Chapter Two: Stalling

I'm sitting downstairs in the Mary Oglvie Theatre, which - contrary to its name - is not a proper theatre but a lecture theatre built predominantly to allow St Anne's to hold conferences, and I can sense what I'm about to hear. Just as three months earlier as I sat in the uncomfortably stuffy office at the John Radcliffe hospital I'd sensed what the doctor was going to say. Back in March I'd wanted to laugh. This time, hearing my tutor tell me that the college are insisting that I have a year away from Oxford, laughter is the last thing on my mind. I start to cry.

Pasternak-Slater asks if I'm ok. Between muffled sobs I manage to say that I will be.

In reality I want to get out of the Mary Oglvie theatre as fast as I possibly can. If I'm cringingly aware that I'm crying in front of my tutor then I'm also aware that I'm crying in the midst of what has been turned into an impromptu art exhibition. At any moment some unsuspecting tourist might come in and see me looking red faced and distinctly unattractive. We hurriedly agree to meet the next morning when I'll, hopefully, be capable of holding a conversation without snivelling.

The next morning I've gotten my tear ducts under control and my voice is no longer catching. I can see the reasoning behind it all and know that regardless of my physical wellbeing mentally I'm not at a place where I can tackle the Oxford exam merry-go-round. I've quickly assimilated that for all my life had achieved a sense of balanced normality in the couple of weeks prior to this day it is still somehow forced. There is nothing more shattering than the well meaning 'how are you feeling?' when you hear it at least seven times a day. And I'm still hearing it on repeat.

Twenty four hours later and I'm filling the contents of my room into the back of my father's car. Four hours later and I'm unpacking them again in Leeds. Not for the three month break as I'd expected but for the next fifteen months. Suddenly everything seems to have gone off course and I feel slightly unsteady. After twenty years of steady progression I've stalled. It's rather unnerving.