‘Let go, let go,’ urged the other masseuse. I loosened my grip on the couch and tried to relax. Forward and back, up and down, they stroked and I slithered. It had been years since I’d had a massage and I felt I’d lost the ability to switch off. Life, work and commitments always seemed to take precedence. Running my shop was a full-time business, often spilling over into my evenings and weekends, so aspirations to have regular treatments or a facial seemed to get shoved to the bottom of the list. Even this holiday with Pete and Marcia had been combined with purchasing a small amount of merchandise to have sent back home. While my friends had been dozing on the beach in Kerala, I’d been combing the market stalls nearby, looking for appropriate acquisitions while trying to ignore Stuart’s voice in my head advising me not to get into debt before I left. As the masseuse bade me turn over, I wondered what to expect this afternoon. A psychic? What would she see? Anything? I wasn’t sure I wanted to be told about my future. It might be bad news. Life had been uncertain on so many levels before I’d left to come away. Business was slow and my love life at an all-time low. Could things change? Or would it be more of the same – work, work, work; getting older; more Friday nights alone in front of Netflix, trying to convince myself I was OK. I didn’t need anyone. I was strong, independent. I was OK, and keeping busy provided a way to block out the fact that I was fifty, single, and all my previous relationships hadn’t worked out for one reason or another. If I hadn’t got it right so far, there was little chance I was going to succeed in the future, so I’d given up looking. I’d worked hard to create a life where it appeared that I had it all and I didn’t need anyone. I had a lovely house, though I barely spent any time there, great friends, though mainly couples, but really nothing to complain about. My work was my life; that was an achievement, though lately I’d realized that I rarely got the chance just to kick back and enjoy life. The truth was, behind the mask of the independent, successful businesswoman, I was lonely at times. No wonder I was tense.

‘OK, waking up now lady,’ said the masseuse, just as I was finally beginning to doze off. ‘Drink much water. Get dressed when ready.’

3

We set off for the Taj Lake Palace Hotel in the early afternoon, feeling soothed and scented after our treatments. I’d resigned myself to going along to keep Marcia happy, to smile and listen to whatever rubbish the fortune-teller had to say and not to let my cynicism be too apparent.