When she rings off, I don’t go home right away. I do a loop and end up back on the high street where I began. I’ll apply for more marketing positions but how long will it take to get hired? There aren’t any jobs like that around here and I don’t have any money to relocate.
Beneath my panic is anger at myself for repeatedly shunning Arabella’s job offers. The crest of my despair is my parents’ inevitable mortification; their daughter, the bumbling graduate who owes ￡28,000 in student loans, can’t even hold down a coffee shop job.
I don’t have a book deal.
I don’t have a job.
I don’t even have a career to go back to.
I’m going to lose everything.
My chest is tight, and tears are streaming down my cheeks. I come to a sudden halt, someone crashes into the back of me and swears. I think I could be having a panic attack. I stagger towards a bench and sit, waiting to feel better. It’s a cloudless day, the kind of summer afternoon people spend in parks or gardens with Pimm’s and music and laughter, but I am bone-tired and sick. I want storm clouds and thunder and the kind of rain that pours like water from a bucket. I have this childish longing to curl up on the sofa with my mum and cry my heart out, but I can’t because she warned me not to leave marketing and I did it anyway.
A feeling creeps over me, settling into my bones like concrete: loneliness. I have never felt more alone in my life than I do in this moment.
What am I going to do now?
Chapter Eight
16 Days Before
Elodie Fray
My phone vibrates angrily in the darkness of my bedroom. I roll over and snatch it from the bedside table. It’s Mum. Again. I decline the call; I am drained and hopeless, and worried she knows I’m unemployed.
Seefer is curled up beside me. It rained last night, and I couldn’t leave her outside. Today marks one week since I lost my job and none of the Crosshaven restaurant or retail positions I applied to have invited me to interview, which makes no sense because I know how to serve drinks and work a damn till; so, I rang around this morning only to be told that I’m overqualified. I’ve also applied to a dozen admin jobs and marketing roles, but I haven’t heard back from a single one.
My phone buzzes again. I’m about to turn it off when I see the caller ID. Ada never rings. We aren’t exactly chatty, not anymore. There’s a hot lance of terror across my stomach – what if something’s happened to Dad?
Seefer meows loudly, as though urging me to answer.
I sit up and jab at the green button, adrenaline spiking my blood. ‘Ada?’
‘You know how to answer your phone then.’ She is somewhere loud and echoey and I immediately picture a hospital corridor.
‘Is Dad okay?’
‘Of course he is. Why would you even ask that?’
I wilt with relief.
‘Mum’s been calling you all week,’ she says accusingly. ‘Have you broken all your fingers?’
‘No,’ I say, equally as snippy. ‘I have not.’
‘Good, so you can still operate a phone.’
I press my lips together to hold in the ‘fuck off’ which is on the tip of my tongue. Seefer lets out another loud meow and presses her head into my free hand, wanting some fuss.
‘Have you let that fleabag into your house again?’ she asks.
‘Seefer doesn’t have fleas.’
‘Seefer,’ she repeats, not bothering to hide her disapproval.
‘Yes. Like C for cat.’
She snorts.
‘What can I do for you, Ada?’
‘Dinner at my house, Saturday night.’
I mentally run through a list of important dates; I’m sure I haven’t missed a birthday or anniversary. ‘What’s the occasion?’
‘Does there need to be one?’ she huffs. ‘I don’t have time for this, I’m shopping.’
‘Well, I can’t this Saturday, I’m busy,’ I lie.
‘Doing?’
‘Does it matter?’
She doesn’t respond but, in her silence, I feel her irritation rise like bubbles in boiling water.
‘I mean, it’s Thursday. It’s only two days’ notice.’
‘Does it matter?’ she bats back.
‘Can we do this some other time?’
‘The whole family is coming this Saturday. If you’re not there, Mum and Dad are going to be extremely upset. They’re getting older, Elodie; if you don’t make the most of spending time together as a family now, you’ll regret it later.’
‘They’re barely in their sixties.’