Rosaline Palmer Takes the Cake (Winner Bakes All #1) - Alexis Hall Page 0,118
fancy a Whopper. She really fancied a Whopper. “Oh God yes. Not only did Alain try to make me fuck his ex-girlfriend, he tried to make me do it on savoury macaron and pea salad.”
“Now that’s evil.”
They Whoppered up, courtesy of a stoned teenager, and then claimed a space in the mostly empty seating area, on either side of a table that was trying hard to pretend it was made of wood.
“I always liked these places as a kid,” remarked Harry. “They felt sorta magic.”
This would never have occurred to Rosaline, but it did make sense in a way. “They do have a . . . detached-from-space-and-time quality.”
“Yeah, and sometimes they’d have an arcade or one of them vibrating massage chairs. We used to fight like cats and dogs over ’em. Dunno why, though, ’cos they was shit.”
“I’ll remember that if I’m in the vicinity of a vibrating massage chair.”
“So . . .” Harry drew a line of ketchup with a fry he didn’t seem interested in eating. “Thought you might want to know I went to the doctor’s the other day. Apparently I’ve got an anxiety thing . . . like you said. And they’re trying me out on some pills and I’m on a waiting list for phone therapy. You know, like over the phone. Not, like, with a phone.”
Rosaline glanced up from her burger, trying not to look as shocked as she felt. “You went to the doctor’s?”
“Yeah. Seemed I probably should to be honest. I know I bit your head off, but then I thought, Well, Rosaline’s pretty smart. Probably knows what she’s talking about.”
“You have way overestimated my competence.”
“Don’t be daft, mate. I’m just saying you’re worth listening to. And well, you was right. Turns out I’m a mental.”
“I don’t think,” she said, “that’s the technical term.”
“You don’t get to do that no more. As a mental, I get to decide what to call myself.”
“And ‘person with an anxiety disorder’ doesn’t strike you as more appropriate?”
He flashed her one of his sly smiles. “Bit of a mouthful, init?”
“Okay.But for the record, I want you to know that I don’t think of you as mental.”
“Thanks, mate.” He was still playing with the same fry. “It’s weird, though. Like, you know, disorienting. ’Cos it’s like a lot of stuff that you thought was just how it was . . . isn’t how it is or doesn’t have to be. And that does my head in.”
“I think . . . the . . . doing your head in is part of the process.”
“Maybe. But right now I’ve gone from Does everyone think I’m a dick; I hope everyone doesn’t think I’m a dick to Does everyone think I’m a dick or do I only think everyone thinks I’m a dick ’cos I’m a mental or am I a dick. And I’m not sure that’s helping.”
Rosaline rescued the disintegrating fry and tossed it into their designated rubbish bag. “It’ll get easier as you get used to it. And the pills might take the edge off, and therapy can give you new strategies for dealing with this kind of thing.”
“Yeah, and I do feel better, actually. I mean”—he shrugged—“I thought I was going to get laughed out of the doctor’s office, but she was really good about it. Said it was a common thing. Lots of options. Nothing to worry about. Which was a bit of a weird thing to say to someone what you’ve diagnosed with anxiety.”
Despite being in a motorway service station after a disastrously failed threesome, Rosaline smiled. “I’m honestly glad you’re getting help with this. I know how hard it is. After all, I’m the last person who should be lecturing other people on confronting their mental health issues.”
“’Cos of your parents?”
“Basically.” Now it was her turn to pick at her food, folding a stray piece of lettuce into a weird mayonnaisey parcel. “It feels so unbearably middle-class. You know, Woe is me, my life is fine, but I’m sad because Daddy didn’t buy me a pony.”
“I mean, I don’t think you’re sad. And it’s not that your dad didn’t buy you a pony, it’s that him and your mum was pricks your whole life.”
“But even that’s just them being unsupportive. It’s not like they ever locked me in a cupboard or anything like that.”
“It’s not a competition, though, is it, mate? And if it was, we’d all be losing, ’cos there’s people what’ve got cancer or got their houses blown up in a war and