Too close for comfort

The handwriting was squat and wide, each letter nudging the next, tussling for space. She hadn’t meant to read it. She had intended to just post a picture of the cover. It would have been easy for its owner to recognise with its embossed initials, QL. Small and gold in the lower right hand corner. Q, who on earth has a name that starts with Q, she could only think of Quentin. But the cover was a deep fuchsia so it felt more likely it belonged to a girl. Although it was always best to consider all possibilities, men like pink, and grown women. Whoever had written these words, they had done it with a level of dedication that felt foreign to her. Each day, the date neatly inscribed at the top of the entry, going back almost a year. And what a year. Whoever Q was, they had felt some things. Presumably they had also done some things, but that was left to the reader to imagine, or, it crossed her mind, the reader to already know. 

May 19th 

Today I cried three times, but nobody saw. The first time was while I was brushing my teeth, I kept thinking about how grandad used to call them gnashers. I’ve never heard anyone call them that since, it’s been almost a year. Afterwards I feel better for a bit. I felt something close to joy when the bus arrived just as I got to the stop. Then I felt worried, because I don’t think you’re supposed to feel so positively about stuff like that, how low is my bar these days? The second time was going up the stairs at the tube station. Someone on the podcast I was listening to described the moment they saw their granddaughter for the first time, about how this new life represented forgiveness, an opportunity to atone for the sins of parenthood. They went on about how hard it is to get it right that first time around and how seeing their own daughter face up to that impossible task flooded them with a kind of kindred love they had never up to that point felt able to experience. It was fine though, I was wearing sunglasses. The third time was at work, mid afternoon, in the toilets. Mum text me saying she feels like she ‘never sees me anymore’, and I felt burning in that space at the back of your throat sort of behind your nose. I can’t remember the last sober day I had where I didn’t cry. 

She put the diary down. It was surreal to read. Sad, sure, but also relatable? When was the last time she had cried? Tuesday? It was Thursday today and she had been high most of yesterday so her last sober day had been a ‘cry day’ too. She thought about stopping, snapping a photo and crafting the message. Something along the lines of ‘hi all! Found this outside the corner shop at the end of Thornwhislte Road, does it belong to anyone here, DM me’. She’d already scoured the group for anyone with the right initials, no QL’s.  Something about the public nature of the group felt incompatible with what she now knew to be deeply personal. 

June 5th

I knew it could have gone either way. Yearning to be touched is always a risky business. In the end I felt kind of empty afterwards, that dull ache of lacking that comes with being held by someone who is thinking about how to let you down gently. He went for ‘I’m pretty busy at the moment’ in the end, an inspired choice. When he left I held myself for a little bit. Palms outstretched across the slopes of my own shoulders. I stared at the ceiling and wondered if I should stop sleeping with people on the first date. I concluded that maybe I should just stop sleeping with people all together. Then I thought about the curve of his neck as he threw his neck backwards in pleasure, and had a wank instead. 

She puts the diary down. Must be a woman, she thinks. She feels herself snaking her own arms around her shoulders, holding, closing her eyes. If she zeroes in on the pitch of the sensation, amongst the white noise of her mind, she can feel that same ache. It is dull, and lacking. She wishes she could hug Q. She googles ‘names that begin with Q’ Quinn, Quincy, Quigley.

July 11th 

I think I hate my job. And then sometimes I think it’s normal to hate your job. And then other times I think maybe I don’t hate it that much. But then everyone my age seems to feel that way, apart from the ones that say things like ‘I actually love what I do’. Those people always make me feel like I am running up the stairs with someone trying to grab at my ankles. Panicky, and like I will never be able to run fast enough. When 30 year olds say that they’re relieved they are no longer in their 20s, I used to think they were lying, I don’t think that anymore. It seems like such a waste to be so beautiful right now. Sometimes I look at my face and my body, and wonder why I always feel prettiest when I’m sad. I’ve been really good at moisturizing lately, and going to the gym. I will admire my toned, smooth body in the mirror thinking about how ludicrous it is to associate success, happiness or even contentedness with how good a person looks. Does a person who is fulfilled trawl the internet for a list of  recommendations for the best collagen pills for less than £20? I doubt it, along with a lot of other things. I think I make my body a project whenever my mind is letting me down.

She’s just like me, she puts the diary down again. She thinks about her own job, ‘Account Executive’, the pay is fine, the people are quite fun, the ‘next step’ though is something hazy. Trying to conjure it makes her palms sweat. Instagram next, she tries Quinn L. Twitter, Quinn l, South London. What else does she know about this person? Probably a woman, but men probably buy supplements for their hair and nails these days. Definitely in their twenties. Sad. Pretty. That describes about half of the people she knows. She tries TikTok, which is silly, nothing. Google again, Tumblr, Co-star. Nothing. She goes back and tries the same with Quigley, Quentin, Quincy. She stares at the ceiling, her phone heavy in her left hand, diary heavy in her right. If this is all a simulation, she thinks, then it would turn out that Q was me. How strange to read the inside of someone else’s mind and not really be able to distinguish it from your own. She could not decide if it was comforting or horrifying to be read, as she read. She flicks to the latest entry. Yesterday

August 28th 

It is my mum’s birthday today. I am sitting on a very slow train, watching as rural England's boxy towns gallop past the window. I feel calm today, there is something comforting about the prospect of celebrating turning 60. To have lived a whole lifetime of mine again and still find something to cheers to. I’ve always thought I don’t want children, but maybe there is something to be said for turning the focus of your life outside of yourself. Maybe parenthood gives you a break from the full glare of your own expectations, some of it can be deflected away onto your offspring. Suddenly it is their success, their happiness that can pull you out of your obsession with your own. What a relief that would be. To have a project that wasn’t yourself…. Reading that back makes me think that maybe I shouldn’t be a parent after all. Something about shifting all your hopes and dreams onto your kids is textbook toxic. Still about a decade left on the ‘biological clock’ either way, I’ll be sure to leave it to the last minute. 

A thought strikes her. She knows whose diary it is, all of a sudden, it’s glaringly obvious. She gets up, walks to the kitchen, places it is on the table, covers it with last month’s unopened gas bill. She fancies a walk to the park, under the glare of the sun, (and her own expectations). How could she not have recognised the voice of her own housemate, her friend? A voice that sounded so much like hers, and also everyone else’s as well. 

August 30th

Yesterday was the first time I have missed a day’s entry in 4 years. It was an odd feeling lying with my thoughts tangled around my head all night without having straightened them out into a line of writing. I think I lost my Quality of Life, a silly name, branded merch from an old therapist. As he had explained, ‘You will be able to look back over the entries and actually assess your Quality of Life, rather than having to rely on your perception of it that day’. I never do read back though, the entries are only about today, maybe that is my problem. I just can’t seem to work out what I want to be when I grow up, or even who.  I found QL on the kitchen table, under a utility’s bill. So maybe I just put it down absentmindedly. I rarely leave it anywhere ‘public’ though, god forbid my housemate found it and read through my lunatic, self-indulgent ramblings. 

She came home from work to find Gail’s bedroom door closed, she wondered if she was writing. She wondered how she could have lived with someone for three years and not know about something they do everyday. What other things did people do everyday in private, behind the closed doors of their bedrooms? She knocks lightly ‘Have you eaten? I’m going to cook some dinner, if you want some?’. ‘Thanks’ replies Gail, ‘Give me a couple of minutes to sort myself out, just getting my thoughts in order’. Gail comes bounding down the stairs and leans against the kitchen counter watching her friends chop a leek. ‘How did you feel about your mum’s birthday?’. Gail looks up at her friend’s face, which is still fixed on the leek at hand, ‘that’s an interestingly phrased question, um, you really want to know?’. ‘Yep, tell me everything that’s going through that pretty head of yours’.