There were strange things
happening with the heavens. It was hard
for Haley to not think someone was angry with the celestial furniture, a great
chair thrown here or there in the heavenly halls reverberating down its abuse
through the echoing, rolling thunder.
It was a bleak and thoroughly overcast day as Haley sat in the lounge
with her mother, waiting for Dr. Francis to be finished with a client. There was a receptionist in a burgundy dress
at a desk beside the doctor’s door and an elderly man in a tuxedo seated across
the room. Nobody spoke. She amused herself for a while with the
thought that she was being a patient patient slowly growing ancient.
Suddenly the doctor’s door opened and to her starkest surprise none
other came through but the awkward Roane Black, Prince Roane according to
Miguel. Now she knew the meaning of the
limousine parked outside and the silver-haired gentleman across the room.
“Huh, hey Haley,” Roane said, looking just as panicked as she felt. “Uh,
um, what are you, um, what are you doing here?”
“Been feeling a bit stressed lately; come to see if the doc can help
me.” Well it was true.
“Hi M-Mistress Reynolds,” Roane stuttered weakly, quickly discarding an
attempt at a cordial wave of his hand.
Haley’s mom, who had been staring at him distractedly though clearly
lost in her own thoughts, raised her manicured eyebrows at the shy boy with
blond hair and gray eyes who was actually wearing a suit and necktie. “Hello… a friend of Haley?”
“Um, I-I… s-sure.”
A bright streak ticked outside and they all three jerked to the
thunderclap that quickly followed. They
could hear the rain starting to fall, the sound coming gently and relaxing
through a set of open windows just under the eaves.
The gentleman stood and Roane looked at him then back at Haley. “G-Got to go Haley, see you September?”
“Sure, see you.”
Another flash of light and peal of thunder was followed by the
receptionist lifting the receiver of her desk phone. “You may go in now, Haley.”
Her mom stood with her, walked
her to the door and opened it. Looking
back she saw Roane exiting with the elderly man whose identity was unclear…driver
or relative? Roane had always let
himself out of the limo with the heavily tinted windows.
“Good day Andrea. She’ll be
fine. Come right in Haley, how are you
today?”
“I’ll be waiting out here Haley, tell the Doctor everything.” Doctor Francis gestured to a very comfortable
looking seat by his desk that was turned towards him and she started towards it
as mom closed the door.
“So what shall we talk about today, Haley? Your mom tells me you’ve been having some
very troubling experiences. How old are
you Haley?” His voice lulled her and as
she seated herself in the deeply padded chair it slowly reclined a bit.
“I’m ten.” The room shook
slightly as thunder boomed then droned on the outside, but sound was more
subdued in here.
“Are you frightened by the thunder, Haley?”
“Sometimes, but I’m more afraid of the lightning that causes it.”
He somehow found that funny and
laughed good-naturedly. She felt herself
relaxing.
“The world can be a very scary place, Haley. Everybody has something they are afraid
of. Even we grownups sometimes have
fears hiding away deep down. Fears we
try our best to forget, but it’s always a good thing to face our fears, Haley,
to think of what frightens us the most and ask ourselves honest questions about
those things.” He reached in his vest, a
beige one over a white shirt, and took out a pocket watch, gold, with a high
sheen.
“When I was your age I was afraid of heights…terrified really. I knew it was irrational, knew it didn’t make
sense, but whenever I was in a high place I could feel a force drawing my body
to the edge like a sideways kind of gravity.”
He flicked open the cover of the watch and showed her the face.
It had none. She could see the
small gold gears working, and a tiny spiral spring winding and unwinding very
quickly.
“Once I found myself on the top of a very tall building with no rails
around. My friends had found out about
my fear and tricked me out there then locked the door. I was trapped and scared. Can you imagine what it was like, Haley? Can you imagine how the seconds ticked away
with me fighting with all my might against that force that was drawing me to
the edge to pull me over it?”
His voice, Haley thought, it’s so comforting. How could he ever have been afraid? He sounds so safe, like no danger could exist
around him. But she saw him
nonetheless. She saw him on the roof
tilting his body backwards towards the door that was shut mercilessly behind
him. She saw him fight to keep his
footing, as if against the gust of a hurricane.
She saw the watch a thousand times its size floating in the air by the
building with all its gears turning slowly and the second hand ticking around
as a young boy her size got down on his hands and knees and cried.
“They came back after an hour or so, I imagine.” She was back in the office. “But it felt like I was up there the whole
day. When they opened the door I rushed
in and it still felt like the force was drawing me.” She felt perfectly normal, but things seemed
different in the office, the details sharper.
“That night as I rested in bed, still crying for being such a coward, I
thought about it. If the force was so
powerful, how comes it failed to pull me off the roof when it was at its most
powerful? Maybe it wasn’t so powerful
after all. Then I had the idea, maybe it
was really all in my mind. So you know
what I did?”
The room shook again from the thunder outside, but this time it seemed
she could see the furniture vibrating, even though the thunder wasn’t any
louder than the ones before.
He placed the watch on his desk, eyes on it. “I went back on that roof, curious. And the force didn’t even show itself. Since then it never has.” He paused.
He looked up from the watch and looked directly into her eyes.
“What frightens you, Haley?”
Immediately a face that had no features came out of the wall above the
Doctor’s head. “What frightens you so
much you feel like crying?” The thing
came out of the wall and slowly settled in the good doctor.
“I want you to tell me everything about it Haley, knowing that whenever I
take this watch up and tap it on the desk twice, whatever you see in your
mind’s eye will go away.”
She wasn’t so sure about that. In
fact, the only thing she was sure of at the moment was that a pale light had
started to glow in his eyes. Then he said
the words that really frightened her.
“Haley, we need you to come home.”
“Why, why must I go there?” She
couldn’t believe she was speaking with this thing which was in the doctor, or
that she was shouting and beginning to cry.
“Do not be frightened Haley.
There is a reason you were chosen.”
It was the voice of Doctor Francis, still very calm, still soothing, and
her initial shock wore off. Whatever was
in the doctor was not a raging monster out to get her. It was intelligent. She dried her eyes.
“Chosen for what, why do you need me?”
“Not everyone can see the spirit world as well as you can, Haley.”
“I can see the spirit world?”
“You chose to filter it out. You
always saw in great detail when you were a toddler. We could show you things none of the other
toddlers would notice. You are very
special.”
“I’m just me.” Tears came to her
eyes again. “You frighten me.”
“I’ve always been visiting you Haley, but yes, I frighten you, and you
chose to stop seeing because you grew afraid of me.”
Somehow it felt right, like something like that had actually happened. “Why do you need me to see what you have to
show me? And why couldn’t you show me here?”
“There is someone who will be taken to your grandmother in Jamaica,
someone who is already on the island.
You will not understand what we have to show you, but he will. Go there for the holiday, Haley. We need you.”
The pale glow in the doctor’s eyes receded and the faceless entity rose
out of him, still facing Haley, then went up through the ceiling.
The doctor looked puzzled. He
tapped the watch on the desk and suddenly the sharpness of visual focus she had
faded. Things looked normal again.
“That was very interesting, Haley.”
“What was?”
“That story about the rats.”
“I didn’t say anything about rats.”
That frightened her a little. She
hadn’t told anyone here in America about the rats. Had grandma done so?
“Doctor, did you hypnotize me?
Like they do in the movies?”
“Yes I did, Haley.”
“Then I wouldn’t remember what happened in the hypnosis?”
He looked puzzled once more. “Do
you not remember talking about the rats, Haley?”
“No Doctor Francis.”
“Maybe your mind refuses to do so.
I had specifically requested that you remember… but are limits to
hypnosis.” He smiled. “You are a smart one though. So… that concludes our session for the day. I’ll speak with your mom about when we can
schedule another.” He took up the watch
and quickly replaced it in the vest pocket.
“Oh, I might have to go to the Caribbean for the holiday.”
He looked at her. “Feeling braver
already? That was the first thing your
mom told me about, that you were afraid to go to your grandmother.”
“Did she also tell you about the rats?”
He smiled. “No Haley, you did.”
He seemed ready to dismiss her.
“Doctor…”
“Yes, Haley…”
“Would I have been able to speak while under hypnosis without you
hearing me?”
“Not usually dear. You think you
said something I didn’t hear?”
“I was speaking to a spirit that came into this room and went into
you.” The puzzled look one more.
“We only spoke for a minute or so.”
He smiled. “Well that explains it
somewhat. I suppose your mind created
that image on leaving the hypnotic state…an invention to cover what it didn’t
want to remember.”
“So I was speaking for longer than a minute?”
“Haley, we spoke for at least an hour.”
“Are you sure about that doctor?”
She felt miserable and in wonder at the same time that she had lost an
hour without knowing it.
He reached into the pocket for the watch. “We started this session as noted in my diary
at ten forty-five and it is now…” She
glanced at her own wrist watch. Ten
minutes to eleven.
He simply stopped moving; he blinked a few times but that was it. His face was getting paler though. Then he drew in a breath and replaced the
watch. He stared into space for a few
more seconds. “A spirit came into me,
you say?”
Haley didn’t feel like answering.
It was becoming clear that something had happened that was not all in
her mind. She got up. “Bye Doctor Francis, I don’t think I’ll be
coming back.”
She walked around the chair as it readjusted itself to its more upright
position and left the doctor once more staring blankly ahead.
As she opened the door the Doctor’s eyes regained their focus and looked
at the ten year old that had unsettled his day, if not his life. He lifted the handset off his phone and
pressed a button. Margaret, the
receptionist, answered.
“Start calling my later appointments and inform them that I won’t be
available for the rest of the day.”
“What on earth for, Ernesto?”
“I can’t say for sure, but I think I might have just hypnotized myself.”
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