“Why? I will also tell you that experienced psychologists can provoke not only certain thoughts, but also images during a hypnosis session. In some cases, implantation of invented real-life situations is possible in order to block or replace some painful memories that affect a person’s psychological condition.”

“So, you are saying that a hypnotherapist provokes dreams and can implant artificial memories about the past?”

“Exactly! Moreover, during a hypnosis session, the patient does not perceive them as the past, but as reality. It is also possible to implant a wholly invented life-line, and the hypnotized person will also perceive it as reality. I’ve had extensive experience with such hypnotic manipulations, resulting in a positive trend of psychological recovery of the patient. This, however, is possible, as I’ve already told you, only with those who are highly susceptible to suggestion. By the way, based on my experience, they have the most vivid, colorful and very detailed dreams, regardless of whether they are their own or suggested.”

Amanda paused and suddenly asked: “What kind of dreams do you have, Trevor – black and white or color?”

Trevor thought about it. He hadn’t thought about it for a long time. Amanda’s question forced Trevor to look back to his childhood, and his memory created a small puzzle from the distant past out of several pieces of long-forgotten childhood impressions.

It happened on the day he turned twelve.

Trevor’s father, a well-known architect, was designing one of the tallest hotels in Thailand. His wife and son had moved to live in Hong Kong. It was the day Trevor’s family celebrated his birthday. The celebration ended with an evening gondola ride along Bangkok's canals.

The boat was long and narrow and big enough only for a few people. A yellow cloth stretched over it to protect passengers from the sun. A kerosene lamp sat in the rear of the gondola while another dangled from a long pole at the bow, lighting the way ahead.

It was close to midnight, but nobody wanted to return to the sweltering heat of the hotel. More lamps were lit on the boat; the conversation flowed. Trevor had been placed on the bottom of the hull next to his father and had fallen asleep. He dreamed that he was sailing on a large pirate ship on a stormy sea. The periodic splashes of water on his face made his dream seem more real. He was smiling in his slumber. Trevor remembered the day, full of fun, gifts and games.

His father’s colleagues usually took their families with them on long business trips, so Trevor found plenty of friends. On this day, however, he received all the attention. He was given sweets and gifts wrapped in colorful boxes. His father gave him the best present – a model kit of a huge white aircraft. The color image on the lid astounded Trevor, and he couldn’t wait to open the box and start putting it together.

After the party, his parents had decided on the gondola ride along the canals of Bangkok. Trevor held the model kit tightly against his chest, leaning against his father and quietly falling asleep. Trevor heard the casual banter of his parents, splashing of the water and rocking of the boat, the salty smell of algae and fried rice filled his nostrils, and then suddenly everything disappeared, and he found himself on the roof of a barn, like in a fairytale. Everything went still, but the picture was too realistic and clear. The roof of the barn was made of rusty tin. Trevor was squatting barefoot and staring at the clouds.

Shocked by the abrupt transition, Trevor stood up and looked around. Next to him was a boy he didn’t know chatting in a strange language. Trevor looked at the boy with undisguised fear and astonishment, trying to figure out who he was and what was happening to him.

Not far from the barn stood an old log house with a red tile roof. The cracks in its walls were visible. Chickens were scampering around a yard and a big shaggy dog was sleeping, chained to a wooden fence.

The barn looked over a series of vegetable gardens, small houses with red roofs and farther – the mountain slopes densely covered by green forests. The day was very hot and smelled like burning bitumen, like at his father’s construction sites.

In contrast with bustling Bangkok, everything seemed to have stopped here. There wasn’t even a perceptible gust of wind; the total silence accentuated the tranquility of the place.

“Where is the boat, mom? Where has everything gone?” Trevor asked, terrified, not able to grasp what had happened and how he ended up here.

Trevor looked down at his clothes. He was dressed in blue woolen joggers that bagged oddly at the knees and a white t-shirt with the letter 'R' embroidered in black near the hem. Both the t-shirt and the joggers were too big for him, as if they belonged to somebody else.

Everything around him looked vividly realistic. That terrified Trevor. He tried to pinch himself, but nothing happened. Trevor squeezed his eyes shut, held his breath and clenched his hands. Then he cautiously opened one eye, then the other, but it all remained unchanged – the barn, the red roofs and the stranger.

Trevor decided he needed to leave this place quickly and took a step. The red-hot tin of the roof scorched his heels. He shuddered from the sharp pain… and opened his eyes.

“Get the lamp, now!” Trevor heard his father yelling. He grabbed the lamp and quickly passed it forward.

A shot of pain jolted Trevor awake. His heel had touched the glass of the kerosene lamp while he was sleeping, which then fell and nearly broke.

“Are you burned?” his mother asked, inspecting the heel. “Thank God, he seems fine. You scared us. Wake up, honey, we're about to get off.”

The odd dream and strange transition haunted him, but something was about to happen that made him forget about everything.

The next day tragedy struck. There was a car accident. His parents were killed and he spent a month in hospital hovering between life and death.

Much later, the strange transition and the eerie feeling of reality gnawed at him for a long time and he began to see it all as a sign of the impending tragedy, a warning, which he fatally did not understand and so could not warn anybody. He felt guilty for not telling his parents about the dream for a long time. Maybe they would have understood the warning and that horrible accident could have been prevented. The hard feeling of guilt settled deep in Trevor’s heart.

The fears eventually faded, the tragic memories replaced by new one, and the boy’s memory erased everything he had experienced at the time of the accident.

And now, Trevor was taken aback by a simple question about dreams. It made him think and return to that distant past. In fact, it was after the crash that he stopped dreaming. Trevor usually went to sleep and couldn’t remember anything when he woke up. He could not tell whether he had had a dream or not. He did not remember his dreams, as often happens to many people after an exhausting day.

At first, he paid no attention to it. Later, as he grew up, at about the age of twenty he believed that he really did not dream. It was natural for him.

“You know, Amanda, it’s been a very long time since I’ve had a dream. I don’t dream when I sleep, like at all. Ever since I was a child, I think,” answered Trevor, and then remembering something important, exclaimed, “Color. Probably color. This was a very long time ago. But I do remember that those dreams were in color.”

Amanda looked at Trevor with surprise.

“It is impossible not to dream at all. Even those who are born blind experience dreams, although specific visual images are rarely present in them, because other sensations are involved. Maybe you just don’t remember them?"

“No, Amanda. I don’t dream when I sleep. I tried to remember something just now, but only one thing came to mind. A dream from my childhood. It is actually hard to tell what it really was. I don’t think it was a dream per se, but I cannot remember anything except for that.”