Perhaps I’ll just give it a poke to check.
Please be quiet.
I know. I just know, alright?
I reach down into the composting system, but can’t quite touch the surface of the sludge. I strain a little more to reach it . . . then a little more . . . and just a little more . . .
My balance then gives up the ghost, and my head disappears down the hatch with the top half of my body right behind it, wedging itself in the square hole. At exactly the same time, my hand plunges right into the sludge.
Only it’s not really a sludge.
It’s a crust.
And what’s inside is not compost, my friends. At least not the kind produced by plants.
The second my hand breaks through the thick crust, a stench so enormous it should have a harness on it erupts right into my face.
I want to pull back from it, but I’m wedged in the bloody hole, with nothing to use as leverage.
The colossal smell fills every orifice in my head. My hair now dangles in the disgusting dark mass hidden underneath the thick crust. My hand is covered in it, like I’m wearing a filthy brown glove.
There’s nothing I can do except vomit.
Which just makes things smell even worse, so I vomit some more.
‘Help!’ I then scream, into what can only be described as the worst thing I’ve ever seen – and I sat through all of season eight of Game of Thrones in one ill-advised binge session.
I actually feel like I’m going to black out.
There’s no two ways about it, I am definitely about to black—
I feel arms around my waist, and I am yanked backwards out of the hole to emerge into the light – and more importantly, the fresh air.
‘Aaaargh!’ I screech, as I sit down hard on the grass, carried by the momentum generated by those arms. As I do this, my wet hair slaps against my face.
With horror, revulsion and another high-pitched scream that verges on the insane, I hold up my dirty hand and examine what’s on it.
I want to die.
‘What the hell were you doing?!’ Nolan exclaims from where he’s also come crashing down on to the neatly clipped grass.
‘I was . . . I was looking for the composting system!’ I wail, now holding my hand as far away from me as possible. If I could chop it off, I fucking would.
‘Is everything okay?’ I hear Irene McClapperty say in an extremely worried voice, as she appears from between the wicker fence panels. ‘I heard screaming and I—’ A hand flies to her face. ‘Oh my lord! What’s happened?!’
I look up at her, and try to think of a good excuse for this sorry sight. ‘We were . . . we were playing hide-and-seek!’
She recoils. ‘And you thought you’d hide in the septic tank?’
Yep.
We all knew what it was anyway, didn’t we? But Irene McClapperty has confirmed it for us.
I didn’t find the composting system, full of dead plants and useful nutrients – I found the cottage’s septic tank, full of shit and piss.
I am covered in shit and piss.
Some of it probably my own.
In my overwhelming and over-the-top obsession with the environmental credentials of Withy Views B&B, I have managed to immerse my hand up to the elbow in faeces.
It’s in my hair too. And all over my face.
I want to die.
‘I need . . . I need a shower,’ I weep, pulling a wet strand of hair away from my forehead. I’m just going to think of it as ‘wet’ and nothing else, because if I don’t, I’m likely to lose my mind.
Nolan leaps to his feet. ‘I’ll go run it for you!’ he says, and sprints off in the direction of our room.
Irene McClapperty gives me a look. It’s one I will never forget. ‘You must . . . you must really like winning at hide-and-seek,’ she says.
I have no answer.
I am covered in faeces and urine because I have turned into some kind of environmental maniac, who just couldn’t forget about four normal bloody light bulbs – and I really have no answer.
It turned out Nolan was hiding behind the composting system.
Because of course he bloody was.
The rest of the weekend is spent avoiding Irene McClapperty like the plague. I took my breakfast in our room, feigning illness brought on by my visit to the inner recesses of her septic tank.
I have had a lot of thinking to do.
A lot of thinking about what I have become.
Which – in case you hadn’t already come to this conclusion – is a raving environmentalist loon.
There’s nothing like plunging your hand through a thick crust of dried-over poo to make you really look at your choices in life – and my recent choices have been driven by several months of working in a job that has turned me into an obsessive.
Poor old Irene McClapperty didn’t deserve all of that.
And she certainly didn’t need to be judged unworthy by the likes of me, just because she had four normal light bulbs.
She wasn’t lying about the composting system. In fact, she wasn’t lying about Withy Views being environmentally friendly. It turns out that the whole cottage is run on solar power, from panels on the roof – they’re just hidden on the other side, away from view when you arrive at the cottage.
If I’d taken a breath, and bothered to actually look into things a bit more closely, I would have discovered them, and avoided having to dig poo out from under my nails.
Irene McClapperty wasn’t lying. Not at all.
I wasn’t deceived. Not for one second.
The poor woman is trying her best to do her bit for the environment, and I’d decided she was unworthy thanks to her light bulbs.
Good grief.
And I embarrassed Nolan. I know I did. He’s been awkward around me, the other guests at the B&B, and Irene McClapperty the entire rest of the time we’ve been here.
I suppose I can’t blame him for feeling that way.
I was rude, weird and judgemental. Who wants to spend time with somebody like that, eh?
Ellie Cooke from a few months ago certainly wouldn’t.
But then, the Ellie Cooke from this weekend would probably punch the Ellie Cooke from a few months ago for driving around in that clobberdy-banging, gas-guzzling Mercedes.
I really thought that my job at Viridian PR had made me a better person – that my new-found desire to save the planet had improved me.
But I’m now forced to admit that in some ways I’ve become worse.
And I might have once again soured things with Nolan. We’d only just restored the happy dynamic of our relationship, and yet here I am – acting like a right wally and jeopardising it once more!
The fact that the problem which might ruin our romance this time around is how insanely environmentally conscious I’ve become, is an irony that is not lost on me. I couldn’t bloody lose it if I were at the bottom of the Mariana Trench, in a camouflaged submarine.
Hell’s bloody teeth.
I just need to get home now. Get home, and try my best to come down off this bizarre, frenzied plateau I’ve stuck myself on.
And that starts with maybe taking a bit of a step back at work. Not from the job itself, but from some of the client relationships I’ve developed. It’s just not healthy to be constantly talking with – and following the advice of – a large selection of green crusaders. You can’t be bombarded with that much information, passion and righteous indignation without being heavily affected by it.
I’ll also try to prove to Nolan that I am not as insane as I have seemed on this trip down to the Cotswolds.
Quite how I’m going to do it, I don’t know. But I’d better think of something fast, otherwise I really am going to lose him properly this time.
. . . if seeing me – and smelling me – covered in his own waste matter hasn’t done that already, of course.
Chapter Twelve
AN EXTREMELY INCONVENIENT TRUTH
I sit at my desk, drumming my nails
on its wooden surface, in a rapid staccato fashion that perfectly echoes the turmoil going on in my head.
I can’t think straight.
And I certainly can’t get any work done.
I’ve been like this for days now, ever since we got back from Withy Views.
Nolan has been avoiding me again – I know that for a fact. We were supposed to spend the night together last night, but he called to cancel, telling me he had too much paperwork to catch up on. It’s an excuse that would have been more believable if I didn’t know exactly what Nolan’s workload was like at the moment. He doesn’t have any paperwork to do right now.
I can’t even go speak to him today, because he’s off on another one of his regular scouting-for-business missions. I have no idea where he’s gone.
I just have to sit here and drum my fingernails on my desk, letting my brain stew in its own half-guilty, half-frustrated juices.
‘Everything alright?’ Nadia says.
‘I’m sorry?’
‘I said . . . is everything alright? Only you’ve been doing that for so long, you’re starting to wear holes in the wood.’
I look down at my drumming fingers and will them to stop. ‘Sorry. Bit preoccupied.’
‘With what?’
I open my mouth to spill my guts . . . but of course I can’t do that, can I? Because Nadia – like the rest of Viridian PR – still has no idea I’m dating our boss.
Bollocks.
‘Nothing important,’ I eventually tell her. ‘Just some work-related stuff.’
‘Anything you can discuss with me?’
‘No. Not really, I’m afraid.’
‘Ah . . . well, then maybe you should have a chat with Nolan? Maybe he could help.’
My face darkens. If only she knew.
‘He’s out of the office today,’ I tell her. ‘Off touting for business again somewhere.’
Nadia looks a little confused. ‘He told me he was working from home today. Catching up on paperwork. It’s in his diary on the intranet.’
Oh, great. So now he’s lying to me about what he’s doing with his work days.
. . . I’d better go see him.
I’d better get this sorted out. I’d better apologise – again – and hope that he’s as forgiving as he has been before.
My heart leaps into my throat. The idea of just turning up unannounced at his door fills me with dread, but if I call ahead to say I’m coming, he’ll likely just give me an excuse to avoid seeing me.
No. I have to go round there and talk it out with him. Pin him down, and try to convince him I’m not the maniac from the weekend that he thinks I am.
‘Right,’ I say, out loud.
‘Right what?’ Nadia asks.
‘I will go speak to him, Nadia. That’s good advice.’
‘Thanks,’ she replies, as she watches me rise purposefully from my office chair. ‘And remind him we’re meeting with the guys from Barks & Larks tomorrow. They want to talk through the ideas we had for their radio campaign.’
‘Will do,’ I tell her – hoping that I actually get a chance to do so.
With a decision made, and some kind of plan in place, I feel galvanised for the first time in a few days. I’ve been listless and out of sorts – disappearing down a septic tank will do that to you – but now I feel motivated to sort this mini crisis out, before it can get any worse.
And that begins with the twenty-minute drive to Nolan’s large Victorian terraced house.
It feels slightly strange to be making the journey on my own. Every other time I’ve been this way, I’ve been with him. Going over to his place without him knowing I’m coming feels extremely strange – but then I guess it would. It’s not like we’ve been together all that long, and we’ve certainly had our ups and downs. We’re not in each other’s pockets just yet.
Not that we ever will be if I don’t do some fast, convincing talking when I get there.
On the drive over, I formulate what I’m going to say in my head – and it largely consists of me telling Nolan about my thought process over the past few days. I know I have more apologies to make, but I also think I have some pretty good mitigating circumstances for my behaviour.
I’m just the type of person that can get way too caught up in something if I’m given half the chance. My recent strangeness has only come about with the best of intentions – and I need Nolan to know that.
Surely if he sees that I have developed this odd, judgemental attitude only because I am now dedicated to the same cause as him, it’ll smooth things over? He can surely appreciate that, can’t he? My heart’s in the right place, even if my brain possibly hasn’t been.
Yes.
That sounds about right to me.
My justifications are convincing. It should all be fine.
So why do my hands get very cold and sweaty as I turn into Nolan’s road?
Just take some deep breaths.
The only parking space I can find is about twenty yards away from Nolan’s house. As I squeeze my hybrid Mercedes into the space between two parked cars that I would never get into were it not for the super-duper park-assist technology that the car comes with, I look in the rear-view mirror to see someone coming out of Nolan’s front door.
My hackles immediately go up, as this person is dressed in an extremely shifty manner. He’s wearing a black baseball cap, sunglasses and a dark-blue hooded top, with the hood up over the cap. As he walks down the three steps that lead to Nolan’s front door, he looks in both directions up and down the street.
Burglar.
That’s who this person is!
Someone has burgled poor Nolan and is making off with his valuables—
Wait a minute.
That’s not a burglar doing Nolan’s pad over.
That is Nolan.
He’s just briefly taken off the sunglasses to give them a wipe as he crosses the street, and I’d know those kind, easy-going grey eyes anywhere!
What is he doing?
Why is he dressed like that? And why is he acting in such a furtive manner?
Part of me wants to jump out of the car and go over to him to confront him, and see what he’s up to . . . but there’s another part of me that just wants to sit here and see what happens.
It’s a very primal part of my personality. Something that I’m sure is a holdover from one of my distant ancestors, who knew that discretion was the better part of valour sometimes – especially when it came to observing that massive sabre-toothed tiger in the grass over there.
Okay, I don’t think Nolan poses any real kind of threat to me just because he’s dressed like that, but something very strange is going on, and alarm bells are ringing in my head.
I hunker down in my seat a little and turn to look through the rear windscreen as Nolan walks straight past his neat little Tesla – and goes straight towards a frankly enormous bright-green BMW M3.
I’ve noticed that gaudy fucker a couple of times when I’ve come down this street in Nolan’s car, and have blanched at it every time. It must be hideously bad for the environment. The fact that the bonnet bulges outwards must mean the engine underneath is gigantic.
Maybe Nolan is going over to vandalise it?
That’s why he’s wearing those odd clothes and looking so suspicious?
Oh God.
I have to stop him. Being dedicated to an environmental cause is one thing, but committing criminal damage to someone’s property is quite another! I must stop him before he—
Hang on a bloody minute . . .
He’s not vandalising the stupid green BMW – he’s climbing into it!
Nolan Reece is getting into an overblown German muscle car, and is starting the engine.
What the hell is going on?!
I can hear the loud, guttural roar coming from the BMW very easily, despite the fact that I am in my own hermetically sealed Mercedes car cabin. The sound of it must echo around the street like a jet aircraft taking off.
My j
aw goes slack as I watch Nolan pull out of the parking space in the brutish sports car and drive past me. Instinct tells me I need to duck my head so he doesn’t see me.
I have to see what Nolan is up to, and I won’t get to do that if I am discovered . . .
As Nolan reaches the end of the street, I fire up my own nearly silent car, and follow along behind him, keeping enough distance to stop him from noticing that he now has a tail.
Bloody hell.
I came here this morning to make my apologies and make amends. I didn’t expect to find myself thrust into an impromptu spy thriller!
As I turn on to the main road, and continue to follow my furtive boyfriend, my mind starts to race with the implications of what I’m seeing.
Why is Nolan acting so suspiciously? And why is he driving such a different car?
Then it hits me.
The bastard!
The bastard is having an affair with another fucking woman!
That must be it!
He’s carrying on with another woman behind my back – and is behaving this strangely because he doesn’t want to get caught!
That must be it.
Not only is he conducting a relationship with me behind the backs of all our staff at Viridian PR, he’s also conducting another relationship with someone else behind my back . . . as well as everybody at Viridian PR.
Cheatception.
And today – when he’s supposed to be working from home, or out and about touting for business, depending on whether Nadia was right about his activities or not – he’s going off to see his fancy woman dressed like a member of a particularly bad boy band from the 1990s.
My hands grip the steering wheel so tightly they go white.
After everything!
After all that’s happened!
After everything I’ve done to stay in his good books!
After all the bloody forgiveness I’ve sought!
After all the apologies I’ve made, and was going to make!
I’m going to catch him in the act. I’m going to see who this bitch is, and I’m going to make her pay!
All thoughts of apologies and amends-making have gone completely out of the window. I am now incandescent with rage about being cheated on (despite the fact that I have absolutely no evidence of this, beyond Nolan’s impression of Justin Timberlake, and a sickly green sports car).
Going Green Page 26