BRODY DROVE INTO his yard, climbed from his Land Rover and slammed the door, aware that Lewis was probably sitting the other side of the back door waiting for him, wondering where he’d been. Brody had driven all the way to the outskirts of Dartmouth that morning, but he hadn’t been able to take Lewis with him. Therapists (or whatever the official title was) didn’t appreciate furry, four-legged chaperones for their appointments, he’d discovered.
He’d looked the guy up on the internet a couple of months ago, not long after Anna had told him about going to the racetrack. This had been his sixth session. He had no idea if it was working yet. Especially as the only place he’d been, other than out on the moor or on his own land, was to Ibrahim’s office for his sessions, and just driving in the direction of any town got him all stressed out anyway.
He unlocked the back door and was greeted by a slightly frantic and pleased-to-see-him Lewis, before the dog bounded past him, running off to the other side of the yard, where he started barking in the direction of the footpath that ran down the side of the property. It wasn’t a territorial kind of bark, but a ‘look at this!’ kind of bark.
At the very same moment, Brody saw a flash of colour in his peripheral vision. He turned to see a woman in brightly coloured walking gear, and beside her, a man in darker, more muted colours.
‘Oh, hello!’ the woman called out. ‘Thank goodness! I think we’re a little lost…’ And she made to clamber over the drystone wall that acted as a boundary between the footpath and his garden. Brody started to back away, even as the woman made eye contact and waved a badly folded map at him. ‘I don’t suppose you know the way to Hexworthy, do you?’ she said loudly, completely ignoring the fact she’d just hopped onto his property uninvited. She was middle-aged, and what his mother would have called a ‘jolly hockey sticks’ type. ‘We’re booked at a B&B in the village…’ She broke off to look at her partner in crime.
‘The Sheep Dip Bed and Breakfast,’ he supplied.
‘The Sheep Dip Bed and Breakfast,’ she repeated, as if her companion hadn’t just said exactly the same thing, and turned her hopeful gaze back to Brody.
Brody just stared at her, frozen to the spot. His heart began to pound, and his fingers went numb and tingly.
Remember what Ibrahim said,he told himself inside his head.You are okay. You are not having a stroke. Just the same non-dangerous symptoms you get every time you have a panic attack. Don’t fight it, just… notice. Accept.
Ibrahim had suggested keeping a record of when and where he had his most anxious moments: what triggered them, how long they lasted, and how bad they were on a scale of one to ten.
Six,Brody thought matter-of-factly in the corner of his brain that seemed to be functioning almost normally.Although it could peak at an eight or nine if she keeps striding towards me that way.
From talking to Ibrahim, he’d worked out that it was other people – strangers, more specifically – that triggered most of his panic attacks, and the more of them there were around, the more severe the episode, especially if he was in a confined space, like a shop, or even an outside area without many exits. He needed to know that he could get away, that he could escape.
Not for the first time, Brody chided himself for not planting a hedge or getting a fence, but hardly anyone used this old footpath. These were the first walkers he’d seen in months.
There was nothing he could do about that now. His only options were: (a) turn on his heels and run, which would make him seem incredibly rude, or (b) talk to the woman. And since his feet seemed to be cemented to the dusty ground, it appeared option (a) was more wishful thinking than anything else.
Concentrate, Brody! What was the first technique Ibrahim said to employ?
Breathe.
He needed to breathe.
The thought came cleanly and smoothly into his head like magic. As if it belonged there. He dug his feet even harder into the cobblestones and lifted his head, stared the woman in the face, all the while inhaling as evenly as he could, then letting the air out slowly again.
Hockey Sticks slowed a little to let Wiry Man catch up, so they approached him together,then thrust the map out at him. ‘Would you be able to point out where we are?’
Brody nodded. He was so familiar with his little corner of the moor that it didn’t take more than a second before he jabbed a finger at the map.
The woman squinted at where he’d pointed and looked back up at him. ‘Is it far?’ She tipped her head up to look at the sky, which was taking on a golden tinge as the sun threatened to set behind one of the tors on the horizon. ‘We’d like to get there by dark, if possible.’
‘Five…’ he managed to utter, but it sounded as if he was talking with a tablespoon of gravel in his mouth. He held up his hand so she could count his fingers.
‘Five miles?’
He nodded vigorously and pointed to the lane that headed west and down into a little wooded valley.
‘Well… Thank you,’ Hockey Sticks said, even though her face suggested she wasn’t sure her thanks were welcome. She was mostly right, not because Brody had lost the ability or will to be helpful, but because he was counting down the seconds until the pair disappeared from view and he could implode or lie on the floor or whatever else his body felt like doing to compensate for dealing with their intrusion.
Lewis was sitting beside him, looking hopefully up at the woman, tail wagging so hard it was flinging up a little cloud of dust and dirt. She bent down to stroke his head quickly, then she and her partner were off with a jaunty wave.
When they turned the corner into the lane, Brody let out the breath he’d been holding and supported himself by resting his hands on his knees.He was feeling more than a little shaky and his pulse was still galloping.
But you did it,the usually unhelpful and accusative voice in his head said.You didn’t make a fool of yourself in front of them – well, not much. You didn’t vomit. You even spoke!
I did,he thought, as he dragged in a couple of deep breaths.I did all of that.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
