Chamber

Is it today's magical thinking, or tomorrow's established science?

Moshe Levi doesn't know, and doesn't believe anyone else really knows. Skeptical of his own therapist, who believes the notion of ancestors screaming their tortured murders thru their descendents is magical thought, Levi shows up for his regular session.

They've explored these pathways of experience as described by Levi: episodes of strange sensation, sometimes while asleep but also wide awake, and the almost convulsing, overwhelming feeling that someone- some other soul- was howling painfully thru Levi's physical body and brain, as if thru his very organs and veins and pores, a screaming outrage of silent anguish, killings of his past relatives, all doomed to their Auschwitz death.

Levi felt all of this- it would come as short, very intense spells- like cursed demons crawling under his skin, then shouting out into the gruesomly distracted moment that only Levi feels more than hears. Two minutes later, the spell passes, the anscestors' internal witnessing vanishes again.

The therapist wants to treat magical thinking pharmaceutically, but so far, Levi resists that option, secretly doubtful the Ph.D. he sees weekly even comprehends what he's saying. Demons are the most personal enemy.

Levi feels his family's history like an old, heavy coat. The screams from the closet always sound familiar, voices of relatives he never knew, their final panicked moments, the cruelly promised showers becoming giant vaults of deadly gas, the chamber walls scraped down by broken  fingernails, retched vomiting and clouds of death quickly filling the lungs, only cover and hold the crying, terrified children now, everyone coughing and choking, then blackout. All lost, lives stolen, gone into eternity, only the screaming echoing thru Levi with his sanity breaking down. But he doesn't let on, not even to his family.

His therapist's hollow words fade into the final minutes of the hour, and late  afternoon, until next time.