How to Fall in Love (11 page)

‘Some people can’t work.’

‘Of course. Stress is the new back problem.’

‘You’re not at work. In fact, I’m curious to know where exactly they think you are.’

He ignored me. ‘Is it like self-prescribed healing? You say, “I need six ways to lose weight”, or “This week I need twenty-one ways.” This week I’m a Nine Ways to Walk Up the Stairs
kind of person.’

‘That’s not a book.’

‘No, but it could be. You should write it. I’d like to know nine ways to get up a flight of stairs. The most obvious way is clearly never the one these people have in mind.’

Of course it was my ambition to write a book, but I wasn’t about to share that with him, not when he had that opinion of self-help. I felt it was close to happening though. Only the previous week I thought about taking
How to Write a Successful Book
from the unpacked pile of boxes that contained my life in the flat downstairs. Barry hadn’t been very supportive of my dream – not that that should have stopped me from doing what I wanted to do. I freely admit that in the past I had used his lack of support as an excuse because I was afraid of doing it, but things were different now and I had promised myself that I would try.

There were many themes going around in my head, but the working title was
How to Find the Job of Your Dreams
. So far I’d found thirteen variants of the same title in print and I’d read four of them and still felt I had more to add. The books I’d read seemed to focus on get-rich-quick schemes, whereas I always felt the end goal should be personal happiness. Brenda told me personal happiness didn’t sell, that I should weave sex in the office into it, or at least dedicate a chapter to it; again, a family member’s input into my personal ambitions proving infinitely unhelpful.

Adam meanwhile was still venting about the self-help collection.

‘Is there a secret safe with a load of books for me? Maybe
One Hundred Ways Not to Kill Yourself
?’

Thinking he was hilarious, he plopped himself down in an armchair, which happened to be mine. Seeing as it had taken him so long to get there, I didn’t object. I sat in the chair my clients usually sat in. I wasn’t used to this angle of the room and I immediately felt discombobulated.

‘You know you’re not far off,’ I said, beginning the session. ‘I’m not going to give you one hundred ways not to kill yourself, but we are going to put together a crisis plan.’

‘A what?’

I slid a book from the shelf behind me:
How to Cope with Suicidal Thoughts
.
I flicked it open to the appropriate page. I’d read this back to back in the sleepless nights that followed the Simon Conway experience. ‘It’s basically a list of instructions you need to follow if you have a suicidal thought – of which you’ve admitted you’ve had lots. Since you already tried to act on it once, you might want to do it again.’

‘I told you, I
will
want to do it again if nothing changes.’

‘And until your birthday, you’re mine,’ I said, sternly. ‘We have a deal. For the next twelve days I will do my very best to keep my side of the deal. You will have to keep yours. Stay alive. That is your job. Follow the steps and you will stay alive. You may even start to feel closer to finding yourself again. That’s how I can help you get Maria back.’

‘Fine.’

‘Okay. We’ll get to the plan in a moment, it will take us a while to write up. First I’d like to talk. I need to get a real understanding of where you are in your life, how you’re feeling.’

I left a silence. He looked left, then right, for the hidden camera.

‘I’m feeling
… suicidal.’

I knew he was being sarcastic, but I didn’t laugh.

‘Just so you know, suicidal is not a feeling. It’s a state of being. Sadness is a feeling, loneliness is a feeling, anger is a feeling. Frustration is a feeling. Jealousy is a feeling. Suicidal is not a feeling. You can have suicidal
thoughts
, but a thought is merely that: a
thought
. Our thoughts are ever-changing, because we put them there. Once you grasp the difference between suicidal thoughts and your feelings, you will start to understand your emotions. You can separate your suicidal thoughts from your feelings. You will not think, Today I want to kill myself. You will think, Today I feel angry that my sister skipped the country and left me to run the business. Then you’ll deal with your anger. Today I feel overwhelmed by the responsibility of my job – then you’ll deal with feeling overwhelmed. I can help you learn how to get to the bottom of your suicidal thoughts, how to challenge these thoughts and regain control. So, Adam, how are you feeling?’

He looked uncomfortable. He squirmed in his chair and looked around the room. Finally his gaze came to rest somewhere outside the window and he relaxed a little. After thinking about it for a few minutes he said, ‘I’m feeling
… pissed off.’

‘Good. Why?’

‘Because my girlfriend is shagging my best friend.’

Not quite what I was looking for, but I nodded at him to continue.

‘I’m feeling
… like an absolute idiot, for not knowing it was going on.’ He leaned forward, elbows on his thighs, understanding that he was actually going to do this. He rubbed his face and sat up again. ‘But I feel like I understand why she did it. The stuff you said this morning, about me being detached – she’s right. I took my eye off the ball, I got distracted with all of this other stuff, it took over. I haven’t been in a good place. But I can tell her that I’ve changed, and hopefully she’ll change her mind.’

‘When are you going to tell her that you’ve changed?’

‘I don’t know, today?’

‘So you’ve changed overnight. All the feelings of being overwhelmed by work, of being abandoned by your sister, all that bitterness and anger at having to leave a job and life that you love to fulfil a family duty, all that disappointment with your life, with who you are as a person, all that feeling conflicted about your father being terminally ill, feeling that you
no longer want to live
… All those feelings have just disappeared?’

He stared at the floor, his jaw tightening as he worked it over in his head. ‘No. But it will change. You’ll help me. You promised.’

‘My help starts here, in this room. Things won’t change unless
you
change you
.
So talk to me.’

We talked for two hours. When Adam appeared sufficiently drained, and my head was starting to pound with all the responsibilities he had resting on his shoulders, I decided to take a break. I knew the problems, now it was time to gain some perspective, to show him the joy of life. This was the bit I was nervous about. I wasn’t good at it, I wasn’t sure what to do or where to take him. Especially given that I wasn’t exactly feeling the life and soul of the party myself at that moment.

‘What now?’ he asked. He looked tired.

‘Um, hang on a moment.’ I stepped outside my office; by this time Peter and Paul had arrived but they were still refusing to acknowledge my presence. I didn’t care because I had other things on my mind. I took the new book I’d bought from Amelia,
Thirty Simple Ways to Enjoy Life
, the book Amelia had thought I was buying for me, and I recalled her remark:
At last!
Was I really that dull? I had tried to keep my troubles to myself, hadn’t discussed my sadness with anyone. I thought I’d been covering it up so well.

I flicked through the first few pages.

1. Enjoy your meal, don’t just eat. Taste it and appreciate its richness.

Food – seriously? But what else was I going to do with him? I stuffed the book back into my bag. ‘Come on, let’s go.’

‘Where are we going?’

‘To eat,’ I said perkily.

I wasn’t sure if Gemma would be back, but on the off chance, by way of explanation I placed a copy of
How to Share Your Financial Problems With People Who Depend on You
on her desk and hoped that she would understand.

The venue for item 1 on our list was Bay restaurant in Clontarf with views over Dublin Bay.

‘So eating is fun?’ Adam asked, his chin resting on his hand as if his head was too heavy for his neck. ‘I thought it was something that was necessary for life.’

While he scanned listlessly through the menu, I took in the packed café. The place was brimming with people, the chat was loud, plates were piled high with colourful vibrant food, and the aromas wafting around the room probably had everyone’s mouths watering, though they were making my stomach churn.

‘Yes of course,’ I lied. All I really wanted was to eat a green salad and have it over with, but I needed to set a good example for Adam. ‘I’ll have the braised lamb shank, with root vegetables, harissa hummus and herb quinoa, please.’ I forced a smile for the waitress while inwardly dreading the task of eating all that food.

‘I’ll just have a black coffee, thanks,’ Adam said, shutting the menu.

‘No, no!’ I wagged a finger at him. I opened the menu and handed it back to him. ‘Food. Fun. Eat.’

Adam looked lost as his tired eyes flicked across the menu.

‘What do you suggest?’ I asked the waitress.

‘I really like the baked marinated salmon fillet on a bed of Mediterranean vegetable ratatouille and creamy mash.’

Adam looked as if he was going to vomit in his mouth.

‘He’d love that, thank you.’

‘No starters?’ she asked.

‘No,’ we said in unison.

‘So when did you lose your appetite?’ I asked.

‘I don’t know, a couple of months ago. When did you lose yours?’

‘I haven’t.’

He raised his eyebrow.

‘Alcohol and caffeine are not a good idea for someone who’s depressed,’ I said, trying to regain the upper hand and keep him in the spotlight.

‘And what did you have for breakfast this morning?’

I thought about my black coffee at the hotel. ‘Yes, but I’m not depressed.’

He snorted.

‘
You’re
depressed. You tried to kill yourself. I’m just
… a bit down.’

‘A bit down.’ He studied me. ‘That’s an understatement. Eeyore has nothing on you.’

I laughed despite myself. ‘All I meant was, we should look at your diet, it will help you. That has a large part to do with depression. Clearly you’re fit, I mean, you must work out a lot.’ I felt my face get hot. ‘I never see you eat, I don’t know where you get the energy.’

‘Would you like me to tell you in five ways or ten ways?’

‘Just one please.’

‘It’s from when I’m stripping, you know? When I’m on stage, dancing with the boys.’

I laughed. ‘I think you’ve got stripping and modelling completely mixed up.’

‘Well, I don’t know what goes on in your head,’ he said with a smile.

The waitress placed two enormous plates of food in front of us. We both looked at it with dread.

‘Is everything okay?’ the waitress asked, noticing the reaction. ‘Did I get the order right?’

‘Yes, of course, this looks
… delicious. Thank you.’ I picked up my knife and fork, unsure where to begin.

‘So when’s the last time you went out to eat, Christine, since you think this is so much fun?’ he asked, studying his plate and, like me, not knowing where to start.

‘It’s been a long time, but only because we were saving up for the wedding. Mmm, this is good. Is yours good?’
Don’t just eat your food, taste it.
‘I don’t know what this is – is it ginger? It’s really good, and I think I can taste lemon. Anyway, after the wedding we went away on honeymoon and then we had no money so we stayed in for most of the year or got the occasional take-away, which was fine because all our friends were in the same boat.’

‘Fun,’ he said sarcastically. ‘How long were you married?’

‘Eat. Is that nice? Is the mash creamy?’

‘Yes, the mash is creamy,’ he played along. ‘And the carrots are carroty.’

‘Nine months,’ I ignored him.

‘You left him after nine months? I’ve been with girlfriends I hated longer than that. You can’t have tried very hard.’

‘I tried very hard.’ I looked down and played with my food.

‘Eat. Is your lamb lamby?’ he asked. ‘So when did you know it wasn’t right?’ He took a forkful of salmon, chewed slowly and swallowed as if it was a giant pill.

I thought about it. Give the truth, or the answer I had given everyone else?

‘No secrets,’ he added.

‘I had twinges of doubt for a while, but I knew it wasn’t right, for sure, when I was walking down the aisle on my wedding day.’ That was the truth.

He stopped eating, looked at me in surprise.

‘Keep eating,’ I said. ‘I was crying my eyes out, walking towards him. Everybody still talks about it, they thought it was such a sweet moment. But my sisters knew. They weren’t tears of joy.’

‘Then why did you get married?’

‘I panicked. I wanted to stop it but didn’t have the courage. And I didn’t want to hurt him. I couldn’t see a way out; I was trapped, but it was a trap I’d got myself into. So I made myself go ahead with it.’

‘You got married because you didn’t want to hurt his feelings?’

‘Which is why I couldn’t stay married to him just because I didn’t want to hurt his feelings.’

He pondered that, then nodded. ‘That’s a fair point.’

‘If I’d stopped and thought about it at the time, really thought about it, then I would have seen another way out. A better way.’

‘Like being on a bridge.’

‘Exactly like that.’ I pushed the food around on my plate. ‘I loved him, you know, but I have a theory about love. I think that, however good it is, some love isn’t meant to be for ever.’

He was quiet. We both took a few forkfuls of food. Eventually he dropped his cutlery on the plate.

‘I surrender,’ he said, hands in the air. ‘I can’t eat any more. Can I please stop now?’

‘Sure,’ I put my knife and fork down too, relieved. ‘Jesus, I’m full,’ I groaned, hands on my bloated belly, accidentally dropping my act. ‘Imagine, people do this three times a day.’

We looked at each other and laughed.

‘What’s next?’ he leaned forward, eyes shining.

‘Er …’ I looked in my bag and pretended to root for a tissue. Surreptitiously I opened the book.