Liv Unravelled

by Donna Bishop

  “Liv?” Celeste asks, “It might help to do a little exercise to help you let go of those thoughts. It’s just not helpful for you to torture yourself! Here’s a pen and paper, I want you to write down the worst of the worst images, right down to clit rings and whose parts went where and how.”

  Bent over the page, Liv’s face becomes red and rashy and she has tears in her eyes as she writes down the scenarios that have been playing in her head. She reads them aloud to Celeste and somehow the daggers are taken out of them, and they sound more silly than painful.

  “I’m pretty sure you can’t even put that there unless you’re a contortionist,” Celeste snorts, trying to suppress her laughter, and both women laugh until they’re holding their sides.

  “Now carry that paper to the fireplace, rip it up into pieces, strike a match and light it on fire and say ‘I release these images’.”

  She feels a bit silly doing this, but as she sets it alight the paper evaporates quickly into flame and a black tongue of smoke slips up the chimney, taking with it some of Liv’s angst and anger. She sits back on her heels and breathes out a sigh.

  “I’ve been thinking so much about Hannah – did I truly visit my past soul or did I just dredge up a childhood nightmare and cook up a story in my imagination?”

  Celeste smiles, “Does it matter?”

  “No, like I said, it’s weird, but I think it’s helping me find some kind of inner courage and let go of some of the things that are not in my control. I really want to find out if Hannah gets though this.”

  “Okay Liv, we won’t need to do the full prologue to the hypno-session today, as your mind will remember how to be hypnotized and you’ll know where you’re going — that part is scientific, by the way. I could show you my brain diagrams if you like.

  “Direct your mind back to where we left off…”

  Liv imagines she’s walking on a path through a magnificent forest. Her mind is clear and observant as she follows Celeste’s voice and her heart quickens with excitement rather than fear this time as she arrives at a series of stairs leading down to a white, sandy beach. With each step she goes deeper, deeper into relaxation. Her heartbeat slows now and her mind’s eye becomes focused and clear. She feels the wind as it gently rustles the leaves of a stately arbutus at the foot of the trail… seven, six, five, four… she’s breathing comfortably…three, two… down, down…finally at the last step… she can smell the sea and feel it lapping at her toes.

  A cool mist surrounds her as she stands grounded on the sands of time. The mist parts to the left, and again she’s with her spirit sister, Hannah.

  Session No. 2 transcript, Sept. 12, 1987

  Hannah, 1855

  Hannah is still in the barrel. She’s awake, trembling violently from the cold. It’s just past dawn and the sky is pinkish grey and cloudy with just a tiny patch of blue directly overhead. The barrel is rocking more gently now — there are fewer waves. I hear seabirds calling very close — they pass through the view above, wheeling around. Perhaps their squawking is what roused her.

  She’s so weak, but she’s pulling herself up, trying to peek out of the barrel. It tips dangerously with her movements.

  She glimpses the dark silhouette of land on the distant horizon, then drops down into the icy liquor again. She spreads herself wide to try to steady the barrel. I can feel her giving up hope — the land is too far away, there is no one to save her. She’s crying now. Images — flashes of her parents, of Finn — haunt her mind, driving her tears. She’s all crumpled up and sitting in six inches of whiskey, now fouled with her own urine.

  I feel her giving up, slipping away. The chill in her limbs is creeping into her core. There is an ominous quiet. She’s fading away.

  It’s so awful, but I feel like I have to let her go. Things have to happen as they’re meant to….

  Delirious and as if in a dream, from below the surface of the water, I hear a squeaking sound, or more like a tiny horn blowing. Swimming in the bluish haze in Hannah’s mind, I see two shining white sea creatures emerge from the darkness. Their bulbous heads glow — one comes in close, then turns and I look into an intelligent black eye. They are beluga whales — beautiful white belugas — and they swirl around the barrel, bumping it playfully. I can’t tell if they’re real or in Hannah’s imagination. There’s an actual sensation of movement — the barrel is travelling as opposed to just bobbing suspended in the water.

  The movement makes her empty belly whirl — these strong, magnificent creatures are transporting the barrel toward what looks like a giant green rock in the sea. Hannah’s body is numb, her mind is barely conscious. But somehow I’m still here with her, bound by the luminous thread joining our souls.

  There is a jarring crunch — the barrel connecting with the sea bottom. Hannah stirs. Miraculously, I think I hear people talking and the sounds of splashing.

  The voices grow louder, the barrel suddenly tips on its side and a small round face surrounded by a halo of blonde curls peers in.

  For an instant Hannah thinks this is the girl from the boat — Winnie, the one who fell overboard. She’s so excited — her mind screams, “She is alive!” But I can see it’s not Winnie — this girl is much paler, a little older, skinnier, and taller than Winnie. Her heavy wet clothes make her look comical. She reaches into the barrel, trying to pull Hannah out and she’s smiling and sputtering. She turns and shouts to someone behind her.

  Two older girls come and help her drag Hannah’s limp body out of the barrel. Wading through the surf, they carry her to shore and set her on the beach. The taller one strips off her cloak and wraps it tightly around Hannah. The little one is quaking with cold, but talking excitedly, non-stop, in Norwegian.

  The two older girls carry Hannah between them up a steep path that winds up the craggy hillside, followed by their shivering, wet little sister. At the top they travel along a forest path to a clearing with an old ramshackle farmhouse, its whitewash peeling with age. It sits too tall, leaning slightly to the right — perhaps this is the pervasive direction of the wind and over many years the house has shifted. It looks as though it just may fall down with one strong huff or puff. I see smoke coming from the chimney — they’ll be able to warm Hannah and hopefully nurse her back to health. The little girl — the others call her Ingaborg — is chattering away to Hannah. She doesn’t yet realize that Hannah is barely conscious and can’t understand her language anyway.

  The door opens, and there stands a stern looking woman with her hair pulled tightly into a bun. She’s dressed in a dull grey cotton dress, a fishy smelling, bloody apron tied around her waist. The three sisters all begin talking at once. When the mother has deciphered their story, she scoots them inside. Hannah is deposited on the wooden floor in front of a large stone fireplace. The woman begins to undress both Ingaborg and Hannah and then wraps them up, skin to skin, in scratchy wool blankets. She sends one of the older girls outside to fetch more wood to make the fire hotter.

  She’s a dour figure — all of this she has performed without a smile, but there is kindness in her actions. Now satisfied that the girls are warming, she begins preparing food, all the while issuing orders to her two eldest daughters, Oline and Alexandria. Ingaborg, meanwhile, is still talking to Hannah, but now she’s whispering into her sodden, smelly hair. Hannah is drowsy and only vaguely aware of where she is, but I feel a tremendous sense of comfort in her as the warmth slowly ekes into her core and Ingaborg’s animated voice reminds her what it is to be alive.

  It is a cold, bare room, with little furniture other than a table with benches where the woman and her daughters are working. From time to time, one of them stirs a kettle suspended over the fire.

  Hannah has fallen asleep. She’s safe and I think she’s going to be okay.

  From far away, Celeste says, “Yes, Liv. She’s a tenacious little spirit. Do you want to see how her life plays out? Try to cast your spirit line forward — you can touch down in different places, like a stone being ski
pped over the surface of a pool.”

  Alright.

  ~ ~ ~

  Whoa! You’re right. It’s like time slipped ahead, just a little bit. So strange! Hilde — that’s the mother’s name — is bending over, feeding Hannah tiny spoonfuls of broth. Ingaborg is no longer tucked in — she’s at the table, where she and her sisters are devouring freshly baked biscuits and milk.

  Hannah can’t swallow the broth — she’s sputtering, it’s dripping down her chin. But with each spoonful, a little makes its way down her parched throat.

  Nothing in her life has ever tasted so good. Her hands are throbbing as they begin to thaw — her belly contracts and groans as the food arrives. Now the tears come.

  Hilde doesn’t acknowledge her crying or try to comfort her, but Ingaborg comes back and curls in beside her, murmuring in her language that everything will be all right. Tears of sympathy trickle down her round cheeks.

  Suddenly it’s as if I’m watching a movie playing at fast speed — I’m hearing and seeing so many things at once it’s overwhelming. I don’t know if I can describe it, but I’ll try.

  “Liv, turn the stone to help you manage the speed. Your breath is your view into the soul, so breathe evenly. Take it in…. Focus on that thread of light that binds you to Hannah. Carry on. Cast forward — I have the recorder running.”

  ~ ~ ~

  Hannah and Ingaborg are walking hand-in-hand along a trail on a ridge high above a stunning fjord. It’s warm and sunny and they’re dressed for summer in plain cotton shifts. I can see houses here and there through the trees, as well as goats and sheep grazing on green grass. The girls are talking and giggling. They’re speaking Norwegian. Hannah speaks slowly, but they understand each other fairly well, so I must have jumped forward in time several months.

  They’re excited because they’ve finished their chores and Ingaborg’s mother Hilde has given them a basket of food to take to Great Uncle Olav, Hilde’s mother’s eldest brother. He’s just returned from a long fishing voyage — even though he is very old, Ingaborg explains, the fishermen welcome him along because of his almost magical ability to find the best fishing grounds.

  He’s a very lonely man, she says. His beloved wife and daughter died from influenza many years ago. Since then he’s lived in semi-isolation in a stone house he built under a massive granite ledge on the edge of the Lutheran settlement. He’s a storyteller, and he loves to share tales about his family to keep them alive in his mind.

  When they arrive at Uncle Olav’s curious house, Hannah is shy with the old man — she’s never seen so many wrinkles, and he’s thin and bent. His faded blue eyes shine in the dim light of his grim, cramped home.

  Uncle Olaf settles in to entertain his guests — but Ingaborg eagerly asks him if she can first share a story of her own. She describes the day she found Hannah — how she spotted the barrel bobbing off shore and how she knew right away there was treasure inside. Her sisters forbade her to wade out to it — they were worried she would inflict very bad luck on their family by bringing something that had been lost at sea into their home.

  Ingaborg plunged in anyway. She describes herself wading valiantly into the crashing waves, choking on mouthfuls of salty water, her legs throbbing with cold. She was determined to collect her gift from the sea gods — a baby turtle, a wee seahorse, or perhaps a mermaid child or even a tiny dragon of her very own. She drags the tale out, building suspense and humour, until finally she gets to the part when she’s looks into the barrel, sees Hannah and shouts: “It’s a girl! The whales have brought me a little sister!” Uncle Olav laughs uproariously at this ending, his eyes watery. Ingaborg beams proudly when he tells her she has a true gift for telling stories.

  “Just like you, Uncle,” she says.

  Hannah is warming to the old fellow — he is not so scary, not like Ingaborg’s father, Gustaf. It prompts her to think about how it felt when her father praised her and she’s suddenly overtaken by sadness. She retreats inside herself and sits quietly. Ingaborg, however, is squirming with excitement.

  “Uncle Olaf, will you tell the story of great great uncle Nicolai for Hannah? It’s my most favourite story and I know she’ll love it.”

  The old man grins at her fondly, revealing a set of surprisingly near-perfect teeth. He sits forward in his chair and launches into a suspenseful yarn, clearly crafted by repeated telling.

  Nicolai was a renowned Viking whaling captain in the 1700s. During a ferocious storm off the coast of Scotland, he heroically climbed the mast of his whaling ship to untangle a critical rope. A gigantic gust of wind tore him from the mast and cast him into the sea.

  Nearly drowned, he was saved by the very whale he was trying to kill. It carried him to the shore, where he was found by a beautiful Scottish witch named Moragh. She nursed him to health, they fell in love and had a son. He was never able to kill another whale after having been saved by one.

  Alas, two years later, Nicolai was summoned to Norway to aid his ailing father with the family herring business. It was another two years before he could return to his love and their child in Scotland. When he finally reached the cottage on the cliff, he instead found a pile of still-smouldering ashes. When Nicolai looked up, he saw the spirits of his beloved Moragh and his son in the sky far above, holding hands, smiling and sending their love down to him.

  Nicolai waged a war of revenge upon the perpetrators of this atrocity, slaying priests, religious zealots and government-appointed witch killers — all told he killed 20 men. It was a woman who took him down with a butcher knife to his back, felling the magnificent Viking warrior like an oak tree. His spirit did not hesitate to leave — it rose and joined those of his wife and son, and together they journeyed to Valhalla, the resting place of the great God Odin’s chosen warriors and heroes.

  Uncle Olaf smiles to see the rapt expressions on the faces of the two little girls. Telling stories gives him joy.

  I’m reaching out for my spirit line again, hurling it into the future.

  ~ ~ ~

  Images of brilliant northern lights through a small, frosty window — blues, greens and purples. I see Ingaborg and Hannah huddled beneath a quilt on a lumpy woolen mattress on the floor of their cold attic room. They press their feet around clay bricks that have been warmed on the hearth. There are horrible noises coming from below — Ingaborg’s father rants angrily and her mother tries to calm him, then the sound of blows and slaps, crying and, finally, the murmur of praying.

  I leave the girls drifting off to sleep, tucked together for comfort. Again, I cast forward.

  ~ ~ ~

  It’s a sparse room with simple plank benches for pews and an ornate cross at the front. Norwegians seem to love starkness — especially the people of this remote colony, who follow a particularly strict interpretation of their faith.

  The church congregation is singing O Holy Night but Hannah’s voice soars distinct from all the others. One by one, the other voices stop, except for Hannah’s. Everyone is looking at her like she’s someone special. Her last sweet, pure notes ring brightly in the room.

  Ingaborg’s parents, the Kleppens, look proud. Hannah wonders if they believe they are earning some bonus points with God for saving her.

  The service is over, and as they walk away from the church, Ingaborg bumps Hannah playfully — they often do that, it’s a little game between them. They giggle and begin to run. Hannah is relieved that Ingaborg isn’t upset that she drew so much attention for her singing. Poor Ingaborg rarely gets noticed, except when she does something wrong.

  They duck off the path and behind a tree — they are supposed to go directly home after church, but the Kleppens are staying on to attend a community meeting, so of course they doddle.

  Ingaborg tells Hannah that one day she too will make beautiful music, but her family has no money for an instrument or lessons. One day before Hannah came, she says, a visiting missionary was tuning the old piano in the church. Ingaborg was there to clean, a chore the women of the co
lony do by turns. She was so entranced with the sound of the instrument, the man allowed her to watch him work.

  She describes the row of taut steel strings in the back of the piano and the heavenly sounds they made when she strummed them. She says Hannah is lucky that her voice is her instrument and it travels with her everywhere.

  ~ ~ ~

  Hannah is hiding on the stairs, listening to Ingaborg’s parents talking. Gustaf is complaining — he has been making attempts to report to the authorities about Hannah being found alive. He had sent a message to the shipping agency in Holland months ago, and at long last received a reply saying that he should have contacted the passenger agency in Scotland, because that’s where the ship was registered. After all this time, they are no further ahead. Their plan is now to contact agencies in both Scotland and Holland, as the child may have relatives in either. She doesn’t know the surname of her mother’s sister in Scotland but at least it is a lead they can pursue.

  Hannah creeps back up the stairs and crawls in bed with Ingaborg. Holland no longer exists, she thinks.

  ~ ~ ~

  I see seasons passing, like a living slide show. The winters are long and dark — maybe three of them in all. One winter day it is so cold and there is so much snow that the family are trapped in the house for what seems like forever.

  The two girls are drawing pictures at the big kitchen table when Mr. Kleppen comes in and looms over them. He jabs a finger at Ingaborg’s sketch. It’s the Norwegian god, Odin, but she has depicted him in feminine form — a fierce, curvaceous god with blonde curls dancing like a dervish beneath a lush and heavily fruited tree.

  “You godless, heathen little witch child, I will send you to God himself for reckoning,” he rants, taking up the fire bellows and beating Ingaborg with it again and again. She does not cower or cry but her face is red and set with anger and determination. Ingaborg’s mother and her sisters sit rigidly, wishing Ingaborg would cry, apologize or pray. They pretend not to see the violence, not to hear, for fear of drawing his ire. Then Hannah begins to sing a hymn, her voice strong and clear.