by Martyn Ford
Then, and this is where it gets interesting, pay attention to your thoughts.
The most amazing part of this mindfulness business is that it’s so simple and so obvious. All you do is look at your own thoughts.
That’s it.
Just notice what’s happening in your head.
Close your eyes and just think. Do it. What the hell is going on in there? Just random thoughts coming and going. Thinking is easy, you’ve been doing it your whole life. But I tell you what isn’t easy – not thinking. In fact, it’s impossible. I bet you’re thinking, ‘Hey, I could stop thinking’. Give it a go. I will give you a million pounds if you can close your eyes and stop thinking for one minute. It might be that you’re thinking and you haven’t even noticed. But pay attention and you’ll see that your mind is constantly running. If you think you’ve cracked it, if you think your mind is blank, you are probably thinking about how good you are at not thinking. Which is thinking. That or you’re dead. If you’re dead then this exercise is not for you.
I didn’t know any of this jazzy consciousness stuff until Vladovski, the Russian hypnotherapist and ex-circus bear trainer, taught me. He said, ‘You can no more stop your brain than you can stop your heart.’
But, of course, I’m getting distracted again, so let’s go back to number forty-three Sandy Street, back to Dr Vladovski’s office, back to the moment I woke up in his mind instead of my own.
‘You can open your eyes now, Chester,’ I said, in a Russian accent.
Then, with a strange whooshing noise that reminded me of fast wind in a storm, my vision went blurry, foggy and … and I jolted.
Darkness.
I was lying down on a sofa. I checked with one eye, then both. And when I sat up and looked, I saw the office. I saw Dr Vladovski.
‘Whoa,’ I said, touching my own arms and legs. ‘That was crazy.’
‘You like this?’ the bald doctor asked. ‘You feel confident to go to audition now?’
‘Um … yeah … did … What exactly did you do to me?’
‘I did nothing to you, Chester. Only you can make long-term changes to your mind.’
‘Right. Sure. It’s just …’
I wanted to tell him what had happened, I wanted to explain the experience, but I felt silly, I thought he might laugh. Or, worse, decide I was insane and call whoever you call in that situation.
Dr Vladovski placed the notepad and his glasses on the table by his side. ‘You come back on Tuesday, we do a little more.’
‘Sure,’ I said, standing up.
Obviously it had just been in my imagination, I thought. It’s not actually possible to put your consciousness in someone else’s brain. It’s not actually possible to become someone else. I was being silly. I was smart enough to know that it must have just been an illusion, like a dream.
But as I stepped towards the door, I glanced down at Vladovski’s notepad. The notes were familiar and so was the small three-eyed stickman doodle in the top right-hand corner. My eyes were as wide as they’d ever been as I walked outside and felt the bright summer sun on my skin.
*
At dinner, Amy was talking fast about her YouTube channel, about subscribers or something like that – I wasn’t really listening.
‘It used to go up by a thousand or so a month,’ she was saying to Mum. ‘But recently it’s slowed right down. I just don’t understand what I’m doing wrong.’
‘Maybe you’ve got to keep it fresh,’ Mum said. ‘Review different things? What would you give dinner?’
‘I’d say nine point five.’ Amy smiled. ‘Ten for the chicken, but the vegetables could be firmer.’
‘Well, you can cook tomorrow.’
‘I just know Brian will ask about numbers.’
‘As long as he’s watched some of your videos, I’m sure they’ll be interested in working with you.’
‘I hope so.’ Amy’s knife and fork clinked on her plate as she finished. She took a long swig of water.
‘You’re very quiet, Chester,’ Mum said.
‘Huh?’ I turned my head but not my eyes. ‘Oh yeah, sure.’
‘Tell me more about your session with Dr Vladovski. How did it go, what did you learn?’
‘Um, good.’ I stared at the broccoli on my plate, poking it a few times with my fork. ‘Mindfulness.’
‘Oh, that’s interesting, I was …’ She carried on talking, but I realised I wasn’t paying attention.
Right. What am I thinking? That’s what Dr Vladovski said I should say to myself. This would help me notice my thoughts.
What was I thinking?
About what happened, about the notepad that proved it was real. There was no other way I could have seen those notes and that doodle other than through the doctor’s eyes. I had become him. I had … I don’t know. I had been in his mind. Or in his body. Just like I am in my body now.
So the next question was: could I do it again?
After we’d cleared all the plates away and wiped the table, Amy went upstairs to record a video. I paced up and down my bedroom, which is next door to hers, trying to work out a way of testing it. How had it happened? I was relaxed and I imagined myself leaving my body (whatever ‘myself’ actually is). Then, when I came back, I must have missed my body and ended up in Vladovski’s. But to get back into my own body I just looked at myself and, click, it happened.
Maybe seeing was the key – they say the eyes are the window to the soul after all. Right, so I needed a test subject.
‘Hey guys, welcome to Amy Reviews,’ I heard Amy say. ‘Today I’m going to cover a few of my favourites from this summer – I’ll do a top five and a bottom five next week.’
I stepped into the hall – sneaky, quiet. Amy’s door was open a little bit – I could see her sitting at her desk, in front of her computer, talking into the webcam. She’s got this YouTube channel, called Amy Reviews, where she chats about stuff – films, books, songs, chocolate bars, make-up, literally anything. Then she scores it out of ten and judges them on the ‘Amy Scale’. It’s quite a good idea I guess and she’s got thousands of subscribers.
But I didn’t care about all that. All I cared about was whether I could get into her mind. So I sat carefully on the carpet outside her room and pushed the door open a tiny bit more. She was halfway through listing her favourite movies of the year when I began. I stared at the back of her head, frowning, rubbing my temples with two fingers – I don’t know why, it just felt like the right thing to do. I breathed slowly, calmly, and imagined I was leaving my body, floating through the air and rushing into her brain. After straining and even nodding my head forwards, as though I was trying to throw off a hat, I realised how crazy I must have looked.
Maybe I am crazy?
No. Not crazy. Keep trying.
I sat there for about ten minutes doing this. I was about to give up but, for some reason, Amy turned to look over her shoulder. Maybe she could feel me watching her – I don’t know.
The second we made eye contact it happened again. That strange zipping wind noise and then I was looking back at myself sitting on the carpet in the hall. My eyes were closed, I was just sitting there cross-legged outside her room – to be fair, from her point of view, it did look weird.
‘Chester, what the hell are you doing?’ I said in her voice as I strode across her bedroom and slammed the door in my own face.
Bang. I gasped and was back in my body.
I decided that this … Well, I didn’t really know what to call it. Superpower? Ability? Curse? Skill? Whatever. Whatever this was, it was something I wanted to get better at.
So over that weekend, I practised and practised. On Sunday I went into town and tried it on strangers. I leapt into the mind of a street sweeper, a policeman – I even spent ten seconds in the body of an ice-cream seller. I’d never seen the inside of an ice-cream van – not as exciting as you might imagine.
In the park I’d been leaping from person to person for about an hour. I sat on a bench
near the fence so I could see everyone. I would look across the grass and paths, through the hazy sunlight, past the tree shadows swaying on the ground – a few butterflies and tiny bugs like living dust in the beams of yellow – and select my next target.
I glanced at some kids playing football – zip-whoosh, I’m kicking a ball. From him I would look at a woman pushing a pram, hiss-whistle, I’m in her mind. Then I might dart across the park in a blink and I’m that guy with dreadlocks riding a BMX.
I rode around in a circle watching myself do some tricks, then cycled past a kid with brown hair sitting on a bench with his eyes shut – but before I could think it was strange, I opened my eyes and I was Chester Parsons again.
‘Yum-yum puff-puff,’ someone shouted. I didn’t even care.
During these experiments it had felt like I was just watching through someone else’s eyes. Like a passenger in their body. But then I got to wondering – what if I could control people too, that might be fun. I scanned the sunny park for a target. Plenty to choose from, but – there – that guy. A shrieking blink and I was in his body.
Then I decided he should buy some candyfloss, so I strode confidently, easily, to the ice-cream van and pointed at a sugary bush hanging in a bag from the ceiling. It reminded me of Vladovski’s beard but, you know, bright pink. I pushed my hand into his pocket (at this point I felt like I was doing something wrong – was this pickpocketing?). I looked down – in the guy’s hand, my hand, whoever’s hand, there was a pound coin. I placed it on the metal counter. Clink. Done.
Sitting on a bench, I was literally beside myself with joy as I began eating the candyfloss. I could taste it. But then, suddenly, it all went weird. Something was building. Something awful. I felt nauseous, dizzy and … Oh no, no – don’t be sick. Before I puked, I looked to my left and flashed back into my own body. There he was, the guy I was just driving, staring right into my eyes. He was incredibly pale – he held a fist to his mouth, took a deep breath, and frowned at the pink bundle of candyfloss on the end of the stick in his hand. Then he stood, dropped it in the bin and rushed out of the park. Maybe he didn’t like candyfloss, I thought. Or maybe having your brain invaded feels horrible?
One more and then I’d go home. I searched for another victim.
No, victim’s the wrong word. That sounds bad. Is this an OK thing to do? Or is it like reading someone’s diary or something? Snooping through their room? Worse maybe? Who knows, who cares, it was way too much fun. (I often have thoughts like this whenever I do something I know is wrong. But then another part of me thinks, ‘Ah, so what, just do it.’ This has got me in plenty of trouble. Maybe I should listen more to the first voice …?)
In the middle of the park there was a small play area – kids on swings, toddlers going up and down the slide, some dodgy-looking teenagers making the roundabout go ridiculously fast. But on the other side, sitting in a shadow under a tree, I spotted my final role of the day – a kid around my age with a puppy.
I’d love a puppy, I thought, as I took a deep breath in and felt my consciousness drift up and flow like an electrical signal across the park.
But, at the last moment, his dog leapt into the air, trying to grab a butterfly, and then everything looked completely wrong. I was too low, all the colours of the park were gone, my vision was blurry, black and white, like watching a really old TV underwater. But everything smelled incredible – the grass, the candyfloss in the bin a hundred metres away, that woman’s perfume, the leaves, the daisies, my owner’s shampoo.
I ran in a circle, the world bouncing and rolling as I chased a furry stick of some kind. Man, I wanted that furry stick more than I’d ever wanted anything in my entire life. I would kill for that stick – why can’t I catch it? It’s, always, just, out, of, reach.
Hang on. I stopped. Licked my paw. That’s not a stick, that’s my tail. Ha ha, I’m so stupid.
‘Sit. Ruby, sit.’
Who said that? Sit? Sit where? Sit why?
Wait. Stop. What’s that? Hotdog. There’s a hotdog here. Somewhere in this park someone is eating a hotdog. That is a fact. Mustard. Ketchup.
Hang on. Fried onions too. Sweet baby—
Where is that? Where is that hotdog? I would do—
There’s that furry stick again, come here, you little – stay still, you horrible waggly—
Wait.
A new smell. Something that must DIE. Another dog. It’s looking at me. It wants to fight. I will ruin you, doggo, I will destroy you. Yeah, keep walking, keep walking.
‘Ruby, sit!’
Look, kid, I’m clearly not in the business of following orders, now share that sandwich and we might be able to come to some sort of—
HANG ON.
I’m a dog?
When I realised I had accidentally put my consciousness in the mind of a dog, I panicked. You know in a dream when something horrible happens and you go, ‘Oh no, wait, this is a dream,’ and kick your legs out and then wake up? Well, it felt a bit like that. But instead of waking up, I transferred back into my own body.
Across the park, I saw the dog – a fluffy young Labrador called Ruby, staring back at me. Then it carried on chasing its tail. The reason I had aimed for the owner was simple – I wanted to know what it felt like to have a puppy again. Even if it was just for a few seconds.
We used to have a dog, Dandelion, until a couple of years ago when she ran away. Someone left the side gate open. I say someone – it was me. Or, at least, Mum and Amy believe it was me. I was last in the garden but I was so sure I closed the gate. But I guess my memory isn’t quite as strong as the evidence. Gate open. Dog gone.
Two days later, a policeman came and gave Mum the collar and said she’d been hit by a car. I’ll be honest, it messed me up. I cried. Not just a few sniffs and a watery eye. Actual crying. Not only because Dandelion was dead, but because it was all my fault.
Now I always check the gate three times before I leave the garden, even though we don’t have any pets to escape.
Smiling one last time at that puppy, I headed for the park’s exit.
A part of me felt I should keep this ability secret – I don’t know why, but that’s what people do, isn’t it? Not tell anyone and then fight crime or whatever? Well, I was having none of that. So I ran home and told Amy.
Out of breath, I burst into her room without knocking, then worried for a moment because this usually makes her extremely angry. But she was smiling, almost crying with happiness. She looked like she’d won the lottery or something. She closed a window on her laptop and spun in her swivel chair to face me.
‘Amy, listen, something weird is happening.’
‘Chester, I have the best news.’
‘Sure, but listen, I can go into people’s minds. Dogs too. It’s crazy, I—’
‘That’s great, Chester, well done,’ she said, but I could tell she hadn’t really listened. ‘Now sit down.’
I perched on her bed, which had white fairy lights wrapped around the metal frame, even though it wasn’t Christmas, and a completely ridiculous amount of cushions and pillows. No one needs that many cushions.
‘I just had a video call with Brian from Red Rose Pictures.’
‘Um, OK? Who’s that?’ I knew I had to listen to her news before I told her mine.
‘Brian Lipton is a television producer.’ She grabbed me by the shoulders. ‘He saw some of Amy Reviews and got in touch. They want me to present a new show. A TV show, Chester. They want me to be a presenter. Can you imagine what that’ll do to my profile? The subscribers, the followers, the sheer numbers! They’ve invited me to their head office for a meeting. I have to tell Mum.’ She stood.
‘This is good news,’ I said. ‘But, please, I need you to listen to me.’
She sat back down and I explained everything. The whole situation. And I could tell she had heard this time because she was frowning and scrunching up her lip.
When I finished, she seemed angry.
‘Chester, have you be
en taking drugs?!’
‘What? No.’
‘I’m telling Mum. You’re eleven. Where did you get it?’
‘I swear it’s true. I’ve done it to you.’
‘Birds go tweet, cows go moo.’ (Amy is good at the rhyming game.)
‘I … no,’ I said. ‘Not now. I saw myself through your eyes – remember, when I was staring at you from the hall? You slammed the door.’
‘Is this some kind of prank – are you secretly filming this?’ She looked around for a camera and touched her hair.
‘No.’
‘Fine … Prove it. Jump into the mind of …’ She glanced around the room again, then turned to the window. ‘… that squirrel. Right there, in the tree, see him? Get that squirrel to come and dance on my desk.’
I stood and pulled her white curtain to the side. ‘Well, I’ve never done it on a squirrel, I don’t know if—’
‘How convenient. Look, can we wrap this up? I—’
‘All right, wait,’ I said, sitting on the bed and relaxing.
The squirrel hopped fast along the branch, then spiralled up the tree and paused on the corner of a broken twig. I stared into its brown eyes, breathed, and felt that weird feeling again. When I blinked, I arrived in the creature’s tiny little mind.
At first it was hard to control my new body – it felt too light. I looked down. My furry hands were gripping the rough bark and all I wanted to do was climb and eat nuts. Man, nuts are so awesome. Hazelnuts, crunchy little acorns, sesame crackers, nibble, nibble, yum, yum, yum – no, concentrate. To my left I spotted the open window. Amy was glancing from the squirrel (me) to Chester (also me), her eyebrows lifted high and her arms folded tight.