“Don’t suffer through denial, Sasha.” Pam gazes at me earnestly. “Maybe you’re perimenopausal. Are you having hot flushes?”
“No,” I say patiently. “But thank you for asking about my body temperature every time we meet.”
“I make your body temperature my business, my love,” Pam says impassionedly, “because nobody talks about menopause! Nobody talks about it!” She looks around the room as though disappointed the sofa hasn’t shared its menopause symptoms.
“I don’t think the menopause is the point, Pam,” says Mum tactfully. “Not in Sasha’s case.” She turns to me. “The point is, we must get you some proper R and R. Now, darling, you can come home with me, but I’m having the bathroom done and it is a little bit noisy. But Pam says you can go to her house, if you don’t mind the parrots. Isn’t that right, Pam?”
I don’t mind the parrots, but I’m not living with the menopause coaching.
“The parrots might be a bit much,” I say hastily. “If I’m trying to rest or whatever.”
“I’m sure Kirsten would have you—”
“No.” I cut her off. “Don’t be silly.”
My sister has a baby and a toddler, and her mother-in-law is living in the spare bedroom for a bit while she has her heating repaired. It’s chocka there.
“I don’t need to go anywhere. It’s fine. I can stay here. Chill out. Rest.”
“Hmm.” Mum looks around the flat. “Is this restful, though?”
We all silently take in my unlovely little sitting room. As though to prove the point, a lorry clatters by outside and a dead leaf falls off a plant. I feel my phone buzzing in my pocket and take it out to see Kirsten is calling.
“Oh, hi,” I say, standing up and heading out to the hall. “How are you?”
“Sasha, what the hell!” she exclaims. “You ran into a brick wall?”
I can tell she’s on speakerphone, and I picture her in her small, bright kitchen, wearing the cable-knit sweater I gave her for Christmas, holding a wriggling baby Ben on her knee while feeding apple slices to Coco.
“It was by mistake,” I explain defensively. “I didn’t line myself up and hurl myself at a brick wall for kicks. It just loomed up.”
“Walls don’t just loom up.”
“Well, this one did.”
“Were you on something?”
“No!” I retort defensively, because that’s what the doctors kept asking too. “I was just … preoccupied.”
“Mum says the doctor’s signed you off for stress. I thought you looked stressed out at Christmas, and that’s weeks ago.” She adds, “I said you needed a holiday.”
“I know you did. Anyway, I’ve got three weeks off. So. How are Ben and Coco?”
“Running into walls isn’t ideal, you know,” says Kirsten, ignoring my attempt to deflect the conversation. “Why were you running, anyway?”
“I was trying to escape from a nun.”
“A nun?” She sounds flabbergasted. “What kind of nun?”
“You know. The nun kind. Veil. Cross. All that. I thought I might join a convent,” I add, “but it all went a bit wrong.”
The whole thing seems like a bit of a dream now.
“You thought you might join a convent?” Kirsten’s laugh explodes in my ear.
“I know it sounds stupid. It just seemed like … the easiest way out. Of everything.”
There’s another silence except for the distant sound of Coco singing a tuneless kind of non-song.
“Sasha, you’re worrying me now,” says Kirsten more quietly. “The ‘easiest way out of everything’？”
“I didn’t mean that,” I say at once. “Not that.” I pause, because, hand on heart, I’m not sure what I did mean. “I just felt overwhelmed. Life sometimes feels … impossible.”
“Oh, Sasha.” My big sister’s voice is suddenly soft and kind, like a hug down the line, and out of nowhere I feel tears gathering.
“Sorry.” I try to pull myself together. “Look, I know becoming a nun isn’t the answer. I’m having three weeks off work.”
“Doing what? Just sitting at home?”
“Unclear. Pam says she’ll have me to stay,” I offer quickly, before Kirsten makes some valiant offer to squash me into her house.
“Pam’s there? Has she asked you about hot flushes yet?” I can tell Kirsten’s trying to cheer me up.
“Of course.”
“She can’t leave it, can she? Every time I had morning sickness with Ben, she said, ‘It might be the menopause, Kirsten, don’t rule it out.’ ”
I can’t help laughing, even as a tear rolls down my face. God, I’m a wreck.
“Sasha! I have the solution!” From the sitting room, Mum’s loud, urgent voice summons me. “The perfect solution!”
“I heard that,” says Kirsten in my ear. “Text me the perfect solution when Mum’s shared it with you. But it’s not buying a two-bed in Bracknell, if that’s what she says.”
I can’t help smiling, because Mum’s always trying to convince us to snap up bargain properties.
“And listen, Sasha,” Kirsten continues more gently. “Take this seriously, OK? You need to have a proper break. No emails. No stress. Get yourself back on track. Otherwise …”
She trails off into a loaded kind of silence. I can’t see exactly where she’s heading with otherwise, and I’m not sure she knows either. But it doesn’t feel like anywhere good.
“I will take it seriously.” I exhale hard. “Promise.”
“Because I’m not visiting you at the convent. And you won’t find Captain von Trapp there either, if that’s what you were hoping for.”
“I’m pretty sure he was there,” I counter. “He was hiding in the cellar.”
“Sasha!” Mum calls again.
“Go on,” says Kirsten. “Go and hear Mum’s plan. And take care of yourself.”
As I head back into the sitting room, Mum is looking at something on her phone with a little smile. Her face has softened and I gaze at her, a bit intrigued. What’s she thinking about? What’s her perfect solution?
“How much holiday entitlement do you have?” she asks.
“Loads,” I admit. “I’ve carried a lot forward from last year.”
I barely took any holiday last year. What’s the point? I have finally realized the secret that no one admits: The “holiday” is a myth. Holidays are worse than normal life. You still deal with emails but on an uncomfortable sun lounger instead of at a desk. You squint at your screen in the sunshine. You’re constantly trying to find signal and stay in the shade and talk to the office over a patchy line.
Or the other option is you decide to have a “proper break.” You put an out-of-office on your computer, enjoy yourself, and leave things for when you get back. At which point you’re greeted with such unfathomable amounts of work that you have to stay up till 2 A.M. for a week to catch up, cursing yourself for having gone away even for twenty-four hours.