The Astral Projectionist

CW: Contains references to severe injuries and physical trauma.

It was the hottest day of the year. Johnny Bradshaw was sitting in his air-conditioned room, wistfully staring out of his window, remembering how it all was before it all came crashing down. He had everything he ever wanted; his own very successful business, his own house, a nice pickup truck, a large boat, a luxury car, a vacation home in the mountains overlooking a lake in a valley, a stock racing car, and all of it completely paid for, not a cent owed on anything.

Then, he met Melanie, the most beautiful woman in the world. She had dimples in her cheeks that were so deep you could stick your thumb in them and have wiggling space left over. She also had long, luxurious legs, blonde hair, bright blue eyes, full lips, and a perfect figure-eight body that just wouldn’t quit. And a very expensive cologne that she had specially made in France, which went beautifully with her natural scent that drove him insane every time he smelled it. Every other man also went mad over it, too.

He loved her because of her vivaciousness, and she loved him because he was a great salesman in his real estate business and had won dozens of awards over the years, which made him very rich. In short, she loved his money, not him. He suspected that fact, but he did not want to know; all he wanted to know was that he loved her and she was his, and she could give him sex like no one else before her. Best of all, he could show her off like a trophy, as he did at the parties and business meetings they attended.

But that was a long time ago, well over ten years now. She ran through his money like a starving dog gobbling up a discarded steak. And he didn’t help matters any when driving his race car on the local, one-and-a-half-mile, high-banked, oval-shaped race track; he drove recklessly, showing off to her.

Then one night, he spun out of control coming out of turn four into the front stretch. His rear end swung wide to the right as he was about to take the checkered flag. As he spun, the driver’s side of his car was hit by the second-place car in the driver’s door, rolling him over onto his roof. As his car rolled over, the second-place car rode over his car and also flipped over onto its roof, injuring both drivers badly.

“Gene Austin smacked right into Johnny Bradshaw’s driver door at full speed. Man, that was a bad hit. I hope both guys are A-okay,” the announcer yelled into the microphone.

The race commentator, Mike Conroy, a former race driver himself until he was injured in a bad accident a few years ago, described the crash, his voice going over the loudspeakers at the track and the local radio station. “That was worse than the one I was in, eight years ago, and that was bad. I still don’t see anyone moving in either of the cars.”

The flagman, a chubby former car builder, had immediately grabbed the red flag from the cylinder in which the handle rested. By doing this, a spring-loaded button would pop up, turning all the blinking red track lights on, and the green lights off, thus instantly halting the race, the rest of the drivers jamming on their brakes.

The emergency track personnel, some running and carrying chemical fire extinguishers, the rest manning the ambulances and wreckers, rushed to the scene to assist the drivers. Johnny’s door would have to be pried open to extract him; Gene’s door would too, but his door would be easier since it wasn’t hit; both of his doors had slightly popped open when his car landed on its roof.

When the first paramedic driver arrived at Gene’s car, he saw blood coming through the left arm and leg of his fireproof racing uniform. “We need arm and leg braces over here,” he yelled. “We have possible fractures.”

Another paramedic looked in Johnny’s car. “His arms and legs appear to be straight, and he’s holding onto the steering wheel very tightly. I’ll get his fingers loose. Let’s get a HANS device on this man’s neck!”

The emergency crews worked hurriedly, but gently, carefully extricating the men from their wrecked race cars. After an excruciating half hour, the men were finally removed from their cars, alive, but unconscious and on their way to a local hospital for treatment.

“Ladies and gentlemen, the men are alive. They are being taken to Saint Joseph’s Hospital for examination and treatment. Other than that, I have no idea as to their conditions. We can only hope and pray that any injuries they may have are minor and they will heal up very quickly. Thank you.”

Their race cars were taken to the pit area, which was below the stands at turns three and four. Then the track was cleaned up and prepared for the final two races, which were “figure-eight” races. These were held on a concourse in the middle of the oval track and the shape of the numeral “8,” the cars whipping past each other’s rear ends, missing by inches every time, engines screaming, and the crowd cheering them on as they just missed each other.

“Next,” the announcer was saying, “We’ll have on our hills, thrills, chills, and spills as those dashing young men and women in the ‘figger’ eight racing cars in the figger eight course. Watch and see if they have any interesting driver’s meetings in the crossover during the races!” (He always pronounced the word figure as “figger,” but no one at the track seemed to mind.)

Ever since the crash, everything went spiraling downward for Johnny. His name on his birth certificate was “John,” but since several athletes and race car drivers named John used the name “Johnny,” in their chosen sport, Johnny did so too. And he loved it when Melissa would tousle his hair and make love to him and referred to him as Johnny.

His injuries from the crash included a whiplash in the neck, a pinched nerve in the spine where the neck and back met, and a compressed fracture of the T-7 disk and a slight crack in that disk.

He had been in constant pain in most of his spine since the crash, unable to work much. Then came the crushing blow: One night in his office, while working late on a multi-million dollar deal for a client, a sudden jarring pain screamed up and down his spine. Grunting in pain, he managed to finish typing the documents concerning the deal and emailed it to his client, not noticing he had accidentally typed an extra “0” on the end of the offer.

The monumental headaches this error would later cause him would put him into a financial nightmare world of legal issues and fees he could never repay. His home, personal car, truck, boat, vacation home, and nearly everything else valuable to him would have to be sold to pay some of the fees; he would have to file bankruptcy on the rest. In the middle of this, his beloved wife Melissa would divorce him, leaving him a penniless, broken man.

So, for the last eleven years, he had been trying to regain his feet, to recoup at least some of his losses. Since he was in constant and severe pain in his spine from the crash, there wasn’t much physical labor he could do. So, he opted to go on disability. Although it paid less than one thousand dollars per month, it was something, and he could live in “affordable housing,” even though it was nothing more than a tenement for the poor and wretched.

He moved in with his meager belongings into apartment 702 of a high-rise building. Luckily, it did have an elevator, so it wasn’t a seventh-floor walkup. And in the cellar, there was a fairly large laundry room, and his disability income more than adequately paid for everything in the building, leaving him a hundred fifty dollars over at the end of each month.

After he was settled in, he began stopping into a local used book store, purchasing books and spending his time reading, although he had to get up a couple of times each day and exercise his aching back. One day, after he stopped in, the title of one of the books, “Astral Projection: Its Methods and Uses,” caught his eye. He asked the salesgirl what astral projection was.

“What?” she asked, giggling, embarrassed.

He picked up the book and showed her the title again, asking her what it meant.

“I don’t know,” she said.

“Whatever,” he said, shaking his head in disgust, leaving the store.

Later that evening, after dinner, he Googled astral projection on the Internet. It was described as a state of self-hypnosis where one could, with a little practice, send or “project” one's soul, also called the astral body, out of one's own physical body to any place one wanted to.

This intrigued him. For days, he thought about it and thought that if it were possible to send or project one’s soul or astral body to any place one wanted, he could do it too. And if he could send his own astral body to any place, to where would he send it?

After a few weeks of contemplating it, he had it. It was the perfect solution. He would send his astral body to his own body, the night before the crash, avoiding the race track the next night, thus preventing the crash and the injuries he and Gene had suffered in the crash. Yes, that would work. It would. The next day, after breakfast, he hurried to the bookstore. There it was; the book on astral projection. Grabbing it, he paid the ditzy sales girl and hurried home with his treasure, his hope, his salvation.

That night, he began to study it thoroughly, very carefully, taking studious notes on how to master the technique and perform it perfectly. He studied it late into the night. For days, he studied the book, practicing its instructions to the letter, never deviating, preparing himself for the journey toward his salvation. He learned that the self-hypnosis technique was not to be rushed into, that it took long, patient practice to master it properly. Then, he would practice the astral projection itself, also taking a long time to master properly.

Little by little, projecting his astral body for a minute or two at a time, he could control it; he became accustomed to it, his physical body remaining, his astral body travelling a little longer each time. Finally, when he was able to remain for an hour, he was able to pick up small items like rocks or stones, twigs, and bring them back, he finally felt able to achieve his ultimate goal: to go back to the night before he injured his neck and back so severely in the race car wreck and to avoid the race car wreck, thus preventing the loss of everything he had owned, to keep everything he worked so hard to obtain, the things he had loved so dearly.

So, late that night, with the lights turned down low, he took his place in his recliner and, with his eyes closed, began the meditative process to induce the self-hypnosis.

He felt himself becoming more and more relaxed, more and more comfortable. The trance was now overcoming him as he moved his astral body to the night before the race car wreck that had injured his neck and back so badly, the injury that had caused him so much agonizing pain and misery, thus preventing him from working at his job and causing him to lose everything he owned.

He was back now and was standing in the front yard looking at the front door of his house. He glanced at his watch. It was just after midnight, and it was the night before the race. He began moving toward the front door of his house, tentatively, but excitedly, his heart pounding in anticipation. He walked up the front steps, opened the front door, and entered the living room. It was exactly as before! The furniture, the photos on the walls, everything was back! He made it! He had gone back in time, and to the very night he had wanted. He continued through the living room to the dining room. He turned toward the hallway that led to the bedroom/bathroom area. He walked down the hallway to his bedroom and entered. Ahead to the left, at the far corner, was his bed, and on the bed was a sleeping form. He could see his slumbering face silhouetted in the moonlight shining through the curtains of the window next to the head of his bed. He approached the bed and bent over it, then lay down on the bed next to the slumbering form.

#

“Has there been any change in his condition, doctor?” a woman asked.

“No, Miss Bradshaw,” the doctor said. He was a youngish man in his early forties. “There’s been no change in your brother’s condition. He just keeps mumbling something about being back to the night before his race car wreck and trying to avoid it.”

“I see,” Miss Bradshaw said softly. “Why do you think he’s doing that? What’s happened to him?”

“I don’t know. But, this might give us a clue.” The doctor handed her the book on astral projection.

“What’s this?”

“The neighbor boy who mowed your brother’s yard found it on the table next to your brother when he didn’t answer the door.” He described the teachings of the book.

“I don’t understand.”

“Judging from your brother’s mumblings, I think your brother was trying to project himself to a time before the car wreck, to a happier time, for him. In his mind, he made it; the present no longer exists for him, just the past.”

“Oh, my God!”

And so today, Johnny Bradford sits in his room of the rest home in which he lives, in his recliner, looking out the window. He sees children running up and down the street, riding their bicycles, throwing balls, mowing neighbors’ yards, and that’s all. For him, nothing else exists. Not anymore.

THE END