Who's That Girl (11 page)

In fact, this is exactly the same route I used to drive home, I realise as the Beetle suddenly hangs a left at a mini-roundabout without indicating. Gosh, whoever she is, she's a terrible driver. She doesn't indicate. Or slow down over speed-bumps, I curse silently, as she shoots off ahead of me. Honestly! If she's not careful, she's going to ruin the suspension on that car. Come to think of it, that was how I ruined it.

No sooner has the thought popped into my head than we turn a corner and I suddenly see the turning for my old street up ahead. It's like a blast from the past:
Kilmaine Terrace
. Gosh, it's been years since I've been down there. Well, there's never been a reason to. It's a dead-end street, I muse, my attention switching back to the Beetle, which is still zipping ahead, until without warning the driver slams on the brakes.

God, wouldn't it be funny if—

She swerves right into Kilmaine Terrace.

My stomach spasms.

You have got to be kidding.

As I watch the car disappearing down the street, I feel a bit stunned. Talk about a coincidence. Indicating, I follow. The street looks exactly the same. Large white terrace houses, cherry trees…

My eyes flick forwards. I used to live at number thirty-nine, overlooking the little square right at the end. I hang back as the Beetle zips towards it, the noise of its exhaust reverberating off the houses. It doesn't show any sign of slowing down.

Don't stop outside number thirty-nine.

A voice suddenly pops into my head and I jump. I realise I'm silently praying the Beetle is going to stop outside a different house. Any house. Just not number thirty-nine. That would be too freaky. Too weird.
Too much
of a coincidence.

Screech.

The red brake lights snap on.

Right outside number thirty-nine.

I feel the hairs prickle on the back of my neck. Then again, you do hear of bizarre coincidences. I once read an article about a woman who had three sets of triplets and all three sets shared the same birthday. I mean, what are the odds of that happening?

And yet it happened. This is exactly the same, I tell myself firmly. Well, sort of. Hurriedly I pull into a space a few cars down, turn off the engine and squint across the street. Damn, I'm too far away. I hesitate. Oh, what the hell, in for a penny, in for a pound. Grabbing my tote bag, I shove on my sunglasses and without even glancing in the Beetle's direction I walk briskly to the little square at the end.

It hasn't changed a jot. Same patch of lawn, same flower beds, same little bench in the middle. I sit down and pull out my book,
Finding Yourself Made Easy
, and pretend to start reading. As I do, I feel a slight thrill. This is like being one of those TV detectives you see on undercover operations.

Either that or a stalker.

Suddenly the sheer absurdity of my situation hits me. Jesus Christ, Charlotte, you're going to get yourself bloody arrested! What on
earth
do you think you're doing? Sitting here, spying on some innocent girl trying to parallel-park and making a complete mess of it. See-sawing in and out of the space, banging bumpers with the cars on either side with reckless abandon. Honestly, she's the worst parker I've ever seen.

Just like you used to be…

Out of nowhere, I suddenly remember the time I tried reversing into a space outside the local pub and mounted the kerb, sending customers scattering and drinks spilling. My parking used to be a family joke. I once kerbed every wheel on my father's new Volvo, and I've lost count of the dings and scratches I put on cars over the years. Thankfully I've got better as I've got older, but when I was twenty-one, I was terrible. In fact, when I lived down this street, I once reversed into a—

I hear the crunch of metal.

—
lamp-post
.

The engine cuts out and a door swings open. Loud music wafts out into the silent street: (What's the Story) Morning Glory? by Oasis. I feel a rush of nostalgia. Wow, I used to love that album. My heart starts pounding.

Suddenly the stereo is turned off and a tanned leg appears, then another, revealing the shortest denim miniskirt you've ever seen, followed by a low-cut vest showing off a generous amount of cleavage.
God, what a tart
, instantly flashes through my mind. Her hair is hanging in a dark, curly sheet over the side of her face, and as she gets out of the car, she turns away from me and walks round to the back of the Beetle.

'Fuck,' she curses loudly, as she sees her crumpled bumper. 'Fucking bastard lamp-post.'

And rough too, I decide with disdain. And to
think
for a moment there I thought she somehow bore some resemblance to me. I mean, as if! Feeling somewhat ridiculous, I stuff my book into my bag and stand up. I've seen enough. OK, so she's driving my old car and living in my old street, so what?

She turns.

And I freeze. It's like someone just dropped a ten-ton weight on my stomach. That can't be.

That can't possibly be —

As I see her face up close, my mind goes into freefall. I'd assumed it was a trick of the light, a combination of not enough sleep and too much stress, but now…

Steadying myself on a nearby railing, I squeeze my eyes shut. My mind feels like that symbol on my iBook that whirls round and round when I've opened too many programs and it's confused and overloaded and about to crash at any minute. Because this isn't a case of mistaken identity, a lookalike, a stranger who used to look like I did when I was twenty-one.
I know her
- all five foot six, miniskirted, scrunch-dried, black-eyelinered, suntanned, twenty-one-year-old bit of her. I snap my eyes wide open.

It's me.

OK, this is scaring the living daylights out of me. This cannot be real. This can't
actually
be happening, I know that, with every single inch of my rational, sensible, thirty-one-year-old self. I know there is only one of me. That's an absolute, a truth not even Dad could argue against. Which means I'm seeing things. I'm hallucinating.
I'm losing my mind
. As the door to number thirty-nine slams shut and she disappears inside, I come to and set off down the street at a canter, my heels clattering against the pavement as I hurry towards my car. OK, Charlotte, just calm down. You're going to go home, take a Valium and put yourself to bed. Sleep this thing off. Maybe tomorrow even take the morning off work, get some rest—

Shit.

I've got another parking ticket! Reaching my car, I see a familiar plastic envelope slapped on my windscreen. Bloody typical. Snatching it up from under the wiper, I glare at it in annoyance. That's just ridiculous. I've only been gone five minutes. Ripping it open, I scan the details. Car/Make Model: VW Beetle

Offence: parking in a permit-controlled area.

Time: 6.28 p.m.

Date: 21 August 1997

What? My heart pounds as I stare at it, the date swimming before my eyes - 1997, 1997, 1997…

My hands are shaking. No, that just can't be, that just can't be —

Panicked, I drop the ticket. And as it flutters to the pavement, I jump into my car, fire up the engine and screech away from the kerb. I need to get the hell out of here. And fast.
Chapter Ten

Hi, Beatrice. It's me, Charlotte. I'm calling in sick.' 'Oh my gosh, you poor darling. What's wrong?'

'I think I have a brain tumour.'

'Sshhhh!' I hear a loud hiss and I glance across the waiting room to see the receptionist glaring in my direction through a potted fern. 'Can't you read the sign? No mobile phones allowed in the doctor's surgery.'

It's the next morning and I'm sitting on a hard plastic chair, surrounded by dog-eared magazines and lots of ill people, waiting to see my GP. Last night I got home, took a Valium and must have immediately crashed out, as I don't remember anything until six o'clock this morning, when I woke up fully clothed on my bed feeling slightly groggy. For like a second, until -
boom
- what happened yesterday came rushing back to me and suddenly I was wide awake. And worrying.

People always advise you to sleep on things, the theory being you're going to wake up miraculously clear-headed and full of answers. But I had slept on it and I still didn't have answers - just more questions whirling round and round in my head. So I did the only thing I could do: I cancelled my trainer.

And started Googling…

'Hallucinations' threw up 936,000 results, all of them terrifying. Some websites talked about serious mental illness: others were diagnosing brain tumours and showing all these gruesome pictures of a woman having the top of her head cut off. But that wasn't all: there were loads of warnings about headaches and fatigue and irrational behaviour.

Such as turning from a sane thirtysomething professional into a crazy stalker. Well, something like that, anyway. To tell the truth, I can't remember exactly, as I was in a sort of clicking-mouse frenzy, going from one link to • the next, reading one horrifying personal blog after another. Until, convinced I had all the symptoms, I raced round to my local GP's, pleading to be seen without an appointment and explaining it was a life-threatening emergency. That was forty-five minutes ago, I think agitatedly, checking my watch for the umpteenth time.

'A brain tumour!' Beatrice is exclaiming down my BlackBerry. 'Oh my Lord, are you at the hospital?'

'Not yet,' I whisper, trying to hide my BlackBerry in the collar of my jacket, away from the eagle-eyed receptionist. 'I'm at the doctor's. But I'm sure he'll want to send me there for tests.' As I say the word 'tests' a bolt of panic rips through me and I have to fight to steady my nerves.

'That's what they did for my cousin Freddy,' she says darkly.

'They did?' I feel myself grip the phone tighter.

'Oh, yes, it was the oddest thing - one day he banged his head and the next he started having all these weird smells. It was really quite alarming. Everywhere he went he thought he could smell chocolate, which sounds rather lovely in
theory
, but poor Freddy was quite frantic as he hates chocolate. In fact he doesn't have a sweet tooth at all. He's much more a cheese-and-biscuits type of person.'

'Miss Merry weather?' I look up sharply to see the receptionist staring at me with a sour expression. 'The doctor is ready for you.'

'Oh, right, thank you.'

'Unless you'd prefer to continue your conversation outside.'

Wedged underneath my ear, I can still hear Beatrice chuntering away: 'So you can tell he's obviously not from my side of the family, as you know me - I can never say no to a pudding.'

'Beatrice, I have to go,' I hiss, and turning my BlackBerry to silent, I smile gratefully at the receptionist and hurry towards the doctor's consulting room.

'Come in.'

As I push open the door, I see Dr Evans, my GP, sitting in his black swivel chair behind a leather-topped desk. A grave-faced man with a white wispy comb-over and tortoiseshell glasses, he's jotting something down on his pad as I enter.

'Please sit down.' He gestures, looking up with an avuncular smile. Which sort of freezes when he sees it's me. 'Ah, Miss Merryweather,' he says evenly. Putting down his pen, he steeples his fingers. 'How nice to see you again.'

Sitting down, I smile shakily.

'And so soon,' he adds brightly, reaching for my notes, which are lying on his desk in a large blue folder. Opening it up, he begins flicking through.

Admittedly the folder is rather thick, bulging in fact, but like I always say, it's better to be safe than sorry.

'So how is the rash?' he asks, referring to my visit last week.

'Oh, fine,' I say quickly. 'You were right - it was just my eczema flaring up again.'

'And the "sharp pain in the left ribs"?' he continues, reading from my notes. I feel a flash of embarrassment. That was the week before. I went to a yoga class and in the middle of this really big stretch I felt a sharp pain and thought I'd broken a rib. I swear it was really painful. In fact for a moment I thought I might have even punctured a lung and so begged Dr Evans to send me for an X-ray.

'Um… actually, it's much better,' I reply, tugging at an invisible thread of cotton on my sleeve. As it turned out, I'd just overexerted myself. A hot bath and some Tiger Balm and I was as good as new the next day. But of course I wasn't to know that, was I?

'So,' he says slowly, 'what seems to be the problem?'

I swallow hard, wondering how to put it, where to start, what to tell him first.

'I think I have a brain tumour.'

The words come tumbling out before I can stop them, and hearing my worst fear out loud in the doctor's surgery makes it suddenly real and I'm scared. Really scared. Dr Evans, on the other hand, doesn't flinch. 'I see…' Raising his tufty white eyebrows, he scribbles something down on his pad. I crane my neck to try and see what he's writing, but of course it's indecipherable. 'And what makes you think that?' he asks pleasantly, as if he's discussing the weather.

I take a deep breath as my mind flicks back to yesterday. 'I've been having these hallucinations,' I reply, trying to keep my voice steady.

He continues scribbling. 'Can you describe them for me?'

I take a deep breath. 'I saw myself aged twenty-one.'

There, I've said it.

Only instead of the jaw-dropping, gripping-on-to-the-side-of-the-chair astonishment I'd been expecting, Dr Evans's face relaxes and he smiles ruefully. 'Oh, that happens to us all as we get older,' he says blithely.

I look at him in confusion. 'It does?'

'Indeed.' He nods. 'I fool myself into imagining I'm twenty-one again on many an occasion, until I look in the mirror.' He chuckles, flattening down his wisps of white hair.

'No, you don't understand,' I try again. 'This was real,' I tell him urgently. 'Plus I've been having headaches,' I add, clutching at my temples. 'Terrible, agonising headaches.'

OK, they're not
that
bad, but you always need to exaggerate a bit when you see the doctor. Dr Evans glances up sharply and looks at me, suddenly concerned. 'So you have to lie in a darkened room?'

See.

'Well, no, not exactly—'

'Nausea and vomiting?'

I hesitate. A little bit of exaggeration is one thing; bare-faced lying is another.

'Actually, I'm usually fine after a couple of Anadin Extra.'

His eyes narrow.

'Although sometimes I have to take three,' I add hastily.

'Miss Merryweather, I need to ask you some questions.'

'OK.' I nod, bracing myself.

'Is there any mental illness in the family?'

'Well, Dad's always saying Mum drives him insane.' I smile, despite myself. Which quickly fades at the sight of Dr Evans's stony face. 'But no. Apart from Great-Aunt Mary, who had a talking parrot,' I add as an afterthought.

'Have you ever suffered a seizure?'

Immediately I have a flashback to last week when I opened my credit-card bill, but I'm pretty sure that doesn't count. 'No.' I shake my head. 'Never.'

'Memory loss?'

'Well, I forgot my dad's birthday,' I confess, glancing down at my hands in my lap, which are twisting up a tissue. 'But I've been really busy at work and it just slipped my mind.'

Dr Evans makes another scribble on his pad. 'And how many hours do you spend in the office a day?'

'Um, six. No, eight. No…' I try counting up on my fingers. 'A lot.'

He makes yet another scribble. 'Do you get eight hours of sleep a night?'

'Does anyone?' I quip wearily. Despite twelve hours of drug-induced sleep, I'm still exhausted.

'Do you eat three square meals a day?'

I think about the breakfasts I skip and my lunches, which I eat al-desk-o, not alfresco, and usually only have time to pick at. 'Well, I wouldn't call them square exactly…'

There's a pause, and then, putting down his pen, Dr Evans stands up and reaches for his stethoscope, which he proceeds to press against my chest. He makes a little sound - 'Uh-hum' - then takes my blood pressure - 'Uh-hum' - before taking a small torch and shining it into each of my retinas - 'Uh-hum.' Wordlessly he sits back down behind his desk. I wait, bracing myself for his diagnosis. 'Well, Doctor?'

'It's as I thought.' He nods.

'It is?' I repeat, my voice wobbling fearfully.

'You're suffering from stress.'

'That's it?' I look at him in astonishment. 'But I read on the Internet—' I break off as he shoots me a stern look.

'Stress is a very serious complaint,' he says gravely. 'My advice to you would be to get more rest, try to relax, start eating a healthy diet and cut down on caffeine and alcohol.' Closing my file, he stands up. 'Oh, and one other thing.'

'Yes?' I ask, all ears.

'Do you know what cyberchondria is?'

I feel a clutch of panic. 'No, but is it dangerous?' I ask fearfully. Shit, what if I've got that?

'It's when someone self-diagnoses from the Internet,' he says, raising an eyebrow and shooting me a look.

I feel my cheeks flush hotly. 'Oh, I see.'

'Stay off the Internet and I think you'll find your health will improve tremendously,' he continues, fixing me with a beady eye. Opening the door, he holds out his hand. 'Good day, Miss Merryweather.'

Having raced round to the doctor's still wearing yesterday's clothes, I go home to shower and change before driving to work. Thankfully this time the journey is pretty uneventful. No weird sightings of Beetles. No hallucinations. No inexplicable events.

In fact as I pull into the little mews where our office is tucked away and walk across the cobblestones, I'm starting to think that maybe the GP is right, maybe I am just stressed. After all, stress can do funny things to you. I know, because I've read about it in my self-help books, cases where people have lost their minds because of stress. People who one day are living these perfectly normal lives and then the next day - boom - they're found wandering around naked on Brighton Pier talking about aliens.

But bumping into yourself, aged twenty-one
? I mean, honestly, how ridiculous. So that's it. I've decided. No more Googling, no more getting carried away and no more ludicrous thoughts about me when I was twenty-one. Reaching the door to the office, I push it open. From now on I'm really going to try to relax and take it easy. Doctor's orders.

'Oh my gosh, thank goodness you're alive!'

As I enter, Beatrice scrambles from her chair and rushes over.

'I was so worried… I haven't been able to stop thinking about you… and poor cousin Freddy. Because of course it dragged it all back up again, you know - the hospital visits, the tests, the alarming smells…' She clutches her pearls and stares at me, showing the whites of her eyes.

'Have you noticed any strange…' she pauses and swallows hard '…
odours?'

'Actually, I'm fine,' I say, trying to brush it off. 'It was an… um… misdiagnosis.'

'You mean… you're not…' Involuntarily she grasps both my hands in hers, then quickly drops them with embarrassment. 'Well, you just sit down and I'll make you a nice cup of coffee,' she says, recovering and darting over to the coffee machine.