I was tossing and turning in my sweaty bed all night.

In two hours I will be eating breakfast in well-ironed creased pants, but with fist-size bags under my eyes.

An elderly voice sounded in my head: ‘You eat what you cook.’

I frowned and flipped over the hot cushions. ‘Some things are out of our control because I have cooked an organized evening with a good night’s sleep, but I’m eating insomnia instead.’

The silk pajamas smelled of washing powder, the sheets were crisp and fresh, and my skin squeaked with cleanliness. I was thinking about how they can sell me for organ trafficking, so I put a message on a ten-day timer for my family, mentioning Reed’s address. I cashed out all money from my savings account and left a will for my parents.

In order to calm down and fall asleep I mentally went over the contents of the bag that I packed for the training.

I ironed and rolled up a sweater with african tribal patterns, tweed shorts with a striped eagle on a tag, a knitted vest, a jabot shirt, flowing viscose and polyester trousers, jeans with red M+FG ribbons, and an old pullover with an athletic cock facing left on the chest. If the scammer decides to kill me, my last wish would be facing death in a pristine manner.

Pills. Cardiovascular, antihistamines, analgesics, antipyretics, sedatives, sleeping pills.

Rusks, vitamin C, a bottle of water.

Hygiene products. Dental care kit. Ear cleansing tool. Nail care kit. Hypoallergenic baby soap for delicate skin.

Candles and matches to get rid of the pixel hallucinations in the air.

Phone numbers and addresses written out in a notebook. A portable charger. A folding tactical knife. Tibetan prayer flags and the Ozhegov thousand-page dictionary.

‍

In my sleeplessness I pronounced memorized passages from the Book of the Dead:
‘Thoughts of fear, of terror... May I recognize the reflections of my own consciousness in whatever visions they appear to me, May I realize that they are only visions of Bardo’.

‍
I didn’t immediately notice the airy grains that began to appear in the darkness against the outlines of the furniture. Air particles were clumping together into a pixelated picture.

Silence rang in my ears and my heart was pounding with fear.

I jumped up, not waiting for the full pixel image to fully emerge in the air, and rushed to the light switch. Not once had I seen what a pixelated picture would turn into.

As soon as I turned on the light, the image and the grains of air disappeared. I was pleased with the victory, but still frightened, so I left the light on.

I couldn’t sleep, and searched a meditation for “focus and tranquility”. Relaxing music with the sounds of murmuring water began to play, followed by an anesthetizing male voice.

‘Stretch out your palms... look at them... see your blue veins, calluses and creases.... warm your palms...I am putting a seed in your hand... hold it... now... cover it with the other palm of your hand... let it feed on your warmth...’

I imagined an orange seed and then accidently dropped it on the floor.

Damn it, I can’t imagine any further!

I paused the video and looked for the imaginary seed on the floor. It appeared and disappeared in my hand. I finally accepted my wandering imagination, and hit the space bar on the keyboard.

‘A tiny green sprout erupts from the seed... like an arrow... you can distinguish the trunk... and the little leaves...’

I shook my head with frustration and continued examining the floor in search of the seed. Eventually, I had to rewind the video to the beginning to get the seed from the narrator again.

‘The roots... clinging to the ground... thickening... breaking down the boundaries of your mass... you can control the sprout...’

Then I was torn between my empty palms and two seeds in each of them. When I was finally able to imagine the roots they behaved like leathery snakes whipping everything around in a confused rush, slapping my face and twisting around my neck. The sprout itself was small, with yellow sickly leaves, and moved on its huge roots like a cuttlefish.

‘Your sprout is slowly reaching upward, piercing your body... growing... through your spine... to the top... your energy boundaries are expanding with the sprout... the sprout is growing stronger... it’s getting stronger.... sprout... becoming the tree...’

I felt like I urgently wanted to see what the word «energy» meant. I leafed through the end of the dictionary and read — one of the basic properties of matter. I crinkled my nose irritably and flipped pages to the middle of the dictionary — matter is an objective reality existing independently of human consciousness.

I continued listening about the sprout that grows stronger and becomes the tree.

Green dragons with webbed metal wings were flying above me, and gypsy-looking leprechauns in orange workwear were jumping around, playing unknown musical instruments that were made of wood and decorated with precious stones.

‘A blooming tree... you notice the silky grass nearby... you see white flowers....’

The leprechauns were doing a hip swing. I tried to tune my mind to the image of a mature tree and grass, but the leprechauns were firmly present in my head.

The harder I tried to focus on the flowers and grass, the more foreign objects showed up in my fantasy.‍

White flowers... humongous white lotuses swayed in a meditative tact under the blue sky. Entire trees hid beneath the lotuses’ massive leaves. I went down the petals of the flowers like a water slide, crashing into the pistils and collecting sweet yellow pollen with my face.

‘Other sprouts are cutting through.... through the ground ... young ... trees... you’ve grown a whole... garden of trees... it’s your garden... you can always... hide there...’

A garden from the Yugo-Zapad district appeared in my mind. There were plush toys nailed to the trees. Tire swans were lurking in the lily bushes. Among the phloxes and velvets, clay pot mushrooms and pink polyethylene terephthalate five-liter piglets were smiling at me, while the leaves of palm trees made of plastic bottles were gleaming in the sun with malachite light.

In the center of the garden I saw a greenhouse with a tattered cellophane roof, its torn edges were swaying in the wind. A homeless man was sleeping in the greenhouse. His clothes were dirty and he smelled as if he hasn’t showered in a while. He was tightly clutching a half-empty bottle of cheap wine. I would even say that he was holding it gently, as if it were a baby.

‘The wind is rustling... it’s stroking your cheeks... the ground is warm... you’re lying in the grass... you feel the warmth of the sun... you hear the wind...’

I concentrated on the stroking wind and was craving to feel its tenderness with my own body... Instantly, I was sitting in a jacuzzi, all dressed, with beautiful women in soaked milk-colored Art Nouveau dresses. They were touching my body and theatrically sighing... I thought they were caressing my body, but they were just going through my pockets... there were orange seeds in my pockets... a lot of orange seeds...

‘You see bushes with soft green leaves nearby... you see the sea behind them... it is shimmering in the sun...’

A homeless man climbed into the jacuzzi with his precious bottle of cheap booze and the women left us screaming. The water quickly became dirty. There was a little man sitting on the homeless man’s shoulder and dangling his feet. Orange seeds were floating on the surface of the jacuzzi... lots of them... I was stuck to the bottom of the jacuzzi and couldn’t get out, like it usually happens in nightmares.

‘You are sitting in a lotus pose... with your eyes closed... you see yourself now.. in the present moment from there... from that garden... You are... Here and There...’

I erased the jacuzzi with the homeless man from my head and saw myself in a summer garden in the silky feather grass, sitting in a lotus pose with my eyes closed. The focused and serene There Self was watching the tense, twitchy, and soft-spoken Here Self that was sitting all sleepy in his room, touching the floor in search of an imaginary seed.

‘You look at yourself from There... and you control yourself Here and Now...’

I yawned sweetly.

Reed lived in the Tractor Plant district. On Stakhanovskaya Street, in a two-room apartment. The neighborhood was like a time portal into the 80s. Everything seemed so kind, like in The Adventures of Dennis written by Soviet author Viktor Dragunsky. However, Soviet people wouldn’t find Reed’s apartment cozy or full of character.

The moment I crossed the threshold of the apartment, I felt jealous. No, there was no 4K Ultra HD TV. There was no vinyl record player either. The apartment was almost empty, and it didn’t look like the Zen Buddhist-minimalist apartments from the magazines. The place gave me a strange feeling that time was only given to do important things in life. I envied that someone could think like that and create such conditions for themselves.

When Reed called me, he intonated the vowel O in “Smoke”, and it sounded awkwardly soulful. “Smo-oh-ke” echoed through the empty apartment, and that O-Oh in my name made me blush every time.

My mentor gave me a tour of the apartment with antique lacquered planks on the floor and fresh white paint on the walls. In the hallway, I saw an oak Narnia reaching out all the way to the ceiling. It took him considerable effort to open the doors of this huge closet. The left side was completely empty; a couple of people could easily fit in there. Reed suggested that I could leave my things in the closet, but I pretended not to hear and clutched the handle of the bag tightly.

In Reed’s room, I quickly glanced up at all the objects. There were a few only. Instead of a bed he had a wooden board with a thin mattress and a gray cotton blanket. Next to it, there were scattered nails and broken glass instead of Sadhu board. A couple of books on the windowsill were the only remaining objects in the room. On top of the stack the very one lay. The Tibetan Book of the Dead.

The decorations are up! I’m sure that Reed does not sleep here. The setup is for the gullible. I felt his eyes on me. Waiting for my reaction? I decided to play dumb and pretend that I believed in this theater and said, “Cool room.”

When we entered the guest room, I was relieved that I would sleep on a single wooden bed. There also were a chair and a small Gambang xylophone. Reed said that he really liked the Indonesian music of the Gamelan orchestra. I fell in love with it afterward, too.

The three-square-foot bathroom was the most abundant in furnishings and details: the rectangular bathtub, sink, and a crystal-clear toilet. The room smelled of pine. Reed used tiny knitted hammocks instead of cabinets to store belongings. The one under the hanging mirror was set aside for me. I crinkled my nose when noticed several jars with swamp-colored liquids.

Reed told me not to sweat it when I asked him if food was included in the training. There was a wooden dining table and three different chairs in the kitchen. A sink. A fridge and a stove are missing. I gathered that apparently invisible consumption of nature energies was included in the training for me. However, half of the kitchen was taken up by a large metal cooking table where Reed kept a manual juicer, clay and wooden bowls and goblets. Under the table there were baskets of fruit and vegetables. Tied moss bundles hung on the wall near the sink. Reed used them to wash dishes.

Thinking of what to ask, I went to the window and watched the waiters working in the café across the street. It was a beautiful café with bas-reliefs in the shape of mermaids at the arched front door.

‘Why aren’t there any plants in the apartment?’

Reed also went to the window and stroked the empty windowsill.

‘I am capable of love, but I must walk my path alone.’

‍

I promised myself not to believe a single word he said as I put a thousand American dollars into his warm hand. I liked him, though. Calm, proud, and light as dessert tobacco. By the way, Reed warned me that we would be working with a sober mind. I was forbidden to take anything that could strongly affect “mental clarity” for ten days. Well, that’s great. Since I was afraid that they would make me drop a blotter, read me some Bible — and that’s all the training.

In general, I imagined that we would be chanting mantras, carrying water in buckets up and down the stairs, meditating, but it all started with watching movies on a projector. I was not allowed to shower and had to sleep in a scratchy wool sweater with the projector screen on high volume. These were the mandatory conditions.

When I was left alone in the room, I wrapped Tibetan flags around the bed. I imagined that the flags could be used for strangling me at night, so I hid them back in the bag.

I secretly took a sip of a sedative, got into bed without undressing, and covered myself with a blanket. I held a combat knife in my sweaty palm under the blanket, just in case Reed was what I feared he might be.

‍
Scene #1.

A girl in a tight white beaded dress appeared on the screen. She looked at the camera with sad eyes and said, “I can’t get out of here.” She was sitting in a white cube room that had no windows or doors with a video camera in her hands, begging for help into the lens. She asked how to get out, and grew sadder and sadder without getting an answer. The girl breathed heavily in a fit of panic. She was a captive trapped against her will in the empty space. She screamed and cried, repeating “I’m stuck” like an incantation.

I sympathized with her and understood the pain that she felt. In addition, the girl was my type, which made me more sensitive to her suffering. Her beaded dress rattled each time she gave out a convulsive sob. Having noticed the glass chime the beads were making, the beauty threw her leg up to hear the sound again. When she heard the chime, she stopped crying like a child distracted by a rattle. Then she started to twirl around and laugh, playing melodies with her shiny dress.

I concluded that towards the end she must have lost her mind completely. She was talking to herself and vividly waving her hands at someone non-existent.

Scene #2.

The next scene was about the same cubic room and a very tall skinny guy with spidery long arms.

The guy walked around the room several times, tapping the walls and touching their seams, then he sat in a corner and froze with his eyes closed.

By the way, the movie didn’t make me sleepy. Not to mention lying on a pillow with a gym bag of my stuff underneath was uncomfortable. This all played in my favor, because I wasn’t going to sleep in my new extreme conditions. My heated body in the wool sweater was shivering. I took another sedative pill. During silent scenes in the movie, I listened to check if floorboards creaked. I was afraid to take my sweater off because of Reed.

After sitting for a long time, the tall guy got up and started taking the camera apart. He smirked and chuckled looking at the insides of the equipment.

Very soon the details of the camera, even the smallest ones, were covering the floor of the cubic room in several rows. There was nothing left of the camera. The guy was watching the parts reassembling them into something new.

The camera’s focus was approaching the guy’s long hair like a microscope until it reached the inside of his hair making it look gigantic.

‍

Scene #3.

After spinning around in the hair for a while, the camera began to recede. It emerged from new darker hair and showed the same white room with no windows or doors. There was an unfamiliar girl inside. She was leaning towards her big feet and stretching out her spine. The girl inhaled through her nose and exhaled through her mouth. Like the previous prisoners of the room, she picked up a video camera and rotated it in her hands, but confidently closed the lens. She didn't consider herself a prisoner, nor was she afraid. The girl closed her eyes and seemed to sink into meditation. I was with her in silence and motionless for a long time, watching her breathing.

The silence was occasionally interrupted by my stomach gurgling with hunger. I didn't touch the apple puree that Reed offered me, because I feared that there might be something in the food. I took rusks out of my bag and quietly chewed them over a napkin right in bed. I was paranoid about not letting a crumb fall past the napkin onto the sheets, and occasionally twitched and glanced at the door ready to grab my knife.

The camera was unsteady. The angles kept changing, pausing on the girl’s body and clothes, sometimes so close that you could easily count the freckles on her cheek. The scene ended with an image of the girl’s face turned upside down after which the recording stopped.

Scene #4.

Afterward, video clips with people in the same white room flashed on rewind. Hundreds of video frames. Some were breaking cameras, others were crying, banging their hands against the walls in hysteria, and rolling around the floor.

I saw the white room prisoners smashing their heads into the walls of the cube, a guy eating camera parts, a girl cutting her hands with a videocard. I saw all kinds of people gasping in panic and laughing with fear in their eyes.

Next video clips showed 4 frames per screen, then 8, 16, 32 appeared with increasing speed to the point where I stopped distinguishing small squares.

I understood that the white cubic room was an allusion to life after death. The emptiness of the Fifth Bardo with all monsters living there, that we, as spectators, cannot see because these monsters are not ours. I sighed. ‘I won’t be able to escape when I’m out in the Bardo, suffocating with horrors and nightmares. I'll have nowhere to run from them. And I can barely end my life fast in Bardo.’

The screen lights went out. And then an episode of Crooked Mirror immediately began. This was an old episode that looked like it was in the early 2000s. A couple of comedians under the pseudonym New Russian grannies appeared on stage. One of them started telling a story about how she found herself in a police station at night. She brought back a plastic bag with souvenirs from her night shelter: a police cap, a riot baton, and handcuffs. She said the handcuffs would come in handy in the household to fasten them on the cow so the milk wouldn’t run away. Then they went on fooling around with the riot baton as if it could be used for conducting an orchestra.

I was woken up by shouts and music. People in the audience were happy and grew pink from laughter. On the stage a character with hair sticking out in all directions and a pig snout on his nose was playing the balalaika. I didn’t know if it was a new episode or the same one, so I covered my head with a blanket, hugged my bag, and fell asleep.