With the bedroom window cracked open slightly, the hectic noise of Wednesday's north London neighbourhood drifted into her bedroom. The sun was shining into the room, coating everything in a golden haze. It was odd that the weather was so sunny, especially in mid-winter, but Wednesday loved it – chilly but sunny was her favourite.

Snuggling further down into her bed, she held the phone above her face, watching the video playing in front of her with a wide smile. The sound of 'Juice' blasted out and she found herself mouthing along as she watched Harry and Lizzo dance alongside each other at their Miami concert the day before. His smile was infectious, and her cheeks began to hurt after a minute of watching, unable to stop the grin plastered onto her face. She didn't allow herself to look and see who'd temporarily replaced her in the band line up, knowing it would bring her nothing but pain.

Dragging herself away from the phone once it ended, she threw it down onto the bed and yawned, stretching out her body. She could feel the nerves in her stomach in anticipation of her first therapy appointment later that day, but she tried to push it to the back of her mind. Instead, she got up and got ready, making her bed before showering and putting on some clothes. Checking the time difference between London and LA, she saw that it was currently 3 in the morning over there, and Harry would definitely be fast asleep by now – she'd have to save their facetime for later.

Instead, she pulled up her text conversation with him and held her finger on the microphone icon, recording herself.

"HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU. HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU. HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO THE MOST AMAZING, FUNNY, COOL, STYLISH, ANNOYING MAN ON THE PLANET AND ALSO MY FAVOURITE PERSON IN THE WORLDDDDDD. HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU."

Smiling as she replayed back her less than wonderful singing voice, she clicked send and for good measure, added a boatload of celebration emojis after.

Something in the air that day made Wednesday want to not be stuck inside the house, waiting around for 3 o'clock. So, she pulled on her vans and beanie and stepped outside into the freshness, ready for a lazy mooch around.

She still hadn't managed to ease herself back into running again yet – it had been a couple of months now and she knew she'd lost all the progress she'd been building up. But instead of allowing herself to be cooped up again when she'd returned to London the week before, in fear of returning to the state she'd found herself in at the start of the year, she'd began to go for almost daily walks.

Whether it was 5 minutes around the block, or an hour walking by the side of the Thames, she'd pushed herself out of the door every day, especially on the days she wanted to the least. She knew that was when it would benefit her the most. And it had truly made a difference to her mental state – the world had started to seem a little less claustrophobic and her head a little less fuzzy. Though she knew she was far from okay, she found the walks to be a nice step in the right direction.

Walking a few roads over, she spotted the café she'd used to frequent every other day, the one that did amazing salted caramel lattes. It also happened to be the one that Patrick would usually accompany her to and was where they'd had their cursed final breakup talk. She'd not felt strong enough to visit on her own again since that, but with a determined nod, she crossed the road and pushed open the door, the intoxicating smell of pastries filling her nostrils. A few minutes later, she left the café with a warm latte in her hand and an accomplished grin on her face.

By the time she'd got back to her house, after grabbing some food and walking around a bit more, it was already time to set off for her appointment and she nervously headed out to the tube station with an anxious swirl in her stomach. Half an hour later, she arrived at the nicely decorated therapy office, taking a seat in the reception area as she waited to be called.

Various vases full of pink peonies were placed across the waiting room, brightening the otherwise dull area. Wednesday's eyes travelled over the room with languid curiosity, focusing on the details she otherwise wouldn't have cared about if her heart wasn't currently beating through her chest at a rapid pace. She noticed how the green paint on the walls had begun to peel away in certain areas, mostly hidden by strategically placed items such as a coat rack and a leaflet stand. The magazines on the table in the centre of the room were creased and worn; most likely the result of hundreds of different pairs of hands flicking through them in nervous apprehension. A faint scent of lavender drifted through the air and though she knew this was probably intended to help calm the people waiting for their appointments, all it was doing for her was creating the onset of a migraine.

Wednesday allowed her eyes to travel to the faces of the few people sat down in the room whilst absentmindedly picking at the skin on her fingers, trying to gage their levels of anxiety in relation to her own. Directly opposite her sat a middle-aged man who, with his shining bald head and football polo top, somewhat reminded her of her own dad. He sat with his hands on his knees in a straight upright position, though her gaze was caught by the continuous slow tapping of his foot on the grey carpet as his eyes skitted from point to point in front of him, his jaw clenched shut. His whole demeanour was rigid, and she sensed that she might not be the only person in there waiting for their first therapy session.

Her stomach turned slightly as she heard the approaching sound of high heels walking down the corridor towards the waiting room and kept her eyes trained to the windowless door in anticipation for whoever would be entering. As the walking stopped, the door gently opened to reveal the warm face of a woman who couldn't be much older than 30 and the heads of everyone in the room turned simultaneously towards her, waiting in silence for who would be called.

"Wednesday Green?" the woman asked, her eyes searching for her next patient and landing on Wednesday as she slowly stood up. Shooting her a welcoming smile, she signalled for her to follow her as she turned on her heel back down the corridor.

Trailing behind the woman, Wednesday was led into the last room on the corridor and took a seat on the brown leather sofa as instructed, pulling off her coat. She noticed that the room was much airier and lighter than the one she was sat in previously, with both of the windows open, causing a breeze to circle around the room. Potted plants of all heights and shapes were placed around the space and though she couldn't quite understand why, it helped to calm her nerves.

Looking back to the woman, who was now sat in her chair with her legs folded and hands clasped, Wednesday observed that she didn't look anything like the image she had in her head of a typical therapist. Though, she wasn't quite sure what a therapist should look like; after all, she'd never been to one before. When she'd called the clinic to book in for therapy sessions after deciding it was something she needed to do for herself, she'd been told her first consultation was with a Dr Sade Nichols. The woman she'd pictured in her mind to suit the name was old, white and most likely had those round spectacles every therapist in every movie ever would wear – instead, the woman before her had lusciously thick, black curls and had a full beat face of makeup; her jewel green coloured tailored suit had Wednesday staring in awe and she almost felt inferior, sat there in her old jeans and battered trainers.

"So, Wednesday it's nice to meet you. I'm Dr Nichols, but you can call me Sade."

Wednesday nodded, limply smiling back. She felt idiotic sat on that sofa, like her reason for being there wasn't really good enough. Not in comparison to some other people's actual struggles.

"First things first, are you happy with me calling you Wednesday, or do you have a preferred name or a nickname you'd rather I use?"

"Wednesday is fine," she replied with a nervous smile.

"Lovely. Okay, so can you tell me what brings you here today Wednesday? What has occurred to make you want to seek out talking therapy?"

"Oh, I-" Wednesday stuttered, taken aback by how quickly she'd jumped right into the questioning. "Well, I...I guess I've not been feeling great for the past few years or so. Mentally. Ever since my dad was diagnosed with cancer and passed away. It's been kind of hard for me to process it all. And since then, all these other horrible things have kept happening and it's felt like my life has just been kind of...spiralling."

"Okay. If you don't mind me asking, what other bad things have happened?" she pressed gently.

"Me and my boyfriend of two years broke up, almost a year ago now. Then I had a big falling out with my best friend around Christmas. And last month, my nanna passed away. It's just...it's felt like one thing after another."

Sade smiled understandingly. "I'm sorry to hear about your father and your grandmother. That must still be a very raw loss for you."

Wednesday could already feel the burn behind her eyes, but she willed herself to not let the emotion show, breathing out slowly as she nodded at the woman opposite her.

"You said that you feel like you've been spiralling. In what way do you feel that?"

Wednesday could feel the fast pace of her heartbeat as she picked at her fingers and looked around the room as she searched for the right words.

"I, um...it's just felt like sometimes the world is so...colourless. Like there's nothing to look forward to. And some days I wake up and just want to go back to sleep instantly. I haven't been to a doctor or anything, but I guess...I guess you could say I've been a bit depressed."

"Okay. When you say the world feels colourless, what do you mean by that?"

"I, um," Wednesday started, her mind starting to become jumbled and confused again. "I just...it seems like every day I've been waking up feeling...numb. And then I pretend to be happy and okay in front of my friends but when I'm back home, it's just...nothing, again."

Sade nodded as she listened, writing in her notepad.

"Why do you feel the need to pretend to be okay in front of your friends Wednesday?"

Wednesday felt herself starting to feel trapped by the questioning, like the room had gotten smaller in the time she'd been in there.

"Um, I don't know really. I don't really like to talk about things that are going to make other people feel upset or depressed. I feel like if I spoke to them about what I felt, I'd be..."

Wednesday trailed off, looking down to the floor. Was it getting warmer in here? Was that why her cheeks felt so flushed all of a sudden?

"You'd be what?" Sade asked, her face never betraying any hint of what she thought as she remained composed.

"I'd be a burden," Wednesday said quietly, not meeting her eyes.

"Do you think your friends would think that if you spoke to them about your struggles? That you were burden?"

Wednesday thought back to the multiple conversations she'd had with her friends. Harry, Zara, Sarah, Gemma, Mitch. They'd all urged her to speak to them or call whenever she felt upset or wanted a friend to vent to. In fact, they actively encouraged her to try and speak to them more.

"No. They'd probably want me to open up to them if they knew it would make me feel better."

Wednesday's voice came out quiet and reluctant, like it was something she didn't want to admit out loud. Feeling her heartbeat quicken, she folded her arms across her chest, looking at the various plants strewn across the room in order to avoid Sade's neutral expression.

"Okay. So, why do you think you'd be a burden to them if you opened up about how you're feeling?"

She felt her whole face tense at the direction of the questioning. Was it always this intense on the first go? She'd assumed that maybe they'd have a nice light discussion, skating over the difficult topics for the first time around. Clearly, she'd been way off.

"I don't know," Wednesday mumbled, retracting into herself.

"Try to think it over Wednesday. Answer what comes into your head."

She looked up to Sade, her face tensed as she tried to find the right words to articulate what she wanted to say.

"Because...because they've all got more important stuff going on than to sit and listen to me whine."

"Okay. If one of your friends came to you, when you were busy, and said that they weren't feeling great and wanted someone to talk to, would you talk to them?"

Wednesday's brows knitted together quickly.

"Of course I would."

"So, by that logic, wouldn't they also be happy to listen to you opening up, regardless of their own personal lives?"

"I...I guess," Wednesday said shakily, her tongue darting out to wet her lips as she continued to stare at the plants.

"Okay. So, do you think that your inability to open up is then less about your friends and more because of yourself?"

"I-I don't know," Wednesday said, her voice raising slightly as the colour in her cheeks deepened. She was starting to get slightly frustrated now at the direction the conversation had taken so abruptly. "I'm sorry but...but what has this got to do with my grief and losing my dad?"

Sade closed her notepad, calmly smiling at Wednesday as she rested her hands gently on top of the pad.

"Wednesday, grief is a complex emotion. Do you know what that means?"

She shook her head, her lips set in a tight line.

"A complex emotion is one that is composed of more than one basic emotion, such as anger or sadness. You're probably familiar with the supposed 5 stages of grief yes? The depression, the anger and so on. Well, because grief is a complex emotion, it appears differently in every single person. Some people grieve by being furious. Others might never even feel anger during their grieving process."

"Okay," Wednesday replied unsurely. She felt lost and stupid as she struggled to follow along, failing to see how this all linked together.

"Well, our emotions and how we process certain situations, is dictated by something called our core beliefs. These are the foundations of who we are as individuals and are built through childhood to be assumptions we have about ourselves that we then begin to mistake as a fact. Every way in which we react and emote is affected by these beliefs. So, your grieving process has been directly swayed by the beliefs you possess."

"Okay. So, what does that mean?" Wednesday pressed, her brows tightly knitted together as her fingers pulled at the skin on the side of her hands.

"That means that in order to discover why you've been feeling so down and defeated, we need to figure out what your core beliefs are. And I believe your inability to open up, ties into that."

"What, so my core belief is I don't like opening up?"

Wednesday felt defensive – she could feel it in her manner and hear it in her tone. She didn't want to be, but it was hard not to. She wanted to talk; she didn't want to be psychoanalysed.

"No – that's simply a by-product of a core belief. A symptom, if you will."

"Well, I...I don't know what the core belief causing that is."

"That's what we're going to try and figure out," Sade smiled warmly, as Wednesday fidgeted in her seat uncomfortably. "So, back to where we were. You said you don't like opening up to your friends and we determined that that was because you felt uncomfortable in doing so. So, what about it makes you uncomfortable?"

Wednesday breathed out and though she wasn't looking down to her fingers, she knew they were probably bleeding from the soreness she felt.

"I guess I—I don't really like feeling vulnerable in front of others."

"How does being vulnerable make you feel?"

Her heart was beating so fast that other than Sade's voice, it was all she could hear. She was sure if she looked down to her chest, she'd see the faint thumps vibrating through her skin.

"Scared."

Sade nodded, writing in her book again. Wednesday tried to strain her eyes to get any indication of what she was writing, but with a defeated sigh she sat back and fervently wished she'd never come in the first place. Because she'd never felt so out of her comfort zone in her life.

"What is it about letting others in that is scary to you, Wednesday?"

Her fingers were clammy, and she could feel the thin layer of sweat forming on her back, under her sweatshirt. Her eyes darted between the plants as she tried to regain composure.

"If I let them in...then...then they have the power to hurt me."

"And how could they hurt you?"

Wednesday's head felt heavy with the pounding in her ears. Her eyes had become glossy, her bottom lip quivering as she tried as hard as she could to hold in the tears that threatened to spill over.

"By leaving me."

Sade nodded with the same expression she'd kept during the entire appointment. Wednesday on the other hand felt closed in, suffocated. The bright lights bore into her eyeballs, the breeze from outside doing nothing to ease the itchy heat that had arose inside of her.

"And if they did leave you, what would that make you think?"

"That I'm..."

The words hitched in Wednesday's throat, unable to be said. Her eyes wildly looked around the room, panic making her think irrationally. The tips of her fingers were dug into the leather of the sofa and the electric feel of anxiety coursed through her body.

She needed to escape. She needed to run.

"I can't do this."

Wednesday stood up quickly, grabbing her coat and walking to the door, not looking back as she mumbled "I'm sorry" over her shoulder and left.

Hastening down the street with her hands shoved into her pockets, Wednesday wanted to create as much distance as she could between herself and the therapy office in as little time as possible. The blistering wind worked to cool down the heat in her cheeks and after 10 minutes, she could feel her heartbeat slow down, her panicked and frenzied mind regaining some clarity.

That had been a mistake. She'd been wrong to think she could handle the intensity of therapy. Maybe it worked for other people – but for her, it was too much too fast. The constant digging, the entire spiel about 'core beliefs'. It couldn't be true, she didn't believe it. Or more so, she didn't want to believe it. Because if it was, that would mean they'd been digging towards a revelation that would make Wednesday seem utterly pathetic.

By the time she got back to her house, it was dark. Pushing her key into the front door, she let herself in with a relieved sigh, feeling grounded now that she was back in familiar territory. Once she'd taken her coat off and calmed down, she made herself a cup of tea, trying to push the session that had caused her so much distress to the back of her mind.

As she took her first sip of the scolding beverage, her eyes noticed the time. 16:21. Jolting with the realisation it would now be around 8 in the morning in LA, she took out her phone for the first time in hours, seeing a message from Harry an hour before.

She hit the facetime button before she could even think about it, a smile on her face at the anticipation of seeing him.