Richard Matheson - What Dreams May Come

I turned back in surprise as the nurse ran from the room. I couldn’t hear what she was shouting.

I moved in closer on the man and saw that he was probably dead. How come someone else was in my bed though? What kind of hospital would put two patients in the same bed?

Strange. I leaned in close to look at him. His face was just like mine. I shook my head. That was impossible. I looked down at his left hand. He wore a wedding band exactly like the one I wore. How could that be?

I began to feel an aching coldness in my stomach. I tried to draw the sheet back from his body but I couldn’t. Somehow, I had lost the sense of touch. I kept on trying until I saw my fingers going through the sheet, then pulled my hand back, sickened. No, it isn’t me, I told myself. How could it be when I was still alive? My body even hurt. Proof positive of life.

I whirled as a pair of doctors rushed into the room, stepping back to let them at the body.

One of them began to blow his breath into the man’s mouth. The other had a highp- spell H-y-p-o-dermic; yes. I watched him shove the needle end into the man’s flesh. Then a nurse came running in, pushing some machine on wheels. One of the doctors pressed the ends of two thick, metal rods against the man’s bare chest and he twitched. Now I knew that there was no relationship between the man and me for I felt nothing.

Their efforts were in vain. The man was dead. Too bad, I thought. His family would be grieved. Which made me think of Ann and the children. I had to find and reassure them. Especially Ann; I knew how terrified she was. My poor, sweet Ann.

I turned and walked toward the doorway. On my right was a bathroom. Glancing in, I saw a toilet, light switch and a button with a red bulb next to it, the word Emergency printed beneath the bulb.

I walked into the hall and recognized it. Yes, of course. The card in my wallet said to take me there in case of accident. The Motion Picture Hospital in Woodland Hills.

I stopped and tried to work things out. There’d been an accident, they’d brought me here. Why wasn’t I in bed then? But I had been in bed. The same one the dead man was in. The man who looked like me. There had to be an explanation for all this. I couldn’t find it though. I couldn’t think with clarity.

The answer finally came. I wasn’t sure it was correct-but there was nothing else. I had to accept it; for the moment anyway.

I was under anesthetic, they were operating on me. Everything was happening inside my mind . That had to be the answer. Nothing else made sense.

Now what? I thought. Despite the distress of what was taking place, I had to smile. If everything was happening in my mind, then, being conscious of it, couldn’t I control it?

Right , I thought. I’d do exactly what I chose. And what I chose to do was find my Ann.

As I decided that, I saw another doctor running down the hall toward me. Deliberately, I tried to stop him as he hurried past but my outstretched hand passed through his shoulder. Never mind, I told myself. In essence, I was dreaming. Any foolish thing could happen in a dream.

I started walking down the hall. I passed a room and saw a green card with white lettering: NO SMOKING-OXYGEN IN USE. Unusual dream, I thought, I’d never been able to read in dreams; words always ran together when I tried. This was completely legible despite the general blurring which continued.

It’s not exactly a dream, of course, I told myself, seeking to explain it. Being under anesthesia isn’t like being asleep. I nodded in agreement with the explanation, kept on walking. Ann would be in the waiting room. I set my mind on reaching her and comforting her. I felt her suffering as though it were my own.

I passed the nurses’ station and heard them talking. I made no attempt to speak to them. All of this was in my mind. I had to go along with that; accept the rules. All right, it’s not a dream persay-per s-e-but it was easier to think of it as one. A dream then; under anesthesia.

Wait, I thought, stopping. Dream or not, I can’t walk around in my patient’s gown. I glanced down at myself, startled to see the clothes. I was wearing when the accident occurred. Where’s the blood? I wondered. I recalled an instant vision of myself unconscious in the wreckage. Blood had been spraying.

I felt a sense of eggs-no! Sorry for the impatience. E-x-u-l-t-a-t-i-o-n. Why? Because I’d reasoned something out despite the dullness of my mind. I couldn’t possibly be that man in the bed. He was in a patient’s gown, bandaged, fed by tubes. I was dressed, unbandaged, mobile. Total difference.

A man in street clothes was approaching me. I expected him to pass me. Instead, to my surprise, he put his hand on my shoulder and stopped me. I could feel the pressure of each separate finger on my flesh.

“Do you know what’s happened yet?” he asked.

“Happened?”

“Yes.” He nodded. “You’ve died.”

I looked at him in disgust. “That’s absurd,” I said.

“It’s true.”

“If I were dead, I wouldn’t have a brain,” I told him, “I couldn’t talk to you.”

“It doesn’t work that way,” he persisted.

“The man in that room is dead, not me.” I said, “I’m under anesthesia, being operated on. In essence, I’m dreaming.” I was pleased by my analysis.

“No, Chris,” he said.

I felt a chill. How did he know my name? I peered at him closely. Did I know him? Was that why he’d appeared in my dream?

No; not at all. I felt distaste for him. Anyway, I thought (the idea made me smile despite my irritation) this was my dream and he had no claim to it. “Go find your own dream,” I said, gratified by the cleverness of my dismissal.

“If you don’t believe me, Chris,” he told me, “look in the waiting room. Your wife and children are there. They haven’t been told yet you’ve died.”

“Wait a minute, wait a minute.” I pointed my finger at him, jabbing at the air. “You’re the one who told me not to fight it, aren’t you?”

He started to reply but I was so incensed by that I wouldn’t let him speak. “I’m tired of you and tired of this stupid place,” I said. “I’m going home.”

Something pulled me from him instantaneously. It was as though my body was encased in metal with a distant magnet drawing me to itself. I hurtled through the air so fast I couldn’t see or hear a thing.

It ended as abruptly as it started. I was standing in fog. I looked around but saw nothing in any direction. I began to walk, moving slowly through the mist. Now and then, I thought I caught a fleeting glimpse of people. When I tried to see them clearly, though, they faded off. I almost called to one, then chose not to. I was master of this dream. I wouldn’t let it dominate me.

I attempted to distract myself by making believe I was back in London. Remember how I traveled there in 1957 to write a film? It had been November and I’d walked in fogs like this more than once-“pea soup” is a good description. This was even thicker, though; like being underwater. It even felt wet.

Finally, through the fog, I saw our house. That sight relieved me in two ways. One, the very look of it. Two, the way I’d gotten there so quickly. That could only happen in a dream.

Suddenly, an inspiration came to me. I’ve told you how my body hurt. Even though it was a dream, I still felt pain. Accordingly, I told myself that, since the pain was dream-eng-e-ndered, it wasn’t necessary that I feel it. Robert, with the thought, the pain was gone . Which caused another sense of pleasure and relief. What more vivid proof could one require that this was dream and not reality?

I remembered, then, how I had sat up on the hospital bed, laughing, because it had all been a dream. That’s exactly what it was. Period.