Chapter 25 #2
My fidgeting must have given me away because I felt a hand reach out and squeeze mine.
Dax. His long fingers wrapped around mine, even as the rest of him remained perfectly still.
The tremors in his hands must come sporadically as they were still around mine in this moment.
He squeezed again softly, and I sighed, letting my head tip back against the wall behind me.
Fine, I’d stay. But only because he was holding my hand, and my life was falling apart, and my chaotic self would take any physical comfort it could get.
Especially his completely normal volunteering, workaholic, perfect change paying comfort.
“This is a space within you where there is nothing for you to do and nothing for you to protect. Where you feel complete ease,” I heard Willow say.
I’d never known such a place. But sure, I’d play along, mainly so I could take the piss out of it with Rick later.
I’d fill mine with giant dildos and jelly doughnuts.
“If you can see a place there,” she said, “could you bring it to life in your mind? Fill it with sounds, colours, smells…”
Sure. Pink dildos, glittery dildos, ones covered in strawberry-scented jelly doughnuts. I bit back a snort.
“Maybe you’re there on your own, just enjoying the space…”
Did she have any idea what I’d created?
“Or perhaps you invite someone in. Someone who makes you feel safe or protected. They could be real or imagined, earthside or not—it’s completely up to you.”
I wanted to mock the “earthside” bit. But then a figure appeared in my mind, uninvited.
A salt-and-pepper-haired man with rectangular glasses. He smiled at me—Mr Vee, the caretaker from my first school. The man I now knew to be my biological grandfather.
Yup, the same one who’d always gone out of his way to be kind to me? He had his reasons.
His wife—my grandmother—had died recently, following his own passing eighteen months earlier. That’s what triggered the will and the ownership of Bellamy Children’s Home changing hands.
His matching grey eyes twinkled as he held out an open tin of colourful sweets.
I smiled back at him, taking a purple one and popping it in my mouth.
Saliva filled the space around it as the grape flavour tingled on my taste buds.
He reached into his pocket, his other hand emerging with a palm full of mints.
I chuckled and took one of them too, enjoying the smoky smell left on them from his clothing.
He stretched an arm around me and pointed into the distance with his free hand.
Imagination is a powerful thing. Or maybe this meditation was. Because I could see her—a woman emerging from between the forest trees. My heart froze. She looked like me. Long brown hair, my build, and—
A dimple in her left cheek. A dark freckle above her lip.
Just like the young woman in the photo next to my grandparents. She was my mother. Without anyone saying anything, I knew it.
Mr Vee pulled me close again before dropping his hand to hold mine.
He reached for one of the woman’s hands with his other.
I hiccupped as unexpected emotion rolled up through my seated body leaning against the wall.
She pulled me into her arms, and we both sank to the ground sobbing.
It felt like running into someone I hadn’t realised I’d been missing my entire life, and her image in front of me emptied me with relief. We both felt it.
We’d been separated by my lack of knowledge about her, but now we didn’t have to be. At least not in my mind.
I didn’t know how much time passed as I let the woman hold me, stroking my hair gently behind my ears as Mr Vee leaned against a tree nearby, watching over us.
Eventually, Willow’s voice began cutting into my consciousness.
“You might start allowing sounds back into your awareness as you begin slowly bringing yourself back into an awakened state of consciousness. Becoming aware of the shape your body takes in the space it fills in the room.”
I looked desperately at the woman in my mind as I heard shuffling around me, pulling me from my connection. She smiled and squeezed me tightly again. I could come back, she was reassuring me; she’d be here.
“Noticing again where your body connects to the surface beneath it. Maybe inviting a little movement into your fingers or toes and opening your eyes whenever it feels right for you.”
The sound of mats being stacked jarred my eyes open. I was surprised to see that half of the room was already standing, packing their things away without me having noticed.
Dax was sitting upright. My cheeks itched, and as I brushed my fingers up to scratch them, I realised I’d been crying. That’s what Dax meant by a moment.
Bodies moved towards the kitchen, and I wanted to get away from them stat, but I didn’t feel ready to move.
“You’re new,” Willow’s voice chimed as she crouched beside me.
I nodded.
“It’s okay—sometimes people need a bit of extra time to come back. Do you want to do some grounding?”
I nodded again, feeling spacey.
“Now, this might feel silly,” she smiled, “but can you look around the room and tell me five things you can see? Maybe things you wouldn’t normally notice.”
I rattled off a list of things, and she smiled.
“Good. Now, five things you can feel with your body, then smell.”
Okay, Dax had definitely been here many times. But I realised how close this grounding exercise was to what I did naturally when I was feeling out of control and felt comfort in it. Then, the realisation dawned that I hadn’t had a nightmare since Olivia’s funeral.
“Weird,” I whispered.
“It does seem a little weird to start with,” Willow nodded, misunderstanding my out loud thinking. “Are you feeling okay?”
The room felt noisy all of a sudden, my body deeply relaxed, and my mind—thank God—felt fully online again. I bobbed my head.
“Good. Yoga Nidra takes you through sleep brain waves, so it can feel similar to waking up in the morning.”
“Then I need a coffee,” I sighed, stretching my arms over my head.
“Girl after my own heart. People always assume I’m a green tea and matcha kind of gal but I’m a shameless coffee addict,” she grinned, then drifted off toward the kitchen.
Now that I could relate to.
Dax appeared in her place.
“You okay?” he asked.
“Yeah,” I said, pressing my lips together. “That was…”
“Intense?” he grinned.
I covered my laugh with a hand. “Very intense. But surprisingly good.”
I bent my knees, moving side to side as I stretched my body out. Okay, maybe it wasn’t all lame. I could maybe see the appeal of this kind of yoga. I’d maybe even come again. Even just to see Dax lying down in his sweatpants.
“Dax?”
“Mm?” he murmured, rolling up his mat.
“I’m sorry.”
He paused, letting the words settle before tucking his mat under his arm.
“It’s all good.”
“No,” I said, biting my lip. “It’s actually not. I shouldn’t have run off without explaining, and I shouldn’t have spoken to you the way I did on the phone. I’ve added it to my list of things to work on.”
“I’ve got thick skin,” he said and flexed a bicep in my direction, shrugging. A pleasant tingle made its way through my pelvis.
“I see that,” I sighed. “But I don’t want you to need it with me.”
And I meant it. I didn’t want to hurt him or anyone else I cared about because I had the emotional capacity of a flea. I didn’t want to lose any more people. I was so bloody exhausted from running for a lifetime on my own.
I crouched back down to roll my mat up, and after I tucked it under my arm I looked back to where Dax was standing. His chocolate eyes met mine, and he nodded, stretching his hand towards me again. I let it hover for a moment and then, with a hesitant exhale, I reached up accepting his help.
Willow had said something about meeting your experience like a curious explorer. If I stopped fighting everyone and opened myself to what was in front of me, maybe something other than chaos awaited me?