MY IMMORTAL

The Climb - Fresh Start Part 2

The next week and a half went so quickly as time tends to when you enjoy yourself. Bear and Sarah both insisted on daily updates but so far nothing happened except Niall working twelve to fourteen-hour days. The work was busy for me because he spent so much time working, I had to oversee, organise or take care of everything from his dry cleaning and daily schedule to calls from his family while he was on set. It was kind of bizarre. I found myself becoming intimately aware of who he was and why. I found it a little overwhelming to be so involved in another persons' life so quickly. He was both a very open and an acutely private person all in one. I was the only person that was permitted to take or make calls with his family and at the same time when I sat waiting for him and listening to interviews, he did he was very open about himself. He was more of an enigma each day, more contradictions revealed themselves moment by moment.

The one constant that also continued to reveal itself was that the more I learned of him and became involved in his life the more I was able to smile. I had finally started to sleep through a full night without the interruption of a single nightmare. I found myself smiling and laughing easily. He was so much fun to be in the company of and I found myself missing all the excitement on any quiet moments I had to myself. So, when he asked me to come with him and his new potential conquest rock climbing on my day off it was not very difficult for him to twist my arm. At first, I thought he was joking and then when I realised, he was serious I was confused. Why would he want to take his EPA with him when he was taking a girl on a date? Weird. Then he said he needed extra people to belay for him and her anyway and that the real date would only start after the climbing anyway if she didn't run screaming from him. We both laughed at that image, he even did an impersonation of it, which was mildly funny. It was not one of the best interpretations of a girl I had seen him do. He often tried to do impersonations of me when he was making fun of me in the multitude of hurry-up-and-wait moments on the set. Neither of us actually contemplated the possibility that she would literally run screaming from him.

He thought he would start easy by taking her to an indoor centre. I had convinced Jeanie to hire the whole place out and do it as a work function. It didn't take too much to convince her, the truth was it would be safer and more controllable if the general public were shut out just like the set. He would need some alone time with 'Rebecca' at some point during the climb if he intended to make a move. To get that alone time they would be out of my range, something I was not comfortable with unless there were ample security measures taken. In fact, I wasn't comfortable with it period. It grated me although I didn't understand why. Niall then asked a stack of people from the cast and crew of the movie to join us, essentially anyone who was up for it.

I was halfway through an overhanging climb when I heard the most horrific scream. It wasn't a fake 'I'm pretending to be scared so he will come and give me some attention' scream. It was a blood curdling 'I'm truly terrified I'm going to die,' scream. I couldn't see him. My heart was in my throat. I called out to the attendant belaying for me. He quickly sat in his harness and I let go of my foot holds then my hand holds within a millisecond. He belayed me down the two and a half meters too slowly for my liking and I had unclipped my Carabiners almost the instant my feet touched the ground. I raced around the multiple climbing walls between where I had been climbing and were Niall and Rebecca had starting climbing. He had chosen the easiest wall for her to start on. She was three-quarters of the way up the wall latching terrified to the wall. She had her whole body pressed against the wall and her face was turned away from him. He was trying to calm her down, but she was clearly in a full panic. I don't know why but I knew that he was not going to be able to calm her down. She didn't trust him. He was the person that brought her to this place. Any time she glanced down she would scream and then shut her eyes tight again. Her arms and legs were visibly trembling. Her attendant had all stack from her line and all but taken all of her weight, all she would need to do is let go of the wall and he could slowly belay her down. There was no way she was going to let go of the wall though. I turned to my attendant just as he arrived gave a few quick instructions. His expression told me that he thought he should be doing it as he was an employee here, but I was clipped in and on my way up the way via the quickest and easiest holds before he had time to protest too much. He was then too busy clipping himself in and belaying for me to argue. He was not going to be very happy with me when I came down. I had scurried up all the large holds and was positioned at eye level with her, but she was about two meters to my left. Her eyes were clamped shut and she was hyperventilating.