Pushing a Button in Me - Pauline Davenport

1890, London.

Not one person in our group of acquaintances can get their fill of the mediumship, séances, tarot and foreign mysticism that are advertised privately, whispered about at parties and yet widely available. However, when I last saw the manifestation of ectoplasm, it made me feel far from healthy, so today I am trying something different. Thus it is that I find myself in a rather motley queue. At nineteen, I am by far the youngest enthusiast of past-life hypnosis.

It is hot on the street where we wait to be ushered to the private venue. A short, suited gentleman with a soft Italian accent appears at the door and quietly beckons us inside. We walk down carpeted stairs, remove our shoes and then enter the chamber. The basement is lavishly decorated with candelabras, Chinese silk cushions, throws and Persian rugs. I notice a sudden drop in temperature. There are mattresses on the floor and oriental fabrics hang from the walls. We sit on the soft, prepared floor and patiently wait for our host to begin the spooky proceedings. A lady in a deep red, floor length gown begins to light candles. I tingle with excitement hoping that this event will be nothing short of macabre.

The gentleman we met at street level comes back into the room but this time he is dressed in a long, embroidered kaftan. He welcomes us with a brief statement about what we will do, but gives no introductions to the men and women stationed in each corner of the room. I conclude that they are here to protect the chamber from troublesome or negative forces. He asks us to remove any pocket watches, crystals or jewellery that we might have on our person because the work that we are about to do can break the mechanisms inside of watches and crystal can interfere with the process. I reluctantly remove my treasured pale blue amulet from around my neck. He starts to talk to us in a caring creamy voice. A flutist gathers our thoughts together as one. Music floats through the basement like opium and we begin to prepare for a group hypnosis as our host continues to talk softly.

The sound comes from me before I have time to logically understand it. I yell out but it is a sudden, unnatural, and broken scream as if someone were pressing a button in me and switching me off and on. The hypnotist looks at me with surprise for we are not fully under his spell. Yet there I go again and again, I cannot stop it. I am afraid and shy. I try to catch his eye for his guidance but he offers none. The people standing in the corners of the room look nervously at each other. Something desperate is clawing for release from deep inside of me. My modern Victorian self is embarrassed but I reason that this is why I am here: to discover a past life. However, I have no control over what is happening to me. I release a high-pitched scream like a woman tormented. The screams get louder and more powerful, as though an internal volcano full of shock and trauma is about to erupt. I gradually disappear deeper into trance. I never notice when we actually begin.

~

I see myself. I am one of many men meditating in silence. Robed in orange, with our heads shaved, we sit in a long row facing a vast landscape of mountains with snowy peaks. I feel physically lighter as I breathe the thin air of a high altitude.

Then it happens.

A sword is plunged into my back. The shock is beyond my imagining. I die instantly. I do not see my attacker.

When I die, it is with the awareness that I am one with all other souls on a vast journey. My being is rich, nourished from the silence of sitting in the Himalayas and reaching the same heights of flowering within my own mountain of self.

~

I hear a bell ringing. I am being told to awaken. Someone counts from five to one, then to zero as I open my eyes. The basement looks strange and I wonder if I will ever look upon the world with the same eyes I had before. One of the Italian’s assistants, a petite, blonde woman, strokes my forehead and I am aware that I am wet with sweat. My eyes fill with tears but I am too confused to talk. She hands me a silk handkerchief. My legs feel like lead and I wonder if I shall ever be able to move them. When I sit up, I notice that all eyes in the room are aglow with a ghoulish light and I realise that everyone has remembered their own story but few saw their fate.