by Rio Youers
She touched my chest. “You can stay here. Roll with me.”
This was the moment. When I recall everything that happened, this moment sits heaviest on my soul. It is Y-shaped, bound in chains that rattle, if only . . . if only, with a near-human voice. How different would my life be if I had stayed with Nadia and let the waves roll alone? This isn’t the time to discuss quantum mechanics, but consider, for one second, the relative state formulation—a universal wave function that doesn’t collapse at each branch point, and implies the existence of parallel worlds. According to this theory, there are infinite Westlake Souls out there, living in infinite dimensions, each one splitting into the next. In one of these worlds I stayed with Nadia in the pink sunshine. We made love again, and again. I didn’t go surfing, and subsequently didn’t drown in the ocean. There’s a Westlake Soul out there who did marry Nadia on a beach in the Caribbean . . . but in the reality I know the wave function collapses.
I kissed Nadia for the last time and went surfing.
If only.
I have, incidentally, sought these parallel worlds, to the point where my brilliant mind aches with the effort. If I could access that critical branch point, I could live an alternate life with no knowledge of this one. I’d have my body back. My girl. Failure to come close throws into question Hugh Everett III’s relative state formulation. Either the theory is nonsense or the universal wave function cannot be accessed on a psychic level, which makes it impossible to prove.
In other words . . . I’m stuck with this life.
With that last kiss still on my lips I strolled down to the beach, my board under one arm, my bag slung over one shoulder. The waves were primo, climbing high and breaking hard. There was a guy throwing a Frisbee for his dog to catch, but otherwise the beach was mine. I set down my board and applied a layer of wax, my eyes never leaving the ocean. A rippling blue/white flag that I couldn’t wait to fly. I got a read on the waves and decided to switch to a 10mm leash. More drag, but less likely to break in the heavies. Another critical branch point. If I had stuck with the 5mm, maybe the leash would have broken, taking the board away from me, rather than having it boomerang and crack me in the skull. So many ifs, and all insignificant.
I stepped out, now living the last thirty-two minutes of life as I knew it. I remember feeling the sand push between my toes, and the surf fizzing around my ankles. Sensations I have always loved. The dog barked happily as I moved into deeper water, then paddled out to the action. The first wave I caught surprised me. It was fast and rough, but I tamed it with my balance, attacking the lip and reentering to let it know who was boss. I rode it backhand until it was spent. The second wave was a cruncher and I wiped out as soon as I got to my feet. The ocean laughed and pulled at me but I grabbed the rails of my board and popped back up. I schooled it with the next set, hitting cutbacks and aerials, then shooting the curl and howling with exhilaration. Nothing comes close to this feeling. Not for me, at least. Maybe snowboarding an avalanche, or skateboarding an earthquake. I cry inside. Jubilant, exultant tears. I’m quite literally riding the world, and that’s exactly how it feels. If making love to a beautiful person is heaven, then surfing is God.
I laughed—it was the last time I ever laughed—and paddled out to the heavies again. And then I saw it. A wall of water surging toward me, filling the horizon. A no-nonsense, freakish motherfucker of a wave, its sole purpose to prove how small and inconsequential I was. My instinct screamed to back down but I was charged inside and nothing could stop me. The rest of the world disappeared. I felt both tiny and limitless.
This was my every wish. My every nightmare.
This was the wave that would kill me.
I caught it perfectly, rising up the face, springing to my feet and feeling the push behind the board. I was ready for the speed, but not the power—thought I was, but it sucked the air from my lungs and drove me into the trough so hard that I almost lost it. Fists pummelled on the bottom of my board and the spray was like teeth. I refused to bail, though, even when I could hear the white water behind me, a thunderhead of sound, bigger than the moon. I turned into the open face and locked in. No chance of pulling any tricks. It was all I could do to keep from getting nailed. Then came the moment I lived for (ironically, the moment I died for): the lip of the wave curling over me, surging ahead of me, and all at once I was riding through a perfect cylinder of water. The barrel. The glasshouse. The green room. A surreal and powerful experience. As close to dreaming as you can get while still awake. I clenched my fists and roared.
There was a tiny circle of daylight at the end of the barrel, filled with spray and tangerine sky. I aimed for it, but the wave was closing around me fast. No way I would make it in time. I considered pulling out, fractionally shifting my back foot, and this was all the hesitation the wave needed. It lifted the tail of my board and threw me. I was airborne for less than a second, then chewed up and swallowed. The power was otherworldly. I had challenged thousands of waves and many of them had gotten the better of me, but I had never known anything like this. An atom bomb in the ocean. An aquatic black hole. My body was thrown down, dragged up, tossed around. Just another piece of seaweed about to be cast limply on the shore. I tried to protect myself—to curl into a ball and cover my head with both hands—but I had no control over my body. I was pushed deep, dragged along the sandy floor, skin sheared from my face and hands. My heart thrashed and my lungs ached for air. Pale thoughts opened in my mind, and as I was sucked up for another go-round, my board whipped on its leash, cut through the water like a ray, and slammed me in the middle of my forehead.
I saw Nadia in that moment, lying on our bed with the ruffled sheet clutched between her legs, between her breasts. A leaf of hair pressed against her left cheek, curled at the tip. The light, through the blinds, was wilder. She blinked her huge eyes, like a woodland animal in a Disney cartoon, and I screamed for her. I didn’t want this wave anymore. This ocean. I wanted my beautiful girlfriend, to fall into her body as I had less than an hour before, draw star-shapes around her nipples and ride deep inside her. I called her name but there was no sound. Not even a shimmer in the air. My hand, reaching for her, was imagined. The depression my head had made in the pillow was still there. It was like my ghost—as close to her as I could get.
Jimi’s guitar, loud and raw. “Little Wing” flowed from the radio in Darryl’s room. I flowed, too, away from Nadia, passing through two walls to see Darryl with his girl, her legs hooked onto his shoulders, both of them gasping, sweating, sounds of passion enveloped by the music. This is what my best friend was doing while I drowned in the ocean. You’d think there’d be some sense of foreboding. A prescience. Nothing radical, just a pause in what he was doing—a funny feeling that something was wrong. I’d known him for sixteen years, after all. But no, he was oblivious, far too preoccupied with getting down on it, like Kool & the Gang. He couldn’t hear me—couldn’t feel me—no matter how loud I screamed.
I backflipped out of there and floated in a cold band of sky over Vancouver Island, listening to Jimi play as my body died. I’m sure you’ve read accounts of people who have gone through near-death experiences. The inner peace. The bright light. It’s not like that—it’s fucking terrifying. I wanted only to shuffle back into my body and resurface in the ocean, with nothing more serious than a headache and a dented ego. I screamed but nobody heard me. I reached out but touched nothing. The island lay beneath me, shaped like a broken wing. I could see the fierce push of the ocean and a brushstroke of sand. But it wasn’t mine anymore. Whatever had been holding me to the earth had snapped and I was floating away . . . into a sky that was painfully blue, toward a sun that looked more like a howling face.
Outside: my body was dragged onto the shore by the man who’d been throwing the Frisbee. His dog ran around me, wild circles, the Frisbee clamped in her jaws. The man administered CPR, but by the time he got my heart started my brain had been starved of oxygen for eight minutes, forty-four seconds.
Inside: I duelled with him, then, for the first time. The first of many. My archenemy. Every superhero has one. Batman has the Joker. Superman has Lex Luthor. Spider-Man has the Green Goblin. Me . . . I have the emperor of darkness.
I have Dr. Quietus.
4. Archenemy.
I am often referred to as a cabbage. A hurtful expression. I’ve also been called brain-dead on occasion. Equally hurtful, and entirely inaccurate. Okay, so my brain cells started to go kamikaze after five minutes without oxygen, resulting in severe and (apparently) irreversible atrophy of the cerebral cortex. My neurologist, Dr. (I shit you not) Thinker (funny, eh?), MD, FRCPC, PhD, told Mom and Dad that my brain is like a rotten apple. The core—my brain stem—is intact and functioning normally. Hence, I have regular sleep-wake cycles, can circulate blood, manage my secretions (no need for a tracheostomy—thank Christ for small favours), and respire without aid. I’m also capable of random, involuntary movement. The remainder of the “apple” is mushy and brown. It has shrivelled in my skull. Pockets of fluid have replaced lost brain mass. Not an apple you would like to eat, as Dr. Thinker told my parents. Good for nothing, in fact. Dad (bless him; he was overwhelmed with emotion at the time, and trying to make the best out of a bad situation) asked if it was good enough to make apple pie. Dr. Thinker frowned and said no. Mom asked if it was good enough to make cider. “What kind of cider?” Dr. Thinker enquired, clearly confounded by my parents’ line of questioning, and Mom (bless her, too) said, “The sweet kind.”
Brain damaged? Shit, yeah. Brain fucked? Okay . . . sure, if you like. But brain-dead? No way, dude. Not even close.
I was in a coma for thirty-seven days. Darkness all the way. An epic battle with Dr. Quietus. I finally woke (insomuch as I opened my eyes) to a chrome-bright hospital room and two weeping parents. The way Mom clutched my hand, the timbre of her sobs, told me that something was very wrong. The cardiac monitor, IV lines, and nasogastric feeding tube reinforced the knowledge. I tried to move my head, but couldn’t. I tried to speak—tell Mom not to cry—but couldn’t. The severity of my condition dawned like a crippled sun. The smell of flowers was sickening.
“Westlake?” Mom squeezed my hand harder. My knuckles popped. I felt the curve of her wedding ring. The tip of her fingernail. “Baby, can you hear me?”
Yeah, Mom, I said. I can hear you.
Imagine something perfect. A flower. A leaf. A work of art. No—nothing material. That’s too clichéd. It needs to be a feeling. A perfect feeling. When you see a loved one after a long absence, or recall the sweetest moment of your life with such intense clarity it’s like you are living it again. A feeling that, if you could see it, it would sparkle. Pour it into a bottle and it would glow. Now imagine, at its brightest point, this feeling stripped away and replaced with a cold, grave-like hole. This may help you understand how I felt at that moment. The contrast—from flight to fallen, from heaven to hell—was debilitating, suffocating.
“Blink if you can hear me, baby,” Mom said.
I couldn’t.
Over the next few weeks, while my physical body was subjected to numerous tests and scans and my parents kept their vigil at my bedside, I became aware of my new superhero abilities. It wasn’t exactly triumphant. I didn’t tear open my shirt to reveal a dazzling “W” or dive into a telephone booth to don my cape and boots. I actually thought I was dreaming. Or hallucinating. A side effect of the fluids they were pumping into me. Understandable, given that I could suddenly comprehend what the birds were singing about, and could think in five thousand different languages. It was easy to shake my soul free while listening to the purr and buzz of the CT scanner, or suffering my mother’s sobs. I would fly above the clouds in emotional circles, and alight on top of neo-Gothic skyscrapers. After realizing I wasn’t dreaming or hallucinating, I surmised that my mind had engaged some kind of defence mechanism. A way to ease the trauma.
Meanwhile, my parents waited for me to emerge from my vegetative state, praying with clenched hands and bleach-pale fingers. They knew that time was critical, and that my chances of recovery faded with every passing day. Mom would say things like, Move your head if you can hear me, Westlake. Or, Smile if you understand. And sometimes I would make a random, reflex movement. Maybe I would moan, or twitch—not in response to Mom, but because my autonomic nervous system happened to throw a switch at that moment, giving an impression of awareness. This fuelled my parents’ hope, even though Dr. Thinker explained that my “responses” were involuntary, coincidental. But a person in distress will cling to anything, and my parents never stopped believing that I would pull through.
Four weeks after emerging from my coma, my condition was changed to “Persistent Vegetative State.” This was when Dr. Thinker likened my brain to a rotten apple. He showed Mom and Dad my CT scan images, pointing out the dark pockets of fluid—the mushy fruit. After assuring them that my brain wasn’t good enough for pie or cider (not even the sweet kind), he told them that I had zero chance of making a full recovery, and that I would be a vegetable (at least he didn’t call me a cabbage) for the rest of my life.
“I don’t believe that,” Mom said to Dr. Thinker. “My baby is still in there. I can see him. I can feel him.”
I had by this time accepted and embraced my superhero skills, and when I wasn’t fighting Dr. Quietus or residing in some blissful secondhand reality, I was seeking a way out. A way to live again. I used all of my strength to channel the motor cortex, trying to scrunch my toes or twitch my fingers, but always without success. Jesus, I was faster than a speeding bullet, more powerful than a locomotive, yet I couldn’t wiggle my pinky. I grabbed my board and surfed the universal wave function, thinking I could turn a trick, cut back, and open my eyes to an alternate reality. But the water was glassy and I didn’t so much surf as sink, leading me to conclude that life exists only in the present. The past is a rotten apple. Good for nothing. Not even pie.
I screamed at my body to move. At my eyes to open. At my voice to be heard. I hoisted vehicles above my head, smashed through concrete walls, and flew against the earth’s rotation fifty thousand times. Nothing. Not a flicker. Exhausted and bereft, I would forsake my useless shell and glide the ocean, listening to its heartbeat as my tears joined the swell.
Trust me, even your soul can cry.
“You should know,” Dr. Thinker told my parents, “that Westlake will have no quality of life, and that the burden on you, his parents, will be demanding.”
“He’s our son,” Dad said. “He’ll never be a burden.”
“There are programmes to help you cope,” Dr. Thinker said. “I’ll provide you with the relevant information. You should also consider home nursing.”
“Whatever it takes,” Dad said.
Dr. Thinker nodded. “Also, I should warn you that Westlake’s life expectancy is uncertain. He’s not as strong as he used to be, and therefore susceptible to infection. He could also develop pneumonia, respiratory problems, or may simply decide to just . . . give up.”
Give up? Never. Not as long as there are waves to surf.
“Are you saying,” Mom said, “that he could die at any moment?”
“He may live another forty years in his condition,” Dr. Thinker replied. “I’m just preparing you for the worst.”
“He’s a fighter,” Mom said.
“Westlake has no cognitive ability whatsoever,” Dr. Thinker said. “He’s not fighting, Mrs. Soul, because he isn’t aware he’s in a fight. He isn’t aware of anything.”
Obviously not true. I rapped on Dr. Thinker’s mind to tell him as much, but you’d be surprised how quickly rational people dismiss strange voices in their head. It’s one of the (many) reasons why communicating with humans on a telepathic level is so difficult, even for me.
He was right about my life expectancy, though. I battle Dr. Quietus frequently. Usually brief, violent confrontations. He comes in many forms, but always sleek and dark. I have never seen his true face. He just slides his cold hands around me. The u
ltimate supervillain. I need all my mental strength to shake him off. There’s a certain ironic humour to the fact that I appear so expressionless on the outside, while inside I’m wrestling my wicked archenemy on top of a cable car in Switzerland, or avoiding his death ray while flying around Tokyo’s flickering skyline.
Of all our battles, the first—while my physical body lay comatose—was the longest and most brutal. He came at me, cold and hooded, and filled me with a terror so huge it felt like my soul had been dipped in tar and smashed with a hammer. Cat and mouse to begin with. Son of a bitch could have taken me out whenever he wanted. Instead he cackled and pawed at me. I crawled into a corner and prayed for light. It would have been easier to succumb—maybe manage a couple of hopeless flips, like a fish out of water—but Mom was right: I’m a fighter. I raged against him. We spilled through the streets of my coma, entangled, trading vicious blows. And somewhere in that vastness I discovered my inner strength. Dr. Quietus was no match. He retreated, vowing to return, and I opened my eyes to that chrome-bright room and the deep tone of grief.
Still alive.
But he’s there . . . always there. Poised to strike.
My archenemy.
Prior to my return home (to the brightly painted box and Mork egg chair), I astral projected into a meeting between my parents and Dr. Thinker. I wish I hadn’t. It was morose . . . worrying. I had been in hospital seven months at this point, and my parents had accepted the probability that my condition would not improve.
“I’m sure you appreciate,” Dr. Thinker said, “how demanding Westlake’s constant care will be.”
Mom and Dad nodded. I drifted around them, lighter than breath. Dad was picking at his cuticles. A nervous habit. Mom was biting her upper lip. Dr. Thinker’s thick spectacles reflected the sunlight splashing through the window. His pale eyes were lost in the glare.
“Which leads me to a sensitive issue,” he continued. “You may—almost certainly will—reach a stage when you seriously contemplate Westlake’s quality of life. Or lack of, to be precise. Taking everything into consideration, you may decide that discontinuing life support is the most sympathetic course of action.”