‘I’m so sorry, Poppy. Victims of our own success, it seems. Carol made a deal with a US media group that if we managed to win the People’s Choice Award, they’d buy us up. So that’s what happened. By the time we held the award in our hands, the deal had been signed.’
‘I see. But why get rid of me? I was part of the show that won. Surely that counts for something? I put my heart and soul into that show. We made it what it was. Don’t say it’s over, Jake. Don’t say we’re finished.’
‘Oh Poppy, believe me, I’m with you on that. That’s why I’ve left the station, I quit over this. I fought Carol tooth and nail over it. But she believes it’s our formula that’s our real asset, not the presenters. Her plan is to roll out the same show but replace us with celebrities, well-known faces, bring in some heavy guns. She figures that if it can work with a regular person off the street, then it’s going to be huge with a well-known, established personality.’
I swallow hard. I can’t believe this.
‘So what happens now? What are you going to do, Jake?’
‘I’m going to take it easy. Spend some time with Teagan before she heads off to university. You know she got a scholarship?’
‘That’s fantastic, Jake. An amazing accomplishment.’
And I mean it. Even though my own heart is breaking, I’m so pleased for her. That’s a big step from the petrified girl in the changing room toilets.
‘Yeah, a few months ago, she could never have gone for something like this; she’d have panicked. But I don’t know … recently she just seems to have got a handle on things. She’s able to manage her anxiety a lot better these days: breathing techniques, focus, that sort of thing. She’s a different girl and I have a feeling you played a significant part in that, Poppy, so I want to say thank you. From both of us.’
‘My pleasure, Jake. It’s what I do.’
Or at least what I did. What I should be doing. What I need to do.
‘Yeah, it is. So, in a selfish way, this has come at a good time for me.’
A thoughtful silence. I hear Jake sigh into the phone.
‘Poppy, you are a real talent. Best co-presenter I’ve ever had the pleasure of working with. I have every confidence …’
I know he means well, but this is just too familiar. I’ve been here before, let down at the last moment, turned away from the very thing I’ve bust my ass on. I know this script too well now: work hard at something and build all your plans, all your dreams, your entire life around it, and then boom! it’s snatched away from under your nose.
I slump down in my chair. What now? What next? I can’t keep doing this. I can’t keep ploughing all my energy into evaporating dreams. I’m at a loss. I don’t know what to do. I don’t know what I can do.
‘Something will come up for you, I know it will,’ Jake tells me.
I make all the right sounds, I thank him over and over, and then I hang up.
I slam down the laptop lid and throw the cold dregs of my coffee down the sink. I lean on the edge of the sink and try to process what exactly this means for me now.
There is no more show. There is no more Jake and Dr Poppy. There is no more award shows or callers or listening figures or music or clues or Astral banging on the glass panel to tell us to ‘Wrap up, people!’ There is no more collapsing in giggles or snorting into the microphone or staying behind for hours after the show answering emails or ringing a distressed caller back to help them with whatever it is they’re going through.
That’s it. Terminated. Finito. Game over.
Back to square one. Back to being jobless and aimless and useless.
I rub my face with my hands. I baulk at the idea of calling Mum. This is what she warned me about. But I hand on heart never believed it would happen. I thought that because they liked me and I was doing a good job and the show was doing so well, I was safe, that I was somehow beyond axing.
I look to the calendar hanging on the kitchen cupboard door.
It is the last week of the month. I already know without needing to put myself through the torture of checking my bank statement that my latest pay cheque will barely cover my overdraft. Then there’s the credit card balance that has been rolling over each month, with interest; it’ll have to roll over again, with more interest. And my rent is due.
And I haven’t got it. There is just no way there’s anything left in the pot for rent. I haven’t worked for the last week and now there’s no more work, I’ve got no income. No funds coming in at all to stem the flow of my haemorrhaging expenses.
I slide down onto the ground. This is a mess. A real-life, what-the-hell-am-I-supposed-to-do-now mess. And I have absolutely no clue how I’m going to get myself out of it.
Well, I have a small clue.
But it’s horrid. Almost unthinkably horrid. It involves raking up contacts that I thought I’d left behind.
I look to my phone. Do I have to do this? Do I have to make this call? Isn’t there any other way?
I think of my mounting bills and I think of my mum and Leanne and all the sacrifices they make on a day-to-day basis. I take a deep breath and remind myself that I need to take charge of this. By myself.
I mean, what else can I do?
I take the last train to London. Carlos makes me promise to keep in touch, says he has some bits and bobs that he knows my dad wanted me to have. I take a window seat and brace myself for the mess I’m returning to. I’ve deliberately not checked my personal inbox this week in case there is a shirty email from the letting agent or a subject line from the bank screaming at me in capital letters. That needs to be sorted asap or else I’ll be turfed out of the flat with all my stuff and lose my hefty deposit. If I let that happen, I’ll have no choice but to move back in with Mum, but this time it’ll be even worse than before, because on top of being homeless and unemployed, I’ll also have to bear the shame of being fired and in overwhelming debt. She won’t be able to look at me without scowling and tutting and comparing me to her friends’ kids. No, that way madness lies. Getting kicked out of the flat is NOT an option.
We enter a tunnel and the wind rattles the glass in the frame beside my head. I could ask Frank for a loan, just to tide me over until I get back on my feet. I know he’d bail me out; I can hear him saying, No problem at all, Poppy, we all need a helping hand sometimes. But then I’d have to deal with Mum. She’d go crazy if she found out I’d tapped him for funds. And what if I didn’t get a job immediately? It was pure luck that the 105FM job turned out like it did. Nothing worthwhile ever came through from the job centre or from the graduate recruitment sites; nothing in my line anyway. So then I’d be in debt to Frank as well as the landlord and the credit card companies.
No. I can’t ask Frank for money.
Back to the horrid prospect of what I’m going to have to do next. I’ve tried everything else. I tried making it in the real world. I tried to move beyond what I knew and rise to new heights and learn new things and meet challenges head on and all that crap that people say you need to do in order to grow.
Well it is crap.
It doesn’t work.
I’m worse off today than I was on my graduation day, sat in the back of my mum’s car, rejected, dejected, but still with a modicum of hope that I could return to Banbridge one day with my reputation intact. I haven’t got that hope now. So all that hard work, all that courage and patience and soul-searching and faith in everything was just an obscene waste of time and effort. A cruel and fruitless exercise in self-battery. And now I’m out of time.
I need to face it, I’ve passed my peak. Far from being a late bloomer, I fear that I’ve already bloomed and nothing of any worth is yet to come. My student days are as good as it’s ever going to get for me. This is what I feared, and it turns out my fear was real. So this is my mess and I must sort it out, however much it hurts. Overnight, I’ve lost my raison d’être – again. And now I’m going to have to crawl back to Banbridge with a Tyrannosaurus-rex-size tail between my legs. And then w
hat about keeping my flat here in London if I’m working out of the city? I won’t be able to commute as it’s too expensive, so I’ll have to rent somewhere in Banbridge and give up my flat in London. If I can even get out of my contract. My head starts to throb. This is going to be hard, there’s no easy fix here.
Before I can change my mind, I take out my phone and punch in Harriet’s mobile number, the number I know by heart.
‘Hi, Harriet.’
‘Poppy? Wow, is it really you? That’s … great, as in weird … I mean, a surprise. In a good way, obviously. Yeah, a surprise, because I haven’t heard from you … it’s been ages … How are you? Is everything okay? Is something wrong?’
‘Yes, you could say that. Everything’s kind of gone tits-up for me on the work front and I’m not exactly being inundated with job offers, so … I’m calling because I’m stuck and I need to ask for a favour. I need some work; I can mark exam papers, answer phones, sort files … I’ll take whatever you’ve got.’
‘Are you serious?’
‘Deadly serious.’
‘Things must be really bad then.’
‘Yes, thank you, Harriet, they are; hence this rather awkward phone call. So is there work going or not?’
‘Yes, absolutely! You are a life-saver, Poppy Bloom! I am completely snowed under; Dr Winters has been asked to advise Parliament on a proposal, her book sales have gone through the roof so her tour has been extended, the paperwork is just mounting and mounting and I physically can’t keep on top of it, especially to her exacting standards. And then Gregory is home for a few days and I thought I wouldn’t be able to spend any proper time with him … so yes, there is shedloads of work for you if you want it.’
It’s not that I want it. It’s that I need it. ‘I’ll take it,’ I tell her.
She titters into the phone. ‘This is just the best news I’ve had in weeks. Can you start, like, tomorrow?’
‘Why not?’
I thank her and hang up, feeling like I should be happy. Or at least relieved.
And maybe I am. But I’m just not feeling it yet.
I meet Harriet at our old local, the Fox and Hound. I take a deep inhalation of the sweet mahogany scent of the wooden panelling and wave to our regular barman behind the counter. He gives me a polite wave back. I’m a bit surprised, to be honest. I’ve known him for years. Well, I thought I knew him. But it’s clear that he has no real idea who I am. Just another punter. Just another student. And then it dawns on me. I don’t really know him either. I don’t even know his first name. I guess that means our exchanges have mainly been me drunkenly philosophising to him and holding court. Therefore not really exchanges. I cringe. How embarrassing. How self-important. How naive to think that the barman was listening to me beyond any sense of professional duty.
I survey the old-world furnishings, the open fire. I spent at least four nights a week in here during my time at Banbridge. I passionately defended Freud and Jung in that corner. I stood on that stool and recited ‘Invictus’. I coaxed Harriet out of the toilet cubicle during a deadline meltdown. I look around at the new, fresh-faced students sitting in the seats we used to sit in. Discussing the topics we used to discuss. Navigating the do’s and don’ts of university life, like we used to do in my time. And that’s it. It’s their time now. My time here has passed.
We take our customary seats by the bay window, where we can overlook the master’s lodge with its red and white blooms spilling over hanging baskets. Harriet orders our usual tipple, a mojito, which arrives in a gigantic Mason jar with fresh stalks of herby pond life plonked in the middle.
‘Bit early, Harriet, even for you,’ I say as I swish the crushed ice around with the stirrer. Remembering all the reasons that have led me back here.
‘I’ve got to head home later on; I’ve got a family thing on tonight, Gregory’s parents’ anniversary meal, and the last train I can take is at four p.m., so … drink up, girl!’ She holds her glass towards mine. ‘To us,’ she toasts. ‘Back together again.’
We clink our glasses and I take a very cold sip. Then bang! Sharp rum hit.
Harriet continues her toast. ‘To us sticking together the moment we entered Banbridge.’ We clink and sip again. Bang! This rum pulls no punches. Harriet’s on a roll. ‘To our first day, when you walked over to me and invited me to come with you to find some decent coffee; not even realising that I was paralysed with fear and had made up my mind to drop out, scamper home and hide in my room for eternity.’
Clink. Sip. Going down as easily as Capri Sun now. If I have to be here, I may as well be drunk.
‘I couldn’t have done it without you, Poppy.’ A final hearty clink and we drain our glasses. Harriet squeezes my hand across the table and gives me a very earnest look.
I shake my head. ‘That’s not true, Harriet, of course you could have done it on your own. You got the fellowship, after all …’
I really didn’t want to bring up the F word, but she dropped the G bomb, so what did she expect? I’ve got to control myself. I’m here because I’m on the scrapheap, and I can’t afford to piss her off. Even though it was hard calling her, agonisingly hard, at least she agreed to see me. At least she didn’t ignore me or hang up on me or feed me some line about not being able to help me because she wanted to keep me out of the picture. She answered the phone and she has come to my aid. So however I feel, however raw and upsetting and utterly humiliating it is being back here, begging for scraps of Dr Winters’ admin work, at least Harriet has given me that chance. So I nod and I drink, I try to keep perspective and fend off all unhelpful attitudes.
Harriet nearly chokes on her refilled drink. ‘Cognitive and Clinical Neuroscience?’ she splutters. ‘Ha! Not a chance in hell! Even you have to admit, I could never have passed that without you.’
Yep, she has a point there. She was ridiculously shit at it. No matter which way I tried to present it to her, she just couldn’t grasp it. I spent weeks in the library with her just explaining the basics, with no joy. If anything, I think she regressed, more confused by the end than she had been in the beginning. As the deadline date drew nearer, it was obvious that she’d fail, and I couldn’t let that happen, so I just wrote up the damn assignment for her. It kind of became a bit of a routine after that.
‘Everyone finds that hard,’ I lie.
‘Not you. You never find anything hard.’
I wave my hand dismissively. ‘That was just one module, no big deal.’
Now she’s shaking her head at me. ‘What about Advanced Statistics, then? All that SPPSS stuff, or was it PSSSPS … PSPS? Oh, I don’t know – I still don’t get it! And Psychopharmacology? Methods in Applied Behaviour Analysis? God, that was tough.’
I laugh to myself. That module was so straightforward. Heartbreakingly simple. Pure common sense. My mother could have got the gist of it in ten minutes without any prior knowledge or training whilst drinking her tenth gin and tonic and hanging out a wash. Utterly easy.
Harriet widens her eyes. ‘Oh my God, I can’t believe I nearly forgot Basis for Addiction and Compulsive Behaviour! You were like the guru. You knew more about that topic than the lecturers. Dr Winters couldn’t even answer your questions. Nobody in our class would have passed that module if it wasn’t for you.’
I smile my appreciation, but mostly I feel sad, because my dad was my first teacher in that topic. Hand on heart, it’s no fun being an expert in that one.
‘And it’s not just me, Poppy. Lots of us turned to you and you helped us through. Everyone’s been asking about you.’
‘Really?’ I say, relieved but a little defensive. ‘But nobody rang me. I thought they’d forgotten about me, or just didn’t care.’
‘Not at all, believe me. Nobody forgot about you. You were the talk of the faculty.’
‘Elaborate, please. I need to know this, Harriet.’
‘Well, there were lots of stories, rumours, observations going around, as I’m sure you can imagine.’
I no
se-dive into my cocktail. I can imagine very well; everyone huddled together, celebratory glass in hand, each offering their own professional diagnostic of the live specimen presenting features of hysteria, narcissism, developmental irrationality or some other psychobabble crap right in front of their eyes. God, my cheeks are burning. I can feel the nerve endings in my ears. I really made an almighty tit of myself leaving without saying anything, rushing out through the fire exit never to return. More mojito. Let’s quench this shame.
‘It was quite a spectacular twist by Dr Winters,’ Harriet says, chin pressed to her chest.
I flutter my hand as if to fast-forward her. ‘Yeah, okay, I know that. Get on to what people were actually saying.’
‘Well, that you were … unhinged, you’d had a breakdown, that they always suspected you could be a bit flighty, that you drank too much to be an academic, that there’s often a strong correlation between genius and personality disorders …’
I point my stirrer at her face. ‘For God’s sake, I do not have a personality disorder. Whoever said that should be struck off.’ I bet it was Gregory; he loves sweeping generalisations, especially if they sound intriguing. And it means very little to him if they hold less weight than a sheet of toilet paper. I can picture him running his mouth off at the bar, offering his insider crumbs as my ex, peddling our shared history for a tequila slammer or ten. ‘Can you believe someone would say that, Harriet? That’s like me going to the dentist with a cavity and him saying that there’s a strong correlation between tooth decay and people who like cats … it’s just false; moronic, stupid, misguided, uninformed, ignorant, just so annoyingly wrong, wrong, wrong—’
‘Anyway …’ Harriet cuts across me, ‘some people were saying that the way you just vanished proved that Dr Winters was an actual genius, because she recognised this potential for you to crumble so easily and deemed you unsuitable because of it, and you went and proved her point right there on the stage.’
I flash her a really dirty look. I am the proof that Dr Winters is a genius. I don’t even want to breathe at the moment in case I inhale particles of that disgusting, toxic thought into my lungs. I scratch the inside of my arm. Harriet drains her glass. We’ve finished the pitcher. She looks at me and I can see from her face that she’s expecting me to run away again, do another vanishing act.
Don't Stop Me Now: The perfect laugh out loud romantic comedy Page 26