Tunnel Vision

49

“I don’t know what to tell you,” Sarah had said as she drove him home. “Yours is the first suspension that comes close to possible transcendence.”

“What about all the other subjects?”

“I’ve only been on the project a few months.”

“But you must have seen the records.”

“A few and nothing very promising. Only one or two were possible OBEs. But no follow-ups like yours.”

That was far from comforting. “So you’re saying my mind separated from my body and experienced me running down that woman.”

“I’m saying the raw data shows a highly intense experience. As for the hit-and-run scenario, that could be something created in your own head—a flash dream.”

“And what about the possibility these suspensions are fucking up my brain? Did anyone think of that?” he snapped. “That all the toxins and flatlining are making me loony.”

“You’ve had bad nightmares before, we all have. But you didn’t lose your mind because of them, right?”

“So you’re saying it could be some weird nightmare vision.”

“I’m echoing Morris here, but yeah. Stuff in your unconsciousness got activated just as you emerged from flatline.”

He couldn’t tell if she really believed that or was trying to placate him. “But you said the stimuli was recorded in real time while I was suspended.”

“Yes.” She was silent for a moment. “Zack, I really don’t have a good answer.”

“But if you were me, would you submit to another suspension?”

“I can’t answer that. It depends on how disturbing the experience was and how much of a risk you want to take of having another.”

In a flash, he saw his father in his monk’s robe standing in the woods before a large rock. Time for big-boy talk. “I’ll think about it.”

By the time she dropped him off, he was feeling more settled. Before he got out, she gave him a hug.

“Want to come up?”

“Not tonight. I’ve got a ton of work.”

He kissed her good night and went up to his apartment. He took two sleeping pills, and before fading into a dreamless night, he again saw his father standing in the long brown robe before a large rock outcropping. Big-boy talk.

The next day, Friday, he called Sarah to say he would submit to another suspension next Tuesday. She was free that night, and Damian didn’t need his car all weekend, so Zack took Sarah to the waterfront, where they took a ferryboat cruise at Boston Harbor.

Over the weekend, he worked on his thesis. At Byron Cates’s suggestion, he filled the prescription for the antipsychotic Haldol, which apparently did the trick—no more dreams of crawling in sand. No psychotic visions of running anyone down in a car. No weird out-of-the-blue flashes.

That Tuesday night, Sarah picked him up and drove to the lab. Everybody was delighted, especially Dr. Luria, who could barely contain her relief.

He was prepped and ready to be rolled into the MRI machine. His last thought was, Dad, please be there.