Page 112 of To Hell With It
I was ready to turn and make my way back to the ferry, where no one would have noticed I had been all along. I was ready to go back to being everything I so desperately wanted to overcome but then something extraordinary happened.
Just as I turned around to look back at the ferry, just as I was about to run away, I saw a pod of dolphins (freshwater dolphins). And just as I always imagined they would, they leapt out of the water in rows, one after the other, as if they were putting on a show just for me. And I knew what I had to do.
I took a deep breath. I counted. I visualised rafts, rivers, and broccoli trees, I thanked Nicola, and then I turned around and I went in.
ChapterFifty-Four
It wasn’t pitch black. But it was dark, and it was small, and I did feel like the walls were closing in on me as soon as I stepped foot inside. I didn’t have a moment ofyou’ve got this! I didn’t suddenly feel enlightened or purged of my fear or that I could take on the world. But I did keep going, with my small steps and the vision of dolphins outside to help me. And of course, my newfound determination to finally be free of my OCD.
I followed a wooden bridge-type path that was suspended above a stream that ran below it. I could hear the water rushing underneath me, but I didn’t look down. I needed to keep my focus on what I was doing.
The group weren’t far ahead. I sped up my small steps until I reached them. I tried to steady my breathing against the pounding of my heart so that I could hear the guide in front.
‘OK, so now we’re going to be going into a slightly tighter space – everyone OK with small spaces?’ he said.
I wanted to scream but I didn’t.
‘Just take your time, it’s also a bit darker in there until we get a bit further in, but you can reach out and feel the grooves of the cave wall, it’s smooth and perfectly fine to hold on to.’
Hold on to? Why would we need to hold on to it?
‘Once we’re through the tunnel we’ll enter the main part of the cave, where you’ll see the majestic waterfall and a bit further along, the glowworms. Everyone OK?’
No.
‘Right, let’s go.’
I watched as the people in front of me squeezed through a tiny gap, more like a crack, in the cave. The sort of gap that someone would see and not ever consider going through because, why would they? Why would I?
I could hear each personoohandahhandohhandoops, followed by an,ow, as they slipped through sideways. One person had to attempt it twice, which I witnessed because they were two in front of me, and guess what? They couldn’t get their bloody head through the gap – their head for God’s sake!
When they finally worked out how to do it (to turn their head sideways the entire time until they got through) and the person in front of me followed, it was my turn.
The gap was probably three metres long, if that. It wasn’t like it went on for miles with twists and turns. From what I could see it was just a straight passageway through a rock to a more open space. So, all I had to do was walk with my head turned sideways through it.
I took a deep breath and squeezed myself inside. I thought of a cave on a raft floating by me on a riverbank but it didn’t quite cut it. I thought of trees. Irish trees and broccoli trees and I whisperedtrees, trees, treesout loud.
I closed my eyes, I opened my eyes, I thought of Tim’s wife dancing in a supermarket, I thought of her swimming with dolphins. I thought of every damn thing I’d ever been told or tried or been assured would help me, but my feet didn’t move. I was frozen. I was frozen in a cave, between two rocks, in a tiny gap that my head could barely fit through, somewhere inside the earth in New Zealand, with no one to help me because how could they pull me out if I was stuck? They couldn’t cut into the cave it would collapse. So how would they do it?
I could hear a man’s voice, it got louder and closer and more familiar as my heart beat faster. He knew my name, he knew my fear, he knew me. He knew me – how could he know me? I hadn’t spoken to any of the group, I was too scared, too petrified to talk to anyone.
Yet there he was. Had I died and gone to heaven? Was it God come to tell me that I had yet to be forgiven for all my sins, all my intrusive thoughts of penises and evil and dying? Was my grandmother right all along about going to hell for having sex before marriage? Was I there already?
‘Pearl, close your eyes and count to ten. Don’t open them until I tell you,’he said.
I closed my eyes.
‘One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten.’
‘Keep going.’
‘One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten.’
‘Don’t come out.’
But I want to come out, I’m scared. I don’t like the dark. I feel trapped, I can’t move, I can’t breathe, it’s too black.
‘Ssh, just wait.’
