Gary Brandner - Walkers

"Yes?"

"Last night, when I went under in the pool and couldn't get anybody's attention, after I, well, blacked out, I had a really weird experience."

Dr. Hovde took a chair facing her. "Tell me about it."

Struggling to keep her tone level and unemotional, Joana recounted the whole experience, from the feeling of leaving her body and floating somewhere above the scene to her struggle to return from the tunnel of shadows and the rage she felt directed at her as she finally made good her escape.

Dr. Hovde sat quietly while Joana talked. His eyes never left her face.

"Well… that's it," she said at last, feeling somehow that she had not done a good job in the telling.

"I see. Well, I wouldn't worry about it too much if I were you," said the doctor. "It's not an uncommon experience."

"It's not?"

"Not at all. In the case of a sudden shock like an accident or a fire or, in your case, a near-drowning, the mind can play some mighty strange tricks."

"I don't think you understand me, Doctor. What I'm saying is that it wasn't a near-drowning last night, it was real. I died in that swimming pool. For a period of time, I have no idea how long, since time had no meaning where I was, I was really dead. I crossed over, then somehow made it back."

"Yes, I can see how you might believe that. There have been a number of books recently about the experiences of people brought back from the so-called brink of death. Have you read any of them?"

"No."

"You've heard of the books, perhaps?"

"Maybe I have." Joana began to feel irritated at the doctor's professional detachment. "Anyway, I don't see what those books have to do with me."

"Sometimes an idea or an impression planted in the subconscious can be blown to the surface, so to speak, at a time of great stress."

"I didn't know you were a psychiatrist," Joana said coolly.

Dr. Hovde chuckled. "I'm not, of course, just an old-fashioned G.P. Still, I can pull out a little elementary Freud now and then if the occasion calls for it. If you want my strictly medical opinion of what caused this 'weird experience' of yours, I would call it anoxic hallucination, sensory distortions caused by temporary lack of oxygen delivered to the brain."

"Do you think that's it?"

"What else could it be?"

"I–I don't know. I have a feeling it's not over."

Dr. Hovde moved to a desk and scribbled on a prescription pad. "I can understand how this would cause you some anxiety, so I'll prescribe a tranquilizer for you. If you still feel edgy, take one every four hours for a couple of days. After that you shouldn't need them."

"All right," Joana said. She took the slip of paper, folded it, and tucked it into her bag. The doctor was so logical and reasonable in his explanation, she began to wonder if perhaps he was right. After all, the oxygen had been cut off from her brain for a short period, and that could have triggered the whole outlandish experience.

But she did not think so.

Dr. Hovde walked her back down the hallway to the waiting room. "Just take it easy the rest of the day," he said. "Do something you enjoy. How's that fordoctor's orders? I wish I could give them to myself, but this is my afternoon in the emergency ward."

"Is that so?" Joana said politely. Her thoughts were elsewhere.

"Yes, I try to put in one or two half-days a week," the doctor said. "With a practice like mine you can get caught up in treating strep infections and flu, and forget how to deal with some of the more violent things that can happen to the human body."

"I suppose so," Joana said.

'Take care of yourself now, and if there's any problem, give me a call."

"I will."

Joana left the building and walked up the street to her car. The overcast was rapidly burning away, and it looked like it was going to be a lovely day.

She was not ready to go home, so decided she would stop in Westwood to get her prescription filled and do some window-shopping. The thought cheered her, and she paid no attention when a Chevy station wagon pulled out into the street behind her and followed her in on Santa Monica Boulevard.

The streets of Westwood thronged, as usual, with shoppers, strollers, college students, and tourists. And as usual, there was not a parking place to be seen anywhere. Joana sometimes wondered where all the cars came from that lined both sides of the streets from Wilshire to Le Conte. There never seemed to be anyone parking or leaving, they were always just… there. However, the sun was fully out now and a gentle breeze blew in from the ocean, and Joana did not mind having to walk a few blocks.

For several minutes she drove back and forth on the oddly angled streets, making her way north block by block. It was several blocks up Hilgard, along the eastern edge of the UCLA campus, that she finally found an available parking place. In the heavy traffic Joana paid no attention to the station wagon that stayed doggedly behind her.

She backed the Datsun into the space on Hilgard and dropped a quarter into the parking meter. Several cars behind her, the station wagon double-parked and sat there with the engine idling. Joana glanced back at the driver, a white-faced woman with a grim mouth and an odd dusty look to her eyes. Feeling uncomfortable, Joana turned away. Something about the woman seemed to trigger a memory, an unpleasant memory. Joana put the thought out of her mind and walked down the street toward Le Conte. Bullock's was there, just across the street from the campus. Joana decided to save the big department store for last, checking out the smaller specialty shops of Westwood first.

On her right the green lawn of the campus sloped up and away. Students lounged about on the grass. Some dozed, some read books, and some were couples with eyes only for each other. Joana, barely four years out of college herself, marveled at how young they looked. How young and unmarked by the world.

Behind her the station wagon eased forward. The woman at the wheel paid no attention to the exasperated drivers behind her and crawled along the line of parked cars, keeping pace with Joana.

At Le Conte Joana turned right, staying alongside the campus, and stopped for the traffic light, waiting to cross at Tiverton. Twenty yards up the street the station wagon stopped too and waited.

The red don't walk light blinked off and the white walk came on. Joana started across the street.

To her left an automobile engine revved suddenly. Tires shrieked on the asphalt. There were shouts of warning from the other pedestrians. A little girl screamed.

For an instant Joana was frozen in the crosswalk, a third of the way across the street. She saw the station wagon rushing toward her like some maddened beast. Through the windshield she could see the face of the woman at the wheel. It was a mask of mindless fury, the lips skinned back from yellowed teeth in a soundless snarl.

Someone clutched at Joana from behind and she snapped out of her trance. She sprang forward in a headlong leap, striking the pavement with her hands. She rolled over and over toward the far curb. A blast of wind buffeted her as the station wagon roared past her, inches away.

There was a metallic clang as the wagon caromed off a parked car and bounced up over the curb. It crossed the sidewalk and continued up onto the lawn, glowing down but still scattering pedestrians and students.

Dazed, her ears ringing, Joana sat up on the pavement. She was surrounded by people, many of them college students. They were looking down at her with concern while they watched the station wagon roll slowly up the bank on the other side of the street. Everyone spoke at once.

"Are you hurt?"

"…ran right through the stop light…"

"…didn't even slow down…"