By the time I join the queue at Starbucks, I feel happier already.
PGNI FIRST BANK VISA 7 Camel Square
Liverpool L1 5NP
Ms. Rebecca Bloomwood
Flat 24 Burney Rd.London SW6 8FD
10 March 2000
Dear Ms. Bloomwood: PGNI First Bank VISA Card No. 1475839204847586 Thank you for your letter of 6 March.Your offer of a free subscription to Successful Saving magazine is most kind, as is your invitation to dinner at The Ivy. Unfortunately, employees of PGNI First Bank are prohibited from accepting such gifts.I look forward to receiving your outstanding payment of £105.40, as soon as possible.Yours sincerely,Peter Johnson Customer Accounts Executive
Ten
ON MONDAY MORNING I wake early, feeling rather hollow inside. My gaze flits to the pile of unopened carrier bags in the corner of my room and then quickly flits away again. I know I spent too much money on Saturday. I know I shouldn’t have bought two pairs of boots. I know I shouldn’t have bought that purple dress. In all, I spent. . Actually, I don’t want to think about how much I spent. Think about something else, quick, I instruct myself. Something else. Anything’ll do.
I’m well aware that at the back of my mind, thumping quietly like a drumbeat, are the twin horrors of Guilt and Panic.
Guilt Guilt Guilt Guilt.
Panic Panic Panic Panic.
If I let them, they’d swoop in and take over. I’d feel completely paralyzed with misery and fear. So the trick I’ve learned is simply not to listen. My mind is very well trained like that.
My other trick is to distract myself with different thoughts and activities. So I get up, switch the radio on, take a shower, and get dressed. The thumping’s still there at the back of my head, but gradually, gradually, it’s fading away. As I go into the kitchen and make a cup of coffee, I can barely hear it anymore. A cautious relief floods over me, like that feeling you get when a painkiller finally gets rid of your headache. I can relax. I’m going to be all right.
On the way out I pause in the hall to check my appearance in the mirror (Top: River Island, Skirt: French Connection, Tights: Pretty Polly Velvets, Shoes: Ravel) and reach for my coat (Coat: House of Fraser sale). Just then the post plops through the door, and I go to pick it up. There’s a handwritten letter for Suze and a postcard from the Maldives. And for me, there are two ominous-looking window envelopes. One from VISA, one from Endwich Bank.
For a moment, my heart stands still. Why another letter from the bank? And VISA. What do they want? Can’t they just leave me alone?
Carefully I place Suze’s post on the ledge in the hall and shove my own two letters in my pocket, telling myself I’ll read them on the way to work. Once I get on the tube, I’ll open them both and I’ll read them, however unpleasant they may be.
Honestly. As I’m walking along the pavement, I promise my intention is to read the letters.
But then I turn into the next street — and there’s a skip outside someone’s house. A huge great yellow skip, already half full of stuff. Builders are coming in and out of the house, tossing old bits of wood and upholstery into the skip. Loads of rubbish, all jumbled up together.
And a little thought creeps into my mind.
My steps slow down as I approach the skip and I pause, staring intently at it as though I’m interested in the words printed on the side. I stand there, trying to appear casual, until the builders have gone back into the house and no one’s looking. Then, in one motion, I reach for the two letters, pull them out of my pocket, and drop them over the side, into the skip.
Gone.
As I’m standing there, a builder pushes past me with two sacks of broken plaster, and heaves them into the skip. And now they really are gone. Buried beneath a layer of plaster, unread. No one will ever find them.
Gone for good.
Quickly I turn away from the skip and begin to walk on again. Already my step’s lighter and I’m feeling buoyant.
Before long, I’m feeling completely purged of guilt. I mean, it’s not my fault if I never read the letters, is it? It’s not my fault if I never got them, is it? As I bound along toward the tube station I honestly feel as though neither of those letters ever existed.
When I arrive at work, I switch on my computer, click efficiently to a new document, and start typing my piece on pensions. Perhaps if I work really hard, it’s occurred to me, Philip will give me a raise. I’ll stay late every night and impress him with my dedication to the job, and he’ll realize that I’m considerably undervalued. Perhaps he’ll even make me associate editor, or something.
“These days,” I type briskly, “none of us can rely on the government to take care of us in our old age. Therefore pension planning should be done as early as possible, ideally as soon as you are earning an income.”
“Morning, Clare,” says Philip, coming into the office in his overcoat. “Morning, Rebecca.”
Hah! Now is the time to impress him.
“Morning, Philip,” I say, in a friendly-yet-professional manner. Then, instead of leaning back in my chair and asking him how his weekend was, I turn back to my computer and start typing again. In fact, I’m typing so fast that the screen is filled with lots of splodgy typos. It has to be said, I’m not the best typist in the world. But who cares? I look very businesslike, that’s the point.
“The bwst ootion is oftwn yoor compaamy occupatinoa Ischeme, bt if tehis is not posibsle, a wide vareiety of peronanlas penion lans is on ther markte, ranign from. .” I break off, reach for a pension brochure, and flip quickly through it, as though scanning for some crucial piece of information.