I WAS EXHAUSTED but I couldn't rest, my sleep broken by Ann's crying. I tried to rise, to comfort her. Instead, I hovered in a limbo between darkness and light. Don't cry, I heard myself murmur. I'll wake up soon and be with you. Just let me sleep a while. Please don't cry; it's all right, sweetheart. I'll take care of you.
Finally, I was forced to open my eyes. I wasn't lying down but standing in a mist. I started walking slowly toward the sound of her crying. I was tired, Robert, groggy. But I couldn't let her cry. I had to find out what was wrong and end it so she wouldn't cry like that. I couldn't bear to hear her cry like that.
I moved into a church I'd never seen before. All the pews were filled with people. Their forms were gray, I couldn't see their features. I walked down the middle aisle, trying to understand why I was there. What church was this? And why was the sound of Ann's crying coming from here?
I saw her sitting in the front pew, dressed in black, Richard on her right, Marie and Ian to her left. Next to Richard, I could see Louise and her husband. All of them were dressed in black. They were easier to see than the other people in the church yet even they looked faded, ghostlike. I could still hear the sobbing even though Ann was silent. It's in her mind, it came to me; and our minds are so close I hear it. I hurried toward her to stop it.
I stopped in front of her. "I'm here," I said.
She looked ahead as though I hadn't spoken; as though I weren't there at all. None of them looked toward me. Were they embarrassed by my presence and pretending not to see? I glanced down at myself. Perhaps it was my outfit. Hadn't I been wearing it a long time now? It seemed as though I had although I wasn't sure.
I looked back up. "All right," I said. I had difficulty speaking; my tongue felt thick. "All right," I repeated slowly. "I'm not dressed correctly. And I'm late. That doesn't mean ..." My voice trailed off because Ann kept looking straight ahead. I might have been invisible. "Ann, please," I said.
She didn't move or blink. I reached out to touch her shoulder.
She twitched sharply, looking up, her face gone blank.
"What's wrong?" I asked.
The crying in her mind abruptly surfaced and she jerked her left hand up to cover her eyes, trying to repress a sob. I felt a numbing pain inside my head. What's wrong? I thought. "Ann, what's wrong?" I pleaded.
She didn't answer and I looked at Richard. His face was tight, tears running down his cheeks. "'Richard, what is going on?" I asked. My words sounded slurred as though I were drunk.
He didn't answer and I looked at Ian. "Will you please tell me?" I asked. I felt a stab of anguish looking at him.
He was sobbing quietly, rubbing shaky fingers at his cheeks, trying to brush away the tears that fell from his eyes. What in the name of God? I thought.
Then I knew. Of course. The dream; it still continued. I was in the hospital being operated on--no, I was asleep on my bed and dreaming--whatever! flared my mind. The dream was continuing and now it included my own funeral. I had to turn away from them; I couldn't stand to watch them crying so. I hate this stupid dream! I thought. When was it going to end?!
It was torment to me to be turned away when, just behind me, I could hear Ann and the children sobbing. I felt a desperate need to turn and comfort them. To what avail though? In my dream, they mourned my death. What good would it do for me to speak if they believed me dead?
I had to think of something else; it was the only answer. The dream would change, they always did. I walked toward the altar, following the drone of a voice. The minister, I realized. I willed myself to feel amused. That might be fun, I told myself. Even in a dream, how many men receive the chance to listen to their own eulogy?
I saw his blurred, gray outline now, behind the pulpit. His voice sounded hollow and distant. I hope he's giving me a royal send-off, I thought, bitterly.
"He is," said a voice.
I looked around. That man again; the one I'd seen in the hospital. Odd that, of everyone, he looked most clear to me.
"Haven't found your own dream yet, I see," I told him. Odd, too, that I could speak to him without effort.
"Chris, try to understand," he said. "This isn't a dream. It's real. You've died."
"Will you get off that?" I began to turn away.
His fingers on my shoulder once again; solid, nearly pinching my flesh. That was odd too. "Chris, can't you see?" he asked. "Your wife and children dressed in black? A church? A minister delivering your eulogy?"
"A convincing dream," I said.
He shook his head.
"Let go of me," I told him, threateningly. "I don't have to listen to this."
His grip was strong; I couldn't break it. "Come with me," he said. He led me to the platform where I saw a casket resting on supports. "Your body is in there," he told me.
"Really?" I said. My tone was cold. The casket lid was shut. How could he know I was in there?
"You can see inside it if you try," he answered.
Unexpectedly, I felt myself begin to shake. I could look in the casket if I tried. Suddenly, I knew that.
"But I won't," I told him. I twisted from his grip and turned away. "This is a dream," I said, glancing across my shoulder. "Maybe you can't understand that but--"
"If it's a dream," he interrupted, "why don't you try to wake up?"
I whirled to face him. "All right, that's exactly what I'll do," I said. "Thank you for a very good suggestion."
I closed my eyes. All right, you heard the man, I told myself. Wake up. He's told you what to do. Now do it.
I heard Ann's sobbing getting louder. "Don't," I said. I couldn't bear the sound of it. I tried to back off but it followed me. I clenched my teeth. This is a dream and you are going to wake up from it right now, I told myself. Any second now I'd jolt awake, perspiring, trembling. Ann would speak my name in startled sympathy, then hold me in her arms, caress me, tell--
The sobbing kept on getting louder, louder. I pressed both hands against my ears to shut it out. "Wake up," I said. I repeated it with fierce determination. "Wake up!"
My effort was rewarded by a sudden silence. I had done it! With a rush of joy, I opened my eyes.
I was standing in the front hall of our house. I didn't understand that.
Then I saw the mist again, my vision blurred. And I began to make out forms of people in the living room. Gray and faded, they stood or sat in small groups, murmuring words I couldn't hear.
I walked into the living room, past a knot of people; none of them were clear enough for me to recognize. Still the dream, I thought. I clung to that.
I walked by Louise and Bob. They didn't look at me. Don't try to talk to them, I thought. Accept the dream. Move on. I walked into the bar room, moving toward the family room.
Richard was behind the bar, making drinks. I felt a twinge of resentment. Drinking at a time like this? I rejected the thought immediately. A time like what? I challenged my mind. This was no special time. It was merely a depressing party in a bleak, depressing dream.
Moving, I caught glimpses. Ann's older brother Bill, his wife Patricia. Her father and stepmother, her younger brother Phil, his wife Andrea. I tried to smile. Well, I told myself, when you dream you really do it up right, no detail overlooked; Ann's entire family down from San Francisco no less. Where was my family though? I wondered. Surely I could dream them here as well. Did it matter, in a dream, that they were three thousand miles away?
That was when a new thought came to me. Was it possible that I had lost my sanity? Perhaps the accident had damaged my brain. There was a thought! I clutched at it. Brain damage; weird, distorted images. Not just a simple operation going on but something complex. Even as I moved unseen among these wraiths, scalpels might be probing at my brain, surgeons working to restore its function.
It didn't help. Despite the logic of it, I began to feel a sense of resentment. All these people totally ignoring me. I stopped in front of someone; faceless, nameless. "Damn it, even in a dream, people talk to you," I said. I tried to grab him by the arms. My fingers moved into his flesh as though it were water. I looked around and saw the family-room table. Moving there, I tried to pick up someone's glass to hurl it against the wall. It was like trying to grip at air. Anger mounted suddenly. I shouted at them. "Damn it, this is my dream! Listen to me!"
My laughter was involuntary, strained. Listen to yourself, I thought. You're acting as though this is really happening. Get things straight, Nielsen. This is a dream.
I left them all behind, starting down the back hall. Ann's Uncle John was standing in front of me, looking at some photographs on the wall. I walked right through him, feeling nothing. Forget it, I ordered myself. It doesn't matter.
Our bedroom door was closed. I walked through it. "This is insane," I muttered. Even in dreams, I'd never walked through doors before.
My aggravation vanished as I moved to the bed and looked at Ann. She was lying on her left side, staring toward the glass door. She still had on the black dress I had seen her wearing in the church but her shoes were off. Her eyes were red from crying.
Ian sat beside her, holding her hand. Tears ran slowly down his cheeks. I felt a rush of love for him. He's such a sweet and gentle boy, Robert. I reached forward to stroke his hair.
He looked around and, for a moment which seemed to stop my heart, I thought he was looking at me, seeing me. "Ian,'' I murmured.
He looked back at Ann. "Mom?" he said.
She didn't respond.
He spoke again and her eyes moved slowly to his face.
"I know it sounds insane," he said, "but... I feel as if Dad is with us."
I looked at Ann quickly. She was staring at Ian, her expression unchanged.
"I mean right here," he told her. "Now."
Her smile was one of straining tenderness. "I know you want to help," she said.
"I really feel it, Mom."
She couldn't go on, a great sob racking her. "Oh, God," she whispered, "Chris ..." Tears filled her eyes.
I dropped beside the bed and tried to touch her face. "Ann, don't--" I started. Breaking off, I twisted from her with a groan. To see my fingers sink into her flesh ... "Ian, I'm afraid," Ann said.
I turned back quickly to her. The last time I'd seen such a look on her face was on a night when Ian had been six and disappeared for three hours; a look of helpless, incapacitated dread. "Ann, I'm here," I said, "I'm here! Death isn't what you think!"
Terror caught me unaware. I didn't mean that! cried my mind. I couldn't take it back though. The admission had been made.
I fought against it, straining to repress it by concentrating on Ann and Ian. But the question came unbidden and I couldn't stop it. What if that man had told the truth? What if this wasn't a dream?
I struggled to retreat. Impossible; the way was blocked. I countered with rage. So what if I had thought it? What if I'd considered it? There was no proof of it beyond that brief consideration.
Better. I felt vengeful justification. I began to touch and prod my body. This is death? I challenged scornfully. Flesh and bone? Ridiculous! It might not be a dream--that much I could allow. But it was certainly not death.
The conflict seemed to drain me suddenly. Once more, my body felt like stone. Again? I thought.
Never mind. I thrust it from my mind. I lay down on my side on the bed and looked at Ann. It was unnerving to lie beside her, face to face, her staring through me like a window. Close your eyes, I thought. I did. Escape through sleep, I told myself. The evidence isn't in by any means. This could still be a dream. But God, dear God in heaven, if it was, I hated everything about it. Please, I begged whatever powers might attend me. Release me from this black, unending nightmare.
To know I still exist!
HOVERING, SUSPENDED, RISING inches, then descending in a silent, engulfing void. Was this the feeling of prebirth; floating in liquid gloom?
No, there'd be no sound of crying in the womb. No sense of grief oppressing me. I murmured in my sleep, wanting to rest, needing to rest, but wanting, too, to wake for Ann's sake. "Honey, it's all right." I must have spoken those words a hundred times before waking. My eyes dragged open, the lids feeling weighted.
She was lying by my side, asleep. I sighed and smiled at her with love. The dream had ended, we were together again. I gazed at her face, sweetly childlike in repose. A tired child, a child who'd wept herself to sleep. My precious Ann. I reached out to touch her face, my hand like iron.
My fingers disappeared inside her head.
She woke up with a start, her gaze alarmed. "Chris?" she said. Again, that momentary leap of hope. Shattered when it quickly grew apparent that she wasn't looking at me but through me. Tears began to well in her eyes. She drew up her legs and clutched her pillow tightly in her arms, pressing her face against it, body shaking with sobs.
"Oh, God, no sweetheart, please don't cry." I was crying too. I would have given up my soul if only she'd been able to see me for a minute, hear my voice, receive my comfort and my love.
I knew she couldn't though. And knew, as well, the nightmare hadn't ended. I turned from her and closed my eyes, desperate to escape in sleep again, let the darkness pull me far from her. Her weeping tore my heart. Please take me away from this, I pleaded. If I can't comfort her, take me away!
I felt my mind begin a downward slide, descending into blackness.
Now it was a dream. It had to be. My life was unreeling before me, a succession of living pictures. Something about it struck me. Hadn't I experienced this before, more briefly, more confusingly?
This was not confusing in the least. I might have been a viewer in an auditorium, watching a film entitled My Life, every episode from start to finish. No, amend that. Finish to start; the film began with the collision--was it real then-- and evolved back toward my birth, each detail magnified.
I won't go into all those details, Robert. It's not the story I want to tell--it would take too long. Each man's life is a tome of episodes. Consider all the moments of your life enumerated one by one with full description. A twenty-volume encyclopedia of events; at the very least.
Let me discuss it in brief then, this display of scenes. It was more than a "flash before my eyes." I was more than just a viewer; that became apparent very soon. I relived each moment with acute perception, experiencing and understanding simultaneously. The phenomenon was vivid, Robert, each emotion infinitely multiplied by level upon level of awareness.
The essence of it all--this is the important part--was the knowledge that my thoughts had been real. Not just the things I said and did. What went on in my mind as well, positive or negative.
Each memory was brought to life before me and within me. I could not avoid them. Neither could I rationalize, explain away. I could only re-experience with total cognizance, unprotected by pretense. Self-delusion was impossible, truth exposed in blinding light. Nothing as I thought it had been. Nothing as I hoped it had been. Only as it had been.
Failures plagued me. Things I had omitted or ignored, neglected. What I should have given and hadn't--to my friends, my relatives, to Mom and Dad, to you and Eleanor, my children, mostly Ann. I felt the biting pang of every unfulfillment. Not only personal but in my work as well-- my failures as a writer. The host of scripts I'd written which did no one any good and, many, harm. I could condone them once. Now, in this stark unmasking of my life, condoning was impossible, self-justifying was impossible. An infinitude of lacks reduced to one fundamental challenge: What I might have done and how irrevocably I fell short of almost every mark.
Not that it was unjust; not that the scales were forced out of balance. Where there had been good, it showed as clearly. Kindnesses, accomplishments; all those were present too.
The trouble was I couldn't get through it. Like the tug of a building rope pulled from a distance, I was drawn from observation by Ann's sorrow. Honey, let me see. I think I spoke those words, I may have only thought them.
I became aware of lying by her side again, my eyelids heavy as I tried to raise them. The sounds she made in sleep were like a knife blade turning in my heart. Please, I thought. I have to see, to know; evaluate. The word seemed vital to me suddenly. Evaluate.
I drifted down again; to the isolation of my visions. I had left the theatre momentarily; the picture on the screen had frozen. Now it started up again, absorbing me. I was inside it once again, reliving days long gone.
Now I saw how much time I had spent in gratifying sense; again, I will not give you details. Not only did I re-discover every sense experience of my life, I had to live each unfulfilled desire as well--as though they'd been fulfilled. I saw that what transpires in the mind is just as real as any flesh and blood occurrence. What had only been imagination in life now became tangible, each fantasy a full reality. I lived them all-- while, at the same time, standing to the side, a witness to their, often, intimate squalor. A witness cursed with total objectivity.
Still always the balance, Robert; I emphasize the balance. The scales of justice: darkness paralleled by light, cruelty by compassion, lust by love. And always, unremittingly, that inmost summons: What have you done with your life?
An added mercy was the knowledge that this deep, internal review was witnessed only by myself. It was a private re-enactment, a judgment rendered by my own conscience. Moreover, I felt sure that somehow, every act and thought relived was being printed on my consciousness indelibly for future reference. Why this was so, I had no notion. I only knew it was.
Then something strange began to happen. I was in a cottage somewhere, looking at an old man lying on a bed. Two people sat nearby, a white-haired woman and a middle- aged man. Their dress was foreign to me and the woman's accent sounded strange as she spoke to say, "I think he's gone." "Chris!"
Ann's tortured crying of my name ripped me from sleep. I looked around to find myself in swirling fog, lying on the ground. Standing slowly, every muscle aching, I tried to walk but couldn't. I was on the bottom of a murky lake whose currents swelled against me.
Inanely, I felt hungry. No, that's not the proper word. In need of sustenance. No, more than that. In need of something to add to myself, to help me re-assemble. That was it. I was incomplete; part of me was gone. I tried to think but found it beyond my capacity. Thoughts trickled in my brain like glue. Let go, was all I could think. Let go.
I saw a pale white column of light take form in front of me, a figure inside it. "You wish my help?" it asked. My mind was not perceptive enough to tell if it was male or female.
I tried to speak, then, from a distance, heard Ann call my name again and looked around.
"You could be here for a long time," said the figure. "Take my hand."
I looked back at it. "Do I know you?" I asked. I could hardly speak, my voice sounding lifeless.
"That's not important now," the figure said. "Just take my hand." I stared at it with vacant eyes. Ann called my name again, and I shook my head. The figure was trying to take me from her. I wouldn't let it do that. "Get away," I said. "I'm going to my wife."
I was alone in fog once more. "Ann?" I called. I felt cold and fearful. "Ann, where are you?" My voice was dead. "I can't see you."
Something began to draw me through the mist. Something else attempted to restrain me but I willed it off; it wasn't Ann, I knew that, and I had to be with Ann. She was all that mattered to me.
The fog began to thin and I found myself able to advance. There was something familiar about the landscape in front of me: broad, green lawns with rows of metal plaques flush with the surface, bouquets of flowers here and there, some dead, some dying, some fresh. I had been here before.
I walked toward a distant figure sitting on the grass. Where had I seen this place? I wondered, trying hard to recollect. At last, like a bubble forced up through a sea of ooze, memory rose. Vaughn. Somebody's son. We'd known him. He was buried here. How long ago? the question came. I couldn't answer it. Time seemed an enigma beyond solution.
I saw, now, that the figure was Ann and moved toward her as quickly as I could, my feelings a blend of joy and sorrow; I didn't know why.
Reaching her, I spoke her name. She made no sign that she had seen or heard me and, for some inexplicable reason, I now found myself unsurprised by that. I sat beside her on the grass and put my arm around her. I felt nothing and she did not respond in any way, staring at the ground. I tried to understand what was happening but there was no way I could. "Ann, I love you," I murmured. It was all my mind could summon. "I'll always love you, Ann." Despair began to blanket me. I gazed at the ground where she was looking. There were flowers and a metal plaque.
Christopher Nielsen/1927-1974. I stared at the plaque, too shocked to react. Vaguely, I recalled some man addressing me, trying to convince me that I'd died. Had it been a dream? Was this a dream? I shook my head. For some reason I could not fathom, the concept that this was a dream was unacceptable. Which meant that I was dead. Dead.
How could such a shattering revelation leave me so incredibly apathetic? I should have been screaming with terror. Instead, I could only stare at the plaque, at my name, at the year of my birth and the year of my death. Slowly, an obsession started gathering in my mind. / was down there? Me? My body? Then I possessed the power to prove it all beyond a doubt. I could travel down there, see my corpse. Memory flickered. You can see inside it if you try. Where had I heard those words? I could see inside what ?
Knowledge came. I could descend and look inside the casket. I could see myself and prove that I was dead. I felt my body easing forward, downward.
"Mom?"
I looked around in startlement. Richard was approaching with a thin, young man with dark hair. "Mom, this is Perry," he said. "He's the one I told you about."
I stared incredulously at the young man.
He was looking at me.
"Your father is here, Richard," he said, calmly. "Sitting near the plaque with his name on it."
I struggled to my feet. "You can see me?" I asked. I was stunned by his words, his gaze directly on me.
"He's saying something I can't make out," Perry said.
I looked at Arm, anxiety returning. / could communicate with her; let her know I still existed.
She was staring at the young man, her expression stricken. "Ann, believe him," I said. "Believe him."
"He's speaking again," Perry told her. "To you now, Mrs. Nielsen."
Ann shuddered and looked at Richard, speaking his name imploringly.
"Mom--'' Richard looked uncomfortable and adamant at once. "--if Perry says that Dad is here, I believe him. I've told you how he--"
"Ann, I am here!" I cried.
"I know how you feel, Mrs. Nielsen," Perry interrupted Richard, "but take my word for it. I see him right beside you. He's wearing a dark blue shirt with short sleeves, blue checkered slacks and Wallaby shoes. He's tall and blond with a husky build. He has green eyes and he's looking at you anxiously. I'm sure he wants you to believe he's really here."
"Ann, please," I said. I looked at Perry again. "Hear me," I entreated him. "You've got to hear me."
"He's speaking again," Perry said. "I think he's saying-- near me or something."
I groaned and looked at Ann again. She was trying not to cry but couldn't help herself. Her teeth were set on edge, her breathing forced and broken. "Please don't do this," she murmured.
"Mom, he's trying to help," Richard told her.
"Don't do this." Ann struggled to her feet and walked away. ''Ann, don't go," I pleaded.
Richard started after her but Perry held him back. "Let her get used to the idea," he said.
Richard looked around uneasily. "He's here?" he asked. "My father?"
I didn't know what to do. I wanted to be with Ann. Yet how could I leave the only person who could see me? Perry had placed his hands on Richard's shoulders and turned him until he faced me. "He's in front of you," he said. "About four feet away."
"Oh, God." Richard's voice was thin and shaking.
"Richard," I said. I stepped forward and tried to grasp his arms.
"He's right in front of you now, trying to hold your arms," Perry told him.
Richard's face was pale. "Why can't I see him then?" he demanded.
"You may be able to if you can talk your mother into a sitting."
Despite the excitement Perry's words created in me, I could stay with him no longer; I had to be with Ann. His voice faded quickly behind me as I started after her. "He's moving after your mother," he said. "He must want to--"
I could hear no more. Anxiously, I followed Ann, trying to overtake her. Whatever a sitting was--a seance?--Ann had to consent to it. I'd never believed in things like that, never even thought of them. I thought about them now. Perry had seen me, actually seen me. The thought that, with his help, Ann and the children might also see me, perhaps even hear me filled me with elation. There'd be no grief then!
I groaned with sudden dismay. A mist was gathering again, obscuring my view of Ann. I tried to run but my movements grew increasingly labored. I have to reach her! I thought. "Ann, wait!" I called. "Don't leave me!"
You have to move on, it seemed as though I heard a voice say in my mind. I wouldn't listen to it, kept on moving, slower, slower, once more on the bottom of that murky lake. Awareness started failing. Please! I thought. There must be some way Ann can see me and be comforted to know I still exist!