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“Makaukau, Selkie?” TJ asks.
It’s what the chanter says to the Hula dancers. Ready?
I’ve been sitting on a swing-seat in TJ’s garden, ‘emptying my mind’, while Davina’s been inside getting guidance.
“Is hypnosis anything like Hula?” I ask him.
“Good question. And the answer is yes. Hula is an expression of spirit. And hypnosis...connects you with spirit.”
In the therapy room the curtains are drawn and the shelves are decked with candles, all alight. Davina is lying on a massage table with her eyes closed. She’s already in a hypnotic space. I lie on the other table and TJ begins to relax me with his voice, deeper and deeper.
Last night he spent an hour in this room showing me what would happen today. Just a state of deep relaxation while I was still awake. I got to cruise through different colours, like my trance during the seminar, and I liked TJ – a plump sandy-haired guy in his forties with a broad open face. No saffron robes, just fluoro board shorts and a white shirt.
“Everything that happens in this room,” he told me, “comes from you. You’ve had experiences that seem to be paranormal in origin, but hypnosis can only deal with your own mind. Whoever we meet under hypnosis is part of you. If we meet the woman, she’s you. If we meet Raven, she’s you. If we meet the entity, it’s you. Like the actors in your dreams they’re all parts of you.”
“That’ll be a relief.” Won’t it?
“Some people find it terrifying. They prefer to deal with spooks and spectres, not the demons in their own psyches.”
I thought about this. Spooks and spectres are comforting. You can put their meddling down to chance. Or bad luck. Nothing to do with you. But a crowd of personal demons would prove I’ve been lolo all along. Just like Raven.
And if she’s riding around on my shoulder and won’t let go, does that make her ‘part of me’? My mother, my entity? I’ve always longed for a real mother and now I can’t wait to get rid of her.
“I have to find out what’s going on,” I said. And meant it. “The roller-coaster has made me dizzy.”
“Good. Be open to whoever makes contact.”
“What? The demons get to choose? But they’ve been calling the shots for weeks. When do I get a turn?”
He laughed. “You need to be open so your mind doesn’t control things. To find out the truth you’ve got to let go and observe.”
So today we’re going deeper. To the observer space. I’m still awake, still aware of my body, of the room. It’s my level of detachment that’s different. If someone fired a gun, I’d find it...interesting.
When he’s satisfied with me, TJ moves away and brings himself down too. I feel him arrive. Then we’re all in that kingdom beneath the sea where time has no meaning, where thoughts are just noise. I see my thoughts floating above on the surface and I’m gazing up at them from a place of deep contentment. They’re just bobbing there, like flotsam from a shipwreck, not even interesting.
What is interesting is the sense of my own presence, a timeless stillness. I’m paying attention at last, an awareness that’s amazing because it requires no energy, and I never want it to end.
When TJ eventually speaks his voice comes from far away. “Can you hear me, Selkie?”
“I hear you.”
“Davina, can you hear us?”
“Yes, I can.”
Her voice delivers a rush of support.
TJ begins. “You’re going to look in the mirror, Selkie. You’re going to go back to the chair. You’re going to see the bathroom and feel the straps around your body and you’re going to look into the mirror. How do you feel about that?”
Another voice comes from far away. My voice. “I’m afraid.”
“You’re afraid. That’s the truth. I want you to talk about your feelings all the way. You’re afraid but you’re in a safe place. You’re lying on a table in a candlelit room. I’m here. Davina’s here. Nothing can happen to you.”
“If nothing can happen why am I afraid?”
“Because you were frightened once upon a time. And you’re still carrying the fear around, perpetuating the state that created it. It’s probably why you blanked out what you saw in the mirror.”
“It frightened me.”
“Yes. But now you can acknowledge the fear and go back to the mirror.”
“Acknowledge the fear.”
“You’ve already done that by being aware of it.”
But I want to do more. “Thank you, fear,” I hear myself say. “You’ve kept me safe. We’re going to do something scary now, we’re going to look in the mirror. But nothing bad can happen to us because TJ and Davina are here.”
“OK,” TJ says. “Let’s begin.”
He takes me back to my bathroom doorway and I’m sitting in the chair all over again. I can feel the bindings. And I can feel the fear. But instead of overwhelming me, it’s strangely comforting. Like an old friend.
“Now you’re going to pull the towel off the mirror. And when you look into the glass, you’re going to stay present with what you see.”
In my mind I do what he says. I pull the string and the towel slips onto the floor. I gaze into the mirror and wait. Nothing happens.
“What can you see?” TJ asks.
“Nothing.”
“Keep looking. Don’t take your eyes off the mirror.”
Is this what happened last time? Nothing at all? But I’m sure I saw the woman before I fainted. Now she’s playing hide and seek, as if she knows the game’s up.
“Selkie? Keep talking to me.”
“Still nothing.”
“Can you see anything, Davina?”
“Selkie is standing on the edge of something. She’s gazing...into a black void.”
“Yes. Does that make sense to you, Selkie?”
Suddenly I’m screaming. “It’s the underworld. She’s trying to suck me into the underworld. She’s trying to take over my body, she’s trying to steal my soul.”
“Who?” His voice is calm.
“The woman. She tried to suck me into the mirror with her eyes. She tried to throw me off the cliff. She turned up at Roger’s and he died trying to print pictures of her. Now I know she’s been my dead mother all along.”
“Raven.”
“A bird. And an omen. Ravens are black-hearted. They forebode death.” I’m standing on the edge of the abyss, almost swooning as the blackness rises up to grab me. If I faint again I’m gone. “Don’t let her take me,” I wail. “I’m not ready to die.”
“Nothing can happen to you here,” TJ says in his calm way. Then he asks, “Why is Raven after your soul?”
Doesn’t he understand? “She’s dead,” I scream. “I’ve seen her grave. She’s dead. And I’m alive.”
“But she’s your mother.”
“She’s gone over to the dark side. She wants to take over my life because I’m family.” A word I’ve always hated. “She left me for dead as a baby and now she’s trying to kill me again. Everything she does is evil.”
“Do mothers do that, suck the life out of their daughters?”
“Yes,” I scream. “It’s their job. When she’s finished I’ll be an empty shell.”
Then he speaks so quietly, the words reverberate like thunder. “So why are you letting her do it?”
“What?”
“Raven’s dead, Selkie. She abandoned you and you’ve grown up without her. But you’re still holding on.”
There’s a long silence before I answer. “She’s holding on to me. She’s the one who won’t let go.”
“How do you know that?”
“Who else would the woman be? Raven died here and now she’s stalking me. She looks like me. She’s got my eyes. Everything fits.”
“And whose mind is making them fit?”
More silence. I’m still strapped in the virtual chair, so Raven can’t get me. But I can’t escape the interrogation either.
“Look in the mirror, Selkie. And tell me what you see.”
“I don’t want to,” a little voice says.
“No, you don’t want to. Why?”
“I might see...the truth.”
“That’s what you saw last time. The truth. Scary, wasn’t it?”
“Yes.”
We sit in silence. We’ve come right back to the fear. I was afraid once upon a time and I’m still afraid.
“It’s your friend, isn’t it?” TJ says. “The fear? It’s kept you safe all these years.”
“Everyone needs a friend,” the little voice says.
“Especially a little girl...who lost her mother.”
Someone starts to cry. Me. I couldn’t bear it if he took my friend away.
“Let’s find this friend,” he says. “Let’s look in the mirror and find the fear.”
Part of me knows it’s a trick but I want to see my friend. So badly it hurts.
“I’m bringing you light, Selkie. To help you see.”
Tejala means ‘bringing light’ – I remember that.
Suddenly the black void is swallowed up and my body appears in the mirror, bathed in light. Liquid light. Blindingly beautiful light. I can’t help looking. In the middle of the space I see my body, sleek and glowing.
“There’s so much light,” TJ says, “that any shadows around you will stand out against the brightness.”
In my mind I squint. I can see all sides of my body as if I’m the light itself.
“Take your time. And tell me what you can see against the light. Anything at all, no matter what it is.”
“I can’t see anything,” I say.
“Look again.”
I start at my feet and rotate in a spiral all the way up to my head. There’s nothing anywhere. What am I supposed to see? A monkey? A raven? A naked woman with an evil stare? There’s nothing to be afraid of here. But where’s my friend?
My voice sounds as distant as TJ’s. “I’m floating in white space.”
TJ asks Davina, “Do you see anything around Selkie’s body?”
“Nothing at all.”
“I agree. How do you feel about that, Selkie?”
“How do I feel?” Feelings surge. The light around my body flushes red. I start to shout. “Angry, that’s how I feel. Furious. You said I’d see my friend but there’s nothing there. You betrayed me. Everyone betrays me.”
“Keep talking about your feelings.”
I start to cry again. Great racking sobs wash over me in multiple shades of blue. “I’m so sad,” I scream at TJ. It’s all his fault.
“Yes, you are. Let the sadness flow.”
Sadness I’ve never felt before gushes out of me and the kingdom at the bottom of the sea is awash with the greyness of grief.
Then TJ asks, “If you could see this friend...who would it be?”
“I don’t know.”
“And if you did know...?”
Time slows down. Something hidden flips into my mind. “Someone...I’ve lost. Someone...of my own kind.”
“Tell me more.”
What my voice says next is a total shock. “My child.”
There’s a moment of silence before TJ says, “Have you had a child, Selkie?”
“No. Whoever just said that lied.” More betrayal.
“Have you lost a child before full term?”
“No.”
“Are you sure? There’s something here. I’m getting very strong energy around this. Around your grief. And your denial. I feel a presence. What are you getting, Davina?”
“An abortion.”
“Selkie?”
My voice is very detached. As cool as ice it betrays me. “A miscarriage. In the downstairs bathroom. A very long time ago.”
“Describe what happened.”
My voice goes on, separate from my will. “My period was late. We were watching TV.”
I remember it clearly, sitting on the floor with Gretel and Stella, watching an old movie. Rock Hudson and Doris Day. Rock had already died of AIDS but Stella was in denial.
“There was a rush between my legs. A force I’d never felt before. I didn’t understand, only that I had to run. I made it to the bathroom and locked the door.”
The bathroom for guests still had a lock.
“It was a long time before it was...finished.” I’m back there now, looking into the toilet bowl. “I knew what it was. I saw...more than blood.”
“What did you feel?” TJ asks.
From my detached space, it’s a strange question.
“There was a terrible mess, my clothes were bloody. I had to clean it up without Stella finding out. She was pounding on the door, demanding I open up. I wasn’t allowed to have secrets, not from Stella.”
I’m reliving the panic, how I had to think fast.
“I decided to say I’d vomited, to explain why I’d washed my clothes in the basin and come out in a towel. Then there was an unholy drama about what I must have eaten.”
“What did you feel?”
“Relief. I wasn’t pregnant. No one was going to find out.” My voice emits an evil cackle. “I got away with it.”
“What was it you got away with?”
It’s a moment before a little voice says, “Can’t tell. Secret.”
“But it’s not a secret any more.”
“If you tell, you die.”
“It’s safe here, Selkie. Nothing can happen to you here.”
“I’m never safe.”
“Why?”
Hasn’t he been listening? “Someone is trying to kill me.”
“Why? What did you do?”
“Can’t tell, not safe.”
TJ waits, then he says, “That’s the secret, isn’t it? Not telling. Who didn’t you tell? You can just say the name.”
If I only say the name it’s not telling, is it? “Andrew,” I whisper.
“You didn’t tell Andrew.”
“No.”
“You didn’t tell him you were pregnant. You didn’t tell him about the miscarriage.”
“No.” Now I’m screaming. “He’d want to keep it. He’d blame me for losing it. I didn’t know how to resist him. I hated myself for not loving him.”
I’m sobbing now, sitting in the wreckage of my secret, a metaphor for my life. Guilt swirls around me in all its ugliness and I’m ashamed.
“I was only sixteen.” My voice drops to a whisper. “The same age as my mother.”
“It isn’t safe to have babies, is it?”
“If you have babies you die.”
“Just like Raven,” he says.
But now I know that was a lie.
After a while TJ asks, “What did Stella think of Andrew?”
The cackle is back. “She hated him. Because he wanted me. A rival for control of my life.” I stop. The penny drops. “It was right after Stella burned my diary, stopped calling me Selkie. I slept with Andrew that first time...to pay her back.”
Another secret. This one I’d kept from myself.
“Virtual suicide,” TJ says. “We punish the people who’ve betrayed us by killing ourselves.”
“But I didn’t kill myself. I killed...the baby.”
“Is that true, Selkie? It was a miscarriage.”
“My mind killed it. I didn’t want it. I knew it was my fault.”
“Miscarriages happen every day. That baby wasn’t meant to live. But you were part of what happened. Own your part in it.”
He gives me time to sit with the truth. To take responsibility for creating that baby. For not wanting it. For not grieving for it. For turning it into a guilty secret. He lets me cry until there are no tears left.
“Denial is a powerful thing,” TJ says. “By not wanting him, you kept him.”
“Who?”
That’s when something amazing happens.
Against the light embracing my body, a tiny shape appears. It begins as a smudge. Then a head takes shape, like a foetus growing, followed by arms and legs.
“I can see him,” I say.
A small boy is sitting on my left shoulder. His head is bowed and his arms are wrapped around his bent knees. But as I watch he straightens his back and lifts his head. When he looks at me I remember him from my dreams.
Words pour out of me. Words I don’t expect. “Hello. I’m sorry you’ve been alone. I’m sorry you’ve had to hide. I pretended you were nothing but...I love you.”
And in that moment I even love myself. Whoever I am. Someone I’ve only just met.
Guided by instinct I reach out my hand and the boy takes it.
“Your fingers are icy cold,” I say. “Where have you been?”
For the first time he speaks. “To the bottom of the sea and back again.”
That’s the moment when the mirror is lashed by silver light. Under its blinding glow my awareness expands and I understand...
Everything.
I’m coughing up water and a woman is screaming. I’m not safe. I’ll never be safe. The message takes root in my soul.
I’m shut in the bathroom for imagining things. Someone is crying. It’s the strangled cry of the misjudged. It isn’t me, it’s another Selkie. She’s taken my place while I hide.
Stella sees right through me because I’m invisible. But the fake Selkie knows how to get noticed. By being compliant instead of real.
My diary is missing. Stella’s read it and destroyed it. My thoughts disappear forever and the fake Selkie gets rewarded with a name of her own.
My empty shell seeks false refuge in Andrew’s bed. When my period is late, I believe my life is in danger and wish the baby dead.
Stella is pounding on the door and I’m standing over the toilet. In that moment of acute relief, an entity detaches itself and soaks up a lifetime of lost emotions.
My terrible secret ties me to Andrew. With my true feelings quarantined, I’m emotionally asleep, abetting his emotional abuse.
Escaping Andrew, I find him in Roger, forever choosing predators so I’m always under threat.
Meanwhile, the tiny entity on my shoulder has kept me ‘safe’. Safe from the reality of sadness and grief and joy and love. Safe from the truth of my own heart. While my default emotions, fear and anger, displaced everything else.
“Why did you stay?” I ask the boy. “Your soul was free to go.”
“You needed me.”
It’s that simple. In my moment of acute panic, he wasn’t free. By denying him, I trapped him forever. And, forged from denial, he made the perfect guardian for the life force I’d denied – entity and emotions linked forever by the same lie. He even stored them at the bottom of the sea where he knew I’d never find them.
We hold each other’s hand and no-one speaks. It’s enough that we’re together at last. Moments of infinite understanding pass between us. Moments of forgiveness. And love.
“You’ve done a great job,” my voice says. “Thank you.”
It’s the acknowledgement he’s been waiting for. He’s done a great job and his job is over. He stands up, and with TJ’s guidance I create a virtual bowl. The boy knows what to do. He steps into the bowl.
“Take it in both hands, Selkie,” TJ says, “and swirl.”
Do I know what’s going to happen? I spin the bowl and the boy goes round and round, getting smaller and smaller. He disappears into the light, just like a dream with the dawn. And I’m alone. Deeply alone.
An arrow of grief leaps from my heart and I cry out in pain. But it bounces off the mirror and douses me in something new.
“He’s gone,” I say, tears of grief and joy rolling down my cheeks.
“Yes,” says TJ.
“I’ve set him free.”
He’s free.
And I’m free.