Page 2 of My Kind of Trouble
Fragile Noa Drake who was always too close to breaking. Noa, who people had to tiptoe around or risk triggering an anxiety spiral that they would then be forced to support her through. She was sick of feeling that way and so, in that moment, she decided she wouldn’t anymore.
Or, at least, she would remove from her life someone who actively made her feel that way.
If Lucas didn’t want her, then she sure as hell wouldn’t be talking him into it, and she would be strong enough to walk away before he witnessed whatever breakdown would inevitably come next. Her and her ‘big feelings,’ as he often referred to them, would not be his problem anymore.
She would deal with it on her own, because he had never actually been much good at emotionally supporting her anyway. It had just taken this one lightbulb moment for her to realise it.
With a newfound determination, she knew what she had to do next and where she needed to do it. And it certainly was not here.
She turned one last angry glance his way, determined to at least get the last word, before snapping, ‘You’re right. God, how rude of me Lucas. Thank you. Thank you for opening my eyes to the comfortable life I’ve been unknowingly living. I’ll be sure to send your thank you note in the post when I leave.’
And with that, she slammed the bedroom door so it rattled on its hinges and began to pack.
Chapter 2
Noa
Undulating hills surrounded Noa in all directions. There was nothing but several shades of greenery as far as the eye could see, only broken up by skipping lambs and the occasional clusters of daffodils well within bloom—a sign that spring was underway.
Surely, there was no better time to start afresh than in the season known for its resurgence of new life. It was the season colour finally broke through from the gloom of winter, but Noa wasn’t feeling much of a sunnydisposition right now.
At twenty-eight years old, she never thought that she would find herself newly single and driving back to her parents’ house. She had a plan for her future but, funnily enough, this was not it. She couldn’t help but think that life had a warped sense of humour and that she was currently the punchline in some sardonic joke. Noa flexed her fingers on her steering wheel to release the pressure from her white-knuckle grip.
She tried to focus on her surroundings, grounding herself in the moment, to avoid the cascade of negative thoughts and worries that would only serve to overwhelm her. She already couldn’t shake the feeling that she was making a mistake and would regret not fighting harder for her relationship.
The winding country roads came to an end as the sign welcoming her to Freymoor gave way to a mix of paved and cobbled streets. She had always felt like the hills protected her sleepy hometown, cocooning it at the foot of their slopes. A far cry from the chaotic city streets of London, where she had spent the last eight years.
Locals waved eagerly at her through her window as she passed them by, clearly more enthusiastic than she was to see her back home. Freymoor was one of those places where everyone felt like more than just a familiar face, and where the gossip mill was even faster than the internet speed. So, she knew that her arrival would be the talk of the town by the evening, and the idea of her failures being small town tittle-tattle elicited an uneasy feeling in her stomach.
Ignoring it, Noa wound down her window as she drove down the familiar cobbled street that led to the place she once called home, and now would again. She took in a deep breath and let the cool, fresh spring air fill her lungs, reminding her she certainly was not in the city anymore. Somehow, that thought settled her. There was something about thecountryside that soothed a part of her whenever life felt too heavy. Everything felt slower and less chaotic in Freymoor, and she needed that now more than ever given her whole life had just gone up in flames.
Dramatic? Maybe.
But she felt like she had earned the right to be a little dramatic.
She’d wanted to move back here with Lucas one day, but had soon buried that idea with a few other things on her ‘to do’ list, under the sacrifices-she-was-happy-to-make-for-him pile. It was funny thinking of those things now. She doubted that list ever ran both ways, but she would pull it out once she got settled and start crossing them off one by one. Doing so would probably be very therapeutic under the circumstances, like claiming back something she had lost. She mentally applauded herself for the head start she had unknowingly given herself by returning home.
Silver linings.
There was no time like the present to start a ‘30 before 30’ list after all and, with no other solid plans in her future, maybe it could be a way of really turning her breakup into something positive. That ought to motivate her to really give it a good go too. Nothing motivated her quite like the power of putting pen to paper and creating tasks for herself. It had been an ongoing joke in her family growing up; she’d constantly left scraps of paper and rambling lists around the house, and it drove them all crazy. Just as the recollection of her family began to calm her racing thoughts, she was jolted back to reality when a ginger ball of fluff shot into the road, causing her to slam on her breaks. The piercing screech of metal on metal reverberated through the car and Tinks mewled in the back seat, clearly less than impressed by the disturbance. Now, it wasn’t only herthoughts that were racing, but her pulse thrummed so intensely she had to slow to a crawl as she tried to gather herself. A panic attack was not on her bingo card for today and every tiny disruption or stimuli threatened to tip her over that edge. She was a raw nerve, and it was clear the next few days were going to test her coping strategies.
The ginger cat now sat preening itself on the kerb, looked completely unfazed by the war currently raging inside Noa. She couldn’t help but think that the near miss was a sign—from who she didn’t know—that she had made a mistake and that this journey home was the wrong one. But there was no going back now. Overanalysing would get her nowhere.
Trying to drown those thoughts out, she turned up the volume on her car’s old speaker, the tinny sound ofThe Greatest Showman’s‘From Now On’ filling her ears. She braced herself for the tears she was sure would fall soon enough.
They should, right?
Six years of her life and the future she had once planned for, now nothing but a distant memory. And yet, all she felt was numb. Like the last forty-eight hours had been nothing but a fever dream, or a few chapters in the latest book she was reading—The Third Act Breakup—and everything was going to be okay again soon. Well, that settles it, she was definitely in the first stage of grief alright: denial.
And if denial was what kept the overwhelming anxiety she felt when anything big changed in her life at bay, she was all for it. In fact, she could stay here in that bubble forever, quite blissfully ignoring the shitty situation she had now found herself in. The car rocked, her suspension being pushed to its limits as she directed it over the cobbles that paved the way to her family home.
Noa tried to centre herself, to push down the rising sense of panic gripping her chest. She focused on the light smell of pollen in the air and the newly-planted hanging baskets which lined the stone-built terraced street—the sign of new beginnings. She concentrated on the hum of her engine as she pulled to a stop and on the bright green door, now chipped and peeling from years of slamming and heavy rainfall in this northern town. The sight had her making another mental note to apologise to her parents for those moody teenage years when she got a chance.
The door’s stained-glass panel had always been one of her favourite features of their house. It was like her very own ‘welcome home’ sign that stood out from the rest on the street. The side of her mouth tipped up into an almost-grin at the sight of the plain glass squares in the corner, a stark difference to the vibrant patterns surrounding it. A memory arose from the depth of her subconscious, of a much younger Noa and her brother, Ryan, when he had kicked a ball through the glass during a game of dodgeball. The wrath of their father had scared them half to death—a side of him it took a lot to unlock—and their mum had refused to replace it to match the rest because she’d said that it would only happen again. Turns out, she wasn’t wrong.
Her brother was a human tornado, always had been. And he had never been one to simply walk through life, more like hop, skip, and jump with a crash landing.
He was fun-loving Ryan. What she would do to steal a bit of that for herself right now, to not take life too seriously and just take her current situation in her stride. She knew that’s what he would do.
