lasagna.

But I don’t say anything. At least the taxi driver gives me a sympathetic look in the rearview mirror.

I cling to our secret mutual understanding like a sad crumb of comfort.

We pull up outside Antonio’s. My stomach clenches and I suddenly feel a bit sick.

It’s like I’ve been keeping the reality of the situation at bay until I see the glint of balloons from inside the window.

This is real. It is happening. A birthday party.

Organized by my mother. What was I thinking?

Why didn’t I say no? Why am I so weak?! WHAT IF NOBODY COMES?

! And how old do I have to get before I stop worrying about no one showing up to my birthday party?

Probably when I’m ninety and all my friends are dead. Then I’ll know for sure that no one’s coming. I might be a bit lonely, but my God, I’ll be relaxed.

It’s very . . . sparkly . . . inside the restaurant. And balloony. I can barely move. Why did Mum order so many balloons? Oh God, was it to make the room seem less empty in case no one turns up?! No. Don’t be paranoid, Becky.

“I ordered extra balloons to make the room seem less empty,” Mum says.

Oh good. It’s always comforting to know your most neurotic thoughts might be entirely accurate. I head to the bathroom to finish my makeup.

When I get into the loos and reach inside my bag, my heart sinks. No. No no no.

Nooooooooo.

I tip the contents out and scrabble around. Lip gloss. Tampon. Condom (optimistic but you never know). Fiver. Tissues. Pen. Emergency Maoams. No eye makeup.

How can that be?!

I think back to my bedroom. UGH. I’d just finished off my right eye when Mum called me downstairs.

In my desperation not to piss her off I must have left it on the side table.

I stare at myself in the mirror and move my head from side to side.

Could I pull this off? Act like I was going for some sort of alternative Clockwork Orange look?

No. I’m nowhere near cool enough for that. I sigh and prepare myself for battle.

“Mum,” I venture, stepping out of the bathroom. My soul feels heavy. She is going to kill me. “I need to run back home.”

Mum’s fiddling with the giant 2 and 9 balloons. Her neck snaps toward me.

“What for?” The storm brews in her voice.

“I left my makeup at home.” I point to my naked eye.

She sighs deeply. “Honestly, Becky.”

There’s a silence. I let her disapproval hang in the air for a moment and try to look repentant, so she can feel like she’s punished me sufficiently before letting me go.

“Why didn’t you just finish your makeup before we left the house?” she continues.

“I’m sorry,” I murmur. Maybe if she hadn’t rushed me to get here several hours early.

“Can’t you ask Angie or Damilola to bring something?”

“Well, Dami says she’ll be here at seven thirty, but you know that means at seven she’ll try-leaving-work-but-just-answer-a-few-more-emails and then it will be nine. And Angie’s coming from Clapham.”

“For God’s sakes. Why is she in Clapham?” Mum accuses, as if this is all Angie’s fault.

“A meeting. I don’t know.” I shrug.

“Well, you can’t go now.” She goes back to fiddling with the balloons. “There’s too much to do. You’ll just have to put up with it.”

“But . . . ,” I start. “I look like I’ve escaped from an asylum!”

Mum smirks.

“What is there to do, exactly?!” I know I should keep my cool.

I know I’m going to regret this in a matter of moments.

But it’s too late. I’m already flailing my arms around wildly and raising my voice.

“All the balloons are blown up. The booze is bought. Someone else is making the food. Why are we even here?!”

Mum doesn’t answer and keeps her eyes fixed on the balloons. A waiter peers through the window in the door to the kitchen, about to bring a tray through. He clearly thinks twice after seeing us arguing and his head disappears.

“I’m sorry that my throwing you a party is such an inconvenience for you, Becky,” Mum says coolly.

There it is. Hello, Regret, my old friend.

I’ve been expecting you. Regret shakes his head at me and wags his finger.

I shouldn’t have said anything. The truth is, this is an inconvenience.

I never wanted a party, but instead of just telling Mum no, like a grown-up, I went along with it to avoid a fight but have been grumpy and unhelpful and have made everything as difficult as humanly possible every step of the way.

I’m about to respond when there’s a tap at the door. A dark mop of ruffled hair emerges, followed by grinning brown eyes.

“Knock knock.” Max’s voice reverberates around the room and my heart leaps into my throat. Why is he here?! Suddenly my limbs feel very meaty. My arms are no longer arms but big, fleshy noodles I have no idea what to do with.

“Max!” My mum beams. Her whole manner softens now that we’re in company. “Becky said you weren’t coming until later.”

“Yeah, the shoot finished early. It’s looking good in here, Ms. A.” Max changes the subject as he pulls away and looks around the room. His gaze finally lands on me and a bemused expression crosses his face. Shit. My hand flies up to cover my left eye.

“Thank you, Max. You don’t think it’s too much glitter?” Mum carries on.

“No such thing.” Max shakes his head solemnly.

“You’re looking tanned,” Mum says. It sounds like an accusation. “Have you been away?”

“Not since the summer.”

Mum makes no reply, hiding a glittery balloon behind a plain one. She often stops listening partway through conversations.

“Your shoot must have finished very early.” I change the subject back, now that Mum is distracted by balloon placement.

Max shrugs. “Well . . . yeah . . . OK. I took some quick snaps and pegged it out of there. Said something about losing the light.” He laughs awkwardly. “I thought you might need help setting up.”

“Did you get everything you need?!” I panic. This was a big deal for him. He’s been talking about it for months. I can’t believe he left an important job to help set up my stupid birthday party. But also . . . I can’t believe he left an important job to help set up my stupid birthday party.

“Ngegh.” Max makes a noncommittal noise and shrugs again. “It’ll be fiiiiine.”

Mum leaves to go and inspect the caterers. Max moves closer and leans over me. I can smell his aftershave and my body turns even more noodley. I tilt my head up, keeping my eye covered. “Everything all right, Becky?” He grins.

“Yeah, um, got something in my eye,” I say.

“Huh, let’s take a look, shall we,” he says, peeling back my fingers. He brings my hand down to my side and we look each other in the face. We both burst out laughing.

“It’s a good look,” he teases.

“I left my makeup at home.” I don’t need to explain to Max why I can’t go back and get it. He knows my mother.

“I’ll go to the shop.” He smiles, still holding my hand. “What do you need?”

“Mascara, liquid eyeliner, some sort of gray eye shadow.”

He looks at me like I just spoke Spanish. Eventually I write it down for him and he heads out. He’ll probably get it all wrong anyway, but oh well. Max is here. Running around helping me because he cares about me.

The quiet, unhinged part of my brain whispers: These are definitely the vibes of a boyfriend, right?

Not just a friend? Friends don’t show up early at parties to hang out with people’s mothers, do they?

UGH. Shut up, brain. Yes, they do. Because you are just friends.

You have been just friends for a long time.

Because YOU brOKE UP WITH HIM, remember?

Max returns with the right makeup and I sort my face out.

Mum feeds Max about a million different entrées and he humors her with an in-depth discussion about the tones, flavors, and textures of each one.

Mum’s boyfriend, Gavin, arrives and starts scoffing them until she slaps his hand away and he laughs.

Gavin cracks open the champagne. For a beautiful moment I stop worrying about whether people will turn up.

I stop worrying about living at home, my lukewarm feelings toward my job, and having zero interest in every date I go on.

I stop torturing myself with the fading, hazy dream of what my life should have been, versus the reality of nearly thirty years on the planet with nothing to show for it.

Then Dami arrives with The Folder.