“Oh, right. Sorry,” I said, and let off her. Having found my clothes, I managed to sit down and take a moment in to breathe, when Colin appeared with a steaming mug.

“Here. You deserved it,” he said and handed me the mug. Coffee, not tea. You wonderful man, I thought.

“How did you know?” I asked him.

“Know what?” he said, again completely flat.

“That I prefer coffee,” I said. “It’s very un-English thing, after all.”

“Well, you did spend six weeks in hospital. Three of them awake, and in those three you cleared out half of our supply,” he laughed. “I think connecting the dots was relatively easy.”

I chuckled. “Well, I suppose it was easier than I thought, then.”

“It was, yes,” he said. “So, tell me. What was different this time around?”

I had a sip before responding. “Well, for starters, he was here this time.”

I told him everything. From the background music being more complex, to him enjoying it. I told him that he was there, I told him how it felt to share thoughts over a longer period of time, and I spared him no details as to some of the more specific thoughts I might have had while down there.

At some of the statements, his eyes widened, but he mostly listened along, occasionally scribbling down in his notebook to review the experiment later.

“Tell you what, Jordan, this is some amazing insight you’re giving me,” he said. “I think that’ll be enough to form a theory. Thank you so much for agreeing to all of this.”

“Thank you, Colin, if I may,” I said, and he nodded. “I would never have found Aaron without your help.”

“You still haven’t found him yet,” he said. “There’s still the chance that you fabricated him completely, and there isn’t going to be anyone waiting for you on that bridge on Sunday evening. I have a question for you.”

“I’m listening.”

“Are you prepared to face the possible outcome of him not being real?”

“Let me have the moment, will you?” I groaned.

“I’m being serious. Can I trust you not to do anything stupid if he doesn’t appear?”
I sighed. “I don’t know, Colin. I’ve spent so much time and energy looking for him. If he turns out not to be real, I suppose it’ll feel as if there’s something wrong with me. As if it’s a complete failure on my part. I’d be shattered.”

He scribbled something down in the corner of a page, then tore it off and handed it to me. “My phone number,” he said. “If he’s not there, call me and I’ll come pick you up. I don’t want you to be alone should it happen.”

“Thanks, Colin,” I said. “It really means a lot. Listen, I have a question for you too.”

“Go on.”

“What were you hiding from me? Before I went down?” I asked with an inappropriate smile, but I couldn’t contain my happiness.

The tables had turned, and it was his turn to sigh. “I didn’t want to tell you this, but I know that you know I was hiding something. The hospital managed to investigate why some of the anaesthetic was gone. They managed to track it down to me. I retired before they could press charges on me, but my licence has been revoked in absentia. I’m not a medical professional anymore.”

“You risked your job, and lost it, for me?” I gasped.

“For science, Jordan. Measuring thought has been my life’s pursuit, and you were my door in. I wasn’t going to stop because the powers that be said no. However, yes, the fact that it was you, and that the case was so peculiar, made the conviction stronger,” he said, staring at his own mug. “It’s my swansong, not my failure.”

I looked at him, and tried to decipher him the old-fashioned way, but he was such a strange mixed bag. The way he talked and stared into the void suggested that he was gutted that he lost his job, but his words didn’t give it away, and even a peek inside his emotions revealed nothing. “Thank you, Colin.”

“No, thank you. I’m just sad that the results might never see the light of day,” he said. “No-one will ever trust someone without a licence, especially if the experiment can’t be reproduced. This secret will die with me, and yourself, Laura, and, hopefully, Aaron will be the only three humans in existence that know of it.”

“Still, you’re not dying, are you?” I said. “You look healthy, and I wish I could say the same about myself.”

“No. But I’ll still never be able to reproduce and release this. And, without my licence, I might as well be dead,” he said. “I don’t regret it, though. You’ve crossed the barrier between the conscious and the unconscious. Thank you for letting me observe it.”

“You’re welcome,” I said, and smiled. He was completely honest there.

“Oh, and before you ask, I never revealed anything about you during the investigation. They have no reason to believe that you’re involved in all of this. You should be safe,” he said. “I did my best to cover your tracks.”

“Thank you, once more,” I said. “How could I ever repay you?”

“Enjoy your life,” he said.

“That’s a tall order,” I snickered. “I’ll still have procedures done to me on the regular.”

“In that case, enjoy Aaron. I want to know that all my work wasn’t done for nothing,” he said. “I think we all do. There’s something intrinsically human about wanting recognition and closure for our life’s work, isn’t there?”

What he said was true, and very heavy. Everyone I knew had some reason to keep toiling in this despicable world, and most of them revolved around closure. For my dad, it was seeing me do well, as his legacy. For the Alexanders, it was seeing their patients and subjects continue having a normal life, and one which they had improved.

As I stared at and through the half-emptied mug, I asked myself: What about me? What was my motivation to keep toiling? Over the last fifteen months, it was certainly Aaron, but that seemed like a really selfish goal to have. I tried to look deep, over-analyse everything that I had previously done, but couldn’t find a better answer. My closure was finding Aaron.

“Am I a terrible person, doctor?” I asked.

“No, of course not, where did that come from?” he said. “Assertive, yes, sometimes brash, but I wouldn’t say terrible. Everyone has their quirks, after all.”

“I’ve been thinking about what you said, about closure and recognition. Is Aaron really my final goal? Am I that selfish?” I said, frowning at him, trying not to overthink everything.

“How old are you?” he said.

“Twenty-six. Why?”

“I know I said it’s human to want recognition, but for you, it’s early to have that instinct. It is for everyone. You’ll develop it later on, I’m sure,” he said. “For now, just enjoy it as much as you can.”

I grinned at him. “Are you a neurologist or a psychologist?”

“I’ve dabbled,” he said. “As part of my scientific work. But this one is from experience. My biggest regret is thinking about that part too early. So early, in fact, that I never got a life out of it.”

“I’m sorry,” I said.

“No, don’t be. I made science my life, and I think I did come out reasonably well, but it’s not quite what I imagined,” he said. “It’s the question that kills you, isn’t it?”

“Not literally, I hope,” I said with an anxious laugh.

“Sometimes it’s even been literal,” he said. “People have been so crazed by what they might’ve done with themselves th-“

“I think that’s quite enough, isn’t it?” Laura intervened. “Jordan, dear, thank you so much for everything. I think it’s time you left us, though. Stay if you want, but he’ll go on a tirade, won’t you, Colin?”

“Maybe,” he grinned and stood up to kiss her.

“I think I’ll go,” I said. “You two obviously need multiple rooms.”

They looked at each other, and then at me. “Can you show yourself out?” Laura said.

“Of course,” I said. I looked at her, then at him, and then her again. “Thank you both so much. If he turns out to be real, I’ll have you to thank for my life.”

“No, thank you,” Colin said. “Goodbye.”

I showed myself out the front door, and into the cold afternoon. The air filled my lungs, but the cold didn’t matter. He was real. Aaron was real. And soon enough, he was going to be mine.