she felt no sense of personal danger. She reminded herself that although this might be accurate, it was not very smart, and realigned her chair so the panic button was within easy reach. “Why not?” she asked.
“I just had a feeling, when you left here last week, that you weren’t planning on coming back.” Lindsey shrugged. “Sometimes my feelings are right on, and as you can see, sometimes they’re not.”
Suki glanced from her watch to the partially completed evaluation form in front of her. She needed to get home as soon as possible. She had left Alexa with her father, and she didn’t want to give the two of them too much time alone; Seymour’s heart might not be able to handle the fact that once again, someone he loved was able to predict disaster. Yet she found Lindsey’s statement irresistible. “Could you tell me about some of these ‘feelings’?” she asked, although this was not one of the items on her form. “Have you always believed you were clairvoyant?”
Lindsey tilted in her chair, resting the back against the wall and raising the front legs off the floor. She placed her hands behind her neck, looking for all the world like a professor expounding to a group of attentive graduate students. “I would’ve told you I never thought I was clairvoyant until just recently—and I know this sounds crazy—but once I started noticing, and remembering, I realized I’d had lots of these experiences, all my life. I just didn’t recognize them.”
Suki ignored the clock ticking in her head. “Can you tell me a couple?”
“Oh,” Lindsey said airily, “you know, lots of small stuff, like answering the phone before it rang and being able to tell who was going to win the next election. I remember, once, I told my friend Wendy her father would be in a car crash.” The legs of Lindsey’s chair cracked to the floor and she laughed sharply. “Wendy was really pissed off when I told her father not to drive into Hartford to pick up her new dress, but boy, was she pissed after the accident. It was as if she believed I had made his brakes fail.”
A brittle shiver scurried up Suki’s spine, the kind the kids used to say meant someone was walking on your grave. Her mother had once predicted a similar event, with a similar outcome: her friend Florence had stopped speaking to her after her husband was killed on a bus trip to the Grand Canyon Harriet had told them not to take. “Did Wendy’s father die?” Suki asked.
“Oh, no,” Lindsey assured her. “Just a broken wrist. The car was totaled, though. Just like I told Wendy it would be.”
“Exactly how did you know? About the car, I mean. Did you see it? Hear it?”
Lindsey was silent for a moment. “I guess it’s mostly a visual thing. But also a sort of overwhelming sense of knowledge. More like a memory than anything else.”
Suki reminded herself that there were many rational explanations for what Lindsey was describing, including both coincidence and deceit. Many types of psychosis caused hallucinations and delusions, most notably schizophrenia and dissociative disorders; one could even argue that the definition of psychosis was a false observation that was then used as the basis for a false conclusion about the world. Still, Suki didn’t see Lindsey as psychotic.
Lindsey’s explanation for what she believed was so reasoned; most psychotics didn’t think their delusions needed explanation—they seemed to be missing the piece of ego necessary to stand back and observe. Yet, Suki knew psychologists far more experienced than she had been fooled before, and that a complete psych history was in order. “So you think this knowledge, this memory, comes to you through some kind of psychic mechanism?” Suki asked.
“I still have days when I wonder what’s happening to me,” Lindsey admitted. “How it can be happening to me. But yes, I do think it’s psychic.”
Suki rubbed the bridge of her nose. Definitely not a psychotic response.
“I just had a feeling, when you left here last week, that you weren’t planning on coming back.” Lindsey shrugged. “Sometimes my feelings are right on, and as you can see, sometimes they’re not.”
Suki glanced from her watch to the partially completed evaluation form in front of her. She needed to get home as soon as possible. She had left Alexa with her father, and she didn’t want to give the two of them too much time alone; Seymour’s heart might not be able to handle the fact that once again, someone he loved was able to predict disaster. Yet she found Lindsey’s statement irresistible. “Could you tell me about some of these ‘feelings’?” she asked, although this was not one of the items on her form. “Have you always believed you were clairvoyant?”
Lindsey tilted in her chair, resting the back against the wall and raising the front legs off the floor. She placed her hands behind her neck, looking for all the world like a professor expounding to a group of attentive graduate students. “I would’ve told you I never thought I was clairvoyant until just recently—and I know this sounds crazy—but once I started noticing, and remembering, I realized I’d had lots of these experiences, all my life. I just didn’t recognize them.”
Suki ignored the clock ticking in her head. “Can you tell me a couple?”
“Oh,” Lindsey said airily, “you know, lots of small stuff, like answering the phone before it rang and being able to tell who was going to win the next election. I remember, once, I told my friend Wendy her father would be in a car crash.” The legs of Lindsey’s chair cracked to the floor and she laughed sharply. “Wendy was really pissed off when I told her father not to drive into Hartford to pick up her new dress, but boy, was she pissed after the accident. It was as if she believed I had made his brakes fail.”
A brittle shiver scurried up Suki’s spine, the kind the kids used to say meant someone was walking on your grave. Her mother had once predicted a similar event, with a similar outcome: her friend Florence had stopped speaking to her after her husband was killed on a bus trip to the Grand Canyon Harriet had told them not to take. “Did Wendy’s father die?” Suki asked.
“Oh, no,” Lindsey assured her. “Just a broken wrist. The car was totaled, though. Just like I told Wendy it would be.”
“Exactly how did you know? About the car, I mean. Did you see it? Hear it?”
Lindsey was silent for a moment. “I guess it’s mostly a visual thing. But also a sort of overwhelming sense of knowledge. More like a memory than anything else.”
Suki reminded herself that there were many rational explanations for what Lindsey was describing, including both coincidence and deceit. Many types of psychosis caused hallucinations and delusions, most notably schizophrenia and dissociative disorders; one could even argue that the definition of psychosis was a false observation that was then used as the basis for a false conclusion about the world. Still, Suki didn’t see Lindsey as psychotic.
Lindsey’s explanation for what she believed was so reasoned; most psychotics didn’t think their delusions needed explanation—they seemed to be missing the piece of ego necessary to stand back and observe. Yet, Suki knew psychologists far more experienced than she had been fooled before, and that a complete psych history was in order. “So you think this knowledge, this memory, comes to you through some kind of psychic mechanism?” Suki asked.
“I still have days when I wonder what’s happening to me,” Lindsey admitted. “How it can be happening to me. But yes, I do think it’s psychic.”
Suki rubbed the bridge of her nose. Definitely not a psychotic response.
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