A year and a half before the new moon settled over the November darkness, green lights had flashed in the sky above the treeline, and the next day, the newspapers had more than a little bit to say about it. In such a small community, occurrences like that were front page affairs, and the green lights had only missed the front page because of the results of the federal election.

Anything to promote a book. It was a good time to be an alien expert, or to pretend to be one. The dollars were in sensation in a manner the fiction it truly was could not match. The resulting tome was the most lucrative set of three hundred pages churned out a hundred miles in at least half as many years.

Dr. Clement Winsley—not a doctor, mind you, but the title exuded an air of expertise, a trick tried out by at least a handful of television hosts before Clement ever picked it up—made off with the money and moved to the city to give talks on the ostensible alien sighting. He left his ex-wife, Madelina, to hide all of the lights that had flared in the night, and the grass trimmers responsible for the odd crop circle here and there. Why she did it, her best friend never figured it out. Perhaps it was to cover her own tracks. She had been instrumental in the whole ordeal. Perhaps it was to avoid selling out her fraudulent ex-husband, because whether she liked it or not, she had loved him once, or a few more times than that.

After so long, Clement Winsley was back in the small community, in the domain of dusty roads and evergreens, and so, too, was the reporter who had flown in to record an interview with him.

Kell Harvies, after a year and a half in a different big city, adjusting from having her own half-empty home to living in a room on the twentieth floor, drove along the road that time had not bothered to touch, with one hand on the steering wheel and the other on the radio dial. She fiddled with the knob through the static until she found a local radio station. It was late. It played cool jazz. It was the kind of music that made Kell tired, because she had studied so much while listening to it years before. The experts on conditioning would have had a field day with her, and she would have savoured every second of it.

She had badly wanted the aliens to be real, the first moment she saw the otherworldly lights above the treetops. Aliens had to be an inquisitive type, to fly all the way to Earth and to touch down on it. No one could say astronauts did not have a certain element of curiosity about them; Madelina had always said she would never leave Earth, not for a billion dollars. Everything she loved was there, especially her home. Kell could not be so sure. If she had lived a different life, she would be an astronaut, and if she had lived that life on another planet, she would be the alien in the green-blinking ship.

It was, to put it lightly, a total bummer when she had stalked the ship to its origin and found cables and cords, and Clement and Madelina.

It was the most disappointed she had ever been to have seen either of them. And that was a hard feat in itself. Kell never told them, but it had to be some sort of obvious: she would not have minded being taken home by either of them. Their wedding was of benefit to particularly no one after the passing of some time, Kell included among the immediately disappointed, but finding them together faking the UFO was worse. It was easier to dream up the future possibility of some sordid affair of betrayal or being chosen to accompany them both to mitigate the sting of their marriage than to figure that aliens would bother to touch down in the same village that had experienced its own fake alien landing before. The odds just would not work out.

A chance to interview Dr. Clement Winsley after the planet had looped around the sun more than one full time made a decent enough consolation prize to the possibility of aliens having been shot down. It was a lucrative opportunity for someone whose name was not very well-known in the wider reporting world, or did not report on behalf of some titan of an institution.

What made the opportunity especially special was that it was private, in the expert’s own home. His old home, which, of course, he kept for his very few moments of retreat from money and fame, book signings and alien conventions, and appearances on various television stations.

Kell remembered the way to his old house perfectly. She still dreamed about it sometimes. She had rarely ever been inside, and when she had, it had been for placid dinners, and nothing of any more substance than the food. Madelina was a middling cook, but Kell had eaten everything she offered, anyway. She wished that either or both of the then-spouses would offer her more.

Not so, this time, if Madelina’s cooking was the question. Madelina was in the community, but no longer in Clement’s home, and that night was not for something as mundane as a neighbourly meal.

A low, warm light inside leaked out from the front window pane, and a white car, shiny and new, filled one parking section of the driveway. Kell surmised the other half had been left for her car, but her insurance company would have her head and hundreds more of her dollars per month if she so much as nicked the bumper of the glorious mechanical beast Clement had come to own, so she parked in front of the house, on the edge of the road.

She had everything she needed. Her tape recorder. A notebook and pen. A box of chocolates from the specialty shop near her apartment building. She hoped Clement still liked chocolates. With these in tow, she left her car and walked up the driveway until she reached the front door.

She knocked lightly. Just touching the door again was surreal. If it was a dream—it wasn’t, but she could not be too sure what was real anymore, after the alien spacecraft sighting was false—she did not want to strike her hand too hard and wake herself.

Clement Winsley opened the door, sweeping Kell up in the aroma of his warm, tranquillizing cologne. His eyes harboured fewer dark circles than they used to, but otherwise, he looked as he always had. His brown three-piece suit held him well, his auburn hair flecked with traces of silver had been neatly combed, and his deep, enchanting eyes were focused on his guest.

There were two more differences between the man before her and the version of him last written to her memory, though it took Kell a moment to notice them. Firstly, his suit carried a pinchbeck pocket watch, almost certainly a genuine antique. The chain was visible, running over brown wool, and its timepiece end’s impression rose from the expanse of his pocket. That was the more comfortable of the two details. Clement always had a discerning eye when it came to fine collectibles, and his alien work’s public success allowed him the budget to hunt more of them.

Secondly, his eyes were apologetic. Neither had to say a word to understand why, but Kell almost wished he would have. He knew how he had let her down. Dashed hopes were hard to recover, and to recover from. A genuine sighting could have changed Kell’s life. But she nearly squirmed beneath the sympathy, the recognition, even if unspoken, that he knew the effect he had on her.

One of the effects. As for the other…

She handed him the box of chocolates, which he accepted dutifully. “Dr. Winsley,” she said. “How wonderful it is to see you again.”

“Ms. Harvies. The same to you. Thank you for travelling all this way…”

“The same to you, Dr. Winsley.”

“Clement, if you prefer. We are close enough to warrant that. And may I call you Kell?”

“Always,” Kell replied.

“Thank you for the gift, Kell, though your agreement to do this interview is more than enough to give.”

“It is more a gift to me. I understand not many of my standing are allowed to interview you.”

“Your close competition? Heavens, no. I would not make your work harder like that.”

“My colleagues, but you have a point.”

Clement led Kell into the house. It was warm and dark, with wooden floors draped in dyed wool rugs and heavy curtains that stood sentry at all windows, waiting to be deployed. Everything in the village was a little darker and heavier than the bright greys of the city, and it made Kell almost homesick for her old house.

She turned toward the living room, but Clement put a hand on her shoulder and guided her down the hall.

“We are going to my study,” he said. “I believe you will like it there.”

Kell’s breath hitched in her throat. She had not even known Clement had his own study.

“It will be more suitable for an interview, of course. That is where I do my work, during my visits.”

The study was small and close. Shelves of books encircled the paper-strewn, wooden desk and set of brown leather office chairs. The titles, at least, on the books thick enough for their spine text to be easily legible from the doorway, filled with words like ‘UFO’ and ‘alien’ and ‘extraterrestrial.’ Photographs, printed from the newspaper, of the false spacecraft lights had been pinned to a corkboard to the left side of the room.

“You have the look down, no doubt,” Kell said. “If I hadn’t seen what I saw, and then had a look at your study now, I’d believe that the sighting was real.”

Clement frowned. “Sit, please.” He gestured to the chair closest to the desk, which was not the one Kell expected to be offered.

She took up the perch, then watched Clement as he sat in the chair nearest to the door. His motions were measured. Was time taking its toll on him sooner than either would have expected, or had he calculated the movements in advance?

Kell fidgeted with her tape recorder. Adeptly, she turned it on while maintaining the idle actions.

“I guess it all worked out, didn’t it?” she asked.

“Is this part of the interview?”

“No,” Kell lied. “This is me asking, as your friend, and as the person who saw those cords and lights. This isn’t the reporter asking, for now.”

Clement’s face reddened.

“This is the first time since you moved that anyone has asked you about that part of the sighting, isn’t it? I’m sure Madelina is not much of one to talk about it.”

“Madelina, yes. Have you visited her, or notified her of your arrival?” Clement asked. “She would be dismayed, I am sure, to know you are in for a visit and did not let her know so she would have something to look forward to.”

Kell had not told Madelina. Why would Madelina want to know she was there for the sake of seeing Clement? She would, perhaps, turn up at Madelina’s doorstep later, saying she missed home, that she was there on some unspecified business, and that of course Madelina’s house was her first stop.

But that was not the point of Clement’s probing. Kell redirected back to her earlier question. “You don’t get to talk about what really happened often. Have you told anyone?”

“And, what really happened?” Clement leaned toward Kell. His dark eyes locked onto her. A firm hand trailed up to fondle the ends of her pale hair.

“You set it all up. The UFO was just your lights.”

“You mean to say I tricked everyone, yes? That all of this ever since has been predicated on a lie.”

“I wasn’t going to use words quite so severe, but…”

“But that is what you believe.” Clement drew back from Kell. “Is that so?”

Kell nodded.

“I knew you were distressed after that night, and I could only make a conjecture as to why. You feel duped. Betrayed. Oh, Kell, I have thought ever since on how to restore you to yourself.”

Never mind that he did not think she was acting like herself; Kell’s recognition caught on the ledge of Clement having thought of her often since their leaving each other’s lives.

“What you thought you saw that night is what you saw. Such incidents have a way of bending the memory. The mind fills in the details with what makes sense, even if it is cruel.”

“Cruel?”

“Indeed, Kell. You have spent the past year and a half believing that two of the people you trusted the most have lied to you.”

“I did trust you,” Kell admitted.

“Trust me again.” Clement removed his pocket watch from his suit and held it in front of Kell’s eyes. The craftsmanship was impeccable. “Are you familiar with hypnosis?”

“As much as anyone would be,” Kell said. “You mean you’re going to…?”

“In incidents of, shall I say, extraterrestrial meddling in the recall of memories, hypnosis has proven to unlock the true memory hidden within, to break through the confident fog of the alien spell.”

Kell’s angular brows furrowed, but her heartbeat flutter bought the tale. An alien spell? What a thrilling thing to be under. But she had seen what she had seen, and she had seen Clement and Madelina setting the whole ordeal up, as clear as day. Such a crisp memory could have been alien meddling, but when the dream crashed down into cords and mundane lights, full belief in such extraordinary matters could no longer be posited without necessity.

“Their hold on you is strong. It is making you miserable, is it not? It must be so difficult, to struggle to trust, to struggle to know what is real. Why don’t you give the hypnosis a try, dear?”

That final, minute word sent a shiver through Kell’s vertebrae that echoed strongest between the blades of her shoulders. Whether Clement was playing the role of the alien expert as he always did or whether he was being genuine, what did it matter? Two distinct options unfurled to Kell, and she would ruminate evermore if she chose the wrong one.

Number one: accept the closeness, the offer, the sympathy. She would get to participate at least one last time of the magic of that night, of its narrative, before it all came crashing downward into disbelief.

Number two: rebuke the man and turn from his home and interview in an effort to preserve her dignified scornedness and the lie she had uncovered but planned never to expose.

One was good for her work and her heart, and for all of the fantasies she would earn from hearing Clement out. The other would throw everything away.

“All right. Hopefully we can sort out what’s right from what’s wrong.”

“Good.”

Clement reached past Kell to turn on the lamp on the desk, then shut off the overhead light. His manner became languid and specific as darkness washed over the corners of the room. He settled himself into his previous position, then crossed one leg over the other.

“Are you comfortable?” he asked.

Kell nodded.

“How is the chair?”

“It’s nice, thank you.”

“Is it firm enough?”

“Yes.”

“What about the lights? Are they fine?”

“Yes, they are.”

“Good.”

Clement held his pocket watch close, but not too close, to Kell’s face. Its circular body hovered right above her eyes, suspended by its sturdy chain. Lamplight drifted across its surface, a soft reflection of the incandescent bulb.

“Could you follow the watch with your eyes for me, please? Not with your pretty head, just your eyes.”

Kell started to nod as the compliment and request registered before the stipulation, then ceased the motion in compliance. A favoured glow rushed through her mind. Maybe it was just an idiomatic turn of phrase, but… pretty. What a word. Pretty.

“Yes, I can,” she confirmed. She fixed her gaze on the pocket watch. “What’s it supposed to be like?”

“You, dear, are here to discover that as it happens, not to come in with preconceptions. Let it happen as it does. Now, follow the watch for me as I swing it back and forth. Will you do that for me?”

The watch swayed with a slow arc at first, then built momentum as its present owner found his subject sufficiently obedient. Kell flicked her eyes upward, then back and forth as the watch rose higher on either end of its curve, as its pace increased. Less fluid and more saccadic became the movements of her eyes, and her eyelids shuddered beneath the sudden strain.

“Bring all of your concentration to your eyes and to your mind,” said Clement, his voice soft and measured. “That’s it, keep your eyes open for me, just for a short while. The rest of your body knows there is nothing demanded of it. The rest of your body knows you are safe and comfortable here tonight. Relax. Will you do that for me? Relax.”

Kell had not noticed how tense her shoulders were, and she let them ease back into the chair. The fewer of her efforts went to auxiliary tasks, the more could keep her focus on the watch. How quickly it moved! Back and forth, back and forth, beyond the tensing muscles of her eyes.

“How sleepy you appear,” Clement remarked. “Are you sleepy?”

The answer was near-automatic, though, if asked, Kell might have chosen another word. Exhausted. Confused. Sleepy was close enough to those, and Clement, thinking her sleepy, could bring on the sweet release of instructing her eyes to close, releasing her from the burden of tracking the watch back and forth and back and forth and back and forth until it was almost too quick to keep up with and until her eyes curtained from above and below her vision and until the strength of her body left her and all resources were allocated to the eyes. And to the watch. “Yes.”

And, of course, in this time, the resources of the mind did not stray from the path of the resources of the body. Kell’s attention narrowed to contain only the watch, her weary eyes, and Clement. Everything else was unnecessary, for the time being.

“How sleepy are you?” Clement inquired.

“Very.” Anything to let her eyes close. Relief was on the horizon. Anything to dip below the horizon with it.

“Are you sleepy enough to let me take care of you for a while?”

The words were difficult for Kell to form without tensing the muscles around her mouth and stealing her attention from the watch, her eyes, the watch, her eyes. “Yes, please.”

“Very good. I will count down from five. It would do no good to throw you down all at once, I might lose you completely. I can see it, you crave this sleep. I will count down, and when I tell you to sleep, you will close your eyes and enjoy the deep trance that awaits you. Does that sound good?”

Back and forth, back and forth, the watch was a natural at the motions. The watch would never run out of energy so long as Clement never let it. There would be no waiting it out. Clement, Kell dimly understood, was the one factor that decided if she was allowed to rest her eyes or not, and he held the opportunity so near to her.

“Yes.”

“Five.”

Clement rested his free hand on one of Kell’s shoulders. The touch was grounding and authoritative. With Clement’s forward lean, the watch drew closer to Kell’s eyes. With a flick of a wrist, the watch-sway grew quicker.

Kell’s eyelids strained against their nature. A sigh escaped her and withered just beyond her lips.

“Four.” Clement’s hand travelled to the side of Kell’s neck. “Everything below my touch is no longer yours to control. Relaxation claims you when you let me manage your body and mind.”

Kell murmured assent as his fingers massaged the side of her neck. He had her taken care of. She just needed to keep up with the watch.

“Three.” His hand upon her cheek, claiming it. “You feel so good.”

Kell’s lips, having been relinquished, out of her control, could not have answered if it had been a question; better, then, that it was not.

At once, Clement dropped the watch down into his lap and placed his hand atop Kell’s head. “Two, one. Sleep.”

Dominoes cascaded through Kell’s body and mind. Her eyelids closed down into heavy peace, her head fell forward over her chest, and the last of her focus fell out of her thoughts. With no more watch and no more strain of the eyes, there was nothing, except for Clement: his voice and his touch.

“Good. Deeper. You are no longer in this room. Deeper, now. I know you can do it.”

Kell’s breathing was shallow. Each breath prolonged in the sleeper’s rhythm. Deeper she descended, for deeper Clement asked her to go.

Clement took each of Kell’s cold hands in his. “You are winding back like the watch in the time of ending daylight savings. Whichever time you expect it to be, it is not. It is the time I tell you, because I do not lie to you. You accept this. You know it in your heart. Accepting this is right.”

The strength and clarity were not within Kell to question his words. It was so entirely easy to accept his words as the truth. Just as he had said, it was right. Time, the temperamental thing, dissolved and prepared to be rebuilt as Clement willed it.

“It is spring. Late April, or perhaps May. You know well when it is, for it is night, and the night is punctured by unfamiliar green lights. What are you doing?”

“I am in the garden,” Kell said. Her own sound was a million miles away, and it contained little vigour and none of the assertive will she could dredge up when the moment called for it. She had not only the sleeper’s breath, but also the sleep-talker’s voice. “Dried flower heads are falling, and I am pushing them, and their seeds, down into the soil. This year was fine enough, but next year will be better. I fear I will stay here for a few more years yet before a better life begins.”

“And then?”

“I see the lights. They rise up into the sky, over the treetops, and swirl in their synchronized dance. I’ve never seen anything like it. They are silent and beautiful, and they are all I see of whichever strange device they belong to.”

Had Kell opened her eyes, she would have seen the near-nostalgia fermenting in Clement’s expression. She did not and could not, though she would not have had the wakefulness to put a name to it, had she seen.

“What do you do next?”

“I stand for a little while, half-transfixed. The neighbors are opening their doors and windows to look out. Distant shouting, ‘It’s a UFO.’ I have got to see this. I take my camera and tape recorder.”

“This tape recorder?”

“Yes.”

“Hand it to me, so I may understand it.”

Kell’s hand raised, as though drawn by helium from her side. It landed upon the tape recorder and closed around it, then brought it forward until Clement collected it from her.

Then, the clicks of two plastic buttons. “Very good. It feels so pleasant to do as I say, because you know you can always trust me. You do not even have to think about it, you listen and obey, as you have just done so well. Now, what do you do?”

“I follow the lights. I take a photograph. If they are above the trees, I will see the rest of the spacecraft better if I am close enough that their lights illuminate the bottom that is obscured. It is a dark craft, so dark as to blend into the night, but its lights guide me.”

Kell reached ahead to part invisible trees until Clement guided her hands down to her hips.

“I am between the trees, and there is something unusual on the other side. Have the aliens let down their ladder? It is grey-white and long, and black webs tangle around it. A cable and cords. They look strikingly like our own do on Earth.”

“I see. Continue.”

Kell’s head shook from side to side, slowly, but distinctly. “Clement and Madelina. I think they have come out in search of the UFO’s features, too. But Madelina is holding two cables, and Clement has… is it a remote control?”

A quick snap of Clement’s fingers. “Incorrect. Drop deeper. Remember the truth.”

Kell slumped further into the chair’s hold. Her anecdote dissolved into mist.

“Continue.”

“Clement and Madelina are there, and…”

Snap. “Incorrect. The visitors want you to believe that, but you know it is not true. You have found their cable ladder. What next?”

“They… have me?”

“Yes, they have you. They take you up once you hold their ladder, do you not remember? Of course you can remember. It is so easy to remember for me.”

Kell squirmed in her seat.

“They mean you no harm, but you have found your way to their craft,” Clement told her. “This is a minor complication to them. They are not prepared to engage with humanity yet, are they? Perhaps they are only trying, for now, to touch down on the planet unfamiliar to them. You can see them ahead of you. Your mind cannot remember what they look like, but you know they are there. Be still. They are only going to put their glowing device up to your eyes.”

Kell’s eyes opened wide. They were glassy and unseeing of Clement ahead of her, or the room. “Yes, I see them. Their device. They are bringing it so close.”

“Be obedient. Be still.” Clement covered Kell’s eyes. “Their device is over your eyes now. Your mind is empty. Feel their will overpower your mind and overwrite your memories.”

“I don’t want to forget them,” Kell complained. “I’ve seen them. I was there. They’ll leave me with none of it.”

“Shh. Be good for them, now. It will be harder if you struggle. Be still for them and they will take only the memories you have of them, and no more.”

With a quiet whimper, Kell sat perfectly still.

“Good. Five, four, three, two, one. Sleep. Close your eyes. Sleep deeply for me.”

Kell closed her eyes and fell forward into Clement’s arms. He pulled her from her chair, onto his lap, and rested her chin against his shoulder.

“The UFO is gone now. The aliens have lowered you back into the woods, deprived of your memory of having met them. That is where we find you, Madelina and I. Your mind has been scrambled, and you tell us about cables, about a remote control, about a mundane explanation for the UFO lights. Do you remember?”

“Yes.”

“Do you remember it all?”

“Yes, I do.”

“Good. Now, it is time for you to come out of hypnosis. You’ve been so good for me, and for yourself, because it feels better to remember. You believe it, because it is true, and you know it is true, because I am an expert guiding you. Is it true?”

“Yes.”

“Yes? Try, ‘Yes, Dr. Winsley.’”

“Yes, Dr. Winsley.”

Clement squeezed his embrace tighter. “You love to say those words,” he whispered. “Don’t you?”

“Yes, Dr. Winsley.”

“Excellent. Now, on the count of five, you will wake up and leave this trance behind, and with it, any recollection of what has happened in the trance. You will remember your encounter with the aliens, and the rest can fade into the restful sleep you’ve been under. Coming up quickly now. One, two, three, that’s it, four, let your breathing come back to its regular pace, five. Wake up, Kell.”

Kell’s eyes fluttered open. Her head darted around, and as her cognition bloomed once more, she blushed upon finding herself in Clement’s arms.

“What happened? What did we do?”

“You slept, that is all. You required a little extra support. Do you remember your encounter with the aliens now?”

“Yes, Dr. Winsley.” Kell flung a hand over her mouth. “Clement. I’m sorry. That’s so formal of me.”

“I do not mind at all. You do remember your experience?”

“Yes, Dr. Winsley.”

“So you know that you were, briefly, in the care of the aliens, and that they are responsible for your altered memory.”

“Yes—oh my goodness, I find it hard to stop saying it—yes, Dr. Winsley, I do.”

“How fortunate that you can rely on my expertise.”

Kell extracted herself from Clement’s hold. “I’ve been so cruel, all of this time. I blamed you and Madelina. A year and a half. How wrong I’ve been.”

“Understandable, given the circumstances. I would not expect someone as good and amenable as you to resist their methods of confusing your mind.”

“I don’t know how I’ll ever make it up to you.”

“Sit down.”

“Yes, Dr. Winsley.” And Kell sat in the leather chair again.

Clement handed Kell’s tape recorder back to her, clicking the button to turn it on as he passed it.

“Thank you.”

“I have a few ideas, but there is one we may begin with. There is the matter of this interview, of course. You had some questions for me, didn’t you, reporter?”

Kell smiled placidly. “Yes, Dr. Winsley, and I look forward to interviewing an expert as trustworthy as you are. So, for my first question…”