The Truth About Gemma Grey: A feel-good, romantic comedy you won't be able to put down

by Sophie Ranald

  At first, I tried engaging her in conversation while I made my own food (toast, mostly. I love toast – toast with peanut butter, toast with jam, toast with cheese – it’s all good. But that doesn’t necessarily mean I want to eat it every single night of my life). But she seemed reluctant to be engaged with. She always answered my questions about how her day had been and what she was cooking perfectly politely, but she never asked me anything back and I got the sense that she would far rather be alone with The Archers or Front Row or whatever it was she was listening to.

  So I took my toast up to my bedroom and ate it while looking at videos on YouTube, and after a few days I gave up trying to chat and just said, “Hi,” and, “See you later.”

  And so it was that, a week and a bit after I’d moved in, I was up in my room, alone, a plate scattered with crumbs by my feet, realising that my plan of showing Jack, through the medium of YouTube, that I was leading an enviably fabulous life was pretty much dying on its arse.

  “I need to have more fun, Stanley,” I said.

  Stanley regarded me steadily though his plastic eyes. I knew perfectly well that he didn’t care about fun – he was perfectly happy just chilling in my bedroom, elderly bear that he was.

  “I should make a video,” I said. “But I’ve got nothing to say.”

  I’d done concealer and contouring – not that well, admittedly. I’d done strobing. I’d even tried Kim Kardashian-style baking, except I think I must have got it wrong because it made me look like a panda. My viewers thought it was all great, but I couldn’t see Jack giving even a fraction of a toss about whether a brush or a sponge was a more effective applicator for highlighting concealer.

  I needed to up my game. Maybe I could learn to cook – get some tips from Hannah. After all, don’t they say the way to a man’s heart was through his stomach? Although if this were true, Jack would end up marrying the waitress from our local Nando’s. I’d take my plate downstairs anyway, I decided, as instructed in the Book of Rules: We would prefer you not to consume food and drink in your bedroom. However, if you do, please remove all used crockery immediately.

  I followed the delicious smell down to the kitchen and slotted my plate in the dishwasher. Hannah was standing by the cooker, stirring determinedly away at something in a pan. There was a big bowl of salad on the table, glossy green leaves and slivers of red onion shining with dressing. It looked good. It looked like it had vitamins in it.

  I really do need to sort out my diet, I thought. I’ve always been skinny, but since I’d moved out of Mum’s and wasn’t getting even the occasional benefit of home cooking (which, in Mum’s case, generally meant a few roast vegetables chucked on top of some couscous), my skin had gone to pot.

  I considered stopping and trying yet again to chat to Hannah, but then I heard Richard’s key in the front door and changed my mind.

  “I’m off upstairs,” I said. “See you later.”

  “See you later,” Hannah said.

  I went back to my room, but before I could close the door I heard Richard say, “What’s cooking, my little domestic goddess?”

  Hannah said, “It’s only risotto, with the rest of the chicken we had on Sunday and some pea purée.”

  “And most of a pack of butter, if I know you,” Richard said.

  Hannah gave a little laugh. “Well, it wouldn’t be risotto without butter, would it?”

  “Not that I mind,” Richard said. “More of you to love.”

  “What?” Hannah said.

  “More of you to love,” Richard said. “Look at those lovely curves. Mmmm.”

  Ick. Pass the brain bleach, I thought, ducking inside my room and closing the door.

  I lay back down on the bed and picked up my phone, reflexively flicking through my social media for the thousandth time that day. I responded to new comments on my vlog and Instagram. I posted a picture of Stanley lying face-down on the bed and made a joke about him having been on the vodka. I liked a few friends’ posts on Facebook. I retweeted a link to the new Pixiwoo video – not that Sam and Nic needed any help from me, with their two million followers versus my four thousand.

  Then I checked my email, and literally as I watched, a message from Jack landed in my inbox. It didn’t have a title. I tapped and read, and as I read I felt my whole body growing colder and colder.

  It didn’t start with Hey babe or Hi Gems, but just with Gemma. So at least I knew right from the beginning that what I was going to read would be about as welcome as a slug in Hannah’s salad.

  I’m sorry, but I can’t do this any more. I don’t think it’s fair on either of us to pretend we’re still together when we’re not. You’re a great girl and we’ve had some amazing times, but I think we want different things at the end of the day. We’ve grown apart – not just since I’ve been away, but before that. That’s partly why I decided to go travelling – I needed some space to think about things and find myself. And it only seems fair to let you get on with your life instead of waiting for me. Hope you’re loving London and your new job – bet you’ll nail it. You were always way smarter than me.

  Then he’d added – of all fucking things – a winking emoji. And then a postscript. Borneo is sick. You’d love it here. And then another. Liv says hi.

  As if, I thought. Liv – Olivia – had blocked me on social media. After four years of friendship, she’d said bye in the most definitive way possible. And now, I was convinced, I knew the reason.

  I clicked through to her Instagram feed, feeling all trembly with shock and anger. I was still blocked. Fine, I thought – block me all you want, but duh, a five-year-old can get around that. Which was probably true, but your average five-year-old isn’t reeling with shock from being unceremoniously dumped by their boyfriend. It took me three goes to create a new account, because I kept mistyping the password and I had to create a new email address because it seemed to know exactly who I was and kept bouncing me back to my normal account. Eventually I cracked it, but it didn’t feel like a success at all.

  I lay there for a long time – well, more than a minute, although it felt like years – looking at my phone, knowing that what I was going to see would hurt me even more than Jack’s email had, but that I was going to go right ahead and look anyway. It felt inevitable – it felt necessary. It felt bloody horrible.

  I picked Stanley up and tucked him under my arm for comfort, and then I searched for Olivia’s username and found her straight away. I didn’t need to scroll through her feed to find what I was looking for, because she’d already changed her profile pic.

  It was a selfie of her and Jack, lying on their backs on a beach somewhere. Around their faces, in the sand, one of them had drawn a massive heart with their initials in it. They weren’t looking at the camera – they were looking at each other, their noses almost touching and their hair intertwined. Jack’s hair had got loads longer in the four weeks they’d been away, I saw, and the sun had bleached it a bit. They both looked so fucking happy it made me want to die.

  I love yoga, travelling, and most of all my favourite person in the world, Olivia’s profile said. Together on the adventure of our lives #forever.

  And so that was that. I knew that no amount of begging, nothing I could do – not even booking a flight out to Asia and flinging myself into Jack’s arms and pleading with him to realise he’d made a mistake – would make him change his mind. Olivia must have wanted to be with him the whole time he and I were together – maybe even before – and now she’d got her wish. She was there with him, with the beaches and all the freedom of travelling, and I was left behind, abandoned, rejected and alone.

  I cried for a long time. But crying when you’re on your own is hard, especially when you’re trying to do it silently. There was no one to give me a cuddle and pass me tissues, no one whose kindness would set me off sobbing all over again. No one to talk to.

  I could ring Mum, or Katie. But I knew that however sympathetic they were, they’d be thinking, Yep, I saw that comin
g a mile away. I knew they’d think that because I’d seen it myself – I just hadn’t allowed myself to acknowledge it.

  And then I thought, I do have people I can tell. A whole internet of people who’ve been in love and been hurt and will listen.

  I picked up my phone and opened the camera app. I looked a mess – my eye make-up all smudged and my nose bright red – but I didn’t care. I started to speak.

  Hi everyone. This is a bit of a weird video but I guess I just need to talk. I’m really, really sad right now, and I might not even post this, but – yeah, I need to talk. You don’t have to listen – I’ll totally understand if you don’t. So, Jack, my boyfriend, just dumped me. I know – big deal, right? Everyone gets dumped. Lots of people dumped multiple times. Maybe it gets easier with practice, like doing that flicky eyeliner thing. I don’t know. But it really hurts right now, because you see, I thought we were going to be together forever. At least, that’s what he told me, and I believed him. What a mug, right? But this isn’t about self-pity, not really. Although, obviously, I am feeling extremely sorry for myself right now. I’ll get over that, I expect. But what I’ll never get over is the way he did it. We were together for a long time – four whole years. One sixth of my life. We talked about stuff – all kinds of stuff. Important stuff. Stuff like falling in love. Like having a future together. Like giving each other the freedom to follow our dreams. Like the things we could forgive and the things we couldn’t. And I was always pretty clear that I couldn’t forgive being cheated on. I guess some girls can – maybe they can look the other way and pretend it doesn’t matter, or maybe say things like, “He always comes back to me,” and, “It’s like going out for a burger when there’s fillet steak at home.” Well – newsflash – I’m not a piece of meat. I’m a person. I deserve to be treated decently. I understand that sometimes people grow apart. I know forever is a hell of a long time. Maybe I should have realised what was going on when he decided to go travelling without me – that it was the beginning of the end, that he wanted to spread his wings, or find himself or whatever it was he wanted to do. Or shag someone else. But I didn’t. Because he said he wanted to come back and move in together and that he wanted to be with me – that word again – forever. Maybe he even meant it at the time. I’ve got no way of knowing. So, yeah, I’m really hurt. And I’m also really… really angry. When someone does something to you… when someone you love and trust does what Jack did to me, I think it’s understandable to come over a bit bunny-boiler. And that’s how I’m feeling right now. I know I ought to be shrugging my shoulders, sending him good thoughts, and telling myself that living well is the best revenge. Maybe one day I will. But right now, I want Jack to feel every last little bit as shitty as I do. And not only that – I want his whole life to be shitty. I want it to rain on his wedding day, and then the bride to change her mind at the altar and leave him standing there looking like a dick. I want Norwich City to get relegated this season, and next season, and the one after that. I want his bag to get misrouted to Nairobi every time he boards a plane. I want him to never notice dog poo in the street, and step in it. I want his chips to always be just a bit underdone, so they still taste of raw potato in the middle. I want him to get software update messages every time he’s doing something important, and then forget his password. Yes, I am bitter. Am I going to spend the next ten years stalking him and making his life a misery? No, I’m not. Because I’m actually a nice person and, besides, that would be weird and not leave me any time for shopping. So why am I telling you all this? I don’t know, really. I guess because I’m over this thing that when a person gets dumped they’ve got to be all, “Look at all the fucks I give!” and go off and do a dragon boat race or whatever, when all the time they’re dying inside. Because that lets the person who’s done the dumping, who’s taken the feelings of someone who loves them, looked at them for a bit and then gone, “You know what? I don’t really care,” and stomped all over them – by pretending you’re not hurting when you are, you let the person who’s hurt you go, “She’s better off without me. It was tough, but I did the right thing. Aren’t I brave and noble?” I know what people are going to say now, because I’ve said it to my friends. People mean well when they say it, and they’re right, but it doesn’t actually help. They say, “See, Gemma? He’s a cowardly, selfish git! He was all along! Haven’t you had a lucky escape?” And then of course they totally contradict themselves when they try and offer you a crumb of hope by saying, “He’ll come crawling back, just you watch. He’ll realise what he’s lost and regret it forever and ever.” Maybe Jack will. Maybe he won’t. I can’t even comfort myself with that prospect at the moment, because to be honest I don’t know if I would want him back. All I can think right now is that I want this not to have happened. I want to hit the back button and land on the page where we were before, when we were happy and thought we’d be together forever. The thing is, when you’re the one being dumped and not the one doing the dumping, you don’t get to prepare for it. You don’t get to spend days or weeks or whatever thinking, “Hmmm, maybe this relationship has run its course, actually. Maybe it’s time I shagged someone else.” I haven’t had time to adjust my feelings like he has. So however abjectly shitty I feel, I haven’t got to the point where I no longer love him. And that’s the worst thing about having just been dumped. I still love Jack.

  By the time I finished talking, my voice sounded all scratchy and my throat hurt with the effort of not crying. My arm hurt, too, from holding my phone up over my head. Even now, I thought, I cared about Jack seeing my best angle. That thought made the lump in my throat swell and burst out in a massive, choking sob, and the tears I’d been holding back for so long started to flow again. I lay down on the bed and gave myself up to crying – not that I had any choice; I couldn’t have stopped it for anything. I cried for ages, as quietly as I could so Hannah and Richard wouldn’t hear me. Then I realised that they’d have heard me talking, recording the video for Jack – and all the other ones I’d made over the past few weeks. They must think I’m dangerously mental, I thought.

  An image sprang into my head of Hannah and Richard lying in bed together, discussing me.

  “There she goes again, talking to her imaginary friend.”

  “Is she? I can’t… Oh my God, yes, you’re right. What’s she saying?”

  “I can’t hear. Shall I put a glass against the door?”

  “No! Don’t be daft. But she’s… Do you think she’s, like, all right?”

  “She’s not on the phone, you can tell – it’s just, like, one long monologue.”

  “She’s properly mad, isn’t she? Should we lock away the kitchen knives?”

  The thought was mortifying, but also funny. I found that my tears had stopped and, to my surprise, I felt a bit better. I pulled off my work clothes and put on pyjamas and a dressing gown.

  For a moment I thought about plugging my phone into my laptop and playing the video back, maybe editing it a bit. But then I told myself, No, Gemma. You decided to do this – have the courage of your convictions and do it.

  So I did. I logged into my YouTube account and I posted the video, and then, without even bothering to wash my face or clean my teeth, I crawled under the duvet, took Stanley in my arms and fell asleep.

  CHAPTER SIX

  In romantic novels, heartbroken heroines sleep fitfully, if at all. They toss and turn, ideally between silk sheets, and wake the next morning looking wan and haunted. I didn’t, though. I slept so deeply I don’t think I moved all night, so I woke up with Stanley still cuddled in my arms and a crick in my neck. I felt as if I had a hangover, although obviously I didn’t.

  First, there was a moment when I didn’t know what had happened – the first few seconds of consciousness when I thought that everything was okay, that life was still normal. And then, with a sickening crash, memory returned and realisation hit. Jack had dumped me. Jack was in love with Olivia. I was going to be extremely late for work. My phone must have die
d during the night, so my alarm hadn’t gone off – a glance at my watch told me it was almost nine o’clock.

  Not thinking or caring about where my housemates were, I dashed to the bathroom and showered so quickly I barely had time to get wet. I threw on a dress and flipflops and ran down the stairs two at a time, stuffing my things into my bag as I went. I’d do my face on the Tube and charge my phone at work.

  I’d only just had time to clean my teeth – I certainly didn’t have time for coffee. I dashed past Daily Grind, sniffing regretfully at the blast of warm, spicy fragrance that spilled out of the door. Red-haired Luke was outside having a fag, and he called out a good morning to me, but I could only gasp, “Late! Can’t stop!” as I hurried onward to the station.

  It was nine twenty-nine when I finally arrived at work, sweaty and dishevelled but with my make-up at least vaguely in place. Tom and Ruby were waiting for the lift, chatting animatedly about something. When they saw me their conversation stopped.

  “Morning,” I said.

  “Morning,” they both said, but they didn’t meet my eyes.

  I felt my face growing hotter. Perhaps I was all-too-obviously not okay. Perhaps I’d messed up my eyeliner when the train pulled out of a station and smeared it over my cheek. Perhaps they thought I was late and flustered because I was doing the walk of shame after hooking up with someone the night before. I glanced surreptitiously at my reflection on the way up to the fifth floor; I was puffy-eyed and looked tired, but my layers of highlighter and concealer had done their work adequately, as far as I could see.

  “Have a good day,” I said, stepping out on our floor.

  “Yeah. You too,” Ruby said, and I could have sworn I heard Tom snigger.

  Walking to my desk was the weirdest thing. I was feeling a bit strange anyway – knackered and spacey, as if the floor might suddenly tilt like one of those fairground rides, and tip me off my feet. The hollow of sadness still filled my insides, and I knew that tears weren’t far away. I’d have to spend the day lying low, find a story to work on and do so as quietly and efficiently as I could, until the time came when I’d be allowed to go home and get into bed and cry some more.