Page 33 of The Life Experiment

No matter how comfortable Saira’s office was, Angus couldn’t relax. Something about this session felt different to the others. Angus sensed it as soon as Saira invited him to take a seat. The feeling only grew when Saira skimmed over his data from the last week, which she usually lingered on.

She wants to get to the good stuff , he thought, knowing all too well what that meant.

Tilting his head to his chest, Angus inhaled the scent of Layla’s perfume, which had lingered on his jumper after their hug goodbye the evening prior.

Saira glanced up from the iPad that was balanced on her knees.

‘I must say, Angus, you’re a different man to the one I first met,’ she said. ‘Lighter in many ways. Heavier in some.’

‘Is that a comment about my weight?’ Angus joked, but he knew what she meant. Saira read the questionnaries he filled out as part of the experiment. She knew all about Layla.

More importantly, she knew all about Angus’s lies.

‘This is our sixth counselling session,’ Saira said. ‘By now I think we know each other well enough to delve a little deeper, don’t you?’

Even though this was expected, Angus still shifted in his seat.

‘Deeper how?’ Angus lowered his gaze. ‘You mean about the things I’ve told Layla?’

‘I’m more curious about why you’ve said those things when doing so jeopardises the relationship you want to establish.’

‘Do you think she’ll hate me if she finds out?’

‘Angus,’ Saira replied with a sympathetic tilt of her head. ‘I can’t predict how Layla will react, but I can say that no one likes being lied to. And with lies, it’s rarely a case of “if” someone finds out and more a case of “when”.’

Angus studied his hands. Saira’s honesty confirmed everything that, deep down, Angus already knew – the best thing that had ever happened to him was going to come to an end, and there would be no one to blame but himself.

Angus thought back to last night. Another evening spent in Layla’s company, this time attending a West End show followed by Thai food. Another night trying not to stare at the lips he wanted to kiss.

But Angus knew Saira was right. His lies would come out sooner or later. And Angus could only imagine the consequences.

‘I don’t want to lie to Layla,’ he admitted, ‘but I’m in too deep now.’

‘It’s never too late to tell the truth, Angus. Being honest doesn’t always have the catastrophic repercussions we tell ourselves it will.’

Angus met Saira’s gaze. She was so sincere that for a moment he almost believed her, but then he imagined Layla crying at the falsehoods he’d fed her. He thought of her walking away. As soon as Angus pictured that, it was like all oxygen left the room.

‘Why do you think you’ve lied, Angus?’ Saira asked.

‘I don’t know,’ he replied, but the way Saira stared told Angus she didn’t believe him. Swallowing his shame, he cleared his throat. ‘I didn’t lie about things like what school I went to because I want to delude Layla. I lied because I don’t want to be me.’

There, he’d said it. His most painful truth, released. It didn’t feel good to hear it out loud, but it didn’t exactly feel bad, either.

‘That’s a bold statement, Angus.’

He shrugged. ‘It’s an accurate one.’

‘Why don’t you want to be yourself? On paper, you have a lot going for you.’

‘Well, on paper no one can tell how much I’ve messed up.

It’s not like anyone wants me to be myself, anyway.

They never have. They want me to be—’ Angus stopped, alarmed by how easily he had broached the subject.

But ever since he’d touched on it with Layla and Aleksander, Hugo’s name had been on the tip of his tongue.

As he shifted uncomfortably, Saira tilted her head. ‘They want you to be who, Angus?’

‘Hugo,’ he whispered.

Angus might have said his brother’s name quietly but it triggered a stream of memories he hadn’t allowed himself to think of in years.

Gilly refusing to leave her bedroom, her agonised cries echoing down the hallway.

Peter telling Angus he had to be the ‘man of the house’ before he went away on business.

Coming home from boarding school to find every trace of Hugo removed from the house, as if he’d never existed at all.

Angus’s lonely childhood, even lonelier now there was no one to share the burden of expectation with.

‘Who’s Hugo?’ Saira asked gently, breaking into the chaos of Angus’s mind.

‘You know who he is. I listed my immediate family members in my application.’

‘Yes, but I’d like to hear about him from you. I get the feeling it might do you good to tell me, too.’

Angus held Saira’s gaze, waiting for her to back down, but she didn’t. ‘Hugo is… Hugo was my brother,’ he said, swallowing the betrayal he felt at referring to his brother in the past tense. ‘He drowned when he was thirteen and I was eleven.’

‘How terrible, Angus. I’m so sorry.’

‘Terrible is one word for it. Everything about that day feels like a scene in a film gone wrong. The fancy charter boat, the staff serving my parents champagne… My mother screaming when she saw Hugo facedown in the water.’ Angus shuddered as he remembered a skipper on the boat pulling Hugo’s limp body from the water.

‘My parents sued the boat company and did everything they could think of to make it better, but nothing brought Hugo back. They’ve never recovered from it. ’

‘And you? Did you ever recover from it?’

Angus blinked. He’d never really thought of Hugo’s death solely in terms of himself, but of course, what happened to Hugo impacted Angus. He was his wickedly funny big brother. There one minute, gone the next.

‘I was never allowed to talk about Hugo,’ Angus admitted.

‘My family is the definition of stiff upper lip, so all thoughts of Hugo had to be pushed away. In that sense, no, I never recovered from it. How could I? You can’t recover from something if you’re made to pretend it never happened. Or, in Hugo’s case, never existed.’

‘Keeping those feelings to yourself must have put a terrible strain on you.’

Angus shrugged. ‘It’s not like I had much choice. The fallout from Hugo’s death was inevitable. Overnight, I went from being the youngest sibling to the only child. Everything my parents ever wanted fell to me.’

‘That’s a heavy load for a person to carry.’

‘Maybe, but it’s not like I carried it well.’

Saira’s eyes bored into Angus, willing him to continue pulling at this thread. He could feel the calm she exuded spreading across the room, inviting him to talk.

It’s okay, he thought. Just say it.

For once, Angus listened to himself. ‘My parents have a vision of who Hugo would have become, and it’s everything I’m not.

I mean, look at me, Saira. I’ve done nothing with my life.

The one time I bothered to try something, I failed in the most spectacular way.

I lost so much money. Hugo would never have done that.

He was strong and confident. He would never have fallen for such a stupid scheme, but I did.

’ Shaking his head, Angus sank into his self-loathing.

‘With Hugo gone, I was expected to become everything he was. I tried, I really did. I became Head Boy. I joined the rugby team and made the right friends, but none of it came naturally to me. I couldn’t fit in those spaces.

I couldn’t become the son my parents wanted.

’ Angus winced at the shame of saying that out loud.

‘When I met Layla, I didn’t want to be a failure anymore.

I wanted to be someone different. Someone who worked a nine-to-five and went for runs and had beers with his friends at the weekend. I wanted to be normal.’

‘Some people think we should remove the word “normal” from our discourse,’ Saira said.

‘They argue that “normal” can’t exist because normality is dependent on unique personal experience.

One person’s normal is another’s abnormal.

So, when we compare ourselves based on “normal”, we’re creating limits that don’t exist.’

‘The only limit I’ve ever tested is how badly I can mess up,’ Angus replied, picking at the skin on his thumb.

‘Listening to you is interesting, Angus. You see yourself as a directionless, unambitious failure, but I don’t see that when I look at you.

I see someone who is scared to try in case they let people down, not someone who is a letdown.

They are two very different things. It seems to me you need someone to tell you that it’s okay to fail, so long as you try. ’

‘That is what I need,’ Angus admitted. ‘Before I took part in this experiment, my father told me he could see I wasn’t happy.

He told me to make a change. He’s never said anything like that before.

I can’t stop thinking, what if he’d told me that sooner?

What if he’d given me permission to find my own path instead of worrying I could never follow his or Hugo’s?

Maybe I wouldn’t have wasted so much time. ’

‘What ifs are wonderful tools of thought, but they’re damaging ones. No one can go back, no matter how much we wish we could. All we can do is look to the future.’

‘But I don’t know what my future looks like.’

‘Well, why don’t we imagine it? What does the perfect future look like to you?’

Angus closed his eyes and turned his thoughts inward. As soon as he did, the guilt over his lies stole his breath.

‘Your perfect future,’ Saira said, her measured tone offering his mind a life raft. ‘Who’s in it?’

‘Layla,’ Angus replied immediately.

‘Who else is there?’

‘My father. He’s smiling at me. He’s not worried anymore.’

‘Why isn’t he worried?’

‘Because I’ve figured it out. Who I am. What to do. How to use my time.’

‘And what is it you’re doing in this future?’

‘I… I don’t know, but it makes me feel good. I’m making a difference.’

‘Well, someone with your connections has a lot of power to make a difference,’ Saira commented. ‘And you’ve started volunteering. You could do a lot of good there.’

Angus opened his eyes. ‘I’ve had an idea, actually. Well, half an idea,’ he admitted, then he shook his head. ‘It’s silly. It probably won’t work.’

‘Tell me,’ Saira said.

Sitting forward, Angus clasped his hands together.

‘I met a man at the hospice. His daughter had cancer when she was little. He told me how hard it was to take her for treatment around his job. Their house was miles away from the nearest children’s cancer ward. I was thinking I could help with that.’

‘How?’ Saira pressed.

‘Well, while people are receiving hospital care, the demands of life don’t stop,’ Angus replied.

‘But the disruption of needing treatment is huge. People have to attend appointments, sometimes far away, while still going to work and earning enough to pay their bills. It seems to me that something could be put in place to bridge the gap between people’s everyday lives and their medical needs. ’

‘And what would that be exactly?’

‘I’m not entirely sure. I’m still thinking through the details, but I think there’s an opportunity to ease the burden.’

‘There definitely could be,’ Saira agreed. ‘It sounds like if you can figure that out, it might help you find the purpose you mentioned earlier. Become the person you envision.’

‘I don’t know what to do to get there, though.’

‘Shall I let you in on a secret, Angus? One no one admits? There are very few people out there who know what they’re doing. Most of us are simply making it up as we go along.’

‘You don’t seem like you’re doing that.’

Saira laughed. ‘Trust me, I am. But something I’ve learned while working on The Life Experiment is that the people who do know what they’re doing have one thing in common. They listen to themselves. They’re honest about their desires and they share that honesty with those around them.’

Angus lowered his gaze. ‘You want me to tell Layla the truth.’

‘What I want doesn’t matter, Angus. What you want does.

I know Layla is top of that list, but a relationship shouldn’t be used as a distraction from the things you don’t want to face.

You’ve told me how much you value what you have with Layla.

I read it in your questionnaires and see it in your face when you speak about her.

The best way you can honour that is by working to become the man you describe.

Shut out the weight of expectation, listen to your heart and figure out who Angus Fairview-Whitley is. Do you think you can do that?’

Angus thought about his heart and how it had kept him alive for thirty-four years. How it had powered him through rugby finals and all-night parties. How he increasingly suspected it belonged to Layla, even if he couldn’t brave showing her his true self.

But most of all, when Angus thought of his heart, he thought of how he’d been so scared to break it, he’d never given himself permission to try.

‘I guess there’s no better time to start than now,’ he said, offering Saira a small smile.