“Renny is . . . ?”
“My brother, Warren, but everyone calls him Renny.”
“Are you two close?”
“I have this recurring dream where I’m sailing a boat on a chocolate pudding sea. Renny flies overhead on a missile equipped with a saddle and stirrups, toward a village inhabited by man-sized, flesh-eating emus. He yells that he really loves scrambled eggs before the missile strikes the emu village and explodes.”
“Are you worried about your brother joining the military?”
“I’m worried he’s going to shoot his foot off,” I said. “I’m worried he’s going to be the guy everyone hates and who winds up eating his gun from shame. I’m worried the army is going to strip away the things that make him my brother and return him to us as a hollowed-out shell of a human being.”
Dr. Dawson’s eyebrow twitched, but he refrained from writing down what I’d said, though it probably killed him a little. “It’s clear you have complex feelings regarding your brother, and I’d like to unpack those during our next session, but right now I’d like to discuss Thomas Ross.”
“Or we could talk about something else.” I wriggled in the leather Judas chair I’d been forced to endure, trying to find a comfortable spot. “For instance, were you aware Maya Angelou worked briefly as both a madam and a prostitute? Or that D. H. Lawrence climbed trees in the nude to combat writer’s block? I’ve never had writer’s block—not that I write, I’m more of a reader—but I doubt buck-naked tree climbing would help if I did. I should give it a try.”
Dr. Dawson nodded appreciatively. “Why do you believe you’re the only person who remembers Thomas Ross?” Clearly my non sequitur had failed to deter Dawson. It had worked on Dr. Askari, though it honestly hadn’t taken great effort to derail her thought train.
“I’m not crazy,” I said.
“No one is suggesting you are.”
“Aren’t you, though? Isn’t that why I’m here? Parents of perfectly sane kids don’t send them to therapy.”
Dr. Dawson frowned. “Of course they do. Therapy helps people sort through complex thoughts and emotions. Think of therapy as an antibiotic for the mind.”
“So you’re saying I’m diseased? That I’ve got a mental infection?”
“That’s not what I’m saying at all,” Dr. Dawson said. “And I think you’re smart enough to know that.” He moved his legal pad to the side table, giving me his full attention. “Now, why don’t you tell me about Thomas Ross.”
Dawson wasn’t the first persistent therapist I’d encountered. Dr. Butte had evaded my attempts to dodge her questions too. To fluster her, I’d had to resort to asking her how often was too often for someone my age to masturbate in one day.
“What’s to know? I met Tommy in second grade. He kissed me in eighth. He was my boyfriend and best friend. July third, he existed; July fourth, he didn’t. Not even his parents remember him.”
“Why do you?”
“Because God has a warped sense of humor? How should I know?”
“Do you have a theory?”
“I have a lot of theories.”
“Tell me one.”
As therapists went, I kind of admired Dr. Dawson’s tenacity, but he wanted to know about Tommy. He’d probably ask about Flight 1184 before our hour was up, which necessitated this being our one and only session. It also meant it couldn’t hurt to indulge him a little.
“Have you ever heard of a false vacuum?” I asked.
“I have not.”
“The scientific explanation, which I have to admit I probably don’t understand as well as I should, describes the stability of our universe as the result of resting in the lowest possible energy state. A false vacuum is one in which it only appears we’re in the lowest energy state, until a vacuum metastability event occurs, knocking us into an even lower state.” It’d taken me a long time to wrap my brain around the science, and I figured it probably didn’t make much sense to Dr. Dawson either. Which he confirmed.
“I’m not sure I understand,” he said.
“Imagine the universe is a pot of nearly boiling water. The bubbles on the bottom of the pot are other universes that appear real and stable to their inhabitants, but which, in reality, are not. Eventually, those bubbles rise to the surface and pop. That’s a false vacuum.”
Dr. Dawson’s hand twitched. “And you believe we’re living in a bubble on the verge of bursting?”
“It’s a theory.”
“But how does that account for Thomas Ross’s disappearance?”
I’d said more than I’d meant to, but I’d already decided to tell my parents Dr. Dawson fell asleep during our session as my excuse for not wanting to see him again, so it didn’t matter.
“If our universe is a false vacuum, then maybe the people living in the real universe are trying to warn me.”
Dr. Dawson uncrossed his legs and recrossed them, resting his hands in his lap. “So your theory is that the inhabitants of the true universe have stolen your boyfriend and left you the sole custodian of his memories in order to send you a message?”
“Like I said, it’s one possibility. Besides, there are other weird events.”
“Flight 1184?”
Shit. I’d walked right into that one. “Sure.”
“Do you feel up to discussing it?”
“Why not? I’ll always remember those long, meaningful talks I had with the FAA investigators as the highlight of my nearly brief life.”
Dawson retrieved his notepad. I swear he actually looked relieved to hold it again. “The police report states you were laughing after the plane went down.”
“Went down.” I shook my head. “Why does everyone go to such ludicrous lengths to avoid saying ‘crash’? They say the plane ‘went down’ or ‘fell’ or, my personal favorite, ‘attempted an uncontrolled emergency landing.’ The fact is the plane crashed. It crashed into the ground, killing a hundred and sixty-seven people. A hundred and fifty-five in the plane, and twelve on the road it crashed into. If Renny hadn’t snooped on my computer and ratted me out to my parents, the death toll would’ve been one sixty-eight.”
“Why were you laughing, Ozzie?”
The FAA investigators had asked me the same question a hundred different ways. I think they believed my laughter was an indication I’d caused the crash or been involved in some way, but they hadn’t found a speck of evidence I’d been responsible. After they released me, my friends and parents constantly told me how lucky I was fate had plucked me from my uncomfortable seat on the express flight to a fiery death. But I didn’t feel lucky.
Dawson patiently waited for my answer. Less than ten minutes of our session remained, and I had nothing to lose.
So I said, “You want to know why I was laughing?”
He nodded. “I do.”
“Because I went looking for Tommy and the universe killed a plane full of people to suggest I stay in Cloud Lake. Don’t you think that’s funny?”
Dr. Dawson glanced at his notepad, then at me. “No, Ozzie, I don’t.”
“Well, I think it’s hilarious,” I said. “Especially if it’s true.”
TOMMY