The Quiet Room

The first time I spoke with Dr. Orfield, I had just broken my father’s heart. It wasn’t the first time I’d disappointed him and he’d returned the favor many times. But my first thought when I stepped off that plane had nothing to do with Dr. Orfield or my father. It had nothing to do with silence or noise or anything related to my field. All I felt was remorse because I was out in Minnesota in late January without a jacket. Something told me to turn back and it wasn’t just the cold. The entire aura of the Midwest; the artificial layout of the farms, the mall of America, the abnormally slow gait of those with too much time, it just simply does not appeal to me. I doubt I’ll ever go back. It leaves me with a peculiar sensation of sticking in time like flypaper, unable to move forward.

I was greeted at the gate by Dr. Talbot, pronounced Tall-bow, who introduced herself with a flattering smile and a dainty handshake. She just kind of stuck her bony hand out limp for me to grasp. Very odd woman. She was petite and curly-haired and always seemed distracted by something invisible. Unwieldy, I think, is the right word.

“Talbot? That’s French, right?”

“Yes, Jewish on my mother’s side. Delighted to meet you,” she said, still flashing that bewitching smile.

“Nice to meet you too, I’m John. Please don’t call me Johnny.”

“Oh I wouldn’t dare. It’s too cartoonish.”

“Hah! I appreciate that. Too many people just burst right out with it. They don’t even ask.”

“Can’t be too pleasant having to scold them on first contact. I’m Juliet, the lab’s psychologist.”

“Really? A psychologist. I was hoping I’d be able to discuss Room 116 with someone.”

“Well you can ask Dr. Orfield when you meet him. I may not know much about the room’s specifications but feel free to consult with me whenever you wish…” I was visibly shivering at that point.

“Sorry to waste your time doctor, but you see, I’m quite ill-prepared for the weather. You think there’s a place here I can purchase a jacket? I’d rather not step outside without one.”

“Of course! I’d be delighted to help you pick out something. I think there’s an outlet around here.”

I did not turn back that day because, for some unknown reason, I thought I was deliberately fated to see my stay in Minnesota out to its conclusion. I had been so lucky just to be in that airport in the first place.

“What about this one?” she said, holding up a bright-red North Face puffer, “It has the inner down layer that will really make the difference.”

“Looks as good as any, I’ll take it.” She’d clearly been in Minnesota longer than I, so I deferred to her judgment. I really just wanted to see Mr. Orfield and get in the room, so my thoughts were far from the style of my new jacket. 

I’m usually not one for calling strangers out off the blue, but I didn’t have many other options. It was right after the holidays and because of my father I was stuck in The Netherlands with nowhere else to go. Calling Minnesota, I was surprised to hear a mellow Southern accent coated in a layer of static.

“Is this Dr. Orfield?”

“I would certainly hope so,” he said in measured exuberance, “My intern told me this couldn’t wait.”

“And it can’t. My name’s John and I discovered your lab from an article, the CNN one. Is there any chance you’d be willing to discuss your facility?”

“You’re losing me, I’m very busy right now,” his voice boomed, even when he sighed, “What can I tell you, kid?”

I couldn’t stand his infantilization, “Yes, you see, I’m in a bit of a dire situation right now and I would cherish the opportunity to come work for you. I don’t know how your team does it, but you know how to get results,” I stammered, trying to hold myself together.

“You’re too kind. Unfortunately, I don’t foresee any open positions at this time. I’ll let you know if something comes up, but, keep at it, keep hanging in there—”

“I understand, sir,” I said, wishing I could make the direness of my situation more apparent, “Uh, the quietest room in the world, huh…you must get calls like this all the time. I’m a little shocked, really, how simple it was to achieve your sound-suppression levels. I can’t believe no one had managed anything like this before.”

“Well, none of it would have been possible without a lot of hard work from a list of other facilities, so it’s difficult to claim ownership over such an award. Being the first, we’re probably not gonna be the best, but you have to accept these things.”

“I’m sorry to admit, I must have read that article about a hundred times by now,” It wasn’t an understatement, my search history contained almost every website that even mentioned the lab, “One thing is still bothering me about it.”

“And what might that be?”  

“The article mentioned that nobody’s ever been able to last more than 45 minutes in the room. I’m having a bit of trouble understanding why. I feel if I were in there, I could last hours. It would be quite peaceful, no?“ What I wouldn’t have done to be a part of that team. I’d been craving better colleagues ever since I’d made my name with a group of some of the most intelligent people in my field during my graduate studies. We’d developed a top-of-the-line reverb simulation software based on real-world audio interactions. It had easily overshadowed everything I’d done before and since, but it was probably the only reason Dr. Orfield had continued to talk with me.

“That’s a Hell of a claim,” he said, livening his tone, “I set that record myself, you know?”

“No, I didn’t know that sir. I’m not trying to diminish your achievements—“

“Oh don’t worry, I took no offense. It does sound easy. What’s an hour or two in a quiet room? Have you ever been in an anechoic chamber? It can hardly be described, the feeling of sound working against you like that. Terrifies a lot of people…”

“Really? I find them quite fascinating. I used the one at the university lab often.”

“I tell you, you may think they’re fascinating now, but when you start thinking and your mind starts wandering, let me tell you. Couple years ago I had to get one of those heart valves, a little ball in a cage keeping me alive, you ever seen one? Anyway, in 116 all I could hear was my heart valve wheezing. On and off, on and off. Just sitting there thinking and this thing’s clicking away, pushing the blood through my heart. It was therapeutic for about five minutes and then it became totally unbearable.”

The man was one for rambling, that much I would never deny, but he was one of the smartest people I’d ever met, “That sounds like a nightmare, thankfully I still have all my original valves.”

“Right you are about that, you should keep it that way. You’re still young, you got your health. You mentioned college; so you’re an academic type.”

“Not exactly, I have a PHD, and I just recently completed a fellowship at the University of Oregon, but I hoping to end my interment in academia there, if possible.”

“And why’s that? You sound suited to it. You’re a Yankee, unless I’m mistaken, which I never am.”

“Boston, yes. And it’s been a bit of overkill, sir. I’ve toiled away at the universities long enough to see how much money they throw around. Not to mention the kind of work they had us doing, I mean, they had us engineering bleed-free binaural speakers. It just couldn’t be done on a shoestring budget. Meanwhile we’re doing calculations on Apple II’s.”

“Hehe, you got quite the mouth on you there.”

“Thank you, sir,” At the time I wasn’t quite sure how much of his vernacular was in jest and how much of it was genuine, “Maybe you can’t help me Dr. Orfield, maybe I don’t even know what I want myself. All I know is I can’t go back to that, not again.”

“And you certainly have confidence, too. I’m starting to like you, you remind me a lot of myself when I was an angry young man itching to make a change. If someone’s gonna try to beat my record, I don’t think I’d mind it being you. You should know, it weren’t easy. You gotta be tough, gotta have grit. You think you have that in you?”

“Sure, I mean, I’m not quite sure what you mean, but I know you have your man right here,” the phone practically shook out of my hands, “I was hoping this call would serve as an example of how prepared I am to join your team. I want to beat every record you throw my way.”

“Well, we’ll find some grit in you yet. Why don’t you send over your résumé. We may have some use for you out here, after all.“

“That sounds wonderful, sir. Although…that may be a little difficult as I’m overseas at the moment and I’m almost certain my father has cancelled my flight back to the US, if you can believe that.”

“Family troubles, huh?”

“You could say that, yes.”

“Well, you better book another one.”

“I can’t really afford another one right now, but if I can scrounge enough money in the next couple weeks—“

“We’ve got some money left in the budget over here, don’t you worry about that.”

“You can’t be serious Dr. Orfield? I couldn’t possibly accept—”

“Oh I always am Johnny, except right now, hehehe.” His laugh reminded me of the leaking wheeze of an overweight sportscaster, the kind of infectious generosity I needed at that moment. His eccentricity was undeniable, but the man could make anything interesting, he just had that indescribable quality that left you awaiting his next word. All I knew was that he’d designed the world’s quietest room and he wanted me to help him test it’s silence.

When I say it’s the quietest room in the world, few people really understand what I mean. The room itself actively persecutes sound the second it leaves your mouth, beating it down into the floor, absorbing it through the jagged foam walls and spitting it out God knows where. This is apparent the moment you step in the room. Sound dissipates instantaneously—so quickly it really can’t be called sound at all. It takes whatever sound is left and presses it into the air around you; the air you’re breathing is full of these unanswered echoes, dissipating ghosts of noise. Then suddenly, they’re gone. They disappear completely and you’re left in the room, alone and searching for a reflection of yourself that’s somewhere just out of reach. This is the overwhelming power of silence.

I’ve held an interest in sound from an early age. My field; acoustics, is closer to the study of waves than sound. It’s a physical thing, sound, not many people realize. Governments around the world use sound-based weapons for crowd control that emit a paralyzing wave to harmlessly subdue large groups. I was in Eugene studying reverberation and echoes, my specialty, which to many people mean the same thing. It’s true; they describe the same phenomenon. They both describe how sound is reflected or absorbed by physical objects, but the difference lies in time. With echoes, you hear your voice reflected back at you, but with a noticeable delay between the initial sound and the echo. The delay of reverberation is so negligible that instead of the environment repeating the initial sound, it either amplifies it or envelops it. We don’t realize reverberation is even happening most of the time, but listening to Schubert’s eighth in a concert hall and in my grandmother’s basement yields noticeably different results.

I mention reverb because one of the first things my mother did when she entered my temporary room at the University of Oregon was shriek at the mess. The second thing she did was hand me an article she’d printed out from CNN. It was a profile on the Orfield Laboratory, referencing their Guinness World Record for engineering the quietest room in the world.

“This looks interesting, I think I remember hearing about it a few months ago,” I said, tossing it onto a pile of papers on my desk I had yet to touch.

“Of course he has. See, I told you,” I heard my father gripe from the hall where I couldn’t quite see him yet.

“Well you certainly seem to think you know him best,” I couldn’t watch them interact with each other so I tried to clear some space in my room. My mother stood in the entrance, “Look it over whenever you can dear, I’m sure you’ll find it interesting. Especially that man they interviewed, he reminded me of you. He’s a bit of an oddball, but the things he says about that room there—“

“She wouldn’t stop reading it to me on the plane,” my father interrupted as he poked his head around the threshold, “Kept putting it in my lap like I don’t have enough to read!”

My father skirted around my mother blocking the entrance. He was a stern man, skinny but stern. That was the man I knew, at least. Ask anybody who worked with him at the law firm and he was a funny, hardworking, decent man. But he was different when it came to his household, which he very much considered his. When he joked it was almost never around me and when he did, it was at my expense. I saw him glance at my room and my closet doors and I shuddered, moving swiftly to shove some of the mess away.

“I can assure you, dad, nothing fun has been going on in here. I only just finished those binaural speakers yesterday and I haven’t had time to clean up yet.”

“You hear that, honey, he’s too busy for us. He probably doesn’t even want us here in the first place.” He was acting even more childish than normal.

I sighed, “You’re right dad, and that’s exactly what I told mom over the phone.” If they’d come all this way just to treat me like I was ten again, then I was in for week of Hell. My dad puffed his chest as they both stood in the doorway, leaning in as though they were intruding on me. My mother’s eyes were wide, breaking from her complacent façade. That’s how I knew she was getting nervous. She knew when to expect an outburst from my father better than I did, her eyes signaling me like birds taking flight before a tsunami.

“We had to get on a plane and travel all the way across this country just to see you,” his head wavered from side to side, “The least you can do is not treat us like we’re a nuisance.”

“I’m sorry dad, you’re right,” I said diplomatically, “I’ve just been feeling so buried under all this work,” I sighed, “We’re good?” He stood adjacent to my mother, tucked away in the corner of the room, facing the center. He nodded and closed his eyes, attempting to repair what had already become a troubled evening. 

“Anyways we also came with some good news to share with you. I was talking with some of the guys at the firm and Emilio, you remember Emilio? Tall, dark-haired fellow. Mexican, I think,” I nodded, “Well, he knew some guy who’s been working at Philips…”

“Philips? Really?” My father and I had discussed Philips as an ideal candidate for long-term stability.

My mother chimed, “It’s true! They want to give you an interview and fly you all the way to Europe! Isn’t it great!” She said, eyeing me frantically. 

My dad stopped facing me and craned his neck to look at my mom. His eyes immediately darkened and isolated my mother, stoking the silence until it felt like he was never going to speak, “You interrupted me again.”

“Oh, I-I’m sorry. Frank, I just wanted him to know—“

“I was going to tell him! I got him the Goddamn interview, didn’t I?” He didn’t yell so much as pressured her to respond and challenge his authority, enunciating each word with excessive clarity.

“Oh!” she shuddered.

He let the silence speak for her, “Can you just wait outside? We’ve got to be getting to dinner soon.”

“Okay, dear…” she nodded and limped out, leaving the two of us glaring until finally we heard her shut the dorm’s front door.

“Dad, you didn’t have to—“

“No, I did,” he startled me, “She’s been like this the whole week!”

“She hasn’t seen me in six months!”

“And whose fault is that? You never come to visit us. What do you want me to do? You want me to be angry with you instead? Is that it? ‘Cause I can tell the Philips guy you’re not interested…”

“No, thanks dad. Really, thank you, I mean it.” He stretched out his hand over the threshold and I shook it, one arm in the room, one arm out in the hallway.

It wasn’t until after they left, while I was tidying my room, that I considered the article lying on my desk. My first inclination with these articles was usually to throw them away, but I’d kept this one. I thought it would make a nice bit of light reading for the plane. The first line declared, “The Quietest Place in the World is the Anechoic Test Chamber at Orfield Laboratories, Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA.” The quietest room in the world.

It was shortly after the holidays that I left for The Netherlands to dedicate myself entirely to the interview, which was as guaranteed as they come, a formality really. They had my résumé, they’d spoken with my father, what was there left to discuss? The fellowship had kept me busy, but between term papers, performance reviews, and underfunded equipment, I was ready for a better use of my abilities. The feeling of 30 Hertz amplified where you can’t hear it so much as feel it in your bowels. The sight of a wine glass shattering; its resonant frequency tearing it apart from within. These were the experiments that had first interested me in sound, the kinds of powerful demonstrations that I’d craved from the fellowship. My father had found me what was my dream job in many ways. Though it would be uncomfortable living in his debt, it would satisfy my need for real-world results, it would justify all the hard work and time I’d spent earning my doctorate. All that was left was the interview.

I dressed, ate, shaved, and washed every part of my body, like a prized pig at the state fair. There were butterflies in my stomach, churning my breakfast as I watched the clock on my hotel dresser; I had an hour to get there, barring divine intervention. And just as I had packed my things to leave, that article caught my eye. It was crumpled, unfurled, and thrown onto a pile of clothes exploding from my suitcase, but nevertheless it rested on top. I picked it up and let it fall on the bed, curling and flipping in the air before landing with a crinkle. In that strange second of panicked, inevitable terror, I pulled out my cell phone, called the office at Philips headquarters, and cancelled the interview.

Instead of calling back and begging for a second chance, I called Minneapolis and asked for Dr. Orfield. And that was how I ended up stuck out at the Orfield Laboratories, eating my lunch in the rec area, when Dr. Talbot asked to sit next to me.

“Yeah, it’s fine with me, here,“ I cleared some newspapers and journals I’d been reading and beckoned with my free hand to sit down.

She had a manner of speech that was similar to a Shepard tone illusion. Her pitch increased continuously, slowly filling the room until I’d realize I’d been clenching my fist or clamping my jaw.

“Listen, Doctor, I’ve been meaning to ask you something.”

“Shoot away.” She slid into the chair next to me and placed her thermos, microwave chicken, and fresh pear down next to my things.

“I’ve been involved with several different acoustics labs in the past and, I mean to say, not that I don’t appreciate your being here,” I stumbled over my words, unsure why I was suddenly incoherent, “but in all the labs I’ve ever been I never thought there’d be a need for someone with a masters in psychology.”

She looked slightly taken aback, as if I had offended her even though I had purposely tried not to, “You’re right, I can see how my presence might be confusing. Particularly if you haven’t seen the room yet. But once you hear from Dr. Orfield I’m sure you’ll understand.”

“Well, I assumed it was similar to most anechoic chambers. Large foam pads, grooved wood walls, maybe a few mic stands and instruments,” I smiled.

“I don’t want to spoil anything for you, the tour should start soon. Just keep in mind, as I’m sure you’ve figured out that Mr. Orfield can be…a bit eccentric. And I say that from a place of love, the man’s also a genius.”

“Yes! Every time he talks I end up with a hundred more questions.”

“Well, I’ve only been here two, maybe three months now, but I can try to answer some of them.”

“That would be fantastic because I can’t seem to get a word out of Dr. Orfield about what it’s actually like to be in there. He mentioned that it was somewhat terrifying, but he gave no reason as to why. I’m starting to think that maybe I should—“ Orfield, as if reading my mind, burst through the rec room doors and shouted,

“Evening, ladies and gentleman. If the mood is right, then I ask all my young, beautiful associates to please join me in Room 116 at their earliest convenience.”

I turned to Dr. Talbot, “I guess that’s our cue,” but she had already begun down the hallway towards the room.

The door marked 116 led not to the room, but to the control room, a kind of “command center” that functioned as a threshold to the actual room. The whole place reeked of disinfectant, a lemony, acrid smell that burned in my nostrils. “So this is what we’re here for,” I remarked to nobody in particular.

That was when I noticed the plaque. It decreed the room’s record status in shining bronze, an exclamation point, a showstopper. “The Quietest Place in the World is the Anechoic Test Chamber at Orfield Laboratories, Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA.” The quietest place in the world had what looked to be dried glue or paint encrusting its plaque.

“I’m not sure exactly how long those Guinness people were left in there for, but it makes me want a beer just talking about it,” Orfield chuckled at his own jokes quite often, “Their measurements confirmed everything we already knew, now for the world to see,” Orfield said, directing his gaze towards each of us in turn, one after the other, like he was taking inventory of our faces and respective reactions. “None were interested in sticking around very long afterwards, but they’re weak minded, terribly disinterested. Not like our newest member,” he pointed to me, “That’s where John comes in.”

“Nowhere else on this planet can you be more deprived of your own senses than this little nine by nine closet that I’ve designed,” Orfield started, looking directly at me, “You enter through these two vault doors,” One of his lackeys pressed a button on the control panel and a metallic screeching—overwhelmingly loud and inappropriate for the world’s quietest space—consumed us. That screeching, grating clamor, in a few days’ time would be one of the most relieving sounds I would ever hear.

The name “Anechoic Chamber,” I assume still printed in bright yellow letters above the entrance, means echo-free, in that sound is suppressed the moment it enters the space. Any sounds created in the room have absolutely nothing to bounce off of, Orfield explained, giving them no way to be heard. “We achieve this through the use of three-foot thick fiberglass acoustic wedges on every wall including the floor and ceiling,” which gives the room the feeling of a Futurist geometrical cave with foam stalactites and stalagmites creeping in from every direction. I didn’t say this out loud, but claustrophobia was a serious concern. “Also,” he slapped the wall enthusiastically, “foot-thick concrete walls don’t hurt none.”

“And if you look here,” he said, now sweeping through the room, “the floor is made out of sturdy wire mesh with additional wedges underneath diminishing reverberations, this is really the extra layer of sound absorption that won us the record,” while also giving the room the feeling of being trapped in a chicken coop suspended on top of a death trap. Actually, it feels more like a torture chamber than a recording studio. A torture chamber designed by Frank Gehry.

The world record for quietness recorded there was -9.4 dBA (decibels weighted for human frequency sensitivity), which is in the negative range of hearing. “Zero decibels does not mean zero sound!” as my Acoustics 1 teacher loved to hammer in, but rather it is the threshold of perfect infant hearing. This means it is the ground from which we all start, a perfect baseline before we ruin our fragile hearing with loud music, jackhammers on asphalt, airplanes taking off, and talking to our in-laws.

The most unnerving thing about the room, by far, was the metallic humanoid torso seated facing the corner like a child in reluctant atonement. This ominous presence housed a collection of scientific instruments used to measure the decibel levels, the refraction rate of sound waves, and other qualities of the space, without disturbing its precious silence. Orfield left it unacknowledged in the far-left corner, watching me with its invisible eyes and listening with its pink painted ears. Resting in the middle of its face was a triangular nose, which, I’m guessing, might have been designed for hominoid realism, as if it didn’t already have enough unnerving features. I nicknamed it Frank, after my father.

After a long week of uncertainty, the allure of the faux-Americana bar in the hotel was inescapable. It seemed like most people in that part of the country preferred bars over other forms of entertainment. There were far too many colors at that one, too many bright greens that drew attention to the room’s upsetting kitsch. And there were only three stools, three green stools that looked more fitting in a barbershop.

“Can I just get a Dewar’s, rocks please?” I said to the bartender.

I swirled my index finger in the drink, thoroughly coating myself in the antiseptic bliss, as I watched the ice cubes tumble. The mesh floor, the foam walls, the mort instantaneé of sound, the robot, more names than I could possibly remember, Mr. Orfield. I indulged myself with the cheap scotch, waiting like that, staring into my drink, for what felt like minutes before a tap on my shoulder broke my meditation.

“Hello?” I asked without turning.

“I see you’ve found my favorite part of this hotel.”

“Well, given the choice between this bar and public access TV upstairs, I’d say there was no real choice. You come down for a drink?”

“Yeah, why not?” Talbot addressed the bartender, “Two more of whatever this guy’s got. And put them both on my tab.”

I raised my glass, “Those both for you or what’s the occasion?”

“I just want you to feel welcome here. Orfield can be a bit off-putting at first and the rest of them tend to keep to themselves, you know?”

“I’m well-accustomed to outlandish behavior, unfortunately,” I said, stretching my arms, “So you have a tab here? You don’t strike me as the kind of person who’d have a hotel bar tab.”

She laughed with her mouth closed as the bartender brought her drink, “As you said, there’s no real choice, right?”

I shrugged with my eyebrows, “You got me there.”

“I’m pretty sure they charge it to my room. I just like to say ‘put it on my tab.’ Makes me feel old-fashioned.” We laughed and clinked our glasses before sipping the Red Label. The sound of our cheers rung out like a tuning fork, like the one my father used to keep on his desk, in case he needed to hit a perfect C in the middle of a deposition, I guess.

“I have to come clean, I didn’t come down here just to run up my tab. If you have a moment, I would love to talk about today and some of your impressions from the tour.”

I turned to face her, “How did I know this wasn’t a chance encounter? Honestly doctor, I’m exhausted from everything; the flight and the tour and, you know…everything, so maybe we could just talk tomorrow?”

“Oh of course, I thought you might like to know a little bit more about Dr. Orfield,” she said, looking at me from the side of her eye, “and how things may proceed tomorrow.”

“Maybe you can tell me what planet he’s from? And who would’ve thought to make the entire floor and ceiling out of goddamn chicken wire? That’s pure genius and Frank—I mean, the uh…that thing, the metal humanoid thing, what’s that about? He acted like it wasn’t even there.”

“Hah! I knew you’d get a kick out of that. He just came in one day with that and said, ‘I’d like to introduce y’all to the new intern,’ and started shoving all the instruments and machines into it before we could say anything,” a U2 song was playing on the radio, one I’d already heard about three times since landing.

“Too funny…I can almost hear his voice when you say it that way.” Maybe I was too tired or maybe I was just hooked by the music, but the purpose of our conversation had become hazy. I took a sharp breath, “Doctor…“ she looked over, “How exactly did you know I was here at the bar?”

She blushed, “I asked the receptionist. You’re hard to miss with that tomato outfit.”

She was referring to my bright red puffy jacket that I’d bought at the airport on her recommendation. She’d said it fit my personality or something like that.

She smiled back, “You have no idea how hard it was to hold in my laughter in the store,” she practically shouted at me.

I saluted her with my drink, “Not an easy task to pull a fast one on me. Granted, I’m the last person who’d notice something like that, but still.”

“The real reason I came down here was, well, what Orfield showed you today, that wasn’t really everything. It wasn’t even close, actually.”

“What? What do you mean?” I said, caught off guard.

“I’m sure you’ve read that the record amount of time spent in the room was 45 minutes, but none of those articles can really tell the whole story. What I’m trying to say is, well, some strange things happened in those 45 minutes. Shortly after the record was awarded, Mr. Orfield realized that uh…the room offered more than just silence.”

“I’m still not following, offered what?”

“What he said about full sensory deprivation, it sounds like hyperbole, but it’s true. With the lights off, with nothing in there except cold metal and fiberglass, and nothing to latch on to outside of one’s own mind, the room is not just the quietest room in the world, but the single most sensory-deprived experience a human can have. Are you understanding?”

“Not really, I thought I was here to test silence?”

“Yes, in a way. It’s closer to say you’ll be testing your endurance. When Dr. Orfield did the experiment, his testimony and the EKG readouts were distressing, to say the least.”

“Distressing?” Her hand was wrapped tightly around her drink, “In what way?”

“Visual and auditory hallucinations, paranoia, anxiety, heart palpitations, excessive sweating, nausea, the list goes on and these symptoms are the same for every trial we’ve conducted.”

“Is that all? A little nausea? Just give it to me straight, Doctor,” I was getting tired of this runaround, “Should I be afraid of this room?”

“John, I would absolutely be scared. But you’re asking the wrong person. I get scared just thinking about it.”

“What’s so frightening about the room?” I said, maybe a bit too loud.

“It’s hard to describe, really. Just a feeling I get…like if I were to call for help in there, who would hear me? I get afraid, it’s an awfully lonely situation to willingly put yourself in, don’t you think?”

“The most alone you can get, if I’m to believe Dr. Orfield,” I said, looking down into the bottom of my drink, “So you think I shouldn’t do it then?”

“You’re gonna be put in there for a long time, John. Hours and hours. Do you really think you can handle that?”

“You think I can’t?”

“I don’t know you very well, I just know that you seem eager to get in there and I don’t want to see you get hurt. You’re very heady, you know.”

“So I’ve been told,” I chuckled, “and I appreciate your looking out for me, Doctor, but I flew all the way out here to test that room and I’m not leaving until it’s done.”

“So you’re not going to listen to everything I’ve told you?” She looked at me, her lips forming a distressed half-circle that matched her eyebrows.

“Sorry Doctor, but I’m not.”

“I want everybody in here for this one, yes you too, yup Derek, get in here. Is that everybody? Good, good,” Orfield corralled us all into the control room the next morning for what felt like the beginning of a moral-boosting seminar, “I want everybody to look at these two lines here,” he said, pointing to two identical lines on an otherwise blank piece of paper resting on the console. “Can someone with half a brain tell me which one’s longer?”

“They’re equal, sir.” I chimed in, hoping to avoid an effacing demonstration.

“Very good, John. See, everybody! The man’s not all talk!” This drew a gentle chuckle from the crowd, and a glare from me.

“Now, if I put inward facing arrows on the ends of this one, and outward facing arrows on the ends of that one, somebody tell me which one is longer.” One of the technicians took the bait and chose the line with the outward facing arrows. “Yes! Very good! Even knowing beforehand that they’re the exact same size, the brain still visualizes this one,” he pointed to the outward facing one, “as being longer than the other. I haven’t changed anything about the lines themselves; I’ve only changed their context. This, in turn, alters the way your brain interprets them. It decides that the sensory information it’s receiving is faulty and instead of choosing between fallacies, it invents a new answer and one line is now suddenly longer than the other. This is something fundamental to the way we think, like our ability to see trees and know they’re trees.” Nobody knew what the Hell any of this had to do with our experiment, what lines and arrows and trees were going to tell us about silence.

I looked around the room for Dr. Talbot, but she wasn’t there. Who knew if she was even going to come into the lab today? I hadn’t meant to hurt her feelings; she’d just aggravated me with her questioning. And her insolence, approaching me like a friend then treating me like a patient. I approached Dr. Orfield, “Hello sir, that was quite the demonstration.” 

“I’m glad you enjoyed it.”

“I’m a bit confused, how exactly do the arrows relate to sound?”

“John, not everything’s about sound. You’re going to be fighting your mind more than anything else in there. It’s an example of the brain’s interpretive abilities, how it fills in lapses of information, such as silence. In there, there’s a strong chance you could begin hallucinating almost immediately, but they’re just hallucinations. Nothing to be afraid of.”

            “Did you hallucinate in there?”

            He smiled and closed his eyes, “I think it was about twenty minutes in I started to see a faint light emanating from the wall. Like there was a brilliant sun gleaming just behind the wall, feebly shining through the concrete. It was the strangest thing, like I could just stick my hand through that wall I’d fall right through the void of space…But it was just lights in my eyes. Mental masturbation, so to speak. We’re going to be prepping the room soon, so make sure to get yourself ready.”

            “I’m ready to go whenever you are.”

“Calm down there, just a few moments is all we need. Should only be another half hour or so.”

“Do you mind if I observe the prep? I’m fascinated with how you achieve these suppression levels.” I could see his smile begin to quiver.

“Why don’t you save your strength for the room, Johnny. We need you in there more than out here,” he said, lightly grabbing my arm near the shoulder.

“Oh, okay,” I looked off towards the room. I thought it odd, his reluctance to let me in the command center during the preparations. But he was right; I needed to conserve my energy if I was going to be in there all day. I hadn’t been able to sleep the past few nights, so my energy was in short supply.

He let go of my shoulder and joined the other techs quietly prepping the room for entry. I went back to the rec room since they didn’t seem to need me elsewhere. I sauntered down the grey hallway, towards Talbot’s office. I’d still not seen her come in, but the coffee machine was down by her end. The previous night I’d laid awake wondering why I’d quite suddenly turned on my only real friend at the facility. And for what? Because she was trying to look out for me, because she was “moming” me a bit too much? But the image of her sitting there alone at the bar after I’d left had helped kerp me awake. I stopped outside her office, looking carefully at the door and her nameplate. I rested my head on the door for a few seconds when I heard a faint noise from inside the office. It sounded like a pained, wheezing bird was frantically trying to escape. I opened the door quietly.

“Doctor,” I said, sneaking up to the desk, “Juliet!” I said louder.

She looked up for a second, her eyes red and inflamed, then she pretended to search her desk, “So you’re really going through with it?”

“I’m sorry, but yes.”

“John, it’s fine, I get it.”

“No, I didn’t need to act so defensively. It’s just my first reaction when someone tries to look out for me. I think a psychologist of all people would understand that.”

“Yes,” I’d clearly affected her, normally she was warm and bubbly, but now I could barely get two words out of her.

I stuck out my hand to shake, “So we’re alright?”

She took it, “Decidedly. Anything else?”

“Orfield told me my talents were better suited inside the room than outside it.”

She shook her head as she pulled out some more tissues from her bottom drawer. She continued to rummage through her desk, stopping every couple seconds to look at a paper and throw it away.

“Juliet, what’s wrong? You’re not talking to me at all.”

“Oh, I’m sorry. It’s not you, it’s,” she sighed, “Orfield told me last night…”

“What?”

“I’m fired, effective as of last night. I’m not even supposed to be here today. I don’t know what I’m going to do, where I’m going to find a job,” she sighed.

“He can’t do that, not on the day of the experiment. I can’t believe this. This isn’t right,” I said, making my way towards the door.

“Stop it,” she scolded from her desk, “Don’t let him know I’m here! There’s nothing you can do, it’s my fault that I was fired.”

“How’s that?”

“I called Dr. Orfield last night and told him that I couldn’t in good conscience let you enter that room.”

“Why? Why are you so Hell-bent on keeping me out of there?” I said, holding my arms out to my sides.

“What do you think I was hired to do here? You said it yourself, what use is a psychologist in an acoustics lab. I was hired to monitor you, to monitor all the test subjects, and make sure they’re ready for the experiment.”

“So, did I make you that angry at the bar last night?”

“It has nothing to do with that John. You’re too young; you think you understand everything.”

“You’re not stopping me.”

“Of course I’m not, you and doctor Orfield have made that perfectly clear.”

“I have to do this, okay?”

“I don’t know where you get this finality from,” she stood up from her chair, “it’s just a shitty little lab with a shitty little plaque. This is hardly career-defining work we’re doing here, hardly changing the world. Nothing’s going to change if you decide to pull out.” She stopped talking and the room felt almost deathly quiet.

“I appreciate everything you’ve done for me doctor, I really do. And I even see where you’re coming from. I think you can understand, I don’t like regret following me around.”

“I can understand,” she said, putting her hand on my shoulder, “But understand this; I won’t be there to protect you from him. He’s going to push you and push you, and you may not come out of it feeling as good as you do now.”

“Well, I’m going to have to take that risk, doctor,” I put my hand on top of hers, “I hope we can meet under better circumstances next time.”

“I really do hope everything goes alright for you,” she said as she lifted a box with all her knick-knacks. I held the door for her as she trotted past me and lead me out of her office, down that long grey hallway.

“We’re ready! Everybody, the moment has arrived,” Orfield announced to the rec room. It was One O’clock; they were going to pull me out around Three for observation. Orfield thought I wouldn’t last longer than an hour. I wouldn’t have bothered showing up if I thought I couldn’t do more than two.

“The palpitations are gonna hit you immediately,” he sighed, flipping a few dials on the console before pushing me gently through the screeching doorway, “there’s just no way around it.”

“Should I take something for that? Maybe a Beta Blocker.”

“No, no, wouldn’t want to taint the results. That’s what this trial is for, to test how long you can do on your own. We’ll see to it that you’re alright from out here.”

We walked through the still life of foam and metal, wire and wood. Frank watched us, his hollow sockets intensified in the dim light. The only change was a new high-back swivel chair in the middle of the room. My resting place for the next few hours.

“Doctor Orfield,” I said feeling the muffled weight of the foam push back against my words, “If I call out you’ll be able to hear me on the other side, right?”

He smiled, “Of course, Johnny. We’ve got all our eyes on you...”

I could barely hear him so I waited for him to continue, but that was all he said to calm my nerves, “Why did you have to fire Juliet?”

His eyes squinted, “Sorry John, I’m having some trouble hearing you,” he leaned down to speak inches from my face, the only way I could fully understand what he was saying, “I let her go. I’m sorry about your personal relationship but it was a personnel decision, not something you should be worried about. Keep your mind loose, now, you’re gonna need it in here.” He turned back to the command center and swirled his finger around in the air, signaling that we were ready to go. With a screech and a clamor, the door set closed and thudded to a halt, sealing me within and cutting off the cool air that had been drifting in from the console room.
 

Minute Zero:

The lights are off. Immediately my eyes struggle to adjust. It’s almost too dark, in a way. It’s so dark I can’t see what else is in the room with me. But I know what’s here, I know it’s just me, the chair, and Frank over there in the corner. If I keep thinking to myself, for that’s all I really have in here, then I should come out of this alright. Just a matter of waiting out the clock. Feels like the fellowship all over again. Isn’t that right Frank? He can’t speak, he hasn’t earned that right yet.

Minute One:

Gotta stop shaking my knee, I keep bouncing it in place, making the whole floor shake. Can almost hear the chicken wire crinkle under my feet. What if Orfield just stole all that wire from his neighbor’s coop? Wouldn’t put it past him. God, this is uncomfortable. This chair and the floor. Wish I could just take off my shoes and relax for a bit, really take advantage of this space. I can yell as loud as I want to, I just don’t really feel like yelling right now. Honestly, the worst thing so far is just the boredom. What in Hell am I supposed to do in here? I can’t sing, I can’t whistle, I can’t even hum a tune. This is so fucked.

Minute Two:

Any minute now Dr. Orfield is going to burst through the door, I just know it. He’s going to come in singing praises and spouting jokes. And what did he mean by our “personal relationship?” Did he think Talbot and I were...oh, no wonder he let her go. I’ll have to send her a gift basket or something when I get out. Until then, I’m just waiting in place, like time’s stopped. There’s no way to tell how long it’s been, but it can’t be more than a couple minutes. It’s so strange, it feels like something is going to happen. Like if I just wait patiently enough without disturbing the silence, someone’s going to come for me. I just have to keep waiting.

Minute Three:

I’m up now, that much I’m sure of. Not quite sure where I am, but the ground is under my feet and the air is still very much around me. I can’t hear a thing, not even a creak in the walls or a fly buzzing around or anything. It took me a little while to stand up just because the sounds of my joints stretching, I could hear it! I could hear the sound, it was like nothing I’d ever heard before. Imagine a stretchy rubber band, a giant one, and it’s being pulled and warped and the tension is about to give. To think that happens every time I stand up. There it is, again and again.

Minute Five:

At least my eyes are starting to adjust to the darkness. That’s Frank over there in the corner, I think. Either Frank or someone’s been standing there for the past few minutes. Could you imagine if that is someone, okay now I have to check. No, good, it’s just Frank. Whew, almost psyched myself out. He’s not going anywhere. I guess neither am I for the next few hours.

Minute Eight:

This must be what an immigrant in the back of a truck feels like. Not sure where they’re going to end up or if they’re even going to make it out alive. That feels really poignant, I should write that one down. Maybe if I try really hard I can remember that. Oh who am I kidding, I’m not going to remember. My memory is so static, so fixated on those certain events. I can remember exactly what kind of day it was when I had my first day of school, but ask me what the weather was last week and it’s like I wasn’t even there. Almost like these gaps reveal a lot more than the actual memories. Huh? Is something there? Oh, there’s a strange shadowy thing right in the—no it’s nothing. I thought it was a snake or something. False alarm. It moved across the floor, though, I could swear it. Maybe I should close my eyes for a few minutes.

Minute Thirteen:

That stupid U2 song that was playing at the bar yesterday is still stuck in my head. Can’t believe it, I was just singing it like ten minutes ago and now it’s back again. Every time I turn around I hear new sounds coming from my body, things I’ve never heard. I can hear moaning from my stomach, every beat of my heart, even the breath creeping in from my lungs and back out through my bronchioles. With each minute I hear more and more. Where have these noises been my whole life? Just going unnoticed, left unheard? I hear the inside of my ears, my muscles stretching, and contracting to bring my invisible hand to my face. There’s no way to hear these sounds outside of this room because to listen closely to that mess we call the human body necessitates undivided attention. To think, if I hadn’t called Dr. Orfield that day, I never would have heard these sounds. 

Minute Twenty-One:

I think it was Apollinaire who said “People quickly grow accustomed to being the slaves of mystery.” I’m not accustomed, I’m trapped. He died before me, but if I can bring his words into this room maybe they will ring louder than my own.

Minute Thirty-Four:

I pace back and forth between sections of the room. If I can’t stand then I’m nothing. It must be at least an hour by now, maybe more. The problem with pacing is that each lap gets smaller and smaller. Each time I circle back to where I started, I find I’ve travelled less distance. Are the walls absorbing the space now? The sound of my body is making my head sore, the defeating clamor of sound. If I try not to listen to it, I hear it more, but when I try to listen to it, I feel lonely. If I could find the door maybe I could let someone out there know, let them know that I’m still here. They need me in here more than out there, after all.

Minute Fifty-Five:

I’m sure nobody’s coming for me, I’m sure of it. They said it was only going to be a few hours, so how come they aren’t here yet? My hands are getting cold. I can try to rub them together but what’s the point? How are they supposed to know when to let me out if they can’t hear me? It seems like every time I ask a question the answer gets further away. Time is so fickle.

Minute Eighty-Nine:

If only Talbot were in here too. She was so nice, Jewish on her mother’s side if I remember correctly. Why’d I have to get angry with her? She wanted to keep me out of this room. She never told me why.

Minute One Hundred Forty-Four:

These people make assumptions of my ignorance. I’m not cartoonish. I outperformed every expectation and yet nobody wanted me. They ignored me because I showed real ambition. It’s been a while now, hasn’t it? Feels like forever ago I was arguing with Dr. Talbot. I don’t need your help now. The time for that has long passed. Thanks for everything.

Minute Two Hundred Thirty-Three:

The room itself is actively persecuting me, beating me down into the floor. I’m standing in it, waiting to be spit out God knows where. It can’t be called sound at all. I can’t see my hands, they’re gone. They didn’t take me with them.

Minute Three Hundred Seventy-Seven:

We hide away from our fears and shy from any challenge that might bring us closer to our real self. Somebody left a shoe in here. I found it in the corner over by Frank, that bastard. He must be hoarding them, or maybe he found a way out. Who did he steal it from? This is quite concerning, great cause for concern.

Minute Six Hundred Ten:

They’re not coming for me they’re not coming for me. I’ve screamed. I’ve yelled. I’ve screamed a thousand times, they can’t hear me. I’m not getting out of here if they can’t hear me. Where are they? I’m screaming as loud as I can and I can’t even make a sound. She was right, there’s nothing here. The devil’s left me here because this is Hell. I interrupted him again, oh no. I can see Frank moving again. He keeps telling me to look for the light, but what light? All I can see is light.

Minute Nine Hundred Eighty-Seven:

Can anyone really blame me? My father was a terrible man. I remember that time he just took off without telling anyone and three days later he was back like nothing had happened. Mom would just watched through the window for hours at a time. And me, I was just hiding in the basement. Hiding down there like a rat waiting for my chance to strike. I watched her cry over him.

Minute One Thousand Five Hundred Ninety-Seven:

He locked me in a closet when I was seven. Did you know that? He did. I flunked out of math and English and he wouldn’t have it. He grabbed my arm hard, I thought I was getting the belt but it was worse. He pushed me in there and I was screaming and begging for him to let me out. He told me I wasn’t worth anything if I couldn’t do math. Told me he was going to leave me in there until I promised to study. I screamed and nobody heard me and I’m stuck here. Did you know the man you loved could do something like that?

Minute Two Thousand Eighty-Four:

you’ll be able to hear me on the other side, right?

all our eyes are on me                                                                                      116

Minute ???:

I want to sleep and dream of that child

I want to die and know his face

That world so gently laid down before us

I died to save the one I can’t forget

The child no longer brought here