But I’m not going to.
I’m not going feed Dr Winters’ fan club any further by proving her theories at my own expense.
Harriet raises her hand to the barman to order another pitcher and then looks out of the window, tapping her fingers on the table. I know that she hates awkward silences. I let her stew in it. The radio is on in the background; I can hear the traffic report and it makes me think of FM105. Harriet’s head is tilted in such a way that it looks like she’s listening out for something really important in the distance, her eyes angled to the top left and her mouth in a perfect ‘O’. She reminds me of someone playing the part of a Second World War codebreaker in a really terrible am-dram production. An advert for windscreen repair comes on. And then some kind of shrieking sound followed by a garbled female voice.
Khloe Fox.
Khloe Fox has got her own radio show.
Harriet is still pretending to listen intently to the radio, but it’s just a collection of noises, like a human farmyard. Hard to feign interest for long. Her theatrical skills well and truly stretched, she shuffles about and twirls the stirrer in her fingers.
‘There was a rumour you’d skipped the country!’ she blurts out, like it’s good news. She glances around nervously; no sign of our pitcher yet. She puffs out her chest. ‘You always loved Rio, right? And New York? Maybe they think you’ve skipped off to New York?’
Great. I am to bask in the comfort that my ex-friends think I’ve had to emigrate to escape disgrace. Harriet’s aimless hand finds her neck. I watch the person I used to consider my best friend in the world struggle for something to say to break the tension. Everything is wrong. As the truth hits me, I feel a cold, sinking kind of panic, an emptying realisation. I can’t believe how badly I’ve played this. I can’t believe how much of an idiot I am. For so long I thought this was where I belonged, where I wanted to stay forever, but as I look around now, it means … well, it means nothing to me.
A fresh pitcher of mojito appears in the space between us. Harriet starts to pour immediately. She licks her lips and does a little shuffle in her seat.
‘So, your turn now; what have you been up to?’ she asks.
I spread my fingers out on the table and take a deep breath, speed-scanning though the time since I last saw her. What have I been up to? I can’t tell her about the radio show because she’ll just ask why I’m not doing it anymore. If it was so successful then why on earth am I sat here looking for scraps of admin? I don’t want to tell her about the netball girls – she won’t understand. She’ll snigger and think it’s some kind of sad, lonely-women’s club. She won’t appreciate the energy or the camaraderie or the loyalty. And I don’t want her to know about Tom. She’ll try and gauge him by all the external measures of eligibility. What university did he go to? Oh, he didn’t go? He left school after his GCSEs? He works where? A gym? Oh, I see. She’ll look down her nose at him and I know I won’t be able to make her understand. I realise that actually I don’t want to tell her anything. How can I when I just don’t trust her any more?
‘I dyed my hair,’ I say; safe bet, I figure. Give nothing away.
She nods emphatically. ‘Yes! I noticed. It’s so different. I had to do a double-take when I saw you.’
I note that she hasn’t said she likes it.
‘I never saw you as a blonde.’
Still not complimenting.
‘Did your mum do it?’
Ouch. I nod and take a straw to suck big, syrupy, acidic streams of rum and lime into my veins.
‘Listen, Poppy, I’m going to cut to the chase. How would you feel about coming back to Banbridge. Permanently. With me.’
I know I should feel delighted. I should be over the moon. Harriet to the rescue. Reinstated in Banbridge. It’s what I wanted all along, right?
Maybe. But not now. I know in my bones that this is not what I want now.
Harriet leans across the table, cupping my hands in hers. ‘As my assistant, but obviously not really an assistant; only in name.’
I nod my head slowly in disbelief. I thought being Winters’ assistant was bad. Harriet’s assistant? Harriet’s dogsbody more like. The reality is dawning on me. Oh God. Is there any way I can vacate my own body and watch this horrible, horrible scene on playback?
Remember, I tell myself, everybody has to make sacrifices. Everybody has to do stuff they don’t want to do in order to get by. And now it’s my turn. I need to lower my expectations. I had my dream job. I had a great time. But I couldn’t sustain it. This is my reality now. This is where I belong after all. Handle it, Poppy. Just handle it.
‘Labels don’t really matter, do they?’ Harriet continues. ‘“Assistant” is just a title to get us past the red tape and all that – we’d actually be total equals.’
‘Um, and how do you propose to solve the little matter of Dr Winters and her career-killing hatred for me?’ I ask.
‘Well, that’s the thing – she’s hardly ever here! What with the promotional tour for her book and a new collaboration with Yale University, plus she’s going in big for this major research bid in Japan, so she will literally be on the other side of the world for most of the year.’
Hmmm. Interesting. Maybe this could work after all.
‘Besides, I’ve already spoken to her about that,’ Harriet whispers with a wink.
‘No way. You need to tell me. Tell me now.’
She takes a large brown package out of her bag and puts it down on the table in front of me. ‘Your thesis,’ she says.
I can’t believe my eyes. It’s huge! Huger than I remember.
‘Go on, open it.’ She slides the envelope towards me. I stare at it for a moment, and then carefully open it and draw out the contents.
It is bound. It is leather-bound. It is dark green – British racing green, to be exact. Good God, it’s gorgeous. It’s more striking than I ever envisaged when I chose the colour at the bookbinder’s. And now the real article is here, in my hands, and it is breathtaking. I pick it up. The leather cover is soft, slightly padded, very cool to the touch; a little texturing, not too much. Apparently too much is considered vulgar amongst the bookbinding fraternity; ‘May as well add glitter and feathers,’ the short, bespectacled master binder told me with great solemnity. I run my fingers across the cover again. So here it is. The fruits of all my study, a three-year PhD without extension or recess. Bloody relentless at times.
But worth it all now that I’m holding it in my hands.
I raise it to the sunlight flooding through the bay window so that I can view it from every angle. Did I really write all this? It’s a longer, more voluminous document than I remember. I trace my fingers over the embossed gold lettering on the front: Reclassifying the Classics: A New Approach to Standardising Psychological Classifications to Create a World-Wide Practice.
I wanted to change the world with this thesis. I wanted to make it so that people from all over the world, regardless of money, gender, status or education, could access high-quality care. I wanted to enable psychologists from first-world countries to educate and agree terms with doctors in less developed countries so they could share knowledge and research for the benefit of all. I wanted everybody who felt alone or unsupported to have their voice heard. All it needed was for me to find a common language. And within this racing-green leather binding lies the language to make it all possible.
‘You’d be able to work on this again,’ Harriet says.
I shake my head. ‘No I wouldn’t. Dr Winter’s already slammed it.’
Harriet jumps up in her seat. ‘That’s not the case, Poppy! I spoke with Dr Winters. I asked her if she would consider the possibility of you coming to work for me … with me … seeing as she’s going be away so much.’
I can’t help stroking the green leather cover. It has my name on it.
In gold.
‘Obviously, because we’ve kind of created the post for you, it won’t pay much at first, but that could always change as Dr Winters�
�� schedule gets busier. She’s always saying how much she needs an administrator; her filing system is off-the-chart meticulous, OCD on steroids … Anyway, forget that, because you won’t need any money; you’ll be able to live with me! My parents have bought me a three-bedroom terrace, just a dinky little thing with a really cute garden out the back, five minutes from Dr Winters’ office. It’s nothing special, but it could be just perfect for me and you. Think of it Poppy, the two of us together, house mates again.’
This is like a miracle. I could actually believe in a benevolent intervening God based on this THING that’s happening to me right here, right now. I am overwhelmed by Harriet’s kindness. I am truly overwhelmed. It means I can stand on my own two feet and not be dependent on the reluctant charity of others because my life has crashed to a halt. It means I can hold my head up and hold down a respectable job and maybe, just maybe, build a future with the man I love …
Ah. Tom. What would this decision mean for me and Tom?
Well, the distance isn’t ideal, but we could manage, I suppose. I could come home every weekend. But he’d be at work. And he wouldn’t be able to come and visit and stay over because I’d effectively be Harriet’s lodger. If we could just stick it out for a little while, maybe I could save up and get my own place again? Someday? Though on the money that Dr Winters would be paying me, that’s highly unlikely. I’ve worked so hard to climb this ladder, only to slide back down again.
Maybe he could move to Banbridge?
I shake my head. If he passed up the chance to go to Australia so he could stick around for Leanne, he’s hardly going to throw it all away to move here.
Oh Tom, what will this do to us?
I need to think about this some more. I’m feeling the weight of the decision. Who’d have thought I’d ever be reluctant to live in Banbridge because I have too much to lose at home?
‘Poppy, what do you say? You’ve gone all quiet!’
‘Wow, Harriet,’ I stammer. ‘I don’t know what to say. I’m blown away. I just can’t believe you’ve come to save me like this.’ I take another drink to steady my whirring thoughts. ‘So Dr Winters wants me here after all?’ I ask.
‘Well, I wouldn’t exactly go as far as that. I won’t lie to you, Poppy. She didn’t love the idea straight away.’ She focuses on pouring mojito right to the top of my glass before she meets my eyes. ‘But after some persuasion on the phone last night, she came around. I told her how passionate you are, and how talented, and how well we work together and how important this is to you …’
‘And she said yes?’
Harriet clenches her teeth. ‘Yes! Mostly she said yes!’
I run my fingers through my hair. Oh my God, this is unreal. BLOODY HELL! What a U-turn! Perhaps Dr Winters has had some time to reflect after Burley’s intervention. Maybe she’s had a change of heart.
‘There are some conditions, though. As you’d expect, right?’ Harriet takes a sip of her drink.
‘Like what?’ I ask.
‘Oh, just some clerical stuff to do with your thesis; she’s put some notes in, edits and tweaks she’d like you to make.’ Harriet curls two fingers of each hand to make quotation marks. ‘“Accepting these edits shows maturity, commitment and openness to change”, or something like that. It’s just a token of goodwill, I guess: she takes you on board, you agree to change a few things, and then everyone has reached a diplomatic compromise and you and me are back together in Banbridge just like old times!’
I’m nodding. Fine. I can do this. I can do this no problem. Change things around a bit to keep her happy. I’ll show her that I am mature, committed, professional. We just got off to a poor start, and then she chose to spread malicious allegations about me that ruined my reputation, my career and my self-confidence … I rub my eyes. Enough, Poppy. Enough. I think of my mum, of Frank, of Tom. I think of how much this will mean to them as well as to me. It’s time to put this childishness aside and step up.
My stomach lurches. This used to be my dream, and now it just fills me with dread. Over the past few months, I’ve come to realise that I was never meant to stay here. I’m not the same person now. I miss the world that I tried to shut out because it used to fill me with fear. I miss all the different people who came into my life. I miss playing netball till I’m a big ball of sweat. I miss listening to my mum filling me in on all the Holloway gossip. I miss the randomness and unpredictability of being fully alive and having to handle whatever comes at me. But this isn’t about me and what I want. It’s about making sacrifices and being responsible and mature. This is what my dad would want me to do.
‘Okay, I’ll do it. I’ll make whatever changes she wants.’ Why not? What difference does it make now?
Harriet yelps. ‘Oh my God! I knew it, I knew you’d say yes! You will not regret this, Poppy. You and me are the A-Team. I could not do this fellowship without you; I so need you! This is going be AMAZING!’
I smooth my hand over my gorgeous, immaculate, gold-embossed, British racing green leather-bound thesis. I want to press my face against the cold, velvety paper inside, take in the scent of brand-new print, ink, glue, leather … but I know that will look weird, so I just stroke it some more. I’ll do all the smelling in the privacy of my own home later on. It feels so good to hold it in my hands; my life’s work, my best academic work ever is between these covers. I love you, thesis. We are together again and we could still change the world.
I wipe my hands on my thighs, blow any residual clamminess away and very carefully open the front cover and turn to the first page.
A sharp inhalation; my hand flies to my chest. I feel my stomach actually drop into my bowels.
‘Wh-wh-what? What’s happened? Harriet?’ I can’t catch my breath; it’s too fast and too shallow. ‘Harriet?’ I find my voice. ‘HARRIET?’ That comes out properly loud. I am shrieking now. The bar staff have heard me. They look concerned. And so they should be. This is a fucking EMERGENCY.
There are red ink marks all over the first page. It looks like it has been stabbed. Repeatedly. Viciously. Psychotically. I turn to the next page, and the next, and then flick frantically through the rest of the book. Red, red, RED everywhere. Sometimes tiny flecks, other times huge long slashing gashes. This is a MASSACRE. I slide my hands under my poor bleeding book and slowly raise it to my chest, cradling it like a dying creature. I press my cheek against the corner of the binding.
‘How could you do this?’
‘It’s just a few changes. You said you’d be okay with that. You said! Poppy, don’t back out on me. I need you!’
This is not a few changes. These changes have MURDERED my work, mutilated it, chopped it up and scattered its vital organs all over the place. This is not my beautiful work any more. She’s killed its spirit, its soul. These are just the scarred paper remains.
I gently put my thesis down on the table.
This is not a comeback. This is a back-down.
This is me ghost-writing for Harriet forever. This means me doing all the difficult academic work for her behind the scenes while she takes the credit in exchange for a leafy postcode and a respectable facade of success. This is me saying that Dr Winters is right and I am wrong. And that isn’t the case. My work meant something.
It was good.
What am I saying? As long as I don’t accept any of these changes, then my work remains intact, and that means it’s still worth something; it means it’s still good. And it is good. I’d actually forgotten how good. Dr Burley thought so too. And lots of others from academic circles all over the world. No, it isn’t designed to keep psychological treatment as a luxury service that only the rich and educated can access, like Dr Winters wants. It’s designed to help people, every sort of people. And yes, that means sharing your research for free. And yes, it means helping people who can’t afford to pay you. And yes, it’s an attempt to do the right thing, not the easy thing.
Actually, it is an 80,000-word description of what The Jake and Poppy Morning Show t
ried do.
I turn my thesis over so that it’s face down on the table. I can’t bear to see my name on the cover now that I know the horror inside. I slide it across the polished wood back to Harriet.
‘I’m not staying. I can’t.’
‘But you can!’ she protests.
‘Well I don’t want to.’
Her face darkens. ‘Yes, well, if you’re going, then just go. Go back to your tacky little radio show. You know, Gregory and I laughed, nearly choked with laughter, the first time we found your show online and listened. Dishing out advice like you knew what you were talking about! Telling some little old man who lives in a shoe how to get a love life. Ridiculous. Absolutely ridiculous. That’s what you are, you know: a ridiculous pop-psychology cartoon. So please, just go, and don’t bother calling again.’
‘Goodbye, Harriet,’ I say. I stand up and hold out my hand, but she just shakes her head and starts to rummage around in her bag, looking for her phone, I suspect.
‘I mean, you know you’re a joke, right? Be honest. Taking a job like that. Making an utter fool out of yourself. I thought to myself, please, somebody stop her! Doesn’t she realise what she’s doing?
And I wish she hadn’t done that – asked me to be honest – because I’ve heard about enough. I’m not in the mood to have everything I cherish be ripped apart like it means nothing. After all, she is asking me. She’s asking me, bold as brass: Doesn’t she realise what she’s doing?
I slam my hand down on the table. ‘No, Harriet. The answer to your question is NO.’
I step towards her, my finger jabbing at every word, the force of its thrust making her step backwards towards the wall.
‘No, I did not realise that I was pushing myself harder than I ever thought I could.’ I take another step forward. She takes another one back. ‘No, I did not realise that I was taking the time to listen to people who’d given up on being heard.’ Another step; Harriet feels behind her blindly for a surface to support her. ‘No, I did not realise that I was looking at myself and questioning myself and challenging everything I thought I knew by asking, is this what I want? Is this what I need? Is this going to make a positive difference to the world?’
Don't Stop Me Now: The perfect laugh out loud romantic comedy Page 27