Read Online Night Visions by Thomas Fahy - Free Book Online

when she opens her eyes. Arty watches over the doctor’s shoulder, and the room seems to vibrate like a fluorescent light.
    Dr. Clay checks her pulse. “What happened?”
    â€œI saw things. A house, I think. I don’t know.” She covers her eyes with her right hand. The left rests on her stomach. “It was cold. No, the bathroom tiles were cold, and there was a mirrorwith no reflection.” She sits up suddenly. “What the hell is happening to me?”
    â€œRelax. There’s nothing to worry about. Spontaneous hallucinations are a common side effect of hypnosis, especially in conjunction with sleep deprivation.”
    â€œNothing to worry about! If they’re so damn common, why didn’t you tell me?”
    Dr. Clay flinches, then speaks with a soft sternness. “Sleep-wake cycles are like fingerprints—they’re different for everyone. So just as it’s impossible to predict how someone will respond to prolonged deprivation, it’s also difficult to know how she will be affected by certain treatments, particularly hypnosis. Like dreams, hallucinations are a way of processing anxieties and fears. You haven’t been sleeping well for months, Samantha, and this can cause chemical changes in your brain and body. In some cases, prolonged deprivation releases a chemical into the bloodstream similar to LSD, leading to altered states. That seems to be what’s happening to you.”
    He touches her right hand, which now rests on her thigh, and says, “Trust me. Your brain is just trying to make sense of this new neural activity.”
    â€œBut I didn’t just see things. I felt them.”
    â€œAs I said, extraordinary hypnotic experiences can create an altered state—some scientists even associate it with psychic phenomena such as ESP and clairvoyance. But the truth is that these hallucinations are a result of modified perception. They make you believe that what you’re seeing is real. You think you felt something, but you didn’t. It wasn’t real.”
    â€œOh, no problem then. I can just get a part-time job with the Psychic Network,” she says with anxious sarcasm.
    â€œI’ll prove there’s nothing supernatural about it. What am I thinking right now?”
    â€œThat I’m being a pain in the ass?” She tries to play along.
    â€œHey, maybe you’re psychic after all.”
    He laughs halfheartedly, and Samantha smiles. She feels somewhat relieved, but not entirely convinced.
    â€œIs this going to keep happening to me? What about when I’m driving to work or walking down the street?”
    â€œNot likely. This state was induced by hypnosis, so you should experience hallucinations only going into or coming out of a trance state. After a few more sessions, I expect that your mind will adapt. The hallucinations will stop.”
    She nods quietly, almost imperceptibly. “I guess salvation doesn’t come without a price,” she mutters.
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œNothing.”

8
Visionary
    SATURDAY
    T he windshield wipers pulse as she waits at a red light two blocks from the clinic. All day she has been wary of things that could accidentally hypnotize her—the dripping kitchen faucet, ticking clocks, the humming air filter in her fish tank. She knows this fear is ridiculous, but she feels profoundly exhausted, as if her body recognizes for the first time how deprived it has been. It wants to make up for lost time, not celebrate small victories.
    Once again, she thinks of Frank. Every time the phone rang this afternoon, she grabbed it hastily, hoping it would be him. She wanted to hear his voice, to think about him and the investigation instead of herself. But he never called, and everyone else—telemarketers, a friend from work, a wrong number—had to listen to the disappointment in her voice.
    In junior high, she remembers now, she spent many afternoons like this waiting by the phone