He squeezed his fingers and touched his chin. The knuckles turned white from visible tension.
“By the way, have you taken notice of the name Trevor?" The doctor looked at Robert curiously, as if he just uncovered a secret and was about to reveal it.
“What’s wrong with it?”
“What do you mean what’s wrong? It is a palindrome, a word that reads the same backward as forward. Look!” The doctor took a sheet of paper and wrote several big letters. “Here, this is how it looks. Trevor is the mirror image of your name, Robert."
“Indeed. I’ve never thought about it, but you're right,” Robert said in surprise.
“Yes, Robert, mirror image! Palindrome. By the way, what’s your feeling of time? It is synchronous?"
“For the most part it almost coincides. Life there runs strictly by the rules, even if I don’t sleep here for, like, two days. But usually, in my dream, it’s like I return to the last starting position. Sometimes, it seems as though I enter while it's in progress, but my memory instantly fills with information. I realize that’s what happened only later, when I wake up.”
“So, there are moments you can’t remember?”
“Just as there are in this life, doctor. All feelings are identical. Usually, when I fall asleep, I find myself in the exact moment as before. It’s as if I just push play on a track that was paused. Well, except for the case with Amanda. That was different.”
Dr. Friedman was looking at Robert, contemplating something. He was tormented by doubt and he seemed to be trying to explain to himself what was going on, shuffling through all the cases of multiple personality disorder known to him, comparing them with this unclear condition of his new patient.
After a long silence, the doctor sighed, crossed his arms over his chest and said: “You know, Robert, your condition, even considering your fantasies about night journeys in your dreams, raises no concerns for me. This all falls within the generally accepted standards of psychological deviance. Here’s what does concern me though…” The doctor paused, looking intently at Robert. “Your suicidal thoughts, I believe, are the result of depression, but you seem to be coping with that on your own. And that’s a very good decision, because staying in depression passively is like sitting on the bank of a river waiting for the body of your enemy to float by. I am happy that you are not waiting, but instead trying to find a way out. Seek ways and analyze.”
“You’ve got it a bit wrong, doctor. I have suicidal thoughts not because I don’t see a way out, and they are not the result of some depression. I am fully content with my life here, beyond the dream. I have a good job, successful career, and a woman I love. But…” Robert sighed deeply. “Sometimes all of this does not seem real to me. I’ve thought a lot about it, comparing this world and that one. What if all this is just somebody’s dream? What if you and I and this entire world is just my dream, my imagination, and nothing more? In that case, suicide seems to be a radical way to solve the problem. Do you understand?”
“So, you believe that by killing yourself in this life, you will simply wake up in the other, like in a dream? Right?” the doctor asked. “If that is so, and if we are, as you believe, in a dream right now, what will stop you from coming back here the next time? It’s just a dream, after all. And if we were to assume that you are right and this world is your dream, how can you be sure that you haven’t killed yourself before in this life, which you’ve just called a dream?”
