I learned that you dream about your birth when you sleep on your birthday.
I like to go into unusual shops. So it was not unusual that I decided to go in when I saw the sign. The shop itself wouldn’t have provoked my interest, it was just a typical psychic’s place, I would have dismissed it as a boring scam. But the sign, the sort businesses and churches put up customs messages hawking their latest deals or faintly threatening scriptures on, was intriguing.
“Schedule an appointment on your birthday. Remember your birth!”
That was an odd one. I had to concede that the attention grabber worked. And my birthday was coming up soon. So, I gave in and entered.
Everything about the inside matched the exterior; a boring suburban psychic hardly worth describing. Just a doctor’s office lounge with some new age baubles thrown around to decorate it.
The woman behind the counter was what you would expect as well. She was a younger middle-aged, dark-haired, woman of obviously Eastern European descent. She looked up the moment I entered.
“Can you actually do that?” I curiously asked, cutting to the matter without prelude.
“The sign you mean?” She questioned for clarification.
“Yeah. I’ve never seen that kind of offer.” I admitted.
“Yes. It is my specialty. Schedule an appointment on your birthday, and I will help remember your birth.” She simply explained.
“How does it work?” I still wanted to know more, skeptical that this would even be a fun diversion. I have little patience for psychic readings, boring scams that they are. “Do you just tell me about my birth or something? Why my birthday? Is it just a marketing pitch, because it’s the anniversary?”
“No. You remember it. But, you must go to sleep. You see, everyone dreams of their birth when they go to sleep on their birthday.” She explained.
I have to say that I found this woman’s explanations to be confusing. She was, apparently, not incredibly eloquent for a psychic, someone whose job is fundamentally to make up fabrications enticing enough for people to pay for.
I was still hooked though, so something was working.
“If we all dream it, why do I need you?” I had to at least work out the largest remaining gap in that story.
“You don’t remember your youngest childhood when awake, ever. The dreams are no exception. I can hold them in your mind though, long enough for you to remember what you remembered.” She saw my blank reaction to that and continued. “The memory itself will still fade. Not immediately, don’t worry. But you will not forget what you thought about that memory, so you will still know what you saw.”
Her explanations continued to be obtuse, and there were many red flags to that part that these “memories” might be nothing more than suggestion, but I found my curiosity not to be waning in the least. She could plainly tell that I was going to pry deeper.
“I do not care to show the world or ‘prove’ anything. If you wish for me to answer questions, I will charge you an appointment anyway, so you might as well see for yourself first.” She was clearly used to customers more interested in interrogation than paying.
“Fine.” I gave in. “I’ll make the appointment. But one more question: Why? Why remember your birth? Isn’t that more a weird curiosity than anything else?”
“On the contrary, it is very therapeutic for many.” She pointedly countered. “Seeing the face of a mother lost, reliving a more joyous moment, there are many reasons. Reasons which I am sure you have, or this would not intrigue you so much.”
So she was observant enough for her chosen craft. I did have a reason, of course. Though I had not thought it to begin with, nor admitted it was the factor driving me on.
My own mother died shortly after my birth. And, in fact, my older sister shortly after that. Leaving me raised by my father alone. Although, like many fathers, not openly, he had been affected by the loss, left somewhat aloof and withdrawn around others. In spite of that though, he was openly proud of me, repeating his joy at having a son to raise still. That was enough to have never felt the loss too keenly, never having technically known what I had lost, only occasionally feeling pangs of what could have been when watching other’s fuller families together.
I scheduled a session on my birthday.
The need to fall asleep meant that the block of time scheduled needed to be wide. Sleeping medications were okay, though she warned to fragment the dream a bit, worsening the quality of the memory. Anything else to make me drowsy would be beneficial though.
I settled on going to bed late, waking up early, and for good measure popping a nighttime cold medication as soon as I parked the car there. It made for a weird start to my birthday, but hopefully, this experience would make up for it.
“You look like a wreck, perfect. I like a customer who prepares.” She joked casually upon my arrival and led me to a back room.
It was a simple, bare, square room with a cot in the middle, a lot like a massage room, but even emptier. I was told to lay down and go to sleep. As I did, the woman did one last thing, she stuck a small round sticker on my wrist.
“It’s a sensor to let me know when you are asleep. Some wealthy patrons have gifted me with tools to help make what I do easier.” She explained.
It made sense, though I was impressed that she had managed to get rich people to buy her medical equipment.
It was time to sleep. I don’t go to sleep easily in strange conditions, so going under was a challenge of its own. My preparations allowed me to be just exhausted enough to give in though, thankfully.
I don’t remember what I saw next. By that I mean, I can’t form the images in my mind or feel what I felt in that state. However, as she promised I clearly remember what I thought while I still could remember it, so I can explain what I saw. I can describe it to you as I fervently described it to myself while the images faded from my mind.
At first, I felt myself being birthed in a world of darkness, then a harsh, mucous veiled light washed over me.
I don’t know how long it was after the light, I can’t remember after all, but I know eventually I saw the world, eyes wide open.
I wish more than anything I hadn’t.
There were three faces in the room.
One I knew well to be my father’s.
The next I could tell was my mother. There were a few pictures of her around when I was a child, so I had enough to go on.
The final face was my sister. That one took some time to realize. There were almost no pictures of her out around the house, I had always assumed more were tucked away in family picture albums I had never hunted down, and all of those few were of her when much younger.
Other than the absence of a doctor, the identities of those present were normal.
That was where anything normal ended.
My father’s face could almost have been normal. By the time my eyes had opened, he was already holding me. His face did look joyous, but it was a manic joy, unsettling in its focus and intensity. A twisted sort of ecstatic grin, rather than any wholesome smile.
My mother didn’t just look sickly like I had feared she likely would going into this. She looked outright withered and wasted. In fact, she looked beaten and bruised all over. Her face sunk low and somber. A hopeless resignation was in her eyes.
To describe my sister’s condition requires addressing the true horror in that moment though. The woman lying back, gasping from the pains of just having given birth, the woman I had just come out of, was not the woman I had just described who I had been led to believe was my mother.
It was my sister.
Other horrors slowly melted across my unfocused infantile eyes. The lack of a doctor was well accounted for by the fact that my birth was in a basement furnished with filthy cots, piles of unwashed laundry, and empty packaged food containers. This scene had none of the warmth and love of a family growing.
It was hell.
“Finally, a son.” My father’s teary voice was heard for the first time. “Family, at last.”
The dream continued, but nothing I felt the need to narrate to myself happened after that. I know my mother/sister passed out in tearful exhaustion.
I woke up screaming.
“What?!” The psychic was truly surprised. “Oh, dear. Another traumatic one. I’m so sorry. Sometimes the moment is more painful than you realize-“
“What did you do?” My mind was just piecing together what my infant brain had not comprehended. The shock was too much for me. I could not justify, even explain, what I had seen yet. Some part of me wanted to just blame her.
“I made you remember.” She tried to explain. “Nothing more. You are not the first to see the death of a loved one. We are not ready for some memories, we should never have to be. I’m sorry that you had to go through this.”
Her efforts to calm me down were unfortunately misdirected.
“It wasn’t death. That was… that was impossible. That dream can’t be real!” I was still frantic.
“The dream is your own memory. I’m sorry, but it is real.” She seemed uncertain whether to stand by her work, but professional pride won out.
“I have to go.”
I ran out of the building, floored my car home, and spent the next day working out the details in a haze of feverish anguish.
I was stupid. Stupid to burn an account of what I saw into my mind. I felt like I had to, that I could do some justice, or make things “right” in some way.
I don’t want to do anything now. I just want to forget my birth.
I want my old life back.