It’s chrome, the oven. Chrome so gleaming and polished I can see every last crack and crevice of my face. I peer critically at my nose, the tiny train track of a scar that skitters down the centre a lifelong testament to my dubious skills at riding a two-wheeler. Just for a second, I wonder how I could erase it.
Marcus looms up behind me, filling the frame. I spin on my heels, caught out. This is the fourteenth flat: my nose is really not the point. Everything about Marcus is big; his broad shoulders, his expanse of chest bursting out of his well-cut suit like a superhero with an office job. He’s fifty-four, nearly twenty years my senior, and he looks like he’s juiced every one of them, but somehow it adds to his appeal. He doesn’t hide his greys under a sneaky rinse of Just For Men, he lets them add to his handsome authority. He wears his narrow-framed black glasses, they don’t wear him. For Marcus, life does exactly what you tell it to do.
‘Sorry, darling, I’m an unpunctual dick,’ he says, powering across the acreage of dark-wood floor and kissing me extravagantly, oblivious to Lucy, the timid blonde estate agent who is trapped in the doorway. I’m convinced it’s her first week, the way she keeps anxiously scrabbling through her too-new handbag for her phone like it’s an animal that she needs to keep fed. I can’t help liking her for her awkwardness: she lacks the bullet-proof determination of her brethren, all of whom behave as if renting us a home would be up there with single-handedly brokering world peace. Her skirt and jacket pretend to match, but they don’t, not really, they’re different shades of black, and she’s wearing a long-sleeved T-shirt underneath, as if a crisp white shirt would be too galling a surrender. It’s March. I bet she graduated last summer, started out dreaming of a miraculous opening on a broadsheet or slaving away at a TV company for just her tube fares and a foot on the ladder. She thought she was too good for this job, but now she’s starting to wonder if it’s the other way round. I spy on her over Marcus’s shoulder, her teeth worrying away at her cuticles.
‘Finally!’ I say, rolling my eyes at her, conspiratorial, cringing inwardly the second I’ve done it. Spoilt bitch, she’s probably thinking. I’m off duty. I need to focus.
‘So could you be mistress of all of this?’ says Marcus, oblivious, swinging an expansive arm into the flat’s cavernous kitchen. It’s like it’s his already, like it’s him deigning to give Lucy a look-around – I could love him or hate him for it.
I force myself to engage, feel how the space feels, stop obsessing about what it is I’ve got to do today. It makes me light-headed. You could pretty much fit my whole flat into this kitchen. There’s a tea towel hanging over the oven handle: I neaten the edges, move it until it sits, perfectly flush, in the centre.
‘Let’s do the tour,’ I say, slipping my hand into Marcus’s large paw, and deftly leading him away from the question.
I’m late now. I’m half running once I get off the tube, trying to avoid barrelling into the milling crowds of tourists, their worldly goods humped on their backs like they’re camera-wielding tortoises. Every time I reach this door, tucked away behind Baker Street, I have to metaphorically pinch myself. It’s navy blue, the paint worn, with a round brass bell to the left, an instant target for your finger. It’s a tall, thin Victorian building, a maiden aunt who’s fallen on hard times.
Brendan – our part-time receptionist, part-time Hollywood star in training – is bustling around the waiting room, putting out flowers and dispatching hastily abandoned coffee mugs. He’s handsome, Brendan, properly handsome, twenty-six years old, with those kind of well-turned, angular features that look great on camera and make mere mortals like me feel utterly pudding-faced. He’s dark-haired and olive-skinned, with soulful green-grey eyes that can make you feel like you’re the only thing that matters in the entire world, when all he’s asking is if you want a Very Berry smoothie from Pret. Despite all that, I don’t find him in the slightest bit attractive. For me he’s like an incredibly sweet and efficient work of art.
‘Morning, gorgeous,’ he says, jiggling a mug at me quizzically. ‘Judith should still have twenty minutes, if you go straight through. Pink tea?’
I appreciate the compliment, even if I don’t entirely deserve it. I’m not gorgeous per se, but I do work hard with the raw materials. My face is a bit too much of an upside-down triangle, which I offset with my masterful use of bronzer, and my long dark hair lacks the luscious bounce of a Pantene advert. I blow-dry it painstakingly, slather it with unguents, and I know how to dress in such a way that looks deceptively expensive (trust me, therapists only earn the big bucks in Beverly Hills).
‘Perfect. Did you hear . . .?’ I tail off, seeing his crestfallen smile. How does he stand it – all those baby-faced directors demanding he stand on one leg and mime being a tree, then sniffily telling him he ‘didn’t quite sell spring’ to them. ‘They’re fools, Brendan!’ I say, hurrying towards Judith’s office. ‘Nothing but fools!’
Judith’s my supervisor, which basically makes her Yoda to my Luke. All therapists have one – a senior figure who monitors the progress of our cases, and makes sure we’re following the ethical guidelines. I’ve known Judith since I was in training, and she’d come to give the occasional awe-inspiring lecture. I was thrilled enough when she agreed to supervise me , but when one of her therapists left London last year, and she asked me to join the practice, I was ecstatic. For me, it was like that call from Spielberg that Brendan’s waiting for, and I’ve been doing everything I can to justify her faith in me. The fact she’s assigned me today’s case, when she could have assumed it demanded her level of seniority, is making me feel just a tiny bit triumphant.
Judith’s got a large corner office, graced with a sweeping view over Regent’s Park. No herbal tea for her: she’s sipping from a tiny china cup of espresso that I know will be strong enough to stand a spoon up in. She’s wearing a red-velvet shirt over some cropped green trousers: she should look as though she’s auditioning for Dick Whittington, but instead she seems vivid and unapologetic. She’s late fifties at least with the wrinkles to prove it, but she still oozes sex and vivacity. I think about that famous poem, the one about growing old disgracefully wearing purple and munching sausages, and hope I’ll have the balls for it.
‘Mia,’ she says, bright eyes taking me in. ‘What’s the panic?’
I throw myself down on her sofa, pulling Gemma Vine’s notes out of my bag at the same time. I don’t just see the ‘worried well’ – the slightly anxious but essentially sorted people who use therapy to give them the sense of calm they need to survive an increasingly chaotic world. I also specialize in treating children, particularly those who’ve experienced serious trauma. You might find me kneeling in my sand tray, working with a six-year-old who hasn’t got the words to express his grief over his mummy dying, but can build it for you once you hand him a plastic spade.
‘I’ve been going back over Gemma’s notes . . .’
Gemma’s too old for the sand tray. She’s thirteen, the last person to see her dad before he disappeared off the face of the earth three weeks ago. Her father owns a large accountancy firm, whose clients include a tycoon named Stephen Wright. Wright claims his multimillion-pound business is whiter than white, but the police are convinced that waste disposal and property are cover for a whole host of nefarious activities, from money laundering to people trafficking to large-scale fraud. His assets have been frozen, leaving thousands of investors – who thought they’d poured their savings into a legitimate business – desperate and angry. Meanwhile his trial, which was due to start this Monday, is on hold for seven weeks whilst the police search for their key witness: Gemma’s dad.
‘Of course you have . . .’ says Judith, a wry smile on her face. ‘Till midnight, I imagine?’
‘I’m a swot, what can I say?’
The manhunt’s been all over the papers, but I’ve been trying to avoid the lurid headlines so I can meet her fresh. I’ve still found myself worrying about her all weekend, pulling the facts I do have in all directions, like dough I’m still deciding how to shape. How must it feel to have her dad disappear in a puff of smoke, only to have him reappear plastered across the front of the Daily Mail?
‘How can he not have known – Gemma’s dad? That’s what he said, isn’t it? That he didn’t know Stephen Wright was a criminal.’
‘Wright’s definitely a criminal,’ says Judith drily. ‘It’s just that he’s clever enough and ruthless enough to have prevented the police from building a case until now. One particularly charming anecdote I was told is that he slashed the face of someone who had the temerity to disagree with him in a business meeting. Imaginative way to make it clear who’s boss.’ I shudder involuntarily. ‘Don’t look so worried, Mia. I’m not planning on stealing any management tips from him.’
‘Yes, so Christopher Vine must have known? And if he knew – surely the whole family must’ve known. Gemma even?’ Judith looks at me, face neutral, spoon gently clinking against the bone china cup. ‘I just want to go into this session ready for whatever could come out of her mouth.’
‘Mia, it’s not for us to speculate. I told you that. You’re just here to provide a safe space for Gemma.’
‘But . . .’
‘Besides, all this information is only just coming out in the press. Stephen Wright might have deliberately kept Vine away from the underground part of the business. Having a squeaky clean accountancy firm was a great way to give himself a veneer of respectability.’
‘So if Vine didn’t know anything, why go on the run? He’s abandoned his family. He’s left his own daughter to be interrogated by the police . . .’
Judith shrugs, deliberately non-committal.
‘The police will have put pressure on him by telling him the horror stories. If Stephen Wright’s idea of a friendly greeting is a knife to the throat, you wouldn’t want to risk taking the stand at his trial, even if you were going to do nothing more than recite nursery rhymes.’
‘But if she did say anything about his whereabouts . . . I’d have to tell the investigation, wouldn’t I?’
‘In principle, yes, but I don’t think that’s a real concern. Her mum wouldn’t be bringing her here if there was any danger she knows anything. She’s a mixed-up kid from a mixed-up family, who desperately needs our support.’
‘And it’s her mum asked for the appointment?’
‘Yes, I know a friend of hers socially. It’s too close for me to see Gemma, but I absolutely think you’re ready for it.’ Judith wriggles her shoulders, shaking it off, and takes another slug of coffee. ‘Besides, I think you’ll have real emotional insight into her situation.’
Judith’s a very instinctive therapist: one of her most deeply held convictions is that we get the clients we need for our own healing. I stand up a little too abruptly, smile a smile that shines extra bright.
‘OK, that’s really helpful. Wish me luck!’
‘You won’t need it. You’ll be great.’
Gemma’s twenty minutes late. I sit in my room, painstakingly rereading her notes, trying not to feel a sense of anticlimax. It’s a full half-hour after our appointment time before Brendan buzzes to say she’s finally arrived. I walk through to the waiting room, a tiny tremor of nervous anticipation running through me. I still get it on a first session, even as I’m outwardly projecting the smooth glide of a swan. There’s an intimacy to doing this work well, a locking together that has to happen.
Gemma’s jammed into the furthest corner of the grey sofa, hugged as close as a clam to its arm. She looks young for thirteen, like the endless billboards and MTV videos of girls dancing in just their teeny-tiny pants have somehow passed her by. She’s wearing a baggy unzipped hoodie and loose jeans, her small thin body lost in the swathes of fabric. Her dead gaze is fixed on an empty point in the distance, her sharp chin jutting forwards. Thin blonde hair, shaggy and unstyled, falls over her shoulders. A smattering of freckles punctuates her pale skin, playing across her small nose. There’s an innocence about those freckles that slightly breaks my heart: they speak of carefree summers playing outside, roaming around with a gaggle of friends – or perhaps that’s only in some storybook version of childhood. The thing that’s puncturing me is the way she embodies the fact that once innocence is lost it cannot be regained.
Next to Gemma sits a woman who must be her mum. She’s mid-forties, I think; her impeccable highlights and caramel skin making it hard to tell, a fidgety nervousness pulsing through her. Her fingers worry at her iPhone, her tongue darts out and moistens her lipsticked mouth. She’s faux casual – second-mortgage skinny jeans and a silk peasant blouse – a million miles from Gemma’s aggressively unkempt style. She jumps to her feet as I arrive, thrusts a hand towards me.
‘I’m Annie, Gemma’s mum,’ she says, the vowels slightly extending, a Northerner who’s lived South too long. ‘I’m SO sorry we’ve wasted your time.’
Her eyes blaze as she looks down at Gemma, but her gaze simply boomerangs back, no acknowledgement.
‘Please don’t worry,’ I say, shaking her hand, feeling its tremor. I turn my gaze to Gemma. ‘But we’d better make the most of what’s left. Do you want to follow me?’
My words simply hang there in the ether, unclaimed. Slowly, deliberately, Gemma turns to look at her mum. I wouldn’t want to receive that look: anger’s clean, but this is something else, harder and colder. Annie forces a smile as Gemma reluctantly prises herself from the sofa and stalks after me towards my treatment room.
‘Where would you . . .’
I’ve tried to make my room as welcoming and unthreatening as I can. There’s a dark red sofa scattered with big squishy cushions, and a box of tissues planted within easy reach. It’s light, too, with a big window with a view nearly as good as Judith’s – it’s very different from the little grey cage, deep in the bowels of an NHS clinic, where I first went, too desperate to carry on pretending I could keep it together. I was going to ask Gemma where she’d like to sit, but she’s already sprawled herself across my sofa like she’s got squatter’s rights. I sit down squarely, right opposite her.
‘I’m Mia,’ I say. ‘Mia Cosgrove. I’m a psychotherapist, and I can tell you more about what that means if you’d like me to.’
‘You’re a doctor. A head doctor.’
‘I’m not a doctor, no. But I do have qualifications. The idea is that I can help with the head stuff.’ Gemma’s eyes slide towards the big picture window – cars stream down the Marylebone Road, a haze of exhaust fumes throwing a gauzy grey blanket over the top. ‘We’re here to talk about whatever you’d like to talk about. This is your space. I won’t be telling your mum, or telling your teacher. You can use it however you like.’
‘Ooh, sounds like fun,’ she says, then snaps back to silence.
I let it run for a minute or so before I try again. I’m not one of those therapists who let the silence go on forever, pooling and deepening, waiting for the client to swim to shore. You can both end up drowning out there.
‘It feels to me like there’s quite a lot of tension in the room. Do you think that’s true?’
Sometimes it works, naming the big old elephant rampaging round the room; sometimes it doesn’t.
‘Maybe for you,’ she says, shoulders shrugging under her baggy hoodie. ‘I’m fine.’
‘That’s good,’ I say, managing to hold her gaze for a few seconds. ‘I just wanted to check in with how you were feeling. So you’re in Year Nine?’
She nods, almost imperceptibly. With the family’s assets frozen, Gemma’s been yanked out of her expensive private school and sent to the local comp.
‘And you’ve just moved schools?’ I pause, waiting to see if she’ll volunteer anything. ‘You’ve had a lot of changes happening all at once.’ Gemma shrugs, pale face effortfully rigid, like she’s putting everything she’s got into keeping me out. I keep inching forward. ‘Has it been hard for you, Gemma?’
‘No. It’s been like one big birthday party,’ she spits.
‘And Christmas?’ I say, cocking my head. It’s a risk. ‘Just one non-stop celebration?’
‘And Easter,’ she says, a tiny smile on her face. ‘Loads of chocolate.’
‘Hanukkah? No, you’re not Jewish.’ She’s softened, her body not quite so much of a fortress. ‘What has it been like, Gemma?’
‘What, at Shitsville Academy?’
‘Mmm, unusual name.’
Another tiny smile.
‘It’s shit. It’s a shit-hole, stuffed full of losers. Can I go now, or do I have to keep talking to you?’
‘Of course you can, if that’s what you want. I haven’t bolted the door.’
We look at each other, gazes finally locking. Stay: I send it out into the silence. Perhaps she hears it. Her shoulders slide downwards, the tension finally starting to lift. ‘Is there anyone you’d like to talk to, Gemma?’
I keep my voice gentle, watch for her instinctive reaction rather than the likely verbal missile. She folds a cushion into her belly, hugging it close. Her gaze drops to a point on the woven green rug that my best friend Lysette gave me when I started here, her eyes filling. This time I let the silence linger. Her eyes meet mine for a second, something close to desperation there, and then drop back to the rug. It’s round, with thick white stitching that spirals inwards, chasing itself round and round in an eternal circle. It’s either the perfect accessory for my work, or the absolute opposite.
‘If you want to ask about my dad, just say it. We both know why I’m here.’
The air feels taut again the moment she mentions him. No, ‘mention’ is far too feeble a word. It’s more like a bomb she drops.
‘Do we? I meant what I said when we started, Gemma. It’s your time. You’re the boss. We can talk about him, or we can talk about – I don’t know, Harry Styles’ lamentable use of hair gel. It’s up to you.’
‘I’m not a kid, Mia,’ she spits, as if there could be no worse insult. ‘Don’t patronize me. One Direction are a bunch of twats.’
‘They’re not really the point.’ I wait for her to look at me, keep my expression soft. ‘What I mean is, I want you to feel safe here.’
Safe: seems comical now. My naivety.
‘Dad knows where all the speed cameras are,’ she says, suddenly animated. ‘When we go to Westfield, he drives really fast on the Westway and he plays his music – not crap like One Direction – so loud the car shakes. It’s lucky we never get stopped.’
‘So what does he shake the car with?’
‘Old stuff. Blur and Radiohead. You know. Proper music.’
She’s grinning as she says it, eyes shining, like she’s there on the Westway right now, the music pumping, a hint of danger laced under the racing of her heart. Proper music. I play with the phrase in my head.
‘So his music is proper music? Do you like the same things as him, or do you like your own stuff too?’
‘What do you mean?’ she says, quick as a flash.
‘I’m just interested. Do you have your own version of proper music? You might like things he doesn’t.’
‘Don’t start thinking you can slag him off because he’s not here.’
She’s his guard dog: ferocious, quick to bare her teeth.
‘I’m sorry if it sounded like I was slagging him off. I was actually trying to find out more about you.’
‘Step away, Mia. There’s nothing to see.’
That’s when she starts to push up the ballooning grey cotton of her sleeves. It’s so very gradual, the way she does it, like a game of Grandmother’s Footsteps.
‘I’m not sure about that, Gemma. I think you might be selling yourself short.’ That spitting anger – it smacks of self-hatred that’s turned itself outward. Perfectly honed, forcing the outside world to keep confirming her darkest feelings about herself. And now, the one person who makes her believe differently has abandoned her – I bet, however illogical it is, it feels inside like it’s the casting vote. ‘There are lots of things I’d like to find out about you.’
‘Shame!’ She deliberately rolls her eyes towards the clock, the session almost ticked away. Then she gives her left sleeve a last, triumphant tweak. ‘We’re all out of time.’ That’s when I see them, deep, bloody scratches criss-crossing the tender flesh of her wrists. I try to control the shock in my face. ‘Gemma, have you done that? Have you been hurting yourself?’
She whips down her sleeves, busies herself with her scruffy rucksack.
‘Don’t be nosy. You think you’re so qualified, don’t you? You think you can just know all about us from some crap I’ve spun you, like you’re Sherlock or something. Well you’re not. My dad would never make me come here.’
I feel a surge of anger, not at her but at him. They merge and meld in her mind, like she doesn’t know where she starts and he ends.
‘I’m worried about you, Gemma. I think what you’re dealing with is incredibly painful and hard. Of course you don’t have to come here, but if you want to see me again, I’ll be here for you.’
She stands up, grabs the straps of the rucksack; her fury so palpable it feels violent. She won’t look at me.
‘He’s going to hate this,’ she hisses, her eyes suddenly finding their focus. ‘He’s going to hate you when I tell him.’
‘Gemma, why don’t you sit down? Take a few minutes to get calm before you go out there.’
‘Don’t tell me what to do,’ she says, the door flung open so violently that the handle crashes against the plaster.
I want to give her a minute before I follow her out, respect her desire to get as far away from me as possible, but as I stand up to shut the swinging door, I realize it’s not just her who needs a minute. Did I go in too hard? I don’t think I did. Those livid scars, thin trails of dried blood.
When I brave the waiting room there’s no sign of Gemma, just Annie, looking even more flustered and anxious than when she arrived. I feel a burst of frustration. That session wasn’t for Gemma, it was for her.
‘What the hell happened in there?’ she says.
‘It was – not easy. But a first session often isn’t,’ I say.
‘She’s waiting outside. I told her I had to talk to you.’ She grabs, suddenly, for my arm, her fingers digging into my flesh. I don’t like the way her grip handcuffs me, but I try not to react. ‘What did she say to you?’
‘I’m sorry Annie, what’s said in there has to stay confidential. She’s obviously in a lot of pain, and there’s a lot of anger coming up. But you’re her mum, I’m sure you know that.’
It’s delicate dealing with parents; you don’t want them to think you’re stepping on their turf. Truth be told, I’m not sure it’s Annie’s turf either. She stares at me, as helpless as a fish on a slab, and I feel a rush of sympathy for Gemma. There’s no certainty here, no one who knows the answers.
‘Is that it?’
‘I definitely think we need a follow-up phone call, tomorrow preferably, but I think that’s the last time I’ll be seeing Gemma. A client has to want to come and see me.’
Annie’s painted red mouth twists into a smile that never translates. She yanks on a smart beige trench coat and jams on a pair of bug-eyed sunglasses, her knuckles white.
‘Thanks,’ she says, turning on her heel, refusing to look at me.
‘Annie . . .’ I start, but by now I’m talking to thin air.
He’s going to hate you when I tell him. I could be wrong, but it didn’t feel hypothetical. It felt like present tense.