“Do you feel better now?” Doc said, smirk on her lips, legs crossed in front of her. She’d bought a new pen—ruby and black, the kind that clicked—and she’d been pushing the end up and down since I’d shown up. Normally, Doc knew better than to try and set me off, but today, she had a major problem. Click, click, click.
“Do I feel better? I’m not sure. How did I get here?”
“You mean you don’t know? You don’t remember?” Click.
“I remember talking to you on the phone when I was at the Inn. But the rest of it. All hazy. Am I on new meds?”
Doc’s phone rang, and she lifted a finger, silently telling me to hold on before she answered it. What the hell? She never answered her phone during one of our sessions. In fact, the phone had always been silenced...
“That’s right,” Doc said to the person on the other line. “Dinner party at eight means you’ll need to be there by six. I could use a bit of help cooking.” Click. “I’m not going to serve anything fancy, but you know how I am.” She giggled and glanced at me. “No, no. That’s okay. I’ll be sure to have something you can eat...chicken? I’d much prefer something a bit darker, shall we say…” Click.
Giggling? Doc? The lift of her eyebrow...I shoved my hands against my eyes, rubbed them, and blinked. Click. Doc had switched positions. She now stood in front of me, arms across her chest, fire blazing from her eyes. A normally calm fixture in my life, she’d become an imposing and daunting figure.
“You’re not as forthcoming as you need to be, Theo. I’m worried about you. It’s time to consider new alternatives.”
“Like what?”
Doc reached for my hand and pulled me to standing. We faced one another, her breathing in tune with mine. Click.
“Can you please stop?” I asked, my entire body pulsing with tension, a slight humming moving up and down my legs and arms.
“Stop what?”
“The clicking.”
“I’m not doing anything.”
“But your pen—”
She held up her hands. Both empty. Click.
I blinked again, grit stinging my eyes. When I opened them, Doc had moved to the corner, and the Yoga Man had appeared, lying on a thin ochre mat next to my feet.
“There’s still hope for you, Theo,” he said.
“What do you mean, hope?” All of me fought to push up from my chair, but something otherworldly tethered me to the seat. My feet. No luck there either. My arms—stuck to those of the chair.
“I mean you’re looking for something. For a connection. I can feel it, in here.” The man touched his chest with one finger and turned his head my way. His dark pupils glittered in the light. “What is holding you back from moving forward?”
“I’m not even sure what forward means anymore.” An image of an empty road, split down the middle by a broad, yellow line, formed before my eyes. The line splintered in two and the road divided, then vanished, taking the man with it. Darkness enveloped the whole room.
His voice remained. “Your body needs to be in tune with the Earth.”
“You mean like Liam’s body is in tune with the Earth?”
“Was that critical tone intentional? Where did it come from, friend?”
His voice—soft and smooth as the newest of skin—moved forward, caressing my ears, moving down my neck, propelling me to speak, even though I didn’t want to.
“From inside, where I’m broken,” I whispered.
“At least you admit it.”
“What else can I say?” Each moment brought a breath, and then another, not slow and steady like Doc would have wanted, but choppy, as if I’d run a long way through water or sand. One, two, three. In through the nose, out through the mouth. I had to be dreaming, didn’t I? But this...this dream was indescribable, eccentric, maddening, all at the same time.
“Have you thought that the love has changed? It’s still there, but different. Might you be better off separate?”
A light flicked on, and the man again sat on the mat at my feet.
“The love? What love? Are you talking about my relationship with Sadie?”
A burst of color pulsed beside him and broke into a thousand shards of light, all of them settling into the man’s hands. He blew against the pieces, and they vanished. “I am.”
“How do you know about my relationship?”
“Because I’m in tune with the Earth, and you’re a part of that Earth...and so I’m in tune with you.” He gestured for me to lean down as he stood, holding his palms up, cupped like a bowl.
Between his fingers, what looked like a single atom hovered. The cloud of electrons parted, and the nucleus cleared. The subatomic particles thumped and swirled, grew bigger and bigger, and then began to change. Shimmers of images scrolled before my eyes: memories I’d made with Sadie and the kids.
“What? How?”
“Life changes, Theo. But how do we react to those changes? Only worry about what you can control...do not spend energy on everything you can’t. Are you looking?” He raised his arms upward, toward the ceiling. “Are you really seeing?” Now, he brought his arms down before placing them crossed over his heart. “What’s inside you?”
“My body? Organs are.”
“And inside those?”
“Blood, cells, nutrients...” The particulars were easy to list, but what did he want?
“Yes, but more specifically...it’s your life force.” A starburst of yellow light popped behind his head as he spoke the words, and a distant hum began to grow louder.
“I’m not sure what you’re getting at.”
“Well then, when you figure it out, let me know. You have everything you need, Theo. You have everything you need, Theo. You have everything you need, Theo.” His voice reverberated around the room, but came back each time to my eardrums, piercing them.
“Stop!”
Click.
Andrew. Blood on his face, in his eyes, trickling down his neck in rivulets, leaking on to his shirt. A drop and then a bloom of scarlet against the white fabric.
“What are you doing here?” I reached my hand toward him. He needed my
