This Way to Paradise

by Cathy Hopkins

  ‘Um. Yeah,’ I said, although I wasn’t really sure what he was talking about.

  ‘Contrast. The greater the light, the greater the darkness. You are resisting because something inside of you recognises truth, recognises the light. It is the dark side in you that is resisting.’

  ‘The dark side in me?’ I asked. An image of Erin and I doing our zombie act for a laugh flashed through my mind.

  ‘Yes,’ said Liam. ‘We all have a light side and a dark side. The dark side gives into temptation, leads you astray. It is like the weaker, lesser part of you.’

  If you say so, I thought as I popped another little Greek cake into my mouth.

  ‘It’s like this,’ Liam continued, ‘the word meditation simply means concentration. Some people use a mantra like the word Om as a point of focus. Others use a candle or a flower. There are many other techniques that concentrate on the breath. I’ve tried loads of different types and this is really the best I’ve found. Stay with it, India Jane. Don’t quit. Don’t give up on what may be the best thing that’s ever happened to you.’

  I was beginning to feel confused and uncomfortable. I hated it if Dad ever accused me of giving up too easily on anything, but then he was a fine one to talk. He might have staying power when it came to his art or his music but, in other areas of his life, he was the arch quitter – always moving his family around the world when he got restless some place. I felt a flash of anger. I didn’t want to be like that. But was I being a quitter now? Taking the easy way out or what Liam called giving in to my dark side? I didn’t like to think that I was, but maybe I had decided to ditch meditation too soon. In the days before the session, Sensei had spent hours talking about commitment. Maybe I should try it again? It had felt OK when I was talking to Erin about it. Like no big deal if I didn’t follow it through, but then she hadn’t sat through any of Sensei’s talks and heard what he had to say. I decided to be totally honest with Liam.

  ‘I . . . oh, I don’t know, Liam. I guess I’m feeling homesick and that’s thrown me a bit. I really wanted to speak to my family, but . . . well, they were all busy. I felt like a failure.’

  Liam nodded like he understood. ‘It can be hard when you go within for the first time because you encounter how you really are, you know? Like, when you’re busy with external stuff it can be a distraction – it can take your mind off what’s really bothering you, but go inside and it’s all there waiting for you.’

  ‘I guess. All the voices. I hadn’t realised how mad I am, nor how much I was missing everyone,’ I said. ‘At least, I sort of did, but didn’t want to think about it, but anyhow . . . they weren’t there for me when I needed them.’

  Liam nodded again. ‘You can’t rely on anything or anyone in this world. It’s a harsh lesson. Meditating can help you feel more independent. More self-reliant. Like you don’t need anyone.’

  I wasn’t sure if I totally liked the sound of that. I would always need Erin and my family, even if they were all preoccupied at the moment.‘I’ll think about it,’ I replied.‘As you said, it was my first session. Early days. Maybe I’ll give it another shot.’

  ‘Great,’ said Liam and he visibly relaxed.‘I knew you wouldn’t give up. I could tell that about you and . . . well . . .’ He hesitated for a few moments and looked out at the ocean, before turning back to me and staring deeply into my eyes again. ‘I hope you don’t mind me getting personal but I thought there was something special about you the first time I saw you. Special about us. A connection. Did you feel it?’

  Not really, I thought as a wave of panic rose in me. I quickly checked that there were still other people on the beach. I so didn’t want a repeat of the Robin experience.

  ‘Er . . . I feel like we understand each other,’ I said.

  Liam nodded, then laughed lightly. ‘We do. Hey, India, you can relax. I’m not going to pounce on you.’

  I felt embarrassed. He must have seen me check around and the look on my face, even though I’d tried to hide it. ‘I . . .’ I began to bluster.

  Liam looked away, up at the sky. ‘I feel like we connect on a higher level, you know?’

  ‘Oh yeah.’ Higher level I can do, I thought and gave him what I hoped was an enigmatic smile.Just don’t try and snog me.

  ‘I was even thinking, like, maybe we knew each other in a past life.’

  A past life? I thought. Wow, this guy is so intense although . . . nobody’s ever said anything like that to me before. It’s actually quite romantic in a way . . . although I still don’t fancy him.

  ‘Yeah, cool,’ I said, but it felt awkward and I wondered if Liam had been about to say more but changed his mind when he saw how freaked out I looked. We both stared out to sea. I didn’t know what else to say, so I got up.

  ‘OK, Sensei’s always on about being in the here and now so in this life not a past life, I think you’re right. I ought to give this meditation another go, in fact, I’m going to go up to my room this very moment to give it another try. No time like the present, hey?’

  A flicker of disappointment crossed Liam’s face but then he nodded.‘Of course. Good idea. I’ll walk up with you.’

  Phew, I thought as we packed up and set off back up the slope. I felt slightly bad that I had used the meditation as an excuse to get away from him, but it felt uncomfortable sitting with him and he kept giving me long deep looks which I wasn’t sure how I was supposed to respond to. If he wasn’t going to pounce, why was he looking at me like that?

  When we got up to the bungalows, Liam and I decided to go and get some mint tea before doing our meditation. Clare Taylor was at the dining area at the end of the long table with Joe and Rosie. She saw Liam and me and waved us over.

  ‘And here’s another of the new recruits,’ she said, indicating for us to sit with them.

  I braced myself ready for some banter from Joe and couldn’t help thinking that he’d have laughed along with me when I told him about the ‘voices in my head’.

  ‘I’ll go and get tea,’ said Liam as I slid into the bench next to Clare.

  ‘Had a good day, then?’ asked Joe.

  I nodded. ‘Yeah. In the main.’

  ‘Cool,’ said Joe. ‘I hear good things about this Sensei guy. A friend of my sister’s did his meditation and it really helped her. She was, like, major weirded out by public transport, couldn’t go on a plane or a tube without having a panic attack. She went and learned this method Sensei teaches and it helped her through. She’s totally cool about travelling now.’

  ‘Really?’ I was surprised at Joe. Somehow I had thought he would mock it like Kate had but he seemed to be endorsing it. And I hadn’t thought about using the meditation as a way to get through stressful times. If I could get it to work, maybe it would be useful, like at exam times, I thought. I could get major stressed at times like that and had been known to bite my fingernails down to almost nothing.

  ‘Clare here was telling us that she had a wonderful session,’ said Rosie.

  ‘Oh I did,’ beamed Clare. ‘It’s hard to describe but I felt so peaceful. It took a while, mind you. At first I was aware of all sorts of rubbish inside my head but I just kept bringing my focus back the way that Sensei said and, after a while, it was like my thoughts faded into the background, became distant and I felt myself growing still and then, oh, it was the most marvellous feeling.’

  ‘How did you get on, India Jane?’ asked Joe.

  I glanced over to see where Liam was and he was still busy organising our teas.‘Oh yeah,’ I said. ‘It was good. Yeah, good.’

  I didn’t want to publicly admit what a failure I had been and that I had been thinking of giving up. Talking to Liam had made me rethink the plan. I didn’t want anyone thinking I was a quitter and listening to what Joe and Clare had said made me think that maybe I was giving up too easily. Plus I had another reason to hold back. I was sure that I had already given Joe enough reasons to think that I was a total airhead. I didn’t want to give him any more.

  Ch
apter 14

  New Era

  The following morning, I woke in tears. I’d been having the most horrible dream and it took me a moment to come round properly and realise that it hadn’t been real. I dreamed that I was walking down the street and Mum went past on a bicycle. I was so pleased to see her and waved, but she didn’t see me. She rode straight past as if I wasn’t there. And then I saw Dad and Dylan approaching on foot, both chatting away. I felt so relieved to see them and I waved to them too but they didn’t see me either. It was as if I didn’t exist. I was invisible to them. The feeling of loss when I awoke was awful.

  As I lay there, I felt angry. Angry with Dad for sending me away. Angry with Mum for letting him. I felt helpless and I hated feeling the way I did. I’m not normally someone who feels sorry for herself. Try the meditation, said a voice in my head. Go deeper than those roller-coaster emotions – that’s what Sensei said. Maybe it will work at times like this. No harm in giving it a second try.

  I clambered out of bed being careful not to disturb Kate and made my way down to the beach. She’d been coming in late again and liked to sleep in during the morning. As it was early, I thought I might be alone down there, but I spied Sensei at one end of the beach and a few of the others, including Liam, dotted along at various distances away from each other. I sat down, assumed the lotus position, rested my hands on my knees, palms up, touched my thumb to my index finger the way I’d seen Sensei do, closed my eyes and once again began to meditate.

  I opted for the first method that Sensei had taught and, as he’d directed, I focused on the cold air going into my nostrils and warm air going out.

  In. Out.

  Cold. Warm.

  Actually not so cold as it’s a warm day – so forget the cold air: warm air in and warmer air out. OK. In. Out.

  Horrible dream. God it made me feel sad. I wonder what Mum and Dad are doing today. Don’t think about it. They don’t care about me. I’m not going to care about them. Focus.

  In . . . out. Cold air. Warm air.

  Joe looked so cute last night. He really does have such a nice mouth, with a full bottom lip. So much for Liam thinking I have a connection with him. No way. I know where my connection is and it’s with Joe. He must feel it too. Erin said it’s always a two-way thing.

  You’re not concentrating.

  Oops.

  OK. In. Out. In. Out.

  Yes, the voices were still there, blabbing on about this and that, but I was determined to go beyond them. I kept focusing and refocusing, the way that Sensei had said.

  After a while, I began to feel slightly more peaceful. Slightly. And it did feel good when I opened my eyes some time later and looked out at the ocean in front of me. I felt like my mind had been spring-cleaned, the scenery all around looked sharp and clear as if I was seeing it with fresh eyes.

  After twenty minutes, I went up to breakfast with the others, feeling lots more enthusiastic about it all, and I sat with Liam and Rosie to have a bowl of fresh figs, honey and yogurt.

  Liam beamed at me with approval when I said this session had been better and when Sensei came over to join our table, even though it was early days for me, I had a feeling of belonging. For the first time since I’d got to Cloud Nine, I had the sensation of having ‘got it right’.

  Over the next few days, I got into a new routine.

  Up early. Meditate. Breakfast. Check for e-mails. Attend Sensei’s talk. And when Kate had gone out for the day, I’d get my art book out and do some drawing in the bungalow, mainly pencil sketches of some of the people up at the centre, but also some of the view from the veranda out at the front. I didn’t show my drawings to anyone as I didn’t want anyone judging them or me. It was my own private time and, curiously, I found that I felt more peaceful sketching than at any other time, even doing the meditation.

  Mum and Dad had left messages to which I wrote a short reply.

  Hi. Busy busy. Was homesick, but no longer. Have met my master. Am finding myself at last. Bye India Jane.

  Part of me was still hurt that they’d hardly bothered to call in the early days of my trip and hadn’t been there on the day I’d felt so homesick. OK. So maybe our schedules had been out of sync, but I had really wanted to hear their voices that day.

  There was usually a daily e-mail from Dylan, letting me know some facts or figures about some obscure subject he’d read about, and I always replied to him. It was sweet that he bothered. I got the feeling that he was missing me a little in his own peculiar Dylan way.

  And I wrote up everything that I could remember from Sensei’s talks and sent it to Erin every day. It was as near as I could get to sharing the whole experience with her, but strangely she only replied once.

  Dear Sister Margerita Bernadetta Consumatta O’Riley

  I have read the holy blogs that you have sent and all I can say is: oh really?

  Call me when you have returned to planet Earth.

  Erin

  Hhm. I thought when I read her message. Clearly she wasn’t happy with me. Maybe it was because up until then we had made so many discoveries together and this was something I’d done without her. Or maybe I just wasn’t the India Jane she knew any more. I was changing and there were other parts of me coming to light. Maybe I was moving on from where we were when we were both in Ireland.

  As I attended the talks and hung about up at Cloud Nine, instead of taking off with Kate and going into town, I got to know a few more of the guests, the reasons they were there and what they got out of coming.

  Carey Freidman was one of my favourites. She was from LA and we got talking one afternoon while swimming down in the bay. I’d noticed her a few times at supper, partly because she was tall and stunning and partly because she always wore bright headscarves and I’d wondered why. She told me that she had worked as a model until she discovered that she had breast cancer last year. Although it looked as if she was going to make a full recovery, she said that it had made her rethink her whole life.‘The worst part was losing my hair,’ she told me as we swam in the turquoise crystal water.‘I cried like a baby. And I know that we’re all going to die sometime, but having an illness like this forces you to think about it. It makes it real. I can’t believe I used to agonise over stupid stuff like what size I was, like it was the most important thing on earth. Now, I value such different things, like my health and my friends and family.’

  Talking to her made me think about my priorities. What were they? A home, that was for sure. And Erin, who would hopefully still be my friend. But my family felt so distant. Like part of another life and that made me feel sad, especially when I met Anita Patel and heard what had happened to her. She was a slim, pretty pharmacist from North London and I heard her story when I went into town with Aunt Sarah to get provisions at the beginning of my last week. Anita drove us down in the centre’s van and told us how she had lost her sister in the tsunami in Indonesia in 2004.

  ‘Changed everything,’ she said. ‘At first I felt so guilty. You see, we’d rowed the night before she went. It was over some stupid little thing – she’d borrowed a dress and spilled red wine over it. I got so uptight about it. I never got to say sorry and that I loved her. What did a wine stain matter, for heaven’s sake? Her death shook my whole world up, which is why I came here. I needed some time away from people who know me, who relate to the old me, because I don’t feel like that person any more. I want . . . I need to find out who the new me is.’

  I can understand that, I thought. Even though I haven’t lost a sister, I do feel like I am changing, leaving the old India behind and becoming a new me too. Like Carey’s story, Anita’s experiences made me think. Dad and I hadn’t exactly rowed, but I’d felt so mad at him for sending me away. How would I feel if anything happened to him before we had a chance to clear the air? The thought of him not being there, even if I was angry with him, was unimaginable.

  Chantelle Harrison was an ex-footballer’s wife who was totally glam – she even wore full make-up at breakf
ast. At first I felt intimidated by her and then I got to know her. She was a sweetie who liked to mother everyone and who didn’t miss a thing. I met her when on kitchen duty and, after our first conversation, she took me under her wing and fussed over me like I was her long-lost daughter.

  ‘Come here to find yourself, did you?’ I asked as we chopped red onions for a salad one evening.

  ‘No, love,’ she said. ‘I came here to lose my ex. I did bring his credit card, though, and the intention of running it up on a bit of me-time before I divorce the silly sod. And what about you? What are you doing here?’

  ‘Not sure. My family sent me, so it wasn’t exactly my idea. So . . . um . . .’

  At that moment, Joe walked through the restaurant area to our left.

  Chantelle nudged me. I tried to pretend that I hadn’t noticed so she nudged me again.

  ‘What?’ I asked, but I knew I was blushing and that she could see that I was.

  ‘You’ve got your eye on him, haven’t you?’ she asked.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Pull the other one, sweetheart. Chantelle’s my name, Cupid’s my game.’

  ‘Oh God. Is it really obvious?’

  ‘Not really,’ she said. ‘Only to me. I’ve got an in-built radar for romance. But don’t worry, I won’t let on.’

  ‘Thanks,’ I said. ‘But, anyway, he’s not interested.’

  She tapped the side of her nose. ‘I wouldn’t be so sure,’ she said. ‘I’ve seen him watch you when you come into the restaurant.’

  ‘Me? Really?’

  She nodded.‘Really,’ she said. She pointed over to one of the tables where a cute dark-haired guy called Pete was chatting to Carey. ‘Like those two. They’ve been eyeing each other up for days too. Oh yes, Cupid’s definitely flying about with his arrows around here.’

  ‘Cool,’ I said and went back to my chopping.

  There were others I got to know as well. All with a story that came out as the days unfolded, meals got eaten and ouzo (the local drink) was drunk. (Not by me though. It tastes like paint stripper!) And the two sisters that Kate had said were lesbian librarians. They weren’t at all. They were friends, Julie and Macey. Their kids had grown up and gone off to university, and both had felt an enormous hole in their lives so they booked to come here and learn to look forward instead of back.