Game Over

wouldn’t allow myself to love. I didn’t even think I was capable of it.’

There’s lead stuck in the pit of my stomach, but at least I have Darren’s attention and that of every member of year four, l’ecole de Sprogsville. Where is this going? How can I tell him that loving him seemed like the worst thing that could have happened to me, but at the same time the best? That I miscalculated lots of things when I was young. Now I see that to have a figure like Barbie’s I’d have to have an eighteen-inch waist, a forty-inch leg and a head the size of a beach ball. Spaghetti hoops are not the world’s most exquisite culinary delight and Donny Osmond isn’t sexy.

Being made happy by love is an option.

I notice that the neck of my T-shirt is wet. I touch my face and discover that I am sobbing. Fat, globular tears are falling at such a rate that I’m soaked.

‘I’m sorry it took me so long to get here but I’ve learnt I am capable of loving. I did not set you up. I know how you feel about the programme. And for what it’s worth, I see now that you were right. You have to believe me, Darren.’ I wonder if there is any point in telling him that I’ve left TV6. I doubt it. He’ll probably believe the papers and think I was sacked. My face is aflame. My heart literally aches, a filthy agony. I try to read his thoughts. I know he’ll be trying to understand, but will he be able to? And even if he does, will he care? He leans back against a glass display case. The fact that he needs propping up can’t be good for me.

Can it?

He rubs his eyes with the balls of his fists.

‘Believe me,’ I plead.

He shakes his head. Very quietly, almost inaudibly, he whispers, ‘I don’t think I can. I’m sorry.’ And he looks it. He looks devastated. Wounded. ‘I wish I could.’ He bends down and picks up his rucksack and starts to walk out of my life.

For a week I have vacillated between regret, fear and desperation. I’ve howled and cried privately. I’ve fought to appear collected and not too indulgent in public. I’ve been dogged and exposed. Discussed and dismissed at a micro and macro level. The experience has left me weak. The small amount of residual energy I had left was consumed whilst reasoning with Darren.

Wham.

Suddenly I’m whacked with an emotion that is struggling between passion and ire. Anger refuels my body and the resurgence explodes in torrents of undefined fury. Not the premenstrual monster that inhibits my body for three days every twenty-eight. Not the spitting anger that I used to feel when the ratings weren’t robust or a production assistant had made some duff decision. Not the intense irritation I feel when Issie throws herself at some worthless oink. Or the scornful vexation that I’ve felt when Josh mistreated some bimbo. My anger is much more… painful than that. The storm of irritation and hurt begins to climb the Richter scale. Swelling up through my stomach, into my chest and heart, exploding – a veritable whirlwind – in my head.

‘Is that it then, Darren?’ I scream. ‘That was your crack at being in love?’

He turns back to face me. ‘Well, I think it was pretty crap actually!’

Being unreasonable is all I’m capable of again. I’m so bloody desperate. I don’t know how to stop this inevitable, needless disaster.

‘You’ve been loved and adored all your life. Swaddled. Protected. Encouraged to believe the best in people and here you are falling at the first serious hurdle. I thought you were better than that. You are better than that. Don’t you dare walk away from me.’ I stamp my right foot. ‘Don’t you dare stop trusting me.’ Then my left. ‘You said you loved me. Easy fucking words.’ He’s right in front of me. I spray some spittle into his face.

‘OK, so I came to it a bit late in the day but I do believe in love and I do think that out of the billions of people in this world you’re the one I should be with.’ I jab my finger at him accusingly and I want to stamp again and flay my arms. There’s so much anger inside me and it doesn’t know how to get out.

‘I’ve stopped being terrified by the “what ifs”. And I know you’re not my father. And I know that I shouldn’t judge everyone by his iniquitous standards.’ The hairs on the back of my neck stand viciously erect. Tears poke mercilessly at my eyes. ‘And I’m sorry that I’ve hurt so many people in the past before I came to this understanding. I am so sorry. But trust me now. I did not do this for the bloody, fucking, crapping, pissing ratings.’

I think that even if I’d gone to a posh school, I’d have been struggling to come up with more appropriate vocabulary, under the circumstances. I give in and stamp my feet, harder and harder and harder and faster and faster and faster. The tears explode from my eyes and fall harder and harder and harder and faster and faster and faster. Eventually I am worn out.

Exhausted.

Defeated.

I stop stamping and try to find some equilibrium. My breathing is fast and desperate, my feet are throbbing with the violence of my stamping and my head is sore with shaking. I cannot look at Darren or the schoolkids. It is so intensely embarrassing. Over the last few days I’ve lost everything: both my fiances – one my love, the other my best friend, my job, my privacy and now my reason. I’ve been cheated, deceived and humiliated. I’ve felt despair and loneliness and regret.

I take stock.

All that and I still believe in love.

Which means that just when I thought I’d lost track of the game, I’ve won.

I have Mum.

I have Issie.

I have learnt a lot.

I force myself to look up at Darren. My heart cartwheels. I rub the back of my hand across my face, cleaning up the excess of smudged mascara and tears. I pick up my museum map from the floor, where I’d thrown it.

‘Do you know something, Darren? The irony is, I never stopped believing in you. I never thought you’d betrayed me. Not for a minute.’

We are both breathing deeply. Staring at one another. Our faces are a potent cocktail of anger and forgiveness, love and lust, trust and fear, potential and endings. Hope.

It’s all been so intense, right from the beginning. Euphoric, desolate, euphoric again, desolate plus. What now?

Minutes go by. Neither of us says anything. Neither of us moves.

‘Do you know the Camarasaurus weighs twenty-five tons?’ asks Darren.

‘Yes,’ I say carefully, and then add, ‘It’s a plant eater, so I suggest the grapefruit diet.’ It’s a weak joke but Darren’s face hints at a smile. He takes my arm and starts to lead me through the galleries. His fingers singe.

‘So you’ve seen the dinosaur exhibition?’

‘Yes.’ I’m shaking.

‘Have you seen the blue whale?’

‘Yes.’

‘So you’ve seen enough of the Natural History Museum for one day?’ I feel as though I’m behind a number of veils but as he asks each question a veil drops and instead of feeling exposed, I feel more confident. I can see more clearly.

‘Yes.’

‘Do you think you’d like to go for a beer?’

This time I nod. I’m incapable of finding my voice. We leave the museum and go out into the London sun. We stop on the steps of the museum and squint at the brightness and crowds. Darren turns to me.

‘Do you still believe in me, Cas?’ he asks. His voice is patchy with emotion but it is still velvety and I recognize possibility and opportunity glimmering there.

‘Yes.’

‘Will you give me another chance?’

‘Yes. I will. A huge, fat, full YES.’

I’m home.