Scribner Horror Bundle: Four Horror Novels by Joshua Scribner (47 page)

The terrible nightmare hadn’t
returned. At least, he hadn’t awoken her in the night or said
anything else about it. Janet offered to stay home with him,
playing along with his feigned sick role, but Toby had insisted
that she go to the game.

So, on Friday night, in support of her
other son, and in support of the school system her husband led,
Janet sat in the bleachers and watched the Pious Eagles win yet
another game. There was talk about a state championship and the
whole town seemed to be in a buzz over it.

But Janet was in a buzz over something
else. Randy had three more years after this one to be a star,
possibly many more. But she suspected that the biggest part of
Toby’s life was about to take place.

***

Celeste reflected a great deal on the
tunnel during the course of the week. She wished that her brain
could work while she was there. Then she would have been able to
appreciate what it was like while she floated inside. It was nice
to remember, but not near as good as what it would have been like
in real time.

She also thought of what Dr. Porter
had said about the healing process beginning next week, and that
made the passing days maddening, especially when it was slow at
work and all she could do was watch the clock, waiting for the day
to end, so she could be that much closer to Saturday. He had been
so confident. He seemed certain that what he had planned would
work.

She found it hard to sleep at night.
But that was fine. She stayed awake in bed, thinking about the
possibilities. She thought about her special friend. She pondered
futures she hadn’t let herself consider in a long time. She saw
herself preparing to be married. Was it really possible that she
could someday have a honeymoon?

Not that these things in themselves
mattered much to her. She would never want a big wedding or an
extravagant honeymoon. She just wanted what those things
represented. That someone would always be there.

When she did sleep, she dreamt a lot
of what she had been thinking about. But the dreams were kind of
weird, disjointed. She dreamt of having a partner, but they cooked
on a hotplate in the bed instead of talking or having sex. She
dreamt she was being married, but to some old man in a wheel chair.
It was like she had not been hopeful long enough for her
subconscious mind to know how to produce good dreams. Still, at
least the nightmares of last week were gone.

On Friday night, Celeste asked if she
could be the first cut. Tiffany granted the request. Celeste was
glad that she could go home early, wanting to be well rested for
tomorrow. She couldn’t wait to be in the tunnel again. She knew
that the tunnel meant something. Somehow, it was connected to her
getting better.

***

James rarely had trouble sleeping. But
on Friday night, the night before the next session, he lay in bed
and watched the hours go by on the alarm clock. The nightmares of
last week had not returned this week, leaving him with nothing that
marred the experience.

He was glad Dr. Porter had taken up
the tapes at the beginning of each session. James, normally not
impulsive, doubted he would have been able to resist playing with
them, seeing if he could use them to make it into the
tunnel.

And the tunnel? There were several
pieces of logic that added up to explain what that was. First,
there was Dr. Porter’s behavior. He had not been surprised when
they all saw the tunnel, which meant it was probably fairly common,
maybe common to everyone. But then there was the extra barrier,
that clear wall that kept them from reaching the sides. Dr. Porter
had been surprised to hear of that. Then, after hearing about it,
he had become confident. He had assured them that the healing
process would begin on Saturday, which meant the barrier had been
the something missing that Dr. Porter had been looking for, and
once he found it, at least thought he understood it.

What was this barrier? James wasn’t
sure yet. He thought it had something to do with the reason he
couldn’t handle being outside. But he realized that might just be a
wish. He’d have to wait and see. Now he was more than just
intrigued by the treatment. For the first time in years, he was
kind of optimistic.

***

How and why were the questions. But
Friday night, lying next to his wife, the next session only hours
away, Dr. Porter didn’t have solid answers to these
questions.

How and why? He suspected the barrier
that existed in these three clients, and a small percentage of
people in the world, had been there at their birth. The three of
them were blocked from part of the tunnel and thus blocked from the
complete human experience that most people have.

The answer to how, Dr. Porter
suspected, did not reside in the clients themselves, but in their
predecessors to life, their parents. Toby Porter’s biological
father had been killed by obesity. Toby hated food, possibly
protecting him from his father’s fate.

Celeste, who had been raised by her
aunt, had never met her mother. The details she had been provided
about this woman were limited. All she had been able to tell Dr.
Porter was that her mother had been a prostitute and that she had
been murdered shortly after Celeste was born. Dr. Porter was left
to wonder if something about her mother’s sexual practices had led
to her demise, a fate Celeste, through her disorder, was protected
from.

James was the biggest conundrum of
them all. His parents were both still alive and both successful in
their fields. What was it that James’s disorder protected him from?
Was the barrier inside James’s subconscious there to protect him at
all?

Dr. Porter could not be sure of this.
Ethics demanded that he at least be somewhat more certain what he
was breaking into before he took his clients any further. But
again, he was ready to violate those ethics. For the sake of
knowledge, he was willing to make that sacrifice.

Chapter 7

It had not taken long to get them all
to the tunnel and then to bring in light. This done, Dr. Porter
said, “And now I would like for you to bring from your history a
tool that will help you break through the invisible barrier. Signal
me when you have done this.”

The response was not immediate. Dr.
Porter suspected subconscious resistance. The barrier itself,
inside each of them, had been there as long as the subconscious
itself. James, usually quick to respond, took nearly thirty
minutes. Near the end of the session, Dr. Porter came to suspect
that Toby and Celeste would not be done on time. He had wanted to
keep them together. But now, more than that, he wanted to see what
would happen once the tool was put to use. He brought them
up.

By the time all three were out of the
trance, he had the two tapes in his hand. He gave one to Celeste
and one to Toby. He sent them away with directions to listen to the
tapes, three times, spaced throughout the week. The tapes contained
the suggestion that they bring the breaking tool to the
tunnel.

He sat alone with James. “You’re
further advanced than the other two,” he said to his single client,
who was waiting patiently.

James nodded.

“Would you like to
continue?”

James smiled as big as Dr. Porter had
ever seen him smile and then nodded again.

James’s parents would not come in
until they saw Dr. Porter’s car was gone. So he figured they had
the extra time. Dr. Porter saw no reason, at least no reason he
cared about, not to continue. He put James back under, giving him
the same set of instructions, one by one, that James’s subconscious
had already heard to that point. Then, with James’s immediate
experience in the tunnel, with whatever tool he had brought in, Dr.
Porter said, “Now, start to break through the barrier.”

***

James heard Dr. Porter count, and he
came out of the trance. Moments ago he had no knowledge of who he
was. He was simply a being of destruction. Now he was able to put
words to that experience. “I brought in a hammer and a chisel,”
James said, even before Dr. Porter asked. “And all I knew was what
I was doing. I was breaking away at the barrier.”

“Did it break?” Dr. Porter
asked.

“Yes, it did, but not like glass
would.” James laughed at himself. Of course it hadn’t broken like
glass. Just because it was similar to glass in that it was clear,
didn’t make it glass. “It chipped, like a rock would.”

“Did you get all the way
through?”

“Yes, I made a small hole, not much
bigger than a quarter. I started to make the hole bigger, but
didn’t make much progress. I guess that must have been about the
time you brought me up.”

“Yes, James. I let you chip at it for
about five minutes. I don’t think it’s wise to rush at this
time.”

James agreed, but only on an
intellectual level. Emotionally, he wanted to go back under right
now and keep chipping away until that barrier was gone.

Dr. Porter asked, “Did you experience
anything when you broke through?”

James thought back and then said,
“Yes, I guess I did. There was a short rush of heat.”

James studied the doctor. He wasn’t
certain but he thought there might have been a little hesitancy in
his expression. James remembered where else he’d experienced heat,
in the nightmares. He didn’t want to talk about that right now,
though. He wanted to keep feeling good about this.

James was disappointed when the doctor
didn’t give him a tape to use during the week. But he thought he
understood. The doctor would want to be right there to monitor his
progress.

***

The kitchen was the first room James
came to out of the basement. He’d rarely been further in his life,
and had not dared to go beyond it in many years. But upon waking up
this morning, he had felt something different. He was
different.

James took short steps all the way to
the front of the house, into the living room. Shock painted the
faces of both his parents when they saw James. For the last few
weeks, he had skipped his Monday routine of coming upstairs. And it
wasn’t even Monday now. It was Sunday. They just sat there
speechless, his mother on the couch, his father in a recliner, both
with books in their hands, as James walked around.

The anxiety had been very low as he
entered the kitchen and then grew as he made his way to the living
room, which faced the front yard and the street, way more open than
the kitchen, which faced the backyard and the alley. But still, he
had made it this far. He spoke with a shaking voice. “I’m going
back to the kitchen.”

His mom came out of the shock first.
“Is there anything we can do to help?” she asked, staring at the
open blinds. James knew the unspoken question was if he wanted them
closed.

He shook his head. He wanted to take
this conversation into the kitchen, but at the same time, he wasn’t
so anxious that he couldn’t stay at the front of the house for a
little bit longer. “Just tell me before you open any doors,” James
said. “Leave the blinds as they are.”

James turned and walked away from
them. When he made it back to the kitchen and sat down, his anxiety
flowed down to a reasonable level. He got up and poured himself a
cup of coffee.

He thought about what this must be
like for his parents. They were both intellectuals, and must have
had certain expections for what their offspring would be. When he
was born, they wouldn’t have expected to be here forty years later,
seeing their son make it to the front of the house, regarding it as
their proudest moment as parents.

Both of them made their way into the
kitchen. When he saw the glow on their faces he realized that it
didn’t matter. Rhodes Scholar, Nobel Prize winner, making it to the
living room, it was all the same. It was all relative. He’d blown
their minds.

“Do you want us to make you some
breakfast?” his mother said, a few seconds after sitting
down.

“No,” James said. He then checked his
anxiety. It was still there, but very manageable. Confident, he
said, “I’d rather make you breakfast.”

James looked at his father, who had
the question on his face before it came to his lips. “Up
here?”

“Yes,” James said.

James made them breakfast that morning
and every day that week. He spent most of his time in the kitchen,
not daring to go further, but very happy with his progress, knowing
he would do more next week. The only glitch came on Wednesday, when
someone knocked on the front door.

James rushed downstairs, not the least
bit afraid of the person at the door, but fearing the door being
opened.

***

Janet heard her son yell and went
running again. But this time, he hadn’t brought her from sleep. It
was shortly after dinner, which he still hadn’t been able to enjoy.
She wasn’t the only one running to his room. Robert, who had been
in the living room with her, followed. Randy, who had been in his
room, studying, joined them in Toby’s room.

They found him lying on his bed, with
a smile on his face. That yell had not been in fear, but in
triumph. “I’m ready,” Toby repeated, this time not so loud, looking
at his family.