I don't suppose that it makes much sense if I explain it as logically as possible, because scientifically speaking, what happened to us defies all logical explanation. But I'm a firm believer in the concept of trying your best, and no matter how emotional I may get, I do try to be consistent and there's no point in breaking a lifelong habit on this endeavor. So I'll try, and see how well it goes.
I'm not quite sure at which point I decided that it was a coma, it was a gradual progression towards the adoption of this viewpoint but it was greatly influenced by a show that explored the inexplicable, focusing one episode on the thesis that coma patients' consciousness congregated on an island of undetermined location, the book of a consummately scientific physician who described in great detail what is a medically impossible spiritual experience of those with zero brain activity, the niggling belief in parallel universes and a passing acknowledgement to lucid dreaming that amalgamated in a laissez faire attitude towards a reality of being suddenly transported into what looked like the forest of Dean.
The belief that we were dreaming was enforced by the fact that I couldn't remember how exactly it was that we came to be in the forest and neither could Cassidy when asked to think very hard. The thing about Cassidy that I both loved and hated her for, is something of a defining trait: her ability to create tales on the spot and make them entirely believable partially through sheer force of conviction and guilelessness while telling them and partially in the crafting of the tale itself which was just realistic enough to be considered possible and charmingly touched with the fantasy that only a child of five could imbue upon a story and get away with. Cassidy, to put it nicely, was a master storyteller, to put it not so nicely, was a very good liar. It took a great deal of patience on my part and a fair bit of creative bribery to get as honest an answer as I could expect from her and left us no better informed than before I had managed to confirm any information from her.
"Creative bribery?" you ask. "Yes, creative bribery." I would reply, because … appearing in a forest with nothing but the clothes on your back leaves you with very little options available with which to entice a five year old into doing something that they're not particularly inclined to doing: sitting still for an hour and speaking very seriously about topics that seem very silly to them but in actuality are very important if they ever want to reach home again. So: creative bribery, which involved a fair bit of fibbing on my part, ironically enough. I was just lucky that she was young enough to believe it.
The main point of criticism that I'm expecting from a … sympathetic reader of this tale is something along the lines of, "You must have realized at some point that there was the possibility that this was a reality to you...at the very least it shouldn't have taken you four months to come to the realization that this affected you." I've tried to address it as much as possible at the outset but it was a self-affirming belief...situations would occur that would then prompt me to justify them in a manner that inadvertently happened to reinforce the belief that this was some...neurologically-induced hallucination. I mean, there were ample opportunities for me to come to the conclusion that I should take things a bit more seriously and believe me, I mull over them in the quiet moments before slumber each evening, somewhat sadistically.
Pain could be explained away as a twisted sleeping position, a hand that fell asleep from having the weight of a torso crushing it for the better part of a night and impeding crucial blood flow, a head hitting the headboard, a hand knocking against the bedside table in the process of finding a more comfortable position. But a limb falling asleep doesn't normally feel like flesh ripping away from bone. Neither thirst nor hunger are a feasible experience for one who is dreaming as such functions shut down when the brain enters the REM cycle. In retrospect, I have few excuses to fall back on but believable justifications for my thoughts and the resulting actions. If you are confused by the differentiation between excuses and justifications, I think it's the perfect introduction to how thin the line became for us, for me, between what was occurring and what actually happened. It's not an easy story to tell. I'm not even sure if it's something that I should be telling. Like this. So clinically. So coldly.
"Which evenings, Gwen?" Dr. Leakie asked quietly, looking intently at my face. I couldn't place the expression on his. I think it's a class they must teach at graduate school for aspiring psychologists entering the field of psychotherapy: how to remain as facially indecipherable and vocally aloof as humanly possible without seeming forthrightly robotic. Dr. Leakie probably got honours. If not the highest mark ever awarded in the history of the class since it was first established. He's that good. Or I'm that bad.
"Some." I replied. All would be the truth. I couldn't forget. I wouldn't forget. I can't forget. It stays with me and forever shall stay with me. Some people have birthmarks, others have adorable dimples or endearing freckles or knobby knees that make them look like a small child from mid-thigh downwards but I have this. My own-
The silence that was building is abruptly disturbed by Dr. Leakie's soft, gravelly, monotone: "Some, Gwen?" He closed the leather journal with his equally leathery hands and sighed. "I thought we had agreed to full disclosure after last week's incident?" he asks, his voice reaching new levels of small, pebbly stone pathways.
"We did." I said, looking at the plant by the door that would take me out of this purgatorial interlude with a pastor of nightmares and narcotically aided suppression.
"I trust you to hold up your end of the bargain. I'm only here to help you, Gwen. But I can't help you if you don't at least try. It has to come from you." His voice sounds plaintive and resigned, a funny combination, like a sad clown or a fat ballerina. We've been through this very conversation many times before. I've heard those exact same words in that exact same order three times in the last week. The plant by the door still looks a child's finger painting; an artistic representation that only vaguely resembles what it's supposed to be, an artist's rendering. Only Dr. Leakie could find a plant that looks like it's been sculpted by an Inuit postmodernist trying to recapture their evaporating culture's essence.
I sighed, looking up and said, "I want to get better, Dr. Leakie, I really do. And I know it's not going to be easy but I am trying." and apprehensively focused on the gray irises of Dr Leakie's bulging eyes. With trepidation, I return his gaze as it solidifies, his sightline clearing, as though he's finally seeing what he'd been looking at all this time. I know where this is going. The whole hour could be condensed into the exchange that begins with what is coming. He leans forwards and asks, almost conspiratorially, "How are you sleeping?"
My Catch-22. No answer is a good answer. If I were to tell him that I wasn't, he'd prescribe more medication that I wouldn't take and we'd be back to our Mexican stand-off which would, inevitably, lead to a catastrophic resolution. If I were to tell him that I was, it would lead to more questions, whose answers are not ones that I'm prepared to share with anyone, let alone a skinny old man with a paper that says he's certified to help me solve all my problems. The silence….well the silence would lead us back to where we began. Catch-22.
"Like the dead." I replied, heavily, bitterly.
*DING*
There was a pause before Dr Leakie said, bemused, "Well, that's it for today, Gwen."
It's almost funny how I get lucky with the little things, the absolutely useless, pointless, worthless, little things that somehow manage to turn out alright. The big things are another story.