Nobody knew that her refusal to touch a kitchen knife wasn’t because of that one time she cut her thumb chopping tomatoes but because she was terrified she would suddenly plunge the knife into the nearest family member’s throat.
Nobody knew that the reason she dropped Ancient History as a subject was because the teacher had a seating plan, and she had to sit next to a window on the second floor, and she could think of nothing else but throwing herself out that window, and the thought was so incessant, the only solution seemed to be to just do it. She remembers rationalizing it: It won’t necessarily kill me, just break my legs.
It was in Dr. Donnelly’s office that she first heard the term “obsessive-compulsive disorder” used as a diagnosis applicable to her, not as a lighthearted description for a tidy, uptight, germophobic person.
Dr. Donnelly was not a fan of reassurance. Unlike her sister, he promised her nothing.
He said, “Yes, it’s true, Paula, you could run those people over.”
He explained that many if not most people have thoughts like hers, but the OCD brain takes intrusive thoughts seriously. He said OCD sufferers often believe they are responsible for things they can’t control, which is probably why she thought she alone controlled her cat’s destiny. Even if she rationally knew this couldn’t be true (because if it were, why not tell people what a good job she was doing, keeping the stupid ungrateful cat alive by laboriously reciting those tables), it felt true.
He got her to do exposure therapy. All different kinds.
She had to hold the sharpest kitchen knife to her family members’ throats, for thirty seconds at a time. She had to slowly accelerate her car as close as she dared to her dad, while he gestured with his hands, closer, closer, closer, as casually as if he were just helping her park.
She had to stand in various high locations—the top level of the local shopping center, a cliff face on their favorite bushwalk—and instead of reassuring herself, You’re okay, you’re not going to jump, she had to tell herself, You might jump, you might not.
She and her family had to play a memory game with cards on which she’d written her intrusive thoughts and then match them up, to demonstrate that her thoughts were nothing special or mystical. She can still remember her sister triumphantly holding up two cards saying I might push Lisa down the stairs, thrilled to have matched up the two cards, not at all concerned that her sister thought about pushing her down the stairs.
These are not unhappy memories. There was relief because there was no more secrecy, and there were rules to follow and she likes rules. She was not ashamed or embarrassed. Nobody made her feel that way. Her family could not have been more supportive. And it worked. She saw Dr. Donnelly for two years, and she learned to live with her OCD.
But the more time that has passed, the more she has assumed that OCD is like a childhood allergy she has outgrown. She looks at Dr. Donnelly’s name on her screen. Sees his kind face. She is too busy to make an appointment. She is a grown-up now, with two children. It’s been years. She’s fine. She knows the techniques. She could predict every word that would come out of Dr. Donnelly’s mouth. She can keep a grip on this. Why pay for information she already knows?
Her phone rings in her hand as she’s looking at her sister’s text.
“Grandma?” asks Willow hopefully.
“Not Grandma.” It’s an unknown caller. Paula removes Timmy from her lap. He whimpers and wipes irritably at his nose.
Normally she ignores unknown numbers, but it could be a lead.
After the funeral at St. David’s, where the psychic did not show up, or if she did, she managed to blend into the crowd, Paula and her new friend, the newly married Eve, had gone for coffee. They are kindred spirits: both of them are systematic and organized, compulsive (ha ha) list-makers, except Eve did hers on the Notes app on her phone while Paula did hers on a notepad. It has been enjoyable “working” with Eve on this investigative project. They had a Facebook page set up by the end of the day and have been in regular communication since then. Paula has been direct-messaging anyone who posts if it sounds like they might have genuine information. Eve is keeping an eye on the younger platforms like TikTok.
“Hello?”
The voice on the phone is cultured and confident. “Paula Binici?”
“Yes, that’s right.” Paula automatically sits up straighter, as if it’s a work call.
“My name is Suzanne. I posted something on your page about possibly knowing the identity of the psychic on your flight. You messaged me.”
“Of course.” Paula scoots over to the coffee table, grabs her notepad and pen, and sits up cross-legged behind it. “I remember. You thought she might have read your palm once, many years ago?”
“Well, possibly, I could easily be wrong, it was literally fifty years ago, so…but as soon as I saw the picture I thought of her, and I can’t even tell you why. I remember she was a sweet, very pretty little thing, with long straight brown hair and compelling eyes. Ice-blue. A kind of arctic blue.”
Paula feels a shiver as she remembers the lady’s pale blue eyes. “Kind of scary?”
“Scary? Oh, no, not at all. She was quite shy. Awkward. At first, anyway.”
“So how did she come to read your palm?”
“I was married to a farmer at the time. He, well, we, lived on a cattle station in Queensland. Enormous. Over a hundred thousand acres. She was staying in the staff quarters, I think maybe doing some kind of…research? I just remember her in my kitchen, reading my palm. I don’t even know how that came about, if I paid her or what, but I will never forget what she said. She said, ‘I see you leaving.’ ”
“Leaving the cattle station?”
“I took it to mean leaving my marriage. I was very unhappy at the time.”
“And you left?”
“I did. It was the right decision for both of us. He’s happy with someone else. I own an art gallery. I think she might have said something about the art gallery too.”
“So she got it right,” says Paula. Timmy crawls over to her and lays his snot-slimy cheek on her leg. Paula holds one hand protectively over his head so he doesn’t bang it on the side of the coffee table. He closes his eyes. His cheeks are flushed. Swimming is the last thing he needs today. “Her prediction came true.”
“Sure, I guess. Technically,” says the woman, “although, to be honest, I don’t know if I would have left if she hadn’t read my palm. I was so young and stupid and I had gotten myself in this strange passive state, but she was so adamant she could see this other life for me! It was…inspiring.”
“I assume she didn’t tell you how and when you were going to die?”
“Oh, no, I wouldn’t want to know that!” The woman catches herself, and makes a “tch” sound.
“It’s fine,” Paula says. “And I think you said you couldn’t remember her name?”
“Well, that’s why I’m calling,” says Suzanne. “Just this morning I was reading an article about that charity where they auction off a box of the first cherries of the season. It said Tanya Somebody-or-other had been crowned Cherry Queen. That’s when it came to me. So funny the way the mind works.”
“Her name was Tanya?” Paula is already writing it down.
“No,” says the woman. “Cherry. Her name was Cherry.”
Chapter 97
