A short story by Paul M. Summitt

 "Mr. Robertson?"

Jonathan Alan Robertson sat up with a start. The secretary looked at him quizzically.

"Mr. Robertson?"

"Uh, Yes. I'm sorry. I must have dozed off."

The secretary smiled slightly as she shook her head slowly.

"You are Mr. John Robertson?"

Jonathan stared at her for a moment as he tried to adjust to his new environment.

"Yes. I'm John Robertson. I said I was."

The secretary smiled and turned back to her typewriter.

"The doctor will see you now, sir."

"The doctor?"

The secretary turned back to look at him.

"Yes Sir. Your regular weekly appointment with Dr. Anderson? You do remember, don't you?"

Jonathan looked from the secretary to the door at the end of the hall. Shaking his head, as if to clear it, he brushed the hair out of his eyes with his right hand.

"Yes, I remember. Uh, thank you, Miss . . .?"

"It's Karla, Mr. Robertson. Are you alright?"

"Yes. Thank you."

Jonathan stood up and adjusted his leisure suit.

The other two people in the waiting room looked up briefly at him and then returned to their magazines.

Jonathan started toward the door down the hall as the blurring of his vision began. It didn't bother him that much. He was getting used to it but he stopped walking until it passed.

After the room had come back into focus, Jonathan looked down at the empty sleeve where his right arm had been just a few minutes before.

He looked around at the secretary and at the other two patients. They hadn't noticed. They wouldn't.

Months before, Jonathan would have started screaming.

Now, he was used to it. The arm was gone for now. There was nothing he could do about it. Maybe it would return, maybe it wouldn't.

There was really no way of telling about these things as Jonathan was beginning to understand.

"Is everything alright, Sir?"

Jonathan turned and looked at the secretary.

"Yea, I guess so. Thank you."

Shaking his head slowly, Jonathan stepped toward the doctor's office door.

"Mr. Roberts, it's good to see you again."

The doctor stood up from his chair behind the desk, walked around and reached forward to shake Jonathan's remaining hand.

Jonathan looked at the little pudgy man for a moment and then offered his left hand.

"It's good to see you again, too, I guess."

The doctor's fat face broke into a smile.

"You don't sound too sure about that, Mr. Roberts." He turned and offered a chair to Jonathan. "Come on in and sit down."

Jonathan followed the doctor over to the chair by the desk. It was one of those big, soft easy chairs that he'd fallen asleep in many times while watching television. The doctor continued on around the desk and started to sit down.

"Please, Mr. Roberts. You know the way I do things here. Please sit down and make yourself comfortable."

Jonathan stepped around the chair and eased himself down into the plush simulated velvet. The doctor sat down and smiled across the desk at him.

The desk was clear except for the notepad and pencil in front of the doctor. The doctor just sat, staring at Jonathan, with a smile on his fat little face.

Jonathan, irritated by the smile, looked around the room. The office walls were decorated with those abstract paintings that were popular during the late sixties and early seventies. Behind the doctor, hung a series of diplomas stating where the doctor had received his psychological training.

"Do you like the paintings?"

Jonathan looked back at the smiling face of the doctor.

"Not really."

The doctor widened his smile and nodded as if in agreement.

Jonathan half-heartedly smiled back and turned to look around the room again. For some reason, the doctor made him slightly nervous. For the first time since entering the room, he noticed the quiet muzak coming into the room over the small speakers in the ceiling.

He looked back at the smiling doctor again.

"Why don't you tell me what's bothering you this visit, Mr. Roberts."

Jonathan looked at the doctor quizzically.

"This visit?"

The doctor smiled and remained silent.

Jonathan nodded and looked around for a moment.

"I really don't know where to start."

The doctor nodded again.

"Why?"

Jonathan shrugged.

"Oh, I don't know. There just seems to be so much that I could tell you but sometimes, I don't even believe it."

The doctor leaned forward.

"What seems to be troubling you, Mr. Roberts?"

Jonathan laughed slightly.

"Well, that's one thing that's bothering me right there. My name is Robert-son!"

The doctor sat up and looked down at his notepad.

"Is it now? My appointment book has always said Roberts."

Jonathan shook his head slowly.

"That's ok. It probably is Roberts now."

"Now?"

"How many times have I been here before?"

"Do you not know?"

"Never mind."

"How long have you had trouble remembering things like these appointments and your name?"

"I don't have problems remembering things. I know what my name is. It's just that . . . Things change sometimes."

"What do you mean?"

"I don't know. Things change."

"Like what?"

"Like my name!" Jonathan leaned forward. "And my arm!"

"What about your arm?"

"I lost it!"

"In Vietnam?"

"No! In your waiting room, just a few minutes ago. It was there and then it was gone!"

The doctor laughed slightly.

"Mr. Roberts, be serious. You've been coming here for treatment for quite a while and you've never had your right arm as long as I've known you. When did you loose it?"

Using his left hand, Jonathan pointed to his chest.

"Doc, I have never been in this office before in my life and I told you I lost my arm just a few minutes ago."

The doctor leaned back in his chair.

"OK. Let's say you're right. If you did just loose your arm, I admire your stamina. Most people would be very upset and in a great deal of pain losing their arm."

"I am upset! It's just that I'm getting used to it now."

"Used to your arm being gone?"

"No, used to losing things. It's happened before."

"You've lost your arm before?"

"Well, not the arm."

The doctor smiled again.

"But I did loose a leg once."

The doctor laughed.

"Well, it appears you found it."

Jonathan leaned back in the chair and shook his head.

"No, I didn't find it. It was there. Then it was gone. Now it's back again. The arm will probably do the same thing."

The doctor leaned forward and put his elbows on the desk.

"How long have you thought that this type of thing has been happening to you?"

"I haven't thought it was happening. It has been happening; for about three or four months now."

"You've been coming to see me about that long."

"No. I've never seen you before in my life."

"Why are you here, then?"

"I don't know. I woke up a few minutes ago out in your waiting room."

"And you've forgotten how you got here?"

"No, I haven't forgotten. I don't know how I got here."

"Mr. Roberts, did you serve in Vietnam?

"Robertson, the name is Robertson and I didn't loose my arm in Vietnam!"

"Calm down, Mr. Roberts. Do you remember how you lost it, then?"

"I am calm and, yes, I do remember how and where I lost it!"

"In the waiting room?"

"Yes! In the waiting room!"

The doctor sat back and crossed his arms over his chest.

"Mr. Roberts, where were you born?"

"Tennessee."

"When?"

"August fifteenth, Nineteen Fifty-one."

"You never served in Vietnam?"

"No! I never went to 'Nam!"

The doctor sat silent for a moment looking down at his notes.

"Let's talk about something else."

"Fine by me!"

"Where do you live now?"

"DeSoto."

"DeSoto?"

"Yes."

"Where is that?"

"Desoto, Missouri. It's about thirty to forty-five minutes drive south of here."

"Where do you think you are, Mr. Roberts?"

"I'm . . . Well, I was in St. Louis."

"Mr. Roberts, what's the last thing you remember before you woke up here?"

"You wouldn't believe me if I told you."

"Try me."

"I was flying."

"Is that how you lost your arm? In an airplane accident?"

"No! That's not how I lost my arm. I told you how and where I lost my arm. I said I was flying, and I didn't say anything about an airplane."

"What were you in, then, a helicopter?"

"I wasn't in anything."

"Were you parachuting?

"No! I was . . . I was on the moon, at the colony. I was taking part in the low gravity experiments."

"What moon colony?"

Jonathan shook his head and sat back in the chair.

"Never mind. I told you you wouldn't believe me."

The doctor leaned forward and opened the drawer in the desk. Pulling out a folder, he opened it and looked through the papers in it.

"Mr. Roberts, on your interview form you listed your profession as salesman. What do you sell?"

"I never filled out that form."

"You wrote that you now live in Arlington."

"I never filled out that form."

"You complained of insomnia. Why didn't you write down that you were suffering from delusions?"

"I don't have trouble sleeping! I'm not suffering from delusions! I never filled out that form!"

The doctor closed the folder and looked at Jonathan.

"Do you have any idea what's going on in your situation?"

"Yes. But you haven't believed anything I've said so far so why should I tell you now?"

"Please try me. What have you got to loose?"

Jonathan looked at him for a moment. What did he have to loose? Chances were he wouldn't be here long anyway.

"OK. Imagine for a moment that there are more earths than just this one. On each of these earths, the same people exist. The same but different. Different decisions made on each earth makes each earth slightly different. There's an infinite number of these earths and therefore and infinite number of the same people so an infinite number of me. Each one is in a separate universe, so to speak, and they normally never cross paths. Normally they don't. I'm somehow trapped in a passageway, sort of. I get to cross over and each of me is slightly different. Here, evidently, I've lost an arm somehow and have been seeing you for a while. but I, me, I've never seen you before. Do you understand?"

"That's quite an imagination you have, Mr. Roberts. I tell you what. I'm going to arrange for you to stay at the hospital for a few days so you can get some rest and we can watch you. You just sit here quietly for a few minutes. OK?"

Jonathan sighed and shrugged his shoulders.

"Sure. Why not?"

The doctor stood up and crossed the room to the door.

"I'll send my secretary in to talk to you while I'm gone. OK?"

"Fine."

The doctor opened the door and stepped out.

Jonathan shook his head slowly and stood up. The room began to blur again.

"Great. Just what I need," thought Jonathan.

As the room came back into view, he noticed that the abstract paintings were gone and in their places were family pictures.

As the door opened, he looked down and noticed that his arm was back.

The secretary walked in with a folder followed by the doctor.

"Dr. Robertson, your next patient, Mr. Andrews, is here."

Jonathan turned around and looked at the diplomas. There he read his name on the medical school diplomas.

A cynical smile on his face, he shook his head slowly and sat down.

"Sit down, Mr. Andrews. What seems to be the problem today."

This story and page Copyrighted ©1997-2007, Paul M. Summitt

For more information concerning this work and others by Paul M. Summitt, Contact psummitt@earthlink.net.