Page 72 of The Pleasure of Panic

Gun.

It echoes in my head. And I need to know more. I need to know all of it. Not so I can understand her. I already understand her. But so I can join her. So I can walk by her side. So I can take up her banner and proclaim myself loyal.

Eventually I find myself sitting in a chair near the front row. The woman next to me is crying and I have a sudden urge to take her in my arms and tell her it’s all gonna be OK. That she is strong. That she is valued. That she’s capable.

But I don’t need to, because the woman sitting next to her does it first. I don’t think they’re together, either. I think… I think two hours ago they were total strangers and now they’re hugging like sisters.

Issy has a plan. She doesn’t talk about what it will cost them, at least not in dollars. She talks about the parts of themselves they need to leave behind to move forward. She talks about guilt, because failure and guilt go together. She talks about forgiveness. Not for the people who hurt them—although that’s encouraged too because, to quote Issy herself, “Forgiveness is freedom”—but for themselves. Because everyone makes mistakes and mistakes don’t define you unless you let them. Mistakes are just tools to make better decisions in the future.

And by the time the seminar is over, we’re a family. Just me, Issy Grey, her assistant, Suzanne, and three hundred sad, but hopeful, women.

She says thank you, directs them to her website where a free online course is waiting for them, and then exits the stage.

I can hear them all whisper. “Free? Did she say free?”

Yes, that’s what she said. Which means there will not be another masterclass.

The woman in front of me already has the website pulled up on her phone. Her excitement about the course is hard to contain, so in a matter of thirty seconds, all the women around me are gathered in front of her phone. Filled with hope. Filled with relief. Filled with thoughts of salvation.

I stand up, because I know I should make my way back to that little staging room. I know I have to stop whatever escape plan Issy’s about to enact. I know all this, but I find myself transfixed. Stilled. By this woman. By her performance? No, by her honesty. Her sense of responsibility to these three hundred strangers.

So I take just another minute, just sixty more seconds. And I see them. Like really see them.

And I realize…

We are all Team Issy.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR - ISSY

There’s always a bunch of commotion after a seminar. People want to talk to me, get my opinions, tell me their story. And I want to listen. I usually do listen. But today… today I need to get out of here. I spy Finn in the open door of the staging room. He towers over most of the women. His eyes are searching for me, because I get lost in a crowd. And then his gaze finds mine and he smiles.

I smile back, even though I don’t feel much like smiling. Talking to people about their lives, the things that hold them back, and how to find hope for the future is an exhausting thing. And this time afterward is typically how I recharge the sadness I see on their faces as I talk.

But today it’s Finn’s smile that recharges me. I sign books, because that’s my job. And I listen to them, and smile, because I owe them that. We’re in this together, all of us, so I owe them that. And I’m grateful. Even though this life is over for me, it’s just starting for them.

The free online course will help them. I’ll try to answer emails for a while, but I’m leaving town today. I’m disappearing, turning into someone new tomorrow.

I look at Suzanne and she sighs, looking straight at me. She knows what’s coming, but she doesn’t know why. She has no details.

“What’s wrong?” she mouths from across the room.

“I need to get out of here,” I mouth back. Slowly, so she can read my lips.

She nods, then starts talking loudly, trying to get everyone’s attention.

I take one last look at Finn, who is caught in the crowd, trying to make his way towards me, and turn away.

There’s a door in the back of the room that leads to a more-or-less private hallway. And there’s a stairwell there. I know that much. So that’s where I end up.

“Issy!” Finn calls from behind me. “Wait!”

I want to run. Right now. Because I kinda like him. Even though I’ve known this man less than a day, it was kind of a fun day. The pleasure of panic. I guess it’s true. Danger, even just the perception of danger, brings people closer. It creates bonds that don’t evolve in any other situation.

But it wasn’t just the perception of danger, was it?

“Issy,” he says again when I disappear into the stairwell and let the door close behind me.

But he follows, and a few seconds later he’s jumping down the flight of stairs I’ve descended and blocking my way. “Where are you going?”