Nora takes a sip from her hot drink and I can hear the deep bitterness drip again from her tongue as she swallows. So, she didn’t really give a toss as to how I felt this morning after all. She just needed an excuse to get out of the office and that excuse was me. I am dizzy with all her revelations, not to mention her ulterior motives.
‘And are you looking for advice?’ I ask her, clutching at straws to save my own pride.
‘Hell no, I don’t need any.’ She laughs, knifing me once more. ‘I’m hardly going to spill out my shit to you, am I? As if you need that on top of everything.’
‘On top of everything?’ I say to her. So she does acknowledge I’m going through my own hard times at the moment?
Nora looks around her and then back to me.
‘No harm, Ruth,’ she says, ‘but you’d be better investing in your own life, instead of worrying about mine or anyone else’s right now.’
I gulp.
I manage to splutter, ‘Are you suggesting I’m incapable of doing my job?’
Ouch, that stung. No matter how much understanding I am hoping for from my so-called colleagues, I would hate that Nora and the rest would ever think I was losing my ability to offer advice when it was needed, even if I’m having my own inner doubts. She really isn’t helping.
‘Oh, come on, Ruth,’ she says. ‘I’m a real person, not one of your silly fans who write to you because they can’t remember how to change a lightbulb. You just . . . well, maybe you just need to focus on yourself for a bit instead of poor Peter whose pet goldfish just died.’
She laughs at this, to make it all seem lighter but I’ve gone off my breakfast and I’ve gone off . . . well, if I needed to any more, I’ve gone off some of the people in my life a lot right now.
‘I actually do deal with some very serious problems,’ I tell Nora, determined not to let her undermine my job and position. ‘I’ve shelled out advice on everything from coping with miscarriage, to addictions, to relationship breakdowns and not to mention—’
‘Okay, I know, I know, I’m sorry,’ says Nora, clutching her forehead again. ‘But it’s only words on paper at the end of the day, isn’t it? If only a few words were enough to change the world in real life, eh? I think you should really be focusing on yourself just now, Ruth. You don’t need to fix everyone else right now. Take action. You need to focus on fixing you.’
I fidget with my napkin as Nora’s words swirl around my head. I am trying to deal with my life and all the changes that the past twelve months have brought my way, but do I need to be fixed? I don’t understand . . . Okay, so I don’t have any big responsibility now that my father is gone and maybe I’ve been down in the dumps but I’m grieving, right? I only have to worry about holding down my job, making sure there is enough food in the fridge for me to eat and that the beautiful four-storey stone Georgian townhouse I’ve inherited is just about kept warm considering the time of year. I’ve a few people I can call on when I need to fill a gap in my overflowing diary of social events, so why I am so miserable then? Maybe Nora’s right. Maybe with all that I have I shouldn’t still feel so down and empty inside?
‘I don’t mean to be rude, Ruth, but you don’t even look the same any more,’ Nora whispers.
I look down at my jumper. It’s black, like most of my clothes these days are. It’s also stained, like most of my clothes these days are. It’s also far too big and baggy and does virtually nothing for my frame, like most of my clothes these days. As much as I hate Nora’s brutal honesty, I can see she has a point. I look like shit and I feel even worse – and it’s nothing to do with last night. This is what I’ve been looking like for the past year and people are obviously talking about it behind my back.
‘Thanks for the vote of confidence,’ I say to her. ‘Sorry if I’m not as glamorous as you expected.’
Michael, the waiter, brings us the food and I don’t want to insult Gloria’s cooking despite my sudden loss of appetite, so I push it around the plate as Nora changes the subject and we engage in small talk about office politics and print sales versus online clicks. Nora pretends to listen, but I know that she can’t wait to get away now that her headache is lifting with the help of a good breakfast and being away from under Margo’s nose.
‘Hot waiter,’ says Nora, tucking in with her fork.
‘I didn’t notice.’
She makes a noise like a snort, as if she isn’t surprised, and wolfs through the rest of her breakfast as fast as she can, giving me the impression that her work here is definitely done.
‘I’d better get back,’ she says eventually, downing the remainder of her fizzy drink that she pre-ordered when she first arrived, it seems. ‘I’ll get this. In fact, it’s on the office as it was meant to be kind of a staff meeting, so I’ll stick it on expenses. Look after yourself, Ruth, yeah? See you Tuesday for Gavin’s birthday drinks?’
Gavin’s birthday? Tuesday? I’m about to say I can’t because it’s my father’s bingo night but then I remember he’s not here any more. He hasn’t been here for a full year. I really do need to get my own shit together and seek some fulfilment in life instead of rattling around killing time and pretending that it’s enough to feed my hungry soul.
I’m a caring person. I care for people. I’ve looked after my dad for as long as I can remember and now I don’t have to any more and it feels really . . . it feels like I’ve a huge void and I have no idea how to fill it.
‘Yeah, sure,’ I mumble. ‘Gavin’s birthday. How could I forget? See you then and thanks for the very honest chat, Nora. Tell everyone in the office I said hi.’
I know, and she knows, that there is no way I will make Gavin’s birthday party. I haven’t shown my face socially in months and months and last night was further proof that I’m just not ready yet.
And at that, Nora is gone and I watch, moments later, as she crosses the road outside, her skinny legs dancing across puddles and her nimble, fingerless gloved hand apologising to traffic that has to stop in her honour.
Nora may have spoken the truth about my appearance and how I really need to ‘fix’ myself, but she has no idea of how much pain I am in right now inside. I don’t think anyone does. Not the people I work with, not the people who write to me. How can I help them when I can’t even help myself? I fear I might be letting a lot of people down right now, as I just can’t seem to muster up the confidence to reply to their pleas for help at such a poignant time of year for so many.
Paul Connolly
Paul Connolly hadn’t taken drugs for ten days.
That mightn’t seem like a very long time to the outside world, but in the hostel he lived in, it was a good record because drugs of all sorts were only ever a heartbeat away when you needed them and the ringleader, Screw, was always hovering in the corridors morning, noon and night, making sure everyone was well topped up when they needed to be.
Paul needed drugs, but he wanted to be off them even more than he needed them, so this time, this Christmas, he was going to celebrate being drug-free and in the New Year he was going to get out of this shit-hole and start again in a new part of town where the sewer rats like Screw, who tempted him by dangling their life-crippling carrot before him, would be just a distant memory.
Paul had made a to-do list of things he wanted to do before he turned twenty-one in March of next year. He’d pass his driving test at long last, he’d get a really good job and he’d save up for a car of his own, he’d treat himself to a whole new look from the inside out and he’d swap energy drinks that got him through the day for a proper diet of fruit and vegetables and he’d join the gym and get a