Free Flashback by Michael Palmer Page A

carol, he suddenly realized. That was it. As a child in Ireland it had been one of his favorites. How strange to hear it in the middle of summer.
    He paused to let a semi roar past. The noise of the truck was muted—almost as if it made no sound at all. Andy shrugged. As wonderful as it felt to be back on the road again, it also felt a little odd.
    “… Haste, ha-aste to bring him lau-au-aud, the Ba-abe, the so-on of Ma-ry.…”
    He closed the windows, turned on the air conditioner, and swung out of the drive onto route 110. The green of the mountainside seemed uncomfortably bright. He squinted, then rubbed at his eyes and wondered if perhaps he should stop someplace to pick up a pair of sunglasses. No, he decided. No stops. At least not until after Colson’s.
    Settle down, old boy
, he said to himself.
Just settle down
.
    He adjusted the signal on the radio and settled back in his seat, humming once again.
    Route 110 was two lanes wide, with a narrow breakdown space on either side. It twisted and turned, rose and dropped like an amusement-park ride, from Groveton on the Vermont border, along the ridge of the Ammonoosuc River Valley, to Sterling and Route 16. A scarred, low, white guardrail paralleled the road to Andy’s right, and beyond the rail was the gorge, at places seven hundred feet deep.
    Andy’s restless, ill-at-ease sensation was intensifying, and he knew he was having difficulty concentrating. He adjusted his seatback and checked his safety harness. The guardrail had become something of a blur, and the solid center line kept working its way beneath his left front tire. He tightened his grip on the wheel and checked the speedometer. Forty-five.
Why did it feel like he was speeding?
    Subtly, he noticed, the trees on the mountainside had begun to darken—to develop a reddish tone. He rubbed at his eyes and, once again, forced the sedan back to the right-hand lane.Twenty-five years on the road without an accident. He was damned if he was going to have one now.
    Ahead of him, the scenery dimmed. A tractor trailor approached, sunlight sparking brilliantly off its windshield.
    Suddenly, Andy was aware of a voice echoing in his mind—a deep, slow, resonant, reassuring voice, at first too soft to understand, then louder … and louder still. “Okay, Andy,” it said, “now all I want you to do is count back from one hundred … count back from one hundred … count back from one hundred …”
    Out loud, Andy began to count. “One hundred … ninety-nine … ninety-eight …”
    A blue drape drifted above him, then floated down over his abdomen.
    “Ninety-seven … ninety-six …
    Hands, covered by rubber gloves, appeared in the space where the drape had been.
    “Ninety-five … ninety-four … Why aren’t I asleep?” his mind asked. “Ninety-three … ninety-two.”
    “Bove electrode, please,” the low voice said. “Set it for cut and cauterize.”
    Another pair of gloved hands appeared, one of them holding a gauze sponge, and the other, a small rod with a metal tip. Slowly, they lowered the metal tip toward his belly.
    “Ninety-one … ninety—”
    Suddenly, a loud humming filled his mind. The metal tip of the rod touched his skin just below his navel, sending a searing, electric pain through to his back and down his legs.
    “Jesus Christ, stop!” Andy screamed. “I’m not asleep! I’m not asleep!”
    The wall of his lower abdomen parted beneath the electric blade, exposing a bright yellow layer of fat.
    “Eighty-nine! … Eighty-eight! … For God’s sake, stop! It’s not working! I’m awake! I can feel that! I can feel everything!”
    “Metzenbaums and pick-ups, please.”
    “No! Please, no!”
    The Metzenbaum scissors sheared across Andy’s peritoneum, parting the shiny membrane like tissue paper and exposing the glistening pink rolls of his bowel.
    Again, he screamed. But this time, the sound came from his voice, as well as from within his mind.
    His vision