Remembered

by E. D. Brady

  “Great. Now you tell me. What happened to ‘I work with a great lady called Liz Lewis. I’m sure she wouldn’t mind spending an hour or two talking to you if I asked her to’?” Emily questioned in a mocking tone. “Are you trying to tell me that you don’t think I should go through with this?”

  “I don’t think you should go through with this,” Cappy answered flatly.

  “Why not?” Emily pushed.

  “Look, I was all on board for you talking to Liz for an hour or so, but this…this is really drastic. Suppose you uncover something you’re not ready to face?” Cappy screeched. “Don’t do this, Ems.”

  “I understand your concerns, Cap, and I’ve considered that myself, but I still want to do it. I’m excited at the prospect of possibly getting a glimpse of my mother or father.”

  “Why now, though?” Cappy questioned, irritated.

  “No one’s ever offered to hypnotize me for that reason before, or for any reason. Don’t worry, I’ll be absolutely fine,” Emily promised.

  By the following evening, however, that excitement had quickly turned to apprehension.

  As Emily walked briskly up Third Avenue towards the subway—hurrying to an appointment with a past that was perhaps better left alone—she started to panic, and considered the notion that Cappy may have been right.

  She arrived at the building and called Cappy from her cell phone. “Cap, I’m outside. I can’t remember what floor Dr. Lewis told me to go to.” This was a tiny lie. What she really wanted was the comfort of seeing a friendly face before she allowed herself to be carried into the deepest depths of her memories.

  “I’ll come out and get you,” Cappy replied. She met Emily outside the building and escorted her to the sixth floor. “I’ll wait in my office for you. Call me when you’re done, and good luck.” Something in Emily’s expression must have alerted Cappy to her panic. “Ems, don’t do this if you feel scared or uncomfortable. We can leave now. I’ll call Dr. Lewis and tell her that something came up, and you can’t make it.” She placed her hand on Emily’s shoulder.

  “I’m fine. I’m just being a baby,” Emily answered, trying to sound convincing, but her voice cracked on the last word.

  Cappy pursed her lips. “Are you sure?” she pushed.

  “Yeah…I’ll call you when I’m done,” Emily promised. She gave Cappy a quick peek on the cheek and knocked on the door before she could change her mind.

  “Come in, Emily,” Dr. Lewis said, holding the door open. “It’s really nice to see you again.”

  “You too,” Emily answered, trying to steady her voice. She quickly glanced around the room and felt instantly worse.

  It was a tiny room with a reclining chair, similar to one in a dentist’s office, minus the light on top. On the right hand side of the room, a computer monitor sat on an old desk and next to it lay the scariest thing of all: lots of thin wires with tiny suction cups and clips attached to the ends.

  Emily swallowed with great effort.

  “Okay, take a seat,” instructed the doctor, gesturing towards the reclined chair. “My colleague, Dr. Thompson, is going to join us in one minute—ah, he’s here already.”

  Emily looked over to see a pleasant faced man enter the room.

  “Hi, Emily,” he called out cheerfully. “I’m Dr. Thompson.”

  “Nice to meet you,” Emily replied politely. She walked over to the reclining chair and reluctantly climbed on.

  Dr. Thompson began playing with the bundle of wires, untangling them. When he was finished, he turned to her, still holding the wires in his hand. “I’m going to place these on your head,” he explained, holding them up for her to see.

  “What is that, Doctor?” she asked, starting to feel terrified. She remembered what Cappy told her—these doctors loved to play with people’s minds. What did they have planned for her?

  “This is an Electroencephalogram.” He looked at the monitor and wires the way a new mother would gaze at her baby; to say the look was ‘pride’ would be an understatement.

  “A what?” Emily asked, wide-eyed.

  “It’s commonly referred to as an EEG. Don’t look so nervous, this won’t hurt, you won’t feel a thing. I simply want to monitor your brain wave activity while you’re in a hypnotic state,” he answered.

  “You’re the doctor, Doctor,” she replied with a nervous chuckle.

  Dr. Thompson placed the wires over various parts of her head and hairline. She felt as though she’d walked into a science fiction movie.

  “How do you feel, Emily?” Dr. Lewis questioned. It was obvious that she had noticed Emily cringing once or twice.

  “I’m fine. I’m leaving for a business trip in a few days. I won’t be stumbling into anything after this, will I?”

  “No.” Dr. Lewis laughed. “We’re just going to take you into a relaxed state and ask you a few questions, that’s all, nothing complicated. It’s extremely important that you are completely relaxed, however. Dr. Thompson is going to look at your brainwaves on the monitor while you and I talk. It will be fine.” Her voice sounded so soft, as if she was rocking a baby to sleep, and it was starting to put Emily at ease. How bad could it be? It’s not like they were performing illegal tests. “We’re going to try some age regression suggestions when you are one hundred percent relaxed,” she explained. “How do you feel?”

  “Good,” Emily replied. Surprisingly, she was not lying.

  “Do you see this light in my hand?” Dr. Lewis asked, holding up a miniature flashlight the size of a pen.

  Emily nodded.

  “I’m going to ask you to focus on this light and nothing else, okay?”

  “No problem,” Emily mumbled.

  “This is James Braid’s Eye-Fixation Hypnotic Induction Method,” the doctor explained in a voice that sounded like flowing water.

  “Wow, what a mouthful,” Emily whispered.

  “Are you ready?” Dr. Thompson asked, turning off the lights.

  “Ready,” Emily assured them.

  “Okay, now, concentrate on nothing else but the light in my hand,” Dr. Lewis said softly. “Just keep your eyes on the light. In a little while, I will ask you to close your eyes, but until then, just keep staring at the light. Can you do that for me?”

  Emily nodded again.

  It didn’t take long for her eyes to feel the effects of staring at nothing but the little light, and she could feel her mind starting to clear of thought.

  “Okay, now I need you to relax your entire body,” Dr. Lewis said. “Start by relaxing your arms and legs. Feel the tension drain from each of your limbs, one at a time; from your shoulders to your fingers. Feel the tension drain from the tops of your legs to your feet. Just feel it all drain out. Do you feel more relaxed?”

  “Um,” Emily answered.

  “Feel yourself floating into the light…just floating.” Her voice sounded softer and further away.

  “Imagine that you are becoming one with the light. Can you feel yourself floating?”

  Emily nodded slightly; she didn’t have the strength to nod any more enthusiastically, she was floating into the light.

  “Relax your mind. Let all thoughts drift away; just focus on the light in my hand. Imagine merging with the light, becoming one with it, becoming it,” Dr. Lewis purred.

  Soon, Emily was no longer herself; she was the light, she was nothingness.

  After a moment or a year or ten years—time was suddenly meaningless—she heard the soothing voice again. “Close your eyes, Emily. Just float away.”

  Emily was gone. She had floated away. She was nowhere and everywhere.

  Dr. Lewis’s liquid voice surrounded her, asking her to go back five years. Emily drifted back.

  She looked around a bright room. She knew the room, knew the blackboard with the foreign writing bordering the top. She knew the man sitting in front of her: Mr. Spencer. She was sitting in the first row of her senior year Spanish class.

  Mr. Spencer looked down at her and spoke: �
��¿Cuáles son tus planes para el fin de semana, Emily?”

  Patrick Walsh was staring into her face, trying to make her laugh.

  “Voy a estar haciendo mi tarea de español,” she replied confidently.

  “Muy bein, señorita,” Mr. Spencer replied, chuckling. He turned to Patrick. “Patrick, dejar de babear sobre Emily.”

  Emily blushed.

  “What?” Patrick looked bamboozled.

  Mr. Spencer laughed. “I told you to stop drooling over her. Maybe she would date you if you played it cool, man.”

  Dr. Lewis’s voice filled her head from far away “That’s great, Emily. That’s really, really good,’ she said. “Can you go back even further? Can you try to go back ten more years?”

  Emily pushed with her mind, drifting backwards.

  The scene before her changed. She sat crossed legged on a bed. The door swung open, and Susan came skipping into the room, wearing faded blue jeans and a t-shirt that was much too large for her tiny frame.

  “Emily, guess what I have?” she asked, holding one hand behind her back.

  “What do you have?” Emily questioned.

  They were in the bedroom they shared at the group home, and for once, it was empty except for the two of them.

  “It’s a surprise,” Susan replied. “You have to guess.”

  “Is it a good surprise?” Emily queried, taking the bait like a typical eight-year-old.

  “It’s pretty good,” Susan answered in a sing-song voice.

  “I can’t guess, just tell me,” Emily pleaded.

  “Just try,” Susan insisted.

  “Is it something to eat?” Emily asked. Her answer was obviously satisfactory for Susan. She pulled her hand around, revealing two very large, chocolate chip cookies.

  “Where did you get those?” Emily asked excitedly.

  “Lemar, the new cook, made them. One for you and one for me,” Susan answered, beaming.

  “Wow, for what?” Emily questioned, holding out her hand for half the treasure.

  “Dunno,” Susan responded, stuffing her mouth.

  Emily could taste the warm, freshly made cookie in her mouth, the melted chocolate chips.

  “Good, Emily,” Dr. Lewis’s voice called out. “But can you go back further. Try to locate your very first memory. Can you do that?”

  Emily forced her mind back further; as far back as she could, through a haze of lava-like patterns behind her eyes, and flashes of familiar faces and scenes, sinking down into unknown territory. She finally honed in on one memory, as though it was at the bottom of a murky hole in her mind.

  She came to settle in complete darkness and absolute silence, yet she was very aware that she was lying on a cold floor.

  Suddenly, she realized that it wasn’t dark necessarily but that there was something covering her eyes. She felt a rush of fear immediately. Her heart felt as though it would jump out of her chest.

  “Wait…wait…there’s something wrong here. I’m terrified. Something is very wrong,” she said aloud. “My eyes are covered with a cloth, some kind of material.” She wanted to remove the cloth, but it wasn’t possible. She couldn’t lift her hands to uncover her eyes; they were bound, tied behind her back.

  “What is it, Emily?” she heard Dr. Lewis ask. “What’s happening? What do you see?”

  “I can’t see anything. My eyes are covered, and my hands are bound. I think I’m being held prisoner,” Emily answered.

  The silence was more unnerving than the darkness. She waited for something, anything to happen.

  “What’s happening, Emily?” Dr. Lewis asked again.

  “Nothing. Absolutely nothing. All I can hear is my own heart pounding in my ears.”

  All of a sudden, in the distance, she heard a noise break the silence—footsteps, two sets of footsteps. “There’s someone coming,” she called out to Dr. Lewis. “I can hear people coming, and I’m so afraid.”

  “What happened? How did you get there? Try to remember,” Dr. Lewis urged.

  “I don’t know,” Emily moaned.

  “Try to remember,” Dr. Lewis said forcefully.

  Emily pushed at her memory as hard as she could until something came forth. “I…I think I was alone. He left for…something…” she trailed off.

  “Who left?” Dr. Lewis pushed.

  “I don’t know,” Emily answered. “I can’t remember who, but I think it had something to do with a cat…maybe…”

  “What happened after that?” the doctor questioned.

  “I think…I think I felt a hand covering my mouth. The hand held a cloth that smelled bitter and made me dizzy, and then everything went black.”

  The footsteps grew louder. “Someone is coming,” she said again, panicked. “Help, please help me!”

  “Who’s coming?” Dr. Lewis asked.

  “I don’t know.”

  “Can you hear anything?” the doctor called out.

  “Only footsteps…wait…I can hear a woman’s voice,” Emily said.

  “What is she saying?”

  “Can’t hear…‘Are you sure this will work?’ she asks.”

  “‘No, I’m not sure. I know nothing of this ancient magic, but if it does not work, the effort will kill her.’ A male voice replies”

  “They’re right next to me now,” Emily told Dr. Lewis. “I can feel a hand on my arm.”

  “‘That is inevitable. If the effort does not kill her, then we will have to. She knows too much. She will thwart our plans,’ the female says.”

  “What do you know, Emily?” Dr. Lewis questioned.

  “I don’t know. I have no idea what they’re talking about,” Emily explained.

  “What’s happening now?”

  “‘What must I do?’ the woman asks.”

  “‘Nothing for the moment,’ the man answers. ‘Just stand aside. According to what’s written here, only one person is needed to perform this magic.’”

  “‘I have an ill feeling about this,’ the woman tells the man. ‘We should have killed her and made it look like an accident. We could have made it appear as though she slipped and banged her head’.”

  “‘It would bring bad luck, I believe’, the man responds.”

  “‘But to rely on the word of an old fool is madness, Lionel’, the woman says.”

  “Lionel?” Dr. Lewis questioned. “Who is Lionel?”

  “I don’t know. I’ve never met anyone by that name,” Emily replied.

  “Are you sure?” Dr. Lewis pushed.

  “I don’t remember,” Emily answered.

  “‘Nephlus may have been an old fool, but he knew how to do things that most people could not even dream of,’ the man says.”

  Suddenly, in Emily’s memory, she was being pushed onto her back. She let out a sob.

  “What’s happening now?” Dr. Lewis asked.

  “I have been pushed backwards, and there’s something heavy on my chest. The man is speaking in a strange tongue, chanting in a foreign language. I can’t understand what he’s saying,” Emily cried. “It feels like I’m wrapped in a metal jacket that is becoming tighter and tighter, restricting my breathing.”

  “What else, Emily,” the doctor demanded.

  “He’s chanting louder now, and the hem of my dress is growing past my ankles. I’m finding it so hard to breathe. It’s becoming tighter still…” she trailed off, panting.

  “Keep going, Emily,” Dr. Lewis coaxed.

  “The chanting continues,” Emily moaned loudly. “My ribs are going to burst…pain…chanting…pushing harder. I can’t…I can’t breathe…so much pain—”

  “EMILY!” Dr. Lewis yelled into the darkness, her voice shaken. “Emily,” she called softer, “I’m going to count backwards from three. When you hear me say ‘one’ you will awaken, okay? Here we go…three…two…one.”

  Emily opened her eyes and blinked rapidly, trying to adjust her eyesight to the darkness, trying to make out the shapes around the room.

  Dr. Thompson w
alked across the room and hit the overhead light. He and Dr. Lewis both stared silently at Emily, both holding their breath, utter shock apparent on their faces. “Are you alright?” he stammered after a moment of silence.

  “I…I don’t know,” Emily replied. “Dr. Lewis, what was that?”

  “I wish I knew,” the doctor answered. “You said something about ancient magic, so my only guess is that you’ve confused a real memory with a movie you’ve seen, or a story you’ve heard.”

  “It felt so real,” Emily remarked.

  “I’m sure it did, but it was just a movie that you’ve seen, probably as a child. It must have frightened you so much that the memory buried itself firmly in your subconscious.”

  “I don’t think so,” Emily said with conviction. She threw her shaky legs off the reclining chair and stood upright.

  “I’d like you to come back in a couple—”

  Emily cut Dr. Lewis off. “I’m going on a business trip. I’ll call you when I get back,” she said pointedly, not trying to hide the rudeness in her voice.

  She left the room quickly without saying goodbye, and called Cappy from her cell phone.

  “What happened?” Cappy asked, rushing down the hall to meet her. She threw her arms around her visibly shaken friend.

  “It was horrible, the most frightening thing that’s ever happened to me,” Emily sobbed.

  “Was it your parents? Did someone hurt you?” Cappy questioned, perceptibly worried.

  “It was worse than anything like that. It was worse than being trapped in a nightmare,” Emily informed her, trying to steady her voice.

  “Fucking hell!” Catherine spat. “I knew something like this would happen.”

  “I should have listened to you,” Emily sniffled.

  “Tell me what happened. What did you see?”

  “I’ll tell you later. I don’t want to talk about it just yet,” Emily answered. “I feel sick to my stomach. But I can tell you this: I am officially done with hypnotherapy. In fact, I’m done with all therapy. Please tell Dr. Lewis that I died or something.”

  “That’s a horrible thing to say,” Cappy scolded.

  “Tell her I decided to stay in England, then. I’m not going to see her again, ever,” Emily said through deep breaths.