Chapter One

I remember learning about the shiny girls. They had strong, athletic brown legs, all the better for sweeping the netball high into the net. Also swingy hair (even the ones with short hair somehow swung it) and white teeth. They looked somehow brighter, more defined than me and my brown frizz and hated glasses. Even at eleven I was aware that they seemed to know who they were, seemed to embrace their personalities wholeheartedly, untroubled by my fears, totally without my secret worry that deep down, where a nice firm core of central 'me' should have been, sat a mound of colourless jelly, endlessly grasping at surrounding personalities in order to borrow something solid. Nothing stuck though. Not then, not now. I'd make a vague gesture at adopting a set of values, only to back away from the full statement - mine was an adolescence spent hovering palely at the edge, watching and jealous of the freedom the others seemed to have just to be themselves.

Now, from the outside I probably looked pretty sorted. Nice job in editorial, living with a boyfriend, lots of going out in London. Unfortunately, inside I still felt exactly the same - it took the Autumn of 2013 to make me realise why.

'Are you going to shut that cupboard?' I tensed slightly at my boyfriend's voice. Of course I was going to shut the cupboard. Bastard. Just... later. I got up and shut it with a controlled movement, meant to express my maturity and injured feelings that he might have ever thought I'd forgotten it.
Yes. Things were going great. I bit back a sarcastic 'hello, my love', aware that 1) it would be quite dickish and 2) it wouldn't help. He walked past me to the computer and switched it on, while I fought my fairly common urge to bash the computer brainless with my pestle and mortar. I never thought I'd ever live in a house with so many screens. Never thought I'd have so many conversations about smartphones either. Well, listen to so many conversations about smartphones, anyway. Somewhere, in a beautifully peaceful parallel universe, a stronger-willed, more decisive, cupboard-closing version of me lives in a small, internet free cottage in Wales. I write for a living, have a dark, intense, hunting sort of a boyfriend, who ravishes me on a daily basis and brings home venison, several alternative-style friends and remain blissfully unaware of Twitter. Probably there's a local pub too, with really good pies.
'Good day?' I ask instead. He turns, smiles and nods. Then turns back. I head to the sofa and sit down, a now familiar ache forming at the pit of my stomach. Too young for this only twenty-eight too young. Should be laughing and shagging and kissing and delighted with each other still. I stamp down on the Mills & Boon inside my head and try to remember that we've been with living with each other for four years now.

'You're asking too much,' said Sarah bluntly. 'That's what happens to relationships. You can't just keep staring googly-eyed at each other all the time - it'd be exhausting. Sometimes you just need to come home, nod at each other and be in the same room.'
I grunt, probably fairly unattractively and take another sip of my ill chosen chilli cocktail (sometimes my inability to choose the same thing on a menu twice has its downsides). 'I know it changes, but I just don't know if I can be happy with the way it is at the moment - I see him and I melt, because I find him adorable still, but it's like he looks straight through me. I could be doing salsa naked and he'd just shake his head indulgently before turning back to the computer.' I've had a couple of cocktails now and am aware that tears are hovering. Sternly, I tell myself to change the subject. Unfortunately, I've never responded particularly well to authority. I want Sarah to tell me what to do. She's far more logical than me, with a glorious lack of empathy that makes it possible for her to give ruthless, totally unintuitive solutions to even the messiest emotional outpourings. Even I'm not prepared this time though.
'How about a break up regime?'
'A what?'
'Get yourself fighting fit - it's a tough world out there in the single market - you've got big boobs but frankly otherwise you're just not ready to take it on. You should get yourself ready, then once you're prepared you can leave, but with a rock hard body, hobbies and all that other stuff that single people have to fill up the time that isn't taken up with ferociously resenting their partners.'
I had to admit, as an idea, it had merit. And so the break-up fitness training began.