Dr. White pursed his lips.
“That’s interesting,” he said. He slowly made a long note on his pad, and then he inhaled deeply, as if gathering his thoughts. “It’s quite remarkable, really. The fact that the dream has been occurring for all of these years, with such consistent regularity, and without significant changes to the events within the heart of it is intriguing. The subconscious speaks through images, and it’s most vocal when we’re asleep, so dreams are like a visual dialogue of what’s going on in our minds. The thing that is absolutely fascinating to me is that you began having the dream when you were four. By all rights, even if your subconscious was capable of creating such a complex dream with so many adult themes at that time, it should have evolved over the years, morphed into something else.”
“So what does that mean?” I asked him.
“Well,” he said, sitting forward and setting aside his legal pad and pen to clasp his hands in front of him, “normally, I’d recommend seeing you for several sessions to help you work through the most troubling symbols in the dream, and by talking them through, help you figure out what they mean, and make peace with your subconscious, so to speak, which, hopefully, would be how we’d be able to get them to stop. But all I need to do is take one look at you to see that you’re exhausted to the point that you’re having panic attacks, and otherwise you’re having a hard time functioning. I think a more aggressive approach might be in order.”
I frowned and shook my head. I was afraid he’d say something like that. “I don’t want to take any drugs,” I told him. I’d said as much to my mom, too.
He smiled. “I wasn’t going to suggest a prescription, Lily. Not unless your mom pushed for it.”
That surprised me. “Then what?”
“I’d like to try hypnotherapy.”
“Hypnotherapy?” I repeated. “What? Like, you’re getting sleeeeeeepy?”
Dr. White offered me a sideways smile. “Not quite like that, but you’re close. It could be very effective in your case, because through hypnotherapy we would be able to speak directly to your subconscious and find out what, exactly, it was trying to tell us.”
It sounded creepy. I shifted in my chair, envisioning Dr. White dangling a pocket watch in front of me.
“Your mother would be present, of course,” he told me, as if reading my mind.
That helped, but still it sounded weird. “I’m not gonna cluck like a chicken every time a bell rings, will I?” I’d seen a YouTube clip of a Vegas act where a professional hypnotist made some poor guy from the audience do that for nearly ten minutes.
“No,” Dr. White said with a smile, but I got the feeling he’d been asked that before. “I promise not to make you do or say anything embarrassing. We’re just going to speak directly to your subconscious by bypassing your more dominant conscious mind. That’s all hypnosis does—it takes a shortcut around the conscious mind to find out what’s truly at play here.”
“When would we do it?”
“Given the fact that you’re not sleeping and you’d prefer not to take a sleep aid, I’d suggest right now.”
“Now?”
“I have time if you do.”
“Can my mom really come in?”
Dr. White got up and crossed the room. He opened the door and called to Mom. A minute later he was explaining what was going to happen next. She seemed uncertain.
“Will this really work?” she asked him.
“It might,” he said. “At the very least it’s worth a try.”
Mom looked at me. “You really want to do this?”
“If it’ll get rid of the nightmare and let me sleep?” I said. “Let’s do it.”
She smiled, but she still looked worried. Turning back to Dr. White, she said, “Okay, then.”
Dr. White explained how the whole hypnotizing thing would work. I’ll admit I was really skeptical. I mean, I wasn’t even sure that hypnosis was a real thing.
Dr. White also explained that he would record the session on his laptop so I could have it as a reference should the dream continue to interrupt my sleep.
“We’ll attempt to re-create the dream in your hypnotic state, and once we do that we’ll alter it so that it’ll become something pleasant, rather than a thing that upsets you to the point of waking you up,” he said.
“Okay.” I rubbed my palms against my jeans. I was anxious to get started, but also nervous.