Page 5 of The Fate Of Us

Nate

You'dthink,afteranhour of regulated breathing, that my heart would have slowed down at least enough that it didn't feel like it was about to take flight.

But no, stubborn thing that it is, my heart had different plans, which is why I'm sinking into my couch cushions and still trying to getmy breathing back to a normal, steady pace.

Walking back into my apartment usually makes me feel better. The floor-to-ceilingwindows don't make me feel trapped, the breeze from the air-conditioning hits my heated skin, and the general familiarity of the place calms me down like there was nothing wrong to begin with.

But for one reason or another, the combination wasn't the same today, so I lifted myself from the couch and made my way to the blanket-coated bench on my balcony instead.

I hate that my anxiety doesn’t run on the same schedule as me. How it can pounce on meat any time it pleases, without any sort of warning. No polite reminder email just to say it’s dropping by to say hello, conveniently right around the time when I’m signing probably the biggest contract of my career to date. Nothing.

The only telltale signs that it’s starting to flare up are the earthquake-inducing shaking ofmy leg and the slow, burning and tightening of my chest. Like my heart is in a vice.

I figured that as I got older, my anxiety would fade, that its claws would retract from me andI’d be free. Like how my acne cleared up the moment I turned nineteen, and how I eventually stopped getting taller at sixteen. But the sharp pain from its grip never eased up, never left. If anything, it got worse.

I do my best to keep it under control and not let it get in the way of acting, because panicattacks in the comfort of my own home are one thing; having a category five breakdown in the middle of a scene would be a whole other level of scary. Not just for me, but for my career, my image.

That’s why I’ve rarely mentioned it to anyone outside my closest friends.

Jacob was the first to know, when we found each other in New York while hunting forroommates. I figured we’d be spending too much time together, and if one of my flare-ups happened while he was around, I didn’t want him to panic and not know what to do. Luckily for me, he was more than understanding, he even went out of his way to sign himself up for a few seminars to learn about living with someone with anxiety and what you can do as their closest support network to help them control it.

After everything that had happened before New York, finding Jacob Emerson was exactlywhat I needed to help me realise that maybe I have the upper hand on my anxiety now. Maybe being away from home, and memorising the streets of a new city would provide me with the fresh start I'd needed.

Then one day I got a call from my agent, and before I knew it, all that progress, all those pep talks I had with myself in the bathroom mirror every morning, all the coaching I gave myself that helped me tackle this invisible monster, became useless.

It felt like I was on autopilot, stumbling in and out of audition rooms, castingdirectors’ offices, and other offices that I’m positive were all created by one designer. My life was a haze of beige walls, chauffeured car rides and glass tables that made my shaking leg even harder to disguise.

It took me a while to get a good sense of how different my life was going to be,especially once my debut movie had come out and suddenly there were bidding wars over which production company wanted me more. I’m still not entirely used to it now, if truth be told. It doesn’t matter how many red carpets you walk down or how many awards shows you’re invited to, that feeling of not knowing how many people are watching you, critiquing you, and judging you in that moment, terrifies me.

But to my anxious alter ego, it’s like every day is its birthday.

So it’s safe to say that being an actor doesn’t do wonders for anxious tendencies, and Iknow it’s the career I wanted, but I never fully grasped how much that choice would affect every aspect of my existence. That time of my life when I was emerging into fame truly felt like a dream… sometimes. Other times it was a nightmare pulled straight out of the seven rings of hell, but whatever.

Things eased up a little after I discovered therapy. I’d heard of it when I was younger,naturally, but when my parents suggested I try it out, I’d always denied it. I felt like if I did, if I walked into a therapist’s office and sat down and told them everything that was wrong with me I’d be admitting defeat. I thought it would make me feel weak. That I was so helpless that I’d let it take over without putting up a fight.

“I have that conversation with pretty much everyone who walks in here, Nate. You’re notweak for admitting you need help, it’s actually the bravest thing anyone battling with anxiety can do.”

That was what Alice, my therapist, said to me on my first session with her.

“Being as exposed as you are to the spotlight… I’m glad you’re here. Most of my clients arein the public eye in some aspect.”She carried on, easing the shame that was trying to creep its way up my spine.“Treat it like cleaning. Like how you wipe down the kitchen countertops after cooking dinner; therapy, unloading all your thoughts and feelings will help you stay refreshed. A weekly, mental spring clean, that’s all it is.”

It took me a while to get used to being so open about what had been controlling me for aslong as I could remember. I hated the vulnerability of it all. Hated it ever since I lost the one person who I never felt ashamed to talk to about this side of me that lived in the shadows.

But before I realised it, Alice knew my life story like she’d been with me since birth, hovering over my shoulder and jotting down every bump in the road I hit.

And it worked… for the most part.

There were still some parts of my story that I’d skipped past. That I couldn’t bring myself tomention. Because every time I sat down in the padded armchair in her office in Lenox Hill, wriggled above the squeaky leather, and looked up to talk to her… I’d realised that she’d never compare to the one person who could make me forget everything wrong in my life and silence my negative thoughts, all without uttering a word to me.

The person who taught me how to regulate my breaths, to trick my lungs into thinking I wascalm. The person who would hold me and only let go once she knew I was okay.

And actually, I lied before, about thinking my anxiety would fade away like it was aside effect of getting older. I thought it would fade away because she made it fade away, and if I always had her in my life, my anxiety wouldn’t be.

The only issue with that plan was that Adaline Moore wasn’t always in my life.

It feels stupid to admit that when I walked through those doors and into that office today,I was surprised to see her. I’ve known about this project far longer than she has, and I was even there when the casting director told me they had her in mind to play the female lead, Anastasia, the second they cast me as the male lead, Harry.

I’d spent the last week going back and forth about whether this whole thing was a goodidea or not, for fuck sake, because I wasn’t sure we were ready to be this close again, this intimate.

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