How Not to Be a Loser

by Beth Moran

  Stop Being a Loser Programme

  Day Seventy-Two

  That night consisted of precisely seven minutes sleep, seventeen thousand grabs of the cricket bat and seventy-hundred hissed arguments with my anxiety.

  When I finally gave in and messaged Nathan at 6 a.m., he replied instantly.

  I snatched about fifty-three seconds more sleep and finally dragged myself into the bathroom just before seven-thirty.

  ‘Ouch!’ I winced at the wild-woman squinting at me from the mirror. ‘This is going to take some time.’ And about two days more sleep. And a professional hairdresser. And more make-up than I had worn in the rest of my life all smeared together. And a miracle.

  By eight-fifty, when the doorbell rang, I was a good twelve per cent of the way to looking in a fit state to be seen out having breakfast with Nathan Gallagher. Helped along by a non-terrible blue shirt dress from my pre-hermit days, I did my best attempt at casually sauntering downstairs, and opened the door, almost as if it wasn’t bright November sunshine outside.

  ‘Ready?’

  I closed my eyes. Took a deep breath. Remembered I was on high alert for a crazed stalker and quickly opened them again. Nodded. Took a great big step out onto the path. Stepped back in again and decided I’d probably best put some shoes and a coat on first, as there was a wicked frost out there.

  Only, by the time I’d put my boots on, I was ready to change my mind again.

  Nathan said nothing. He crinkled his eyes at me in a sort of smile and held out his hand. I ignored that gorgeous temptation, taking a tentative step outside and then stopping again.

  ‘There’s been a complication.’

  ‘Okay.’ He watched me, steadily, eyes still crinkling.

  ‘I didn’t ask you to meet me here because I was wimping out of walking by myself. That car, the one the school warned the kids about, I’ve seen it a few times at the leisure centre, and for the past week it’s been hanging about the street, here.’

  ‘Seriously? How often?’ Nathan quickly turned to scan the road behind us.

  ‘A few times. I went out to confront them on Wednesday—’

  ‘You did what?’

  ‘They drove off when they saw me coming.’

  ‘Have you seen them since?’

  I shook my head. Nathan’s apparent concern was enough to allow the thoughts which had been keeping me awake most of the night to not seem so melodramatic after all. I was overtired, overwrought and totally lost inside my own head. It was hardly surprising that a big, fat tear squeezed out and rolled down my cheek. If anything, I was impressed it was only one.

  ‘Come on, let’s get inside. It’s freezing out here.’ Nathan took me by the shoulders and gently steered me into the kitchen, guiding me to a chair.

  ‘I don’t want to cancel the challenge. I’m not failing right at the start,’ I said. At least, I think that’s what it was, it was hard to decipher, what with all the sniffing and sobbing and sappy loserness going on.

  ‘Nothing wrong with adapting the challenge to suit new circumstances.’ Nathan was rummaging around in my fridge. ‘If you had flu, or a broken leg, or something came up with Joey, you’d do it.’ He pulled back out again, a carton in one hand. ‘Eggs Benedict?’

  ‘I’ll cook it.’ I straightened my shoulders, found a tissue in my pocket and did a weirdly elephantine blow of my nose. ‘I might have forfeited the right to force Danish pastries and hot chocolate on you, but I’m not letting you get away with cooking some Mr Natural version of eggs, either.’

  He hesitated. Because he wanted to cook me a nice, comforting breakfast or himself a horrible, healthy one, I wasn’t sure.

  ‘Fine. You cook. I’ll set the table.’

  And he did. After dragging it outside into a dazzling patch of sunshine in the back garden first.

  Deep breaths. Counting to ten, slowly. Finding a focal point. I refused to hold Nathan’s hand. No way on this earth we were going to eat breakfast while holding hands across the table. Especially with my son’s window overlooking the garden. So, yes, the focal point did appear to be Nathan’s face, but that was okay. It’s generally considered normal to be looking (staring intently!) at someone’s face when making conversation, isn’t it?

  And making conversation seemed to work, too. Especially when I talked fast and loud enough to drown out my anxiety, which did entail talking without registering any thoughts. Probably not the best conversation style, but, hey, Nathan was here to help.

  ‘You replied to my message fast. What were you doing up at six on a Saturday?’

  ‘I was heading to the gym.’ Nathan poked his breakfast, dubiously.

  ‘Do you go every day?’

  ‘Not Wednesday or Sunday.’

  ‘What do you do there? I mean, I don’t need your whole routine. But weights, cardio, Zumba? I heard they did a new booty bounce class on weekends.’

  ‘I was working.’ He carefully sliced off a tiny corner of his pancake – the only slither not drenched in maple syrup.

  ‘Working what?’

  ‘A client.’ He froze, fork halfway to his mouth. At first I thought it was his muscles refusing to cooperate with the pancake. ‘I mean, I was training a client. At work. Not working a client…’ His voice trailed off and he stuffed the chunk of batter into his mouth.

  ‘Yes. I got that.’

  Nathan had turned the same colour as the bacon balanced on top of his pancake stack.

  ‘I don’t even know what working a client would mean.’ I could kind of guess, but this was getting interesting, and interesting went a long way in helping me not to tip the table over and run inside screaming.

  ‘Nothing. It means nothing. As far as I know.’ He shovelled in another forkful, not even trying to sneakily let the syrup drip off his fork onto the grass. My suspicions grew.

  ‘Who were you training?’ I asked, oh so cool and breezy.

  ‘I don’t discuss client information…’

  ‘Is she pretty?’

  ‘Um, not, well. I…’

  ‘Ugly?’

  ‘No!’

  ‘Pretty then.’

  ‘I haven’t noticed.’ Another mouthful firmly eaten, as if that would end the subject.

  ‘You haven’t noticed? But it’s your job to notice her physical appearance. To watch carefully as she does all the personal training moves. Check out how her body’s improving.’

  ‘Bloody hell, Amy. I get enough of this from the lads at football.’ Nathan shoved his plate away. I didn’t point out the piece of bacon still resting in a pool of syrup, choosing instead to concentrate on pouring myself another mug of tea. ‘I’m a professional. I’ve studied anatomy and physiology. I observe every client to ensure they maximise the exercises and avoid injury with the same level of objectiveness. I’m no more going to be focusing on whether a client is pretty than if I was their doctor, or physiotherapist. I maintain a professional relationship at all times.’

  ‘Even when they come on to you?’

  I didn’t know why I was still talking about this. Nathan was clearly miffed, and I didn’t especially want to discuss how he spent all day observing women’s bodies. It was like some twisted attempt to remind myself of the sort of woman Nathan had to compare me to. While I admired his strictly-business-only attitude, that meant that surely he’d keep a business-only attitude with me. Which was good to know.

  Except that he’d told me I was a friend, not a client. Did that still count? Or was him calling me a friend also setting a firm boundary: friend, not potentially more than friends, just in case I got any wrong ideas.

  ‘If they come on to me, I deal with it. If I have to, I pass them on to another trainer.’

  ‘So, who do you date, if you can’t date clients?’ I asked, my mouth still seemingly unable to resist returning to this topic like a fly buzzing round a cream bun.

  ‘I don’t have a lot of time for dating.’

  ‘So… no one?’

  ‘Not currently.’ Nathan sig
hed, but it seemed exasperated rather than angry, so I kept on buzzing.

  ‘And how long has currently been going on for?’

  ‘A couple of years.’ He shrugged. ‘And I’m fine with that. I’ve got a great life, I’m not lonely, or unfulfilled. Why would I look to change that?’ There was a slightly too long pause. Nathan blinked at the table, running one hand through his hair as he answered. ‘Although, I suppose having a girlfriend might have stopped Selena from trying to eat me alive. She hasn’t always shown due respect for the no-client rule.’ He glanced up at me then, and after a split second the crinkles were back.

  ‘Selena?’

  ‘She got the hint. Eventually.’

  Yeah. Me too.

  Nathan stayed for an hour or so, heading off to burn off all those evil extra calories once the challenge was complete and my courage exhausted. Following the weird start, I had managed to maintain a decent conversation. I was definitely getting back into the swing of the whole chatting thing, helped by Nathan being a really easy person to chat to. It would have been even better if I wasn’t avoiding an entire baggage trolley worth of subjects – my childhood, family, Cee-Cee, Sean, the triathlon, how I’d ended up in this state in the first place…

  The couple of times Nathan gently steered towards my past, I deftly responded by ignoring the question and changing the subject. I had a huge amount of work to do before being ready to handle a genuine friendship with a man I found so darn attractive. My urge to open up to him, spewing all the ugly secrets and unflattering truth about who I really was, and had been, was precisely the reason for keeping firmly on the polite side of friendly.

  I spent the rest of the day cleaning, reading, glancing out the window into the back garden and smiling to myself at my momentous achievement while not at all thinking about Nathan’s eye crinkles. When Joey took it upon himself to make us fajitas for dinner, I should have known he’d heard me belting out Beyoncé while scrubbing the shower and decided to cash in on his mother’s uncharacteristic good mood.

  ‘To celebrate that you’re feeling better,’ he pronounced, tipping a pile of chicken and peppers out of the frying pan onto a serving dish. ‘And managed a giant leap forwards in the Programme today.’

  ‘Thanks, Joey. This looks great.’ It sort of did, too. I was sure the charred bits of chicken would merely add to the flavour. ‘Are those baked beans?’

  ‘I’m really glad Nathan’s helping you. He’s such a quality coach.’ Joey grabbed a wrap and started loading up. ‘Beans are a superfood, and they’re the only type we had.’

  ‘I’ll have you know, I’m helping Coach Gallagher, too.’

  ‘You are?’ He boggled at me. ‘What, like giving him training tips? Have you told him?’

  ‘Absolutely not.’ I shook my head. ‘I’m just helping him to loosen up a bit. He’s got so entrenched in following all these rules for optimum fitness, and, well, I know that kind of controlling lifestyle doesn’t always end well.’

  ‘Cool.’

  We ate in silence for a while, until Joey couldn’t contain his twitchiness any longer.

  ‘So, if you’re feeling better, can we talk about my dad now,’ he blurted, my last bite instantly congealing inside my mouth.

  Well, I should have seen that one coming a mile off.

  I somehow forced the ball of now tasteless mush down my throat, helping it along with a slow drink of water. My brain was racing at a hundred miles an hour, but somehow still couldn’t catch up with a single coherent thought.

  ‘Only, it’s been ages, and I’ve been really patient, and I still want to speak to him just as bad, but if you really aren’t going to let me talk to him without you emailing first, can you please hurry up and do it. Like, this evening. If you aren’t doing anything else.’

  I sat there for a while longer, the longing in my child’s voice ringing in my ears, before replying with the only word I could find right then. ‘Okay.’

  ‘What?!’ Joey nearly fell off his chair, choosing instead to fling himself across the table at me, sending sour cream flying.

  ‘Your jumper’s trailing in the salsa,’ I mumbled into his shoulder.

  ‘Don’t care.’ He gripped me tighter. ‘I love you, Mum.’

  ‘I love you too. Now, while we clear up this mess, I’d better fill you in a bit. Knowledge is power, after all.’

  Washing-up abandoned, we sat and went through Sean’s company website, plus anything else we could find about him online. No social media, except for a long-abandoned Twitter account. I recounted what little I knew about Sean’s background. Joey lapped up the knowledge that he had an uncle and grandparents, while expressing a mix of relief and disappointment that we failed to find any siblings.

  I refused, unequivocally, to show him any of the emails. I didn’t need to argue about the other messages, as I hadn’t mentioned them.

  ‘When was the last time he sent you one?’ Joey asked, biting the last shred of his nail to the quick.

  I thought about that. ‘A while, actually. There was a flurry a few weeks ago, but nothing in the past month.’

  Joey looked at me, fear in his eyes. A twinge of anger.

  ‘Hey, don’t panic. If your dad meant any of what he said about wanting to get to know you, a month isn’t going to have changed that. He probably thought it best to give me a bit of space.’

  Joey said nothing, unconvinced.

  ‘Well, I guess there’s only one way to find out, isn’t there?’ I opened up my email, then, before I could type anything, shut the lid on the laptop altogether. ‘Before I do this, can I tell you how it ended?’

  Was this the right decision? Would it help Joey – help protect him – to know this? Or was it one last stab at making sure I remained the good guy, that history wouldn’t repeat itself, and my boy, so like his father, wouldn’t abandon me too?

  As someone who earns a living by taking crappy information and turning it into something positive, I did a pretty good job of softening the blow and making it sound not quite so appalling. After all, Sean had been young back then.

  What a shame he’d done nothing to make it any less appalling for me, even younger, and without him, utterly alone.

  Sean and I had ridden out the hideous weeks following the Search for Amelia scandal behind the drawn blinds of the flat in Exeter. Once the paparazzi had found another poor celebrity to persecute, Sean charmed his way into an office job which paid enough to cover the bills. For some reason, he chose to put in increasingly long days in the office, rather than come home to his emotional wreck of a girlfriend. When this became accompanied by regular after-work drinks, dinner, joining the department bowling team, my loneliness, boredom and excruciating neediness only grew. An obvious solution was for me to get a job, but by the time all the legal issues with the sponsors had been settled, I could barely get out of bed. And who would employ Amelia Piper, the most famous quitter in the country?

  So, we fought, sulked, felt guilty, made up again. Each time, the cycle left us a little more weary, mistrustful, resentful. And I watched the clichés disprove themselves before our eyes. Love, if that’s what it was, could not conquer all. Instead our love was being resoundingly thrashed by immaturity, isolation, rent arrears, profound insecurities and hidden depression. I had thrown away everything – tossed aside my entire identity, along with my future, career, family and friends. The person Sean had loved had gone, and the unkempt, dreary, pitiful shambles emerging as her replacement was not quite his type.

  And then, six months after we had run away together, I started throwing up. My breasts grew swollen and sore. I became even more exhausted from my days of doing nothing than I had before. I snuck twenty pounds out of Sean’s wallet and bought a pregnancy test. Then I stole another twenty and did it again. Praying for a different result, while clinging onto it as potentially what might save us. At least I would have something to live for now.

  I gave myself a week to absorb the shock, then, in between dashing to the bathroom to e
mpty my battered stomach, I prepared a lasagne and chocolate fudge cake. I showered, changed into my nicest dress and tried to cover up the haggard fear on my face with some leftover make-up from my celebrity days. I dredged up some remaining energy to tidy the flat, change the bed and light the candles I’d bought from the pound shop.

  I phoned Sean at work to tell him I had a surprise, and to please be home for dinner. He promised to be home by seven. When he finally rolled in at nearly nine, I plastered on a smile, dolloped the dried-up remains of his favourite dinner onto plates and relit the candle stumps.

  ‘This is nice,’ he managed, the waft of beer fumes causing my stomach to contract dangerously. ‘Are you feeling better? Because if you are, there’s an advert in the newsagent’s window, looking for a cleaner. I know it’s hardly your dream job, but it at least gets you out the house and earning.’

  ‘Now’s not a good time,’ I interrupted.

  He threw down his fork. ‘Really? Is there a better time for you to get a job than when you’re spending all day sat on your arse nagging me about mine? Please, do tell me about a better time to get a job than when we owe two months’ rent?’

  ‘I…’

  ‘You, what?’ he sneered. ‘You might as well get a job, darling, because you are a disaster as a housewife.’ He pushed his plate away. ‘This is inedible.’

  ‘It was perfectly edible two hours ago.’ I swallowed back the lump of nausea and tears threatening to overwhelm me.

  ‘Don’t you dare criticise me for earning us money. You have no idea what a real job entails. In the real world, you can’t swan off home because your girlfriend’s feeling lonely.’

  ‘No, but you could perhaps manage to come home instead of going to the pub, considering you promised. And the only person to wish me a happy birthday so far is the creepy man at the Asda checkout.’

  Sean looked at me then, his face a mixture of guilt and dismay. ‘It’s your birthday. Why didn’t you say something?’

  ‘And… and I’m pregnant,’ I sobbed out. ‘There. That’s the surprise.’