Jay nudged her and pointed at two women glued to Trent’s every move. ‘There might be a prize of sorts,’ he said. Trent let go with one hand so that he could properly look over one shoulder and wink at his adoring audience.
‘Please concentrate on the climb,’ said one of the climbing leaders, making Trent grumble something.
Nora and Jay were last to take a turn so the climbing team offered to belay them both so they could climb together and it would save time. It was a wide area and there was plenty of room and holds for both of them. Once she’d started she began to relax. She knew she was safe and she did know what she was doing. It was just outdoors and she had to find the hand and foot holds for herself, although the climbing leader was good at shouting out instructions for where to reach to.
There was something comforting about climbing with Jay at her side, or rather a couple of feet below her and to her left as he was a bit slower than she was. Nora took her time and made certain she had hands and feet in good secure positions before she moved on, although she did get herself in a bit of a pickle over one foot hold, at which point Jay carefully overtook her. He was a slow and steady climber and frequently had his tongue stuck out of the side of his mouth in concentration. Meanwhile, Nora was getting herself into quite an awkward position.
‘Now push really hard with that foot and stand up,’ called the leader from below. She could do this. She watched Jay for a moment as he tapped the top of the cliff and received a round of applause from everyone below. He gave her a happy thumbs-up and then started to abseil down. Nora took a breath and put all her weight on her right foot. She straightened out her leg and for a moment she was upright. But then there was a slight shift and her foot slipped a fraction. It felt like her heart stopped. She took stock– she was perfectly fine and still attached to the rock. Unfortunately she realized her right foot was very attached to the rock as her climbing shoe had become completely wedged into the crevice. Nora wriggled and tugged but she couldn’t free herself.
She looked down. People were congratulating Jay. ‘Um, I think I’m stuck,’ she said.
‘What?’ asked the leader.
‘My foot’s stuck!’ she called back.
‘OK. Stay calm. Someone will come up to free you,’ he shouted back.
Why did her fingers instantly start to feel tired as she gripped the rock?
‘You OK?’ called Jay.
‘Yeah. Just hanging around!’ She tried to smile but her muscles wouldn’t let her. She was focusing hard on not panicking. Her ankle was not happy about the angle it was now forced into, which wasn’t helping matters.
‘Don’t panic!’ shouted Trent.
‘I’mnotpanicking!’ yelled back Nora, more than a bitannoyed. Maybe she could free herself. She had another concerted effort at pulling her shoe out of its wedged position. With one big tug her foot came straight out of the climbing shoe. ‘Shit!’ Now she was hanging on with just one foot. She tried to stick her foot back in the shoe, if only to hide her Cookie Monster socks, but it was at too much of an odd angle.
‘Stay there!’ shouted Trent.
‘Not got much choice!’ Nora concentrated on getting her foot back into the shoe. She was aware of shouting below but was a bit preoccupied with her challenge. When the shouting increased, she tuned in.
‘Get down. That’s incredibly dangerous!’
Oh great, that was all she needed. And not exactly helpful because she couldn’t get down and she’d not pulled her foot out of her shoe intentionally. She slowly moved her head to the other side and that was when someone grabbed her right ankle. ‘Shit!’ The unexpected contact made her instinctively kick out, which was when she kicked Trent in the face. He yelped and let go of her but he also let go of the cliff and, as if in slow motion, she watched him fall.
21
After almost two weeks in the wilderness Dixie was tackling life with fresh enthusiasm. She couldn’t completely gut the van and rebuild it like she’d seen some people do in YouTube videos because she was living in it, but she could still transform it. Plenty of video clips and photographs of the before stage highlighted to her how much she needed to do. It felt like she’d accepted the state Elsie was in and now it was time to change that mindset and do something about it. She had already brought with her what she needed in the way of fabric and sewing equipment, as well as a few things she might not need, which were all rammed into any free space, including the passenger footwell. All she needed to do was work out what to do first.
It was a sunny summer’s day and she was sitting in her fold-up chair outside, studying the instructions for fitting the utensil rack she’d bought, when she saw movement in her peripheral vision. She turned slightly to see Arnold the squirrel. Dixie stayed still. She had toyed with the idea of putting out some of the walnuts she’dbought from the service station for him, but had decided that she wanted him to know who they were from, otherwise he’d just think it was a lucky find and would have no gratitude towards Dixie. The least she deserved was to take the credit for supplying them.
Slowly she took out her phone, zoomed in on the squirrel and began recording. He hopped a little closer so Dixie took a walnut half from her pocket. Walnuts had been all they had at the service station, apart from wasabi-coated peanuts and she knew he wouldn’t like those. She held it up and Arnold stopped what he was doing. His tail immediately went into angry wag mode.
‘I brought you food. Don’t get cross.’ Dixie waved the walnut. Arnold stared her down. ‘Fine. Here, have the nut.’ She tossed it in his general direction, making him flinch and back away. ‘Sorry!’
There was a stand-off for a couple of minutes. Dixie stopped filming as it wasn’t the most exciting footage and viewers had short attention spans. Arnold inched closer, keeping eyes on Dixie. He moved cautiously towards the walnut, grabbed it in his mouth and raced off. Success! But she’d forgotten to film it. A couple of minutes later Arnold was back and eyeing Dixie warily.
‘It’s OK, I won’t bite,’ she said, setting her phone to record.
‘But she might,’ said Ned, making her jump.
‘Goodness me! You scared the life out of me. Oh, and Arnold.’ She pointed to where the squirrel had been.
‘Arnold?’
‘You can mock but since I named him he’s been much friendlier,’ said Dixie.
‘Not mocking,’ said Ned. ‘It’s just that Arnold is a girl.’
