The List That Changed My Life

by Olivia Beirne

  I furrow my brow at her. ‘Have you been to bed?’ I ask.

  Amy fingers the piece of paper. ‘Yes,’ she says, ‘but I didn’t sleep for long. I’ve been up since four.’

  ‘A.M..?’ I repeat in disgust. ‘You’ve been up since four a.m.?’

  The last time I was up at four a.m. was when I accidentally gave myself food poisoning after eating three-day-old pizza (not an experience I ever hope to relive).

  Amy takes a sip of her coffee. ‘I couldn’t sleep. I had something on my mind.’

  Mum and Dad converted the study into Amy’s bedroom when she could no longer manage the stairs easily. Has she been sat at her desk all night?

  I push my fringe out of my eyes, my mind waking up and spinning. She looks serious.

  ‘Okay,’ I say slowly, sitting up, ‘what is it?’

  Amy takes a deep breath. I can tell the words are creeping up her throat, coaxing their way out as I look back at her. Finally, she speaks.

  ‘I didn’t tell you this, because I didn’t think it was a big deal.’

  I blink and try to control the hundreds of possibilities spiralling around my brain.

  That is a terrible first sentence. What the hell is she going to say next?

  ‘Right,’ I say, trying to keep my voice steady.

  ‘But,’ Amy continues, ‘before I got diagnosed with MS, I made a list. A bit like a bucket list. It was all of the things I wanted to experience before I turned thirty. It’s a mixture of things that I heard about on the radio, or saw online, and I just began ticking them all off slowly. I just wanted to really experience everything I could.’

  I take a sip of my tea. My chest burns.

  ‘But now . . .’ she pauses, ‘obviously there are a lot of things I can’t do any more, and I’ve been thinking about how I can’t do them.’

  Her voice catches, and suddenly I can’t bear it.

  ‘You can!’ I blurt. ‘You can do anything, you—’

  Amy holds up a hand. ‘Let me finish,’ she says calmly. ‘I think you should do them. I want you to do them instead.’

  I hover.

  ‘Me?’ I say, stumped. ‘Amy you’re making it sound like you’re dying. You can still do them.’

  ‘No, I can’t.’

  ‘You can!’

  ‘I can’t,’ Amy snaps, her fierce eyes flashing up at me. ‘Georgie, I can’t. I can’t do anything any more. This fucking—’

  She breaks off and to my horror, her eyes overflow.

  I blink back at her, my hand reaching out towards her as she wipes her face with the backs of her hands, roughly.

  ‘Sorry,’ she mutters stiffly, ‘I’m tired. I didn’t mean to do that. Sorry.’

  ‘It’s fine,’ I say automatically.

  Amy takes a deep breath and dabs her eyes. She holds the notepad in her lap and raises her eyes to meet mine.

  ‘I’ve edited it,’ she continues, ‘so it’s not my original list. That’s what I’ve been doing this morning. I’ve taken bits out that I know you wouldn’t want to do – and I also added some things in there that I think would benefit you . . .’ She pauses and I notice a flicker of anxiety pass across her face. ‘What do you think? Will you do it for me?’

  There’s a lump in my throat and tears are straining against my eyes now. I can’t see her like this.

  ‘I think we should do it together,’ I say evenly.

  Amy shakes her head. ‘No. I can’t.’

  ‘You always say there’s no such thing as can’t,’ I retort.

  A laugh escapes from Amy, and the effort of this causes tears to spill down her face.

  ‘Sometimes there is.’

  CHAPTER FIVE

  I lean back into my desk chair as Natalie buries her head into my new list, which is laid out on the desk.

  ‘So, you have to do everything on here?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  I glance at the office door to check that Bianca – or, God forbid, Sally – is nowhere to be seen and then follow Natalie’s eyes sweeping across the paper. A dull pang strums in the pit of my stomach as I focus on the list. This feeling is quickly replaced with panic.

  Amy has always been the smarter sister, and she demonstrated this once again on Saturday by tricking me into agreeing to the list before letting me see it. I didn’t have a single chance to edit it, or negotiate bits out, and by the time she let me read it she’d left for a doctor’s appointment and I was left alone, and horrified.

  God only knows what she’s added or taken out ‘for my benefit’. What else could have been on there? Sticking my face in a barrel of piranhas? Tap dancing on the back of a sleeping alligator? Sneaking up behind a gang of drunk girls and running off with their cheesy chips?

  Natalie’s shoulders shake and I glance over

  Georgie’s list

  Have a vindaloo on Brick Lane. (Is Amy trying to kill me?)

  Take a Salsa class. (Humiliating. Why would she ever want to do that?)

  Do a skydive. (She’s definitely trying to kill me.)

  Go on a Tinder date. (Urgh. Why?)

  Cycle around Hyde Park. (May actually enjoy that one, providing I don’t pedal under a bus.)

  Run 10k. (Worst one.)

  Make the perfect Victoria sponge. (I may have to come clean about the ready meals.)

  Go skinny-dipping in the sea. (WHAT? Alone? I’ll be arrested!)

  Try skateboarding at Southbank. (She does not know me at all.)

  Show Bianca your designs! (Hmmm. Perhaps I’ll post them to her and then ‘forget’ to put the correct stamps on the envelope so she won’t receive it until she’s ninety and her eyesight has practically gone.)

  Natalie turns the list over and hands it back to me, a wide smile pulling at the corners of her mouth. ‘It’s not that bad,’ she says, ‘and some of it may even be fun.’

  I raise my eyebrows at her and take the list back. ‘I’ve only got until my birthday to do it.’

  Natalie straightens up. ‘When’s your birthday?’

  ‘Early December,’ I reply, ‘so I’ve got a while.’

  Natalie frowns. ‘But isn’t it a list for her thirtieth?’ she asks. ‘So why isn’t the deadline her birthday?’

  I place the list inside my notebook and slip it back into my bag.

  ‘Her birthday is a week after mine,’ I explain, ‘so it’s sort of the same. I think she wanted it to end on my birthday so I would see it as some sort of celebration. We usually have a joint party anyway.’

  I pull a face at Natalie and she laughs.

  Amy said I should do it fast to prove I could do it. She said if I didn’t then I might forget about it. I can safely say that there is no way I will forget that I have a skydive looming in my near future.

  ‘Well,’ Natalie goes to leave, ‘why don’t you start with the easiest one? The Tinder date will be done in days.’

  ‘Easiest?’ I repeat.

  Obviously she has never had any issue with composing a bio that somehow says: ‘I’m really fun but not that kind of fun. I’m looking for a relationship, but also I’m not crazy I promise I won’t propose to you on the first date’ in five hundred characters.

  It’s an art. Believe me.

  ‘I’ve always wanted to go speed dating,’ Natalie adds.

  I shoot her a look. ‘Don’t you go giving Amy any ideas,’ I mutter.

  Christ.

  I wave Natalie off and pull out my phone, my insides squirming at the thought of going on a Tinder date.

  I downloaded Tinder once, and then swiftly deleted it when a man asked for a photo of my big toe and have been successfully avoiding any online apps ever since.

  Dubiously, I tap the word ‘Tinder’ into my App store and watch as the spiral spins on my screen.

  This is like something out of a horror film, or a Trevor McDonald documentary. My sister writes me a bucket list, I faithfully agree and am then eaten alive by a crazed maniac after he spikes my gin with heroin. I’ll end up on the news and become the f
ace for a safe sex campaign.

  Tinder pops open and I feel my insides shrivel. Fighting every instinct in my body, I choose some pictures of myself and tap in a lame bio. One date. I only have to go on one date with somebody. Also, Amy didn’t stipulate how long the date had to be. Perhaps I will just say hello and then army-crawl out of the fire exit. Job done.

  The first man spins on to my screen and, to my surprise, my heart rate quickens.

  Oh wow! He is so good looking! I had no idea such good-looking men would be on Tinder. I thought they’d all have a peg leg and zero teeth. I could happily go on a date with this guy. In fact, I would love to go on a date with this guy! Maybe he is the one! God, this is so easy, the first guy I spot on Tinder and I fall in love instantly. Why haven’t I done this sooner? What have I been worrying about? I can’t believe I—

  I break off my thoughts as I flick down to his bio:

  No heffas.

  I hover over my screen. No heffas?

  Who is this guy?

  I look around to check I am still alone, as if the heffa police could storm in at any moment and name me Mayor of Heffaville.

  A wave of heat washes up my body as I stare at the screen.

  No heffas? Am I a heffa? I mean, I don’t think I am. But I did just eat half a packet of Jaffa cakes.

  I glance down at my gurgling stomach and feel a surge of defiance.

  I am not a heffa. No way. Screw you, Dave.

  Although, I guess the sensible way to find out would be to swipe right and see if he thinks I’m a heffa. I won’t talk to him, obviously, but if it’s a match I can be happy knowing that I am living in a heffa-free zone. Surely that is the sensible thing to do.

  Before I can stop myself, my finger launches forward and strikes Dave’s face right off my screen. I pause as nothing happens.

  Oh my God, it isn’t a match. I am a heffa! All those years of eating pizza for breakfast have finally caught up with me.

  I am a heffa. And do you know what comes after heffa? Lump. I am a heffalump.

  A bloody lump. A lumpy—

  ‘Georgia?’

  I glance up as Sally sticks her head around the door. ‘Bianca needs you. Meeting. Now.’

  I lurch up from my chair and scuttle after Sally.

  ‘Did you make the coffee?’ Sally barks as we speed round a corner.

  ‘Yes,’ I lie. ‘Of course.’

  I feel a pang in my stomach as we power forward.

  Shit.

  Sally jerks to a halt as we arrive outside the meeting room. She blinks at the empty table.

  ‘Where’s the coffee?’

  I open my notebook and flick through the pages, pretending to look incredibly busy.

  ‘Coffee?’ I repeat, avoiding her eye contact. ‘In there.’

  Do I have time to make it? Could I tap Sally on the shoulder, duck behind her, and then when she questions me claim she’s going senile?

  Although she’s only thirty-two. That’s too young to be senile, isn’t it?

  Maybe I’m going senile.

  ‘Georgia,’ Sally says sternly, ‘it’s not there. Where is it?’

  I could just tell her the truth. That I didn’t make any coffee because I was too distracted by Tinder Dave and whether I was, or was not, a heffalump.

  If I tell her that I forgot, her head will just explode. It took me three months to get her to stop following me around everywhere. If I tell the truth, she might try and move in with me to track my every movement.

  ‘Did you forget to make the coffee?’ Sally’s voice slices through me. ‘Did you forget to make it? You didn’t make it, did you?’

  ‘Yes,’ I fire back. ‘Of course I did.’

  God, she’s so annoying.

  Who is she to assume that I forgot to make the coffee? Like I’m some sort of imbecile. I am a professional, 26-year-old adult. I can successfully undertake a simple task.

  I mean, I know I did forget, but that is beside the point.

  ‘It was here,’ I hear myself say before I can stop myself, ‘the coffee was here. That’s where I left it.’

  My neck burns as the lie tumbles out of my mouth.

  Right. So I just lied. Why did I just lie? I can’t lie. I’m a terrible liar. What am I doing?

  Sally’s gaze swoops around the room and lands back on me. ‘Well, it’s not here any more,’ she says accusingly.

  ‘Maybe someone stole it,’ I retort childishly.

  ‘Sally, get the door!’

  My head jerks up as Bianca swans down the corridor. Sally jumps to attention and props the door open obediently as Bianca sweeps through and throws herself into a chair. Her eyes scan the room and my face burns. It is common knowledge that Bianca never starts a meeting without a fresh cup of coffee. It is arguably more important than the meeting itself.

  Suddenly, her sharp eyes narrow.

  ‘Where’s the coffee?’

  Sally springs forward like she’s been jabbed with a cattle prod.

  ‘Georgia says it’s been stolen,’ she says stiffly.

  My face burns as I fight the urge to kick Sally in the shins.

  Bianca snaps open her laptop and fixes me with a piercing look. ‘Stolen?’ she repeats, aghast. ‘Someone stole our coffee?’

  Oh God. Can I go back from this? Say it was all a big joke? Claim April Fools? I mean, it’s July, but maybe I could claim it as a monthly gag?

  A cold bead of sweat drops down my brow and I keep my face still.

  I take a deep breath and try to control my jigging leg. ‘Yes,’ I say solemnly.

  Silence stretches across the meeting room and I avoid Sally’s laser glare, burning into the side of my face. She knows I’m lying. She definitely knows I’m lying.

  Without warning, Bianca bangs her fist on the table and I leap in fright.

  ‘Bastards!’ she cries. ‘Who was it, Georgie? Do you know?’

  I blink back.

  What?

  ‘No,’ I stammer.

  Bianca swings herself round in her chair, her hair flailing behind her.

  ‘I bet it was that arsehole Dennis from the fourth floor,’ she says scathingly. ‘He’s always trying to sabotage me. You’ll have to put in a formal complaint with HR.’ She points her pen at me. ‘I’ll set you up with Sharon.’

  I nod feebly.

  Please don’t set me up with Sharon.

  What have I done? What have I started? Am I going to have to make a statement? Will I have to lay my hand on a Bible and swear by the Lord to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?

  Is this how fraud cases start? Am I going to go to prison?

  This is bloody awful. My heart rate cannot take this. I think I’d rather have Sally move in with me. Screw it, I’d even opt for bunk beds.

  *

  Har har! Call the authorities, the old Georgia Miller has vanished. Please make way for the new, improved Georgia Miller who is up at 6.20 (in the morning!) ready to go on her first run like a real, in-control adult.

  This is not a drill. I have cracked out my trainers (which somehow have three holes in them. I really should buy a new pair) and even smuggled my unruly breasts into a sports bra.

  I have to say I look fantastic, no wonder everybody loves posting pictures of themselves at the gym. This sports bra has pulled my boobs right up to my chin!

  My chin!

  I take another smug look at myself in the mirror and fight the urge to pose manically as if I am in the new Nike advert alongside Mo Farah.

  I’ve already texted Amy to let her know about the new me. She replied straight away. I was mildly horrified that she was already awake – it took seven aggressive alarms to wake me up at this ungodly hour. But it has happened! I am ready for a run at the crack of dawn. I’m practically beating nature in my morning routine. Not to mention, like, everybody on my street. Nobody is awake yet! There is not a single soul wandering around my street right now. I am the most productive person in SE1.

  I glance out
of the window and feel a small tug in the centre of my chest.

  But I mean, there is literally nobody out there. Not even the corner shop is open and I could have sworn it was twenty-four hours.

  Is it safe to run this early in the morning? Why isn’t anybody else doing it?

  There isn’t any chance I could be abducted, is there?

  I scowl at a cat leaping over a fence.

  No. Strange men and criminals lurk in the middle of the night, not early mornings. Everybody knows that. That is just basic human knowledge. Anyway, if I do see a serial killer then I am perfectly dressed to run away. Ha.

  Unless, that is, they target me at the end of the run when I am thoroughly worn out and already on the verge of death. Actually, that would be the perfect time to abduct me.

  Without quite meaning to, I sink back on to my bed as my mind churns like a vat of condensed milk.

  Is this a terrible idea? Probably not, but what if I’m right? What if I do get abducted?

  A bolt of fear shoots through me as another thought drops into my brain.

  Mum would be asked to supply a ‘have you seen this girl?’ photo and she’d definitely use the one of me at my cousin’s wedding (where I look like a Christmas pudding but Mum always insists I look ‘very nice’).

  I glance at the clock and jolt. I need to get up and go on this run. I need to get up right now.

  Maybe they’d use one of my new Tinder photos. Unless they thought none of them actually looks anything like me. God, that would be mortifying.

  My eyes skim back over to the window anxiously, and I spot the cat now sitting on the fence.

  Okay, well, there is literally nobody out there. Nobody is going on a run. Obviously none of the locals think it is safe. I mean, where is everyone? This has to be a sign that I, too, should not be going on a run.

  Before I can command them not to, my feet pull themselves out of my trainers.

  Right. As an adult, I am making the executive decision not to go on this run for the sake of my health and well-being. That is definitely the safe and logical thing to do, and I should not feel guilty about it.