by Jo Hamya
Oh, your screen will want fixing. Did that happen just now? What’s that from Ghislane?
The picture editor perked up opposite me. You emailed her?
I swallowed. No, direct messaged. Er—I tapped gingerly around splinters—she says . . . Thanks for getting in touch. Please forward this address to your picture editor. Smiley face. I read out the email address she had provided. I stared at my phone. There was nothing on my Instagram—no profile picture or posts. Only my username. It was likely she had, in fact, forgotten who I was. The picture editor asked me to repeat the address so that she could write it down, and so I read the message out again, all two lines of it, and felt my mouth go numb.
Very good of her, the art director said to the picture editor.
Yes, she seems the sort.
I could feel the spit pooling under my tongue. They waited for me to agree.
* * *
By the time Parliament was adjourned, I could not delude any of the drudgery of my work into the beauty of summer days. The builders had come back with their accompanying din: bits of the pavement returned, looking no different to what they had been before, and construction work began in the reception area of the building itself, prompting the associate editor into a feral hysteria. It rained incessantly. Public transport was sodden with it, and packed; I kept losing umbrellas, my shoes soaked through, my books wrinkled, my coat began to smell. I started and ended most of my days wet. For all of this I should have spent the month screaming, but the intern’s cheerful face when they walked in each morning kept my voice low. I cried frequently on the sofa.
The picture editor made good on her suggestion to attend the talk on success. I followed her into the building’s first-floor boardroom, where folding chairs had been locked into perfect rows and tables pushed against the perimeter. On each of them, pyramids of the speaker’s book were stacked now towards the front of the table, now back, so that vases of flowers and complimentary mugs with a Beckett quote on them wove between. The intern was there, exchanging ten-pound notes for a copy of the book and a customary penny. There was an admirable smoothness to the way their hands switched between the cashbox and each book dispensed. I watched them. They smiled perfunctorily at me.
I sat in the front row and regretted it. The speaker was luminously beautiful, raised slightly above us on a barstool. Despite how much I had come to hate her book, it was impossible not to like her. She spoke with enthusiasm and open sincerity: she asked for the opinions and questions of the room with a genuine belief that knowing them was the key to becoming a better person.
I want this to be more of a conversation than a talk, if that’s all right, she said, tucking strands of hair behind her ears. Because I think we all have very different measures for what constitutes a success story and I don’t necessarily feel I have a right to sit and preach to you about how I’ve achieved my own. Often, the very insecurities we have about ourselves are the things other people admire about us. I know that every time I look at a woman telling me about all the things she thinks she’s done wrong in life, a part of me starts despairing and thinking, But you’re perfect. At the same time, she said warningly, although it’s important to acknowledge that impulse, I always try to turn the volume down on it. It’s impossible to know another person’s pain, and I really feel no one has a right to judge anyone else. Particularly women. I think men already spend enough of their time judging us, so why would we make it any easier on them? Let’s all just make a commitment to try to be kind to each other in this room, and to keep being kind even after we’ve left it. So. Would anyone like to kick us off?
There was a silence, a shuffling around the room, and then eventually someone spoke up and said, I really liked how in your book, you talked about your thirties not being at all like how you thought they’d be, and that it was liberating to let that image of yourself go in your forties. I was just wondering whether you still keep any kind of life goals for yourself generally, or whether you’ve completely given up on that as a concept.
The speaker laughed. Um, so I don’t want to be presumptuous in thinking that you’ve all read the book, she said. So I’ll quickly explain. I got married in my late twenties and I thought my thirties would basically look like a fifties sitcom, or a nineties one at least, where I’d stay with my husband, we’d buy a house, I’d experience some kind of career progression—and also, I’d written a book that I thought I’d publish and acquire a glowing reputation as a famous novelist. She made sure to laugh at herself. But midway through my thirties, my husband divorced me because I didn’t want children, which actually upset some conservatively minded people in my life who I thought I was quite close with. I got fired from my job, and I was told on no less than twenty-six occasions that my novel wasn’t really much good. Essentially, every system and mechanism I’d used to check in on myself with and see whether I was “doing” life right fell apart, and I had to learn to feel a sense of accomplishment and seek rewards from something other than a relationship, or a job, or material wealth, or any of the other usual stuff we’re told will make us happy but which actually keeps us in the grip of the patriarchy.
The room clucked sympathetically.
Happiness is something you decide for yourself, she continued. And everyone gets there in the end. I’ve just bought a house with my boyfriend, but will I marry him? Not sure. I don’t think either of us needs the conventional institution of marriage to make each other happy. We can be together and happy for the rest of our lives in our own way. We have a partnership. The main thing has been shifting my attitude so that my personal and professional success is now a thing I think of as innately within me, and achievable at any given moment. It’s been very liberating. I don’t judge myself by anyone else’s standards anymore. She manufactured a pause by gathering her well-cut hair into a low-slung bun and adjusting her trousers so that the seam ran down her leg in a straight line. Then she addressed the person who had asked the first question.
Do I still keep any life goals for myself? the speaker mused, looking towards the ceiling. She tapped her heel against her stool. I mean, yes, she said finally. I think that’s important in that it provides me with a sense of discipline. They can be as small as—I will walk the dog today, or I will write however many pages. And then I’ll let myself eat a tub of hummus as a reward. The room laughed. But in a grander scheme, not really, I guess, not anymore. I keep a set of basic principles for myself, like, try not to be a dick, don’t intentionally hurt anyone, shop sustainably. And the rest . . . what will be will be. But I think, if you do want to keep life goals for yourself, she added, that’s fine. Maybe just be flexible with them, you know? If you don’t get there by a certain age, just push the deadline back a little. And decide what those goals will add to your life. Because, okay, a life goal of raising happy kids, or feeling empowered is great. But losing those extra ten pounds or learning that language just so that you can be a more perfect accoutrement for a society that won’t even value your skills and literally makes money off your self-doubt is crazy.
There was a round of applause. I put my hands together lightly.
Another hand went up. Could you talk a little more about the tyranny of looking perfect and being perfect? a perfectly beautiful woman asked. Especially in a social sense? For example, I love the bit in your book where you say that feminism should only be used to empower other women rather than to put them down.
That was a quote, the speaker said, nodding. A very wise one, I think. Yes. I think it’s okay for us all to make mistakes and to be a bit messy, and to sometimes miss the mark. We’re all human. I think the internet has made it very difficult to be a nuanced, complicated, authentic self.
Don’t you think, I heard myself saying, and hating it, that it’s important to be held accountable if what you’re doing is wrong? For example, a lot of feminism has been co-opted into a marketable luxury, or made to seem like a club whose membership is dictated by unequal wealth distribution and unequal beauty standards.
It’s no longer just a basic premise for society to try and adjust itself to and function on, like . . . I searched my brain. The weather, I finished lamely.
Someone coughed. The room began to shrink down on me. The speaker continued smiling at me, as though expecting me to go on, and so I did. What would you say to women who have used feminism as a “brand” to market diet products, thousand-dollar T-shirts, and exclusive club memberships with?
The sun seemed to radiate out of the speaker’s face. She remained utterly calm, taking time to select her words with care. I would say even feminists sometimes fail at feminism, she said finally. And yes, it’s very important that we examine any hypocrisy within the movement. That being said, I think it’s also crucial to remember that we don’t live in a utopia where feminism can gain importance and thrive if it isn’t propped up by the major frameworks in modern-day society—and for the time being, one of those is a market economy.
But—this came out desperately, I struggled to adjust the pitch of my voice to her cool, her calm—surely the goal of the movement is to prop up major frameworks in society, rather than to be propped up by them?
Well, sure, the speaker said. But it’s a journey, right? First you infiltrate them. Then you spark a revolution from within. Then world domination. She winked. The room laughed. Thank you. The speaker smiled at me. That was a very interesting point. I smiled back and felt like a toad assaulting a princess; wanted desperately to go back in time and clamp my mouth shut. I felt judged by the women in the audience around me; I felt that it would reflect better on my character if the speaker, with her reasonableness, with her constant niceness and luminous skin, liked me.
What would you say the best way to cope with failure is? someone else asked.
Um, breathe, the speaker said. Do whatever you need to do to get through it. Yoga? Do it. Packet of biscuits? Eat it. Ignore calls for a week? It’s your right. Do it knowing that it’s temporary, and tomorrow is another day.
What’s the best thing writing this book has taught you? I asked, wanting desperately to save face.
That’s an excellent question, she beamed. I think that everything is relative. As I’ve been doing this tour, I’ve listened to a lot of people talk about their lives, and definitely the best thing it’s taught me is a kind of self-awareness. For example, before writing this book, I think I was blind to a lot of the structural privilege in my life. You know, I had fairly middle-class parents, and I went to boarding school, and I’m a thin, white woman. All of that, I gradually understood and came to terms with, and now I definitely want to use my voice to help lift others, if that’s in my power. But I think, also, the best people I’ve spoken to know that even when you’re successful, pain is pain, no matter how it happens, or who it happens to. You know, heartbreak is heartbreak. Loss is loss. We all just need to support each other and love each other.
There was another round of applause.
Okay, I think that’s enough of me up here, she said. Um, I’ll be at the back of the room signing copies of the book if anyone wants one, or if you just want a chat, that’s fine too. I just want to close with a quote from Carl Jung, which I have actually had printed on this T-shirt, she said winking at me and opening her blazer briefly. I am not what happened to me, she read out, I am what I choose to become.
On my way out, I knocked one of the Beckett mugs into my bag and placed it visibly on top of one of the first-floor bins.
* * *
The iMac screen flashed new copy at me when I got back to my desk. I printed the page.
What is it?
The art director raised an eyebrow. Climate protests are sexy.
And where are the photos?
Nonexistent. We’ve pulled some sustainable couture for the society protesters to march in, we’re shooting them wearing it—the art director raised her hands and made exaggerated air quotes—in the streets, as it were.
How can couture be sustainable?
It’s made for life.
Yes, but who actually wears it in real life?
The art director tapped her fingers to her temple and rolled her eyes. I tried again.
What’s with all the protests in this issue?
Rehabilitation. The great and the good of society with a capital S can no longer survive as good-looking layabouts. There are enough name-drops in that article to sink a yacht, she grinned.
I began to read out loud from the sheets. When the strikes are happening, it’s never about apportioning blame, says one privately educated, Oxbridge grad. Attendees look for systemic rather than personal change, and remain unflustered by allegations of hypocrisy. We’re all guilty. Most of us, whether we come to these protests or not, drive cars, or buy single-use plastic, that kind of thing, she shrugs. If you exist on planet Earth, you’re part of the problem. I stopped reading and looked up. The art director was stifling a series of snorts.
Do read the bit, she said, where they list the aristocrats, celebrities, and royals who have donated to the cause.
I scanned farther down the page until the words “environmentalist banker” caught my eye. I read aloud again: It’s a paradoxical for a lot of people, but I dispute that, he says. You can’t convict someone for making money. Money is neutral. It’s what you do with it that counts.
I stopped reading. Money is not neutral, I said finally. How you earn it is just as important as how you spend it. I tried to say more, but my mouth fell open, huffing, useless. The art director, taking in the look on my face, began laughing openly.
If you’re so disgusted with it, my flatmate said in the kitchen later that evening once I had read the article to her, why don’t you go and protest yourself?
It’s different for me, I said. I’m not white. Getting arrested means something different.
She did not look up from the ring she was filing. Have you ever been unfairly targeted by law enforcement before in your life?
No, I said awkwardly. And I don’t plan on it.
Sounds like a cop-out to me, she said. Between your accent and the way you dress, I doubt you’re any more likely to be targeted than I am.
I dress that way for work. And you don’t know that.
Why are you so determined to be discriminated against? You’ve never expressed any kind of strong alliance or BAME concern before—you’re entirely the product of an educated, socially mobile middle class. You were born in the last of the blind glory days. It’s Gen Z who have it rough, not you. You’re one of Blair’s babies.
I’m not, I said, shocked. You should see what it’s like in the office. One of my colleagues is this rich, typically English-looking girl—she’s not even that good-looking, she looks like a chipmunk. She’s terrible at her job. But she’s treated like a daughter by everyone because she has perfect skin, and fits sample size.
Yes, it must be tragic for you as a mere size eight in Levi’s, my flatmate said drily. Having left a cushy job in Oxford and arrived to discover you can’t be accepted by a society magazine.
That’s not what I meant. I’m not looking to be accepted by them, I just think it’s bollocks that she’s more rewarded than I am because she was born one of them.
I know what you meant. No offense though, it’s getting boring hearing you whine about your job while you remain completely oblivious to your own privilege. And having finished the ring, she slipped it onto her finger and held it up to the light. Then she turned her hand to show the gem to me. Can you tell it’s fake?
I looked closely at the ring. Its color was blood orange and bitter. I shook my head. My flatmate nodded. Good. Right. By the way, you owe me £58 for bills and council tax.
Sure, I said.
And another thing. She began washing her hands. I was wondering if you wouldn’t mind taking the sheets off the sofa in the morning like you used to? And putting your stuff away when you’re not home? It’s just that when I work from home, I need the living room.
You make most of your jewelry in the kitchen, I pointed out.
Yes, but I do admin in the living room, she said. Tidy room, tidy mind. Can we keep it tidy, please?
I looked at the chaos in the kitchen: the thin layer of metal filings and dust on the floor and inching towards the kitchen knives. Plastic baggies full of gemstones jostled with the cutting boards, the sink stacked full with cups of graying, milky tea. I thought about the bathroom as I regularly found it, uncleaned and laced with her hair, and as I did so, my eyes moving down saw that the side of my jeans had been blackened by the dust on the kitchen countertop. Across the corridor, I could see the door to my flatmate’s bedroom firmly closed to the dirt produced by every ring she made. I remembered the twee Polaroid photos, fairy lights, and cacti, all dustless; felt a rising irritation. Tidy like the kitchen you keep messing up, or the bathroom you never clean? I asked idly. Her eyes narrowed, but she did not shout. Instead she looked levelly at me.
Did you sleep in my room?
Sorry?
When I was gone for the weekend, I got back and my pillow smelt like your shampoo.
The room went hot; shrank, receded. There was my heartbeat, in my ears; I could hear it making everything small and loud. When I shook my head, I felt like a child. My flatmate narrowed her eyes further.
Right. Just keep your stuff packed up and out of my way when you’re in my flat, okay?
* * *
Because a kind of cold war had broken out after the scene in the kitchen, I found any excuse not to come home during sociable hours. I continued going into the office early and stayed late. I bought cheap cinema tickets, or nursed a coffee for four hours in a café and sat bored over a book. At one point, I did go to the ladies’ pond; sat on the banks and admired the magpies darting blue-tailed around them, then grew bored of that as well: I had no inclination to swim in the cold or to get mud in my hair, was too shy of my body to flit naked around the heath. With the time that had elapsed and the little that had changed, I was too embarrassed to call any of the friends who had reached out to me when I had returned to London in the first weeks of June. I took to phoning my mother more often, who accepted the sudden increase in calls with bewildered resentment. But no sooner did she open our conversations with the same gambit—So you remember me now, do you?—than I realized that unlocking my phone, scrolling through my contacts to the letter M, and punching the large green key of a circle with a picture of a phone in the middle was a catastrophic mistake of untold stupidity which could only serve to plunge me into regret: everything she said rang with disgusting amounts of logic and truth. Before calling my mother, I was an unhappy, failing adult. After calling my mother, I was an unhappy, failing child. You really overcomplicate it for yourself, don’t you? she sighed. You’re wasting money living on a sofa and eating Pret A Manger when you could just commute from here. Come. Home.