Page 41 of Five Things I Love About You

‘Well, it’s perfect for light news section. You know at the end…’ She trails off when Tanya seems to become even more outraged. She looks as though she’s desperate to say something else but is trying so hard to hold it in she might explode any second, bits of her scattering across the pub and landing in people’s pints.

I turn my attention back to the table.

‘I think it’s a great idea, if you’ll have me,’ I say, and regret it the instant the words have left my mouth. I would never agree to willingly put myself through that sort of humiliation without the influence of substantial amounts of alcohol, but I can only hope that Debs is just drunk enough to forget the agreement by the morning.

She turns to Tanya, triumphant. ‘See?’ she says. ‘Miranda thinks it’s a great idea.’ She smiles at me as Tanya turns her back on her, seemingly in a sulk.

‘Sorry about her,’ she says. ‘I think she’s got it in her head that you and Matt might get together, but Matt’s already made it perfectly clear it’s not like that between you, and… oh God, it isn’t like that, is it? Between you and Matt, I mean?’

‘Absolutely not,’ I say, a bit too emphatically, while trying to ignore the disappointment about Matt being so adamant there’s nothing more between us. ‘Matt and I are just friends,’ I confirm.

‘Well, good then. Give me your number and we’ll sort it out tomorrow.’

Even as I’m watching her add my number to her phone my heart is sinking. I’m not sure what made me say yes to this, but something tells me I might live to regret it.

15

Debs doesn’t forget aboutLook Northand the bloody light-hearted section of the news programme. Of course she doesn’t. In fact the following day, while I’m nursing a hangover and wondering whether it’s possible for someone’s brain to turn to sand, she rings to tell me she’s agreed it with her editor. ‘So we’re on!’ she says, thrilled with herself.

I’m not sure whether it’s her hopeful tone or the fact that I feel as though my eyeballs have been rubbed with grit, but I say, ‘Of course I’m still up for it, I’m really looking forward to it, thanks for asking me.’

Good God, what am I doing? It’s so ridiculous I haven’t even been able to bring myself to tell my best friends about it yet.

And yet two days later, I’m sitting in a chair as an over-friendly make-up artist called Tara dabs powder onto my face while at the same time regaling me with stories about her boyfriend’s penchant for kinky sex. I nod and smile at the appropriate moments (arethere any appropriate moments?) and try to stop my body from shaking with fear.

In roughly ten minutes’ time I’m due to tell the whole of the north-east of England that I’m so desperate to find a man that I’ve left my entire life behind to look for someone I barely know. I feel as though I’m floating outside my own body.

‘Right, so we’ll film the piece in one take and then if we need any adjustments we can go again,’ says the woman who’s been put in charge of me. Amy, I think she said her name was, although it could be Annie or anything at all quite frankly, as nothing seems to be sticking in my mind right now. I have at least been prepped about what they’re going to ask me, and reassured that the section is only short.

‘It’s the bit people like best, so you’ve got nothing to worry about,’ Amy or Annie tells me.

I am absolutely petrified.

Even though this was Debs’s idea she’s not here today because she’s off on a job in Darlington about a man who found a dead body in a garden bin. Serious stuff. Debs did ask Matt to come along for moral support but he’d said he was working and couldn’t take the time off, so here I am, on my own, trying to pretend I’m fine and not pass out with abject terror.

Tara is still dabbing at my face and I want to swipe her hand away and sprint out of the studio. Except now the producer is hovering beside us asking if I’m ready and I’m trapped.

Someone leads me into the studio, and I sit down on the proffered chair like a puppet. I can see my image reflected back in the camera and I look wild-eyed and pale, despite the make-up, a woman on the verge of delirium. I swipe a stray hair from my face and hope the sweat isn’t showing through my top.

And then the camera is rolling and the producer is smiling at me and the lights are shining in my eyes. I start telling the story I’d concocted about meeting this man, Jay, on a night out; about how the connection between us had been incredible, and how we forgot to exchange numbers before we lost each other. I explain how I’ve been searching for him ever since, and I feel my face flushing as I recount how I’d been skydiving and dog walking in a bid to find him. When they ask what else I’m planning to try I stumble, then admit I don’t really have any ideas.

‘But that’s what I’m here for, in the hope that someone out there might know who this man is and help me find him!’ I say, my voice far too high pitched.

And then it’s all over. My heart is about ready to hammer through my ribcage, and as I’m led away from the studio my body feels hot and tingly.

‘That wasn’t so bad, was it?’ Amy/Annie says as she unclips my mic, and I smile and shake my head and try to drink the coffee someone has handed me.

‘I hope I didn’t gabble too much,’ I say. ‘I’m not used to being in front of the camera.’

‘You were great,’ she says. ‘A natural.’

And then I’m on my way home and as I sit on the Metro, staring at my reflection in the window opposite, it all feels like a dream already. I know I’ll never watch it back. I wonder whether Matt will see it. I hope Kirstie and Sophie won’t.

But for now all I can do is wait and see if it brings me any closer to finding Jay – because if not, it will increasingly feel as though I’m chasing a shadow.

16

The sand is soft between my toes, but the water is freezing, splashing over my feet and up to my ankles. I step backwards with a shriek. I look up and out to sea, the water a deep grey-blue, the sky a brighter aquamarine. Deep black clouds hover on the horizon ready to pounce. The waves lap gently at the shore, against seaweed-covered rocks, and I feel my heart lift.

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