“You want to be well,” Josiah said. “That is the natural state for even a broken woman such as yourself. But although your spirit is willing, your flesh is weak. My tranquilizing chair allows you to stop fighting your nature. It masters your flesh. You will sit in contemplation here as your hot blood ceases its fevered circulation. And your brain, deprived of this poison, will at last achieve the stillness you crave. It is humane and merciful, a freedom from your torments. And if you die, isn’t the stillness of death preferable to the vain agitation and senseless chaos of your life? It will be a great peace for you, Amy. A great peace.”

A hand stroked the top of her head, and though she tried to recoil from its touch, she was unable to move. Eventually Josiah’s hand stopped stroking her head, and then she didn’t hear him anymore.

After a while, she didn’t feel like Amy anymore.

She was a thing. A thing tied to a chair. And slowly she began to go insane.

She wasn’t used to being completely still. In real life, Amy was always adjusting herself, moving, flexing, bending, unbending, rearranging her arms and legs. These options had been taken from her. She could feel her muscles cramping, her joints stiffening, the blood pooling in her swollen feet, and the frustration and pain made her want to scream. If only she could get enough air into her flattened lungs, or open her mouth wide enough to make a sound.

Her spine was pressed hard into the wooden back of the chair, becoming a column of pain running from her tailbone to the base of her skull. Her shoulders were on fire. Her neck burned from holding up her heavy skull. Her kneecaps ached as if they were going to tear through her skin. She felt everything below her knees go numb. But her fingers were the worst.

She tried to flex them, to wiggle each one just a tiny bit, but they were tied down so tightly it was as though something had closed its mouth around them and wouldn’t let go. When she tried to stretch them, they only strained hopelessly against the bands. She felt gravity pulling blood into her fingertips, causing them to swell like juicy red grapes. With every heartbeat, she felt her pulse throb beneath her nails.

She was facing nothing, looking at nothing, surrounded by a darkness so profound she couldn’t tell if her eyes were open or closed. With no input, set adrift inside her own skull, Amy’s mind began to turn on itself. It began to sort through her twenty-four years and calculate what she had to show for all the fighting, all the struggle, all the scrimping, and saving, and double shifts, and finishing papers, and working on her portfolio. All that effort, all that pain—for what?