I fly through the next couple. Someone has chlamydia and is too scared to message his past partners. One is not sure if they are gay or not because they watch gay porn but don’t want to have gay sex in real life.
It’s question number six that gets me.
Message received: 11:32
I’ve never used a service like this before, and I’m worried I’m being silly. It’s just my boyfriend did something weird the other night and it’s really upset me but I’m probably just being stupid. We went out clubbing at the student union and he came back to mine. We were both completely wasted and all I wanted to do was pass out but he wanted to have sex. I said ‘no’ and pushed him off a few times because I just wanted to sleep but he kind of held me down with his body and we had sex. I was so drunk I couldn’t really push him off and just kind of froze. Then we went to sleep. I’m really confused. Is this normal? I don’t mean to make a fuss. I love him. He’s my boyfriend …
I shake my head and throw my head back to the ceiling. ‘For fuck’s sake,’ I mutter as my stomach liquefies.
‘Are you OK, April?’ Matt’s head appears.
‘Yup.’
‘That one literally just came in, otherwise I would’ve given you a heads-up. I’m really sorry.’
My teeth are gritted and I smile through them, forcing myself to look at him. ‘No need to be sorry, I told you I’m OK.’
Matt won’t relent. ‘Two shifts in a row though, that’s not fair.’
‘It’s not like it’s unusual.’
‘Let’s have a proper debrief in the park when you’re done … I insist, come on. Any excuse for ice cream.’ He’s humouring me, which is both endearing and frustrating at the same time.
I nod, stand, and spend way too long doing a wee before returning to my desk to send my reply. I close off my anger, as it is not appropriate to let that seep into my response, and I push the pain down deep into the slosh of my tummy until it is absorbed into me. I pull out the template from the ‘favourites’ folder, I personalise it, I check it through, I hit send, I wish this would stop happening.
Why won’t it stop happening?
‘Ready?’ I say, a bit later, once I’ve dealt with the last message on the list.
Matt takes off his headphones. ‘Can I meet you there? I need to print some stuff off first.’
I nod, desperate to get out of the office. ‘I’ll see you on the bench.’
I don’t say goodbye to Katy as I pick up my bag and leave. I’m still mad at her after what Megan said to me this morning. She looks a bit hurt as I swish on past, but she’s stuck in a volunteering spreadsheet, trying to sort out all the shift changes due to people taking summer holidays. I rush down the stairs, my breath not quite filling my lungs each time, and run out into the chaotic London street, the heat smacking me like a sucker punch, making me sweat within seconds.
I want to scream.
Why is there nowhere in London to scream? Surely there must be some pop-up fucking primal screaming booth? I’m five minutes from Regent’s Park and stumble towards it with too many emotions and nowhere for them to go. Heat drifts up from the pavement, cooking my skin, making my blood boil hotter. I can hear my phone going in my bag but I ignore it. I reach the park entrance and dart through the wrought-iron gates. It’s quieter in here. My phone goes again. Again I ignore it. I do not know what to do with my rage. It’s consuming me. Eating up my stomach like a hungry parasite.
I sink onto a bench dedicated to a lady called Gladys who always loved this place. I try and let the ducks quacking on the pond distract me from myself. They scuttle about, picking at nothing on the ground or dousing themselves in the sludgy black water.
Soon enough, Matt arrives with strawberry Cornettos. ‘Be quick, they’ve almost melted.’ He hands me mine and sits alongside me.
‘Cheers.’
The only noise for a while is the sound of us rescuing drips off our melting cones with our tongues. The syrup in the sugar hits my blood and I feel it rejuvenating me, kicking me back into myselfness.
‘What did you need to print off?’ I ask, once we’re done. I hold out my hand and take his sticky wrapper.
‘It’s cheesy, but I reckon it will cheer you up.’
‘Not like you to be cheesy, Matt.’
His eyes laugh behind his glasses as I return from the neighbouring bin. He is a proper wotsit, it has to be said. He once showed me the Valentine’s Day card he’d spent two weeks making for his boyfriend. It was a hand-sketch of all his favourite things. Though it would’ve been more romantic without the butt-plug.
He gets out a stack of papers from his pocket, unfolds them, and rustles them like a newsreader. ‘I just thought, after another tough shift, you could do with some affirmation about why we do this.’ He coughs as I sit down, and starts to read off the page:
‘Dear Are You There, thank you so much for your reply. I was feeling really lost and scared, but now I feel less alone and like I know what to do next.’ I resist the urge to roll my eyes at how … Disney this all is, because I don’t want to hurt his feelings, and I let him move onto the next page. And that’s the one that gets me.
‘Thank you Are You There. Your service has helped me realise that I was, in fact, raped – which still feels weird to be typing. I rang Rape Crisis, as you suggested, and they’ve been brilliant and I have a counselling session set up for next month. I don’t know what would’ve happened if I hadn’t found your charity. I already feel a bit like me again.’
My throat tripwires. The edges of my heart melt a little. ‘OK, OK, OK,’ I say. ‘I get the point, Oprah.’
‘Are you sure? I’ve got loads more. I’m in the middle of compiling the user satisfaction survey to help fundraising with our bid for Comic Relief.’
‘I get the gist, thank you. I really am fine.’
‘She says, with the vein still bulging in her forehead.’
I laugh and scatter some of the ducks that had started edging towards our feet in the hope of cone crumbs. ‘I honestly am fine.’
‘I know you are. But it helps to be reminded of why we put up with the harder bits of this job.’
I reach over for his sheet and reread it under the glaring light of the sun. Getting feedback is quite rare in our job and we’re trained to cope with this. Because we’re an online service, you don’t get to see or hear the impact you’ve had very often. Ninety per cent of the time you send off your advice and never hear anything ever again. It’s a shame because the feedback is what gives me the high. I used to read and reread these comments when they came through, letting them pour balm over my wounds, but now they’re losing their impact a bit. I get that Matt is just trying to help, but when I look down and see what this girl has written, I don’t feel soothed that I’m helping so much, more angry that she had to go through this in the first place.
I hand it back to him. ‘I do hate men,’ I tell him.
‘God, tell me about it.’
‘Obviously you don’t count.’ I have to admit Matt does not fall into that bracket. Some men have levelled up. They’re rarer than vaginal orgasms, and most of them are gay, but some of them are good.