The best-laid plans...
It should have been a good Sunday. I had it all planned out.
Get the supermarket shop out of the way early, then spend the afternoon watching DVDs, doing a bit of gardening, cooking a roast dinner. Chilling out after a hectic week.
Only it didn't work out quite like that. We managed the shopping. Then the bloody car broke down. In the Asda car park.
That car has been nothing but trouble since the day we got it. Brakes, alignment, tyres, radio. And we've only had it three months. This time, it was the immobiliser refusing to turn off. We sat there in the heat for two hours, as our newly-purchased ice lollies defrosted into a sad puddle and the AA man (a tortured soul from the very start) became more and more pessimistic about the chances our old banger would ever sputter into life again.
After the bloke's 532nd despondent headshake, I could take it no more. I headed into the shop for the loo.
MISTAKE! MISTAKE!
That's when the Bad Thing happened. Yep, the car was just a bonus.
This was my Worst Supermarket Nightmare.
Seeing Someone I Knew Before I Was Fat.
As I strolled blithely through the automatic doors, my mind considering nothing more sinister than whether I'd packed a spare tampon, I heard the hesistant voice:
'Rach? Rachel? Is that you?'
Shit, shit, shit (sorry about the language, but it really is necessary).
It was D from the newspaper. The newspaper I'd left under a cloud of depression a year and a half earlier. The newspaper from which I now oh-so-inconveniently needed a reference.
So I couldn't even blank him.
How on earth had this happened? And how had I not seen it coming? Something had gone very wrong with the workings of the Intuition Department in my head.
Normally, as I ponder the perfectly innocent-sounding move of nipping out for some milk with no mascara on, the little gnomes up there start bashing away frantically at my cranium. 'Hey there! Idiot! Everyone in Cornwall goes to Asda on a Sunday! Sort yourself out!'
The Make An Effort Brigade, I call them. Where I am happy-go-lucky, hopeful, spontaneous, they are the sort who like everything planned.
Jobsworths. Losers. Wouldn't catch them going to the pub on a whim of a Friday afternoon.
Still, they are only trying to help. And so I obey them. Nip upstairs, change my shirt, brush my hair, slap on some lippy.
All that effort. And the worst thing is, it's almost always been in vain. It's not so much that I haven't seen anyone I know (the whole of Cornwall goes to Asda on a Sunday). It's more that I have always spied danger in time to make a speedy dash behind a pyramid of canned soup or some other equally useful barrier.
But not today. Who knows what the bloody gnomes had been up to this week? They'd kept pretty quiet, anyway. Irresponsible. Losers. Probably all down the pub.
Meanwhile I, cruelly deserted, had fallen victim to the well-known Law of the Sod. The one time I'd come to the shop looking truly terrible, I'd been caught.
I almost couldn't go over. Couldn't look at D. But there wasn't really any choice.
I took a deep breath and fixed on my widest, brightest, 'I am very successful, really,' smile.
'Hi there, D. Lovely to see you. How are you?'
The conversation proceeded, rather stilted, as these conversations so often are. I caught him looking me up and down in a surprised way. Imagined him running back to the office with the gossip - 'You know, she's obese!'
I had a minor flash of relief as I realised I wasn't the only one looking less-than perfect. From his appearance, it seemed drinking was still D's crutch to get through the job, as eating had been mine.
I extricated myself from the conversation as quickly as possible, cunningly managing to avoid any embarrassing 'so what are you up to these days?' questions. Noticing D did the same.
I got to the loo, and studied myself in the mirror. Oh no. Sitting in a hot, broken car for two hours had done me no favours. It seemed I had at least applied some mascara before leaving the house. Bonus. Sadly, though, none of it was left on my eyelashes. There was, however, plenty on my cheeks, and attractive little gunky bits in the corners of my eyes.
My top was too tight and low cut. And my boobs! Huge, freckly, disgusting.
When I had been in that job about two days, I was outside the room and I overheard them talking about me. 'She's so pretty.' I wondered what they would say now.
Ah well. It was all over. It had been a matter of five painful minutes out of an otherwise calm, ordered life. Nothing terrible had happened.
The whole experience had been...a nothing. So why was I shaking, sweating, trembling at the knees?
It affected me deeply. I couldn't stop thinking about it, going over the conversation in my head.
The saddest thing was, I'd liked D. We'd been mates. Moaning together about the shocking hours and the even more shocking wages. Ganging up against the Evil Dictators who were our bosses. Sneaking out to the pub of a Friday afternoon for a drink or ten.
And yet, after I'd left the job, I'd never seen him again. Or any of my other work friends, for that matter. They'd invited me to the pub with them countless times, but I'd always made some excuse.
Their pub trips were always too happy-go-lucky, hopeful, spontaneous. Fitted in on a whim between unforgiving deadlines.
That was no good for me. I needed time, to plan, to primp, to lose some weight.
I'd just cut myself off. And now I couldn't even bear to see them in the shop.
I was still their friend, still the same person inside. And, goodness knows, they all had their own issues. So why had I let this happen?
I am sure you all know the answer. Low self-esteem. Cripplingly low, in fact. I could really do some work on that.
So you will be glad to know I have learned from the experience.
Asda is open 24 hours. Next week, I shall do my shopping on Friday. At 10pm.
I will look awful, but it won't matter. I won't see anyone. And I won't have even the tiniest niggle of worry about it.
Because everyone else will be down the pub. Including, no doubt, my gnomes 
.
Love Rach xxx 
