Out-of-Body

"Relax … The anesthesia will take effect in moment …Count backwards from 10."

*   *   *   *   *

It was the middle of the night, and I was wandering through the city's financial district. There wasn't a soul on the street. Even the homeless who, after dark, usually occupy the heating grates, weren't around. The steel and glass buildings towering above the south end of Manhattan looked darker than usual.

I enjoy walking through this part of the city at night. It's a good way to clear your head, especially after an evening at a crowded restaurant talking about nothing in particular.

I was crossing West Broadway when, suddenly, I noticed a strange light in the darkness. It seemed to be coming out of a sidewalk grate. I was curious and walked towards it.

I looked down through the grate and saw that it was fixed into the ceiling of a large room. The light was coming from a television flickering in the corner of the room. Directly below me was a body on a metal table, and a man in surgical scrubs standing next to it. He had a scalpel in his hand. I knew what he was going to do and wanted to look away, but couldn't.

The man in scrubs cut open the abdomen. He reached in with both hands and pulled out a very large scrapbook and began to leaf through it. I read along from above.

Fairy tales and children's poems were pasted onto the first few pages of the scrapbook. I remembered these from my childhood. There were also bits and pieces of text that were taken from plays, short stories, and novels. I recognized something from Shakespeare. Next came newspapers, flyers, and advertisements. There was even the front page of The New York Times from God-knows-when.

Some of the stuff in the scrapbook wasn't familiar to me. Was that a ticket to a concert or a play? A birthday card? Were those scribbled notes to a friend, a girlfriend? Was that part of an argument? Words were scattered here and there in different places, seemingly without a context.

This went on for a while, until I noticed a thin film developing on the pages, as if a layer of dust was settling. It got heavier and heavier, making it difficult to read the scrapbook. The man in the scrubs eventually lost his patience with this and swiped his hand across the page. In the blink of an eye, everything in the room turned red. The blood soaked through the pages and made the scrapbook completely illegible. I pulled a television clicker out of my pocket and tried to turn it all off, but it didn't work. The last thing I can remember was running back across West Broadway.

*   *   *   *   *

"You're not going to believe this, honey. Remember that guy I told you about? The weird professor of postmodern literature, who complained about the blockage in his stomach? I opened him up this afternoon, we almost lost him. Had a hell of a battle bringing him back. Anyway, that's the last one for today, I'll be home soon. … Actually there's something else: The observation area was closed during the operation, but I could've sworn someone was up there. It was kind of weird. I had to look over my shoulder at one point. … No, really. … You're right, might have been the stress. I'll be home soon."

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