“You’re doing great,” Dr. Monk said, hervoice quieter and lower now. “Now I want you to picture a sky. You’re sitting,looking up at that sky. Beautiful blue, just one little cloud floating byabove, nothing else on the horizon. It stretches out over a calm blue sea. Canyou see it?”
Zoe wasn’t the best at imagining things,but she remembered an image she had recently seen, an advertisement for atravel company. A family happily playing in the sand, an impossibly blueparadise behind them. She put herself there, focusing on that. She gave a smallnod to let Dr. Monk know she was ready to continue.
“Good. Feel the warmth of the sun onyour face and your shoulders. It’s a beautiful day. Just a light breeze, exactlythe kind of weather you would ask for. You’re sitting in a small inflatableboat, just off the shore. Feel it rocking gently in the motion of the sea. It’sso peaceful and calm. Isn’t the sun wonderful?”
Zoe would normally have laughed atsomething like this, but she did as she was told, and she could almost swearthat she could feel it. Real sun, beating down on her brow. Not too oppressive:the kind of sun that made you think you were getting a tan, not skin cancer.
Skin cancer. Shouldn’t have thoughtabout skin cancer. Focus, Zoe. Rocking in the current.
“Look over to the side. You’ll see theisland behind you. The beach where you just came from, and behind it the restof this paradise. What do you see?”
Zoe knew exactly what she saw when shelooked over there: another image from a travel advertisement. A place she hadwanted to go. Except it had been advertised as a honeymoon destination, and shehad been single at the time, and it had only made her feel more alone.
“Golden sand,” she said, the sound ofher own voice strangely distant and unfamiliar. “Then lush undergrowth. Behindit, tropical trees reach up to the sky, ten feet and more. The sun is comingdown at a harsh angle, shadows only half a foot long. I can’t see beyond them.There’s a tree leaning right out at a forty-five-degree angle over the water,with a seven-foot hammock tied beneath it. It’s empty.”
“Try to focus more on the scene than thenumbers. Now, listen. Can you hear the waves gently washing onto the sand? Canyou hear bird calls?”
Zoe breathed deeply, letting this newlayer of sensation wash over her. “Yes,” she said. “Parrots. I think. The wavescome at intervals of three seconds. Bird calls every five.”
“Feel the warm sun on your face. You canclose your eyes, stop counting. You’re safe there.”
Zoe breathed, still watching the islandin her mind. Her eyes kept straying to the hammock. Who was it for? Forherself, or would someone join her one day? John? Did she want him there, onthis personal island of hers? It was sized for a man. She was only five footsix herself. The hammock hung two feet above the water.
“That’s great, Zoe. Now, I want you tofocus on your breathing again. Count down from ten, just like we did before butin reverse. As you do, I want you to slowly come back from your island. Let itfade out, and let yourself wake up, a little at a time. Gently, now. That’s it.”
Zoe opened her eyes, a littleembarrassed to find how much mellower she felt—and now aware of how strange itseemed, to have been away on a little island in her head while her therapistwatched her sit straight-backed in an armchair.
“You did really well.” Dr. Monk smiled. “Howdo you feel now?”
Zoe nodded. “Calmer.” Still, she feltdoubt. The numbers had been there. They had followed her, even into that space.What if she could never get rid of them?
“That’s a great start. You’ll find itmore peaceful the more you do the exercise. And that’s a great thing, becauseit can be a calm place that you return to whenever you feel stressed out oroverwhelmed.” Dr. Monk dashed out a few notes in her book, her pen making quickand spidery lines that Zoe could not guess at.
“What if I need to shut the numbers outfast? Like, in an emergency situation?” Zoe asked. “Or if I can’t tell theother person why I need to calm down?”
Dr. Monk nodded. “Try just counting yourbreaths as you did to enter the meditation. We’ll need to test this out in areal scenario, but it’s my belief that counting one thing—your breath—may allowyou to stop seeing the numbers elsewhere. It’s a distraction tactic—keeping thenumbers side of your brain occupied while you focus on something else.”
Zoe nodded, trying to cement that intoher head. “Okay.”
“Now, Zoe, about not wanting to explainto people why you need to shut out the numbers—or the fact that you can seethem. Why is it that you’re still determined to hide this gift?” Dr. Monkasked, tilting her head in a way that Zoe had come to recognize as meaning achange of tack.
She struggled to answer that one. Well,no, she didn’t: she knew the reason. There was a fear that had gripped hersince she was a young girl, reinforced by screams of devil child andenforced praying sessions that kept her on her knees all night, wishing for thenumbers to go away. It was just hard to say that out loud.
“I do not want people to know,” shesaid, picking a piece of imaginary lint from the knee of her trousers.
“But why is that, Zoe?” Dr. Monkpressed. “You have a wonderful ability. Why don’t you want to share it withothers?”
Zoe struggled. “I… do not wish them tothink of me differently.”
“You’re afraid that your peers willperceive you differently from how they do now?”
“Yes. Maybe…” Zoe hesitated, shruggingher shoulders. “Maybe they might try to—to do something with it. To exploit itin some way. I do not wish to be a puppet for someone else to use. Or thevictim of tricks and pranks. Or a performance piece for people to test.”
Dr. Monk nodded. “That’s understandable.Are you certain that’s all you are afraid of?”
Zoe knew the answer. She even whisperedit in her head. I
