Brian Lane - Mind Games with a Serial Killer

Before the dream though… There were misty scenes that floated around in my head. I answered the doctor’s question by talking it through. “The last clear thing I can recall is the camping trip I took up near the Palomar Observatory. I also remember

breaking camp and loading everything onto my Kawasaki, a 750-full dress. But everything after that is kind of fuzzy. I remember a girls face… scared… crying, I think. A green sports car. Maybe a Camaro.” Then some more of the mists cleared. “It hit me and I was thrown from my bike. I was falling away from my bike. I seem to recall seeing a big tree flying through the air, but that can’t be right. That’s about all,” I said, with a half shrug that brought tears to my eyes.

“That’s good, Michael. You remember a lot more than I expected you to be able to remember.”

I interrupted him at that point. “I’ve got a number of questions for you, doctor. Like, how long have I been here and what injuries have I, for starters.”

“All in good time, Michael, all in good time. First, I want to examine you.” I closed my eyes in resignation and submitted to his examinations. I’ve never been a very patient man, but I knew that it was no use to protest. He looked into my eyes, ears and mouth. He probed at my right shoulder and the ribs under my arm. He next probed at my right hip and kept asking if there was any bad pain in any of the places he was probing. I told him about dull aches in each of those places, except for the hip. The hip was very tender and made me wince a bit. I added that there were also aches along my back, left leg, left hand and wrist. “Well, that’s to be expected, Michael. Your left hand was broken in six different spots. We’re still not sure whether or not you’ll have full range of motion return. You’ll need some extensive physical therapy for your hand. You’ll need it for your leg and hip as well. You may have to learn how to walk all over again.”

I began to get even more worried now. If I was going to get that much physical therapy and maybe even have to relearn the ability to walk, I had to have been in a bed and immovable long enough for some of my muscles to atrophy. How long that was, I had no idea, but I did know that it took awhile.

“Now, as to your questions. Your injuries weren’t half as bad as they could have been, considering your accident. But, while your

injuries could have been worse, those you did sustain were, for the most part, bad enough to put you down for the count. Do you remember the date of your accident? When you broke camp and started down from your campground?”

I only had to consider the question for a moment. “I went up to Palomar and set up camp on Friday afternoon, the 15th of January. I broke camp around noon Sunday and started right down the hill. So the date would be the 17th of January. What’s today’s date?” The answer to that question was more important to me than what had happened in the accident.

Doctor Welles made a few notes in the chart he had brought in with him, then put his pen in a pocket and closed the chart. “Michael, today is Wednesday, the 14th of July. You’ve been in a coma, or at least deeply unconscious, for the last six months.” I was able to work out how long it had been faster in my head than he could tell me. I shut my eyes at the amount of time I had lost. I wondered who had been doing my work, who was feeding my birds and fish. The doctor’s voice was suddenly sharp with concern. “Michael? Are you all right?” I opened my eyes and looked at him. “Nurse, some water!” Nurse Mandell instantly gave the cup of water to the doctor and he held the straw for me to sip. After a couple draws of water, he took the cup away. “Are you all right now, Michael?”

I took a couple deep breaths and felt better. “It just had me startled for a moment that I’ve lost six months due to this accident. I realized that some time has passed, but not how much.”

“Well, I’m going to have a physical therapist come up to talk with you and set up a schedule for you. The traction on your head and neck will be removed tomorrow or Friday. Your physical therapy should begin next week and I’ll be checking in on you several times between now and then. The nursing staff will be in and out of here even more often. I’m going to leave an order for a painkiller, in case the pain in your hip or elsewhere gets too much for you to handle. That will give you some relief from your headaches, too. I’ll stop back by for a minute before I leave this evening.” He then left my room and the nurse stepped closer to my bed.

“Would you care for some more water?” I didn’t, so she set the cup back on the nightstand. Then she turned back to me. “You know, you’re something of a celebrity in here. You survived an accident that most people wouldn’t have. The fact that you were wearing a helmet probably says a lot for your still being alive. You’re a very lucky man.”

I gave her a half-hearted smile. “To be perfectly honest with you, I don’t really feel very lucky. Losing that much time out of a person’s life kind of puts a damper on everything.”

She smiled back at me and I noticed for the first time just how pretty she was. She had a beautiful smile and her blonde hair was a perfect frame for her face. “Listen, Michael. There are a few non-medical questions I’d like to ask you. Do you mind?” I couldn’t look her in the eyes, I was getting tongue-tied. So I just said okay and stared at the ceiling. “Several times during your unconsciousness you spoke, as if you were carrying on a conversation with someone. You kept mentioning the names ‘Kaldeer,’ ‘Day Striker,’ ‘Hod Ken’ and ‘Len Ara.’ A few times you said something about your hands opening a door. And through it all, you often mentioned the phrase ‘Aperient Oriel Fenestra.’ Do any of those words mean any thing to you?” She waited politely, not saying anything about my not looking at her.

I was contemplating whether or not I should tell her anything about my dream. I didn’t know if she would think I was crazy and would call a psychiatrist to start filling my head with nonsensical claptrap about me hating my parents and seeing sexual innuendoes in everything. I had even heard of a couple cases where a psychiatrist had brainwashed patients into thinking they had been sexually abused as children. No siree, no psychiatrists for me. After deciding, I quickly glanced at the nurse to see if she was staring at me, then back to the ceiling. I knew that I was coloring with embarrassment, but I couldn’t help it. Quickly, I gave her an answer. “A dream, th-that’s all. Just a dream I, uh, I had before I woke up.”

I could see her smile grow larger from the corner of my eye, and I felt like I was faintly trembling in the nearness of her presence. “I see. You know, it’s highly unusual for a person to dream or speak aloud while in a coma. That’s why Doctor Welles told you that you may have been in a very deep state of unconsciousness. I just wanted you to know that this has happened several times during the past couple months.” She stopped talking, I guess to give me a chance to reply, then: “Well, I’ve got to get back to the nurse’s station. I’ll check in to see how you’re doing every so often. The call button is pinned close to your right hand. If your pain gets to be too much for you, give the button a push and I’ll be right in with your medication. See you later.” With a slight wave, she was gone, leaving faint traces of perfume swirling in the breeze of her departure.

The pain in my hip was bothering me, but not so bad that I couldn’t bear it, if I tried. The pain in the back of my head was slightly worse, but I was pretty sure I could cause it to diminish without having to resort to drugs. I had never cared to try any kind of drug. In a way, they scared me. I’d heard of patients being given drugs for one reason and then getting addicted to them. I wasn’t about to get addicted to any drugs. So, if I could keep the nurses from giving me a drug for the pain, that was just another step to my goal. I’ve read a lot of self-help books and have studied some techniques of hypnotism. I called upon these techniques now trying to pacify the pain receptors in my head and hip. My eyes slid half closed as I coaxed myself into the trance, whereupon I could convince myself that the pain I was feeling was actually something else. In this instance, I pictured the different points of pain as overfilled sacks of water. The pain slowly ebbed away as I mentally emptied the sacks. Soon, I pictured the sacks emptied of water and the pain was nearly gone. But it happened much quicker than it ever had before. When the pain had diminished to the point which I could handle it, I became aware of a faint tingling left in the back of my head. The sensation grew to the point that it enclosed my entire brain. It wasn’t an unpleasant sensation, yet it wasn’t exactly welcome either. It felt like after my foot would fall asleep and before the feeling returned, I felt no pain in the sensation at all, but now I realized that there was no pain anywhere in my body.