Sleep Study

Chapter 1: The Orientation

The flyer had been taped to the bulletin board outside the campus coffee shop, half-hidden behind advertisements for tutoring services and a used futon. DeShawn Morris almost walked past it, but the number caught his eye: $2,500 for seven nights.

He stopped, coffee growing cold in his hand, and read the fine print. Sleep study. Neural imaging research. Participants must be between 18-25, in good health, with no history of sleep disorders. Contact Dr. Victoria Huang, Department of Cognitive Neuroscience.

Two thousand five hundred dollars. That was his textbooks for next semester. That was three months of not worrying about whether his meal plan would stretch to the end of the week. That was breathing room.

DeShawn pulled out his phone and took a picture of the number.

The screening interview happened three days later in a building he'd never noticed before, tucked behind the main science complex. The Aldrich Research Center, according to the small bronze plaque by the door. Inside, everything was new and expensive-looking—polished floors, soft lighting, the kind of modern furniture that probably cost more than his tuition.

Dr. Victoria Huang met him in the lobby. She was younger than he'd expected, maybe early forties, with sharp features and the kind of calm, measured way of speaking that made him feel like every word he said was being catalogued somewhere.

"Mr. Morris." She shook his hand. Her grip was firm but brief. "Thank you for coming in. Follow me."

They walked down a corridor lined with doors, each one identical except for the small numbered plaques beside them. Through a window, DeShawn glimpsed what looked like a hospital room—a bed, monitors, equipment he didn't recognize.

"This is our participant wing," Dr. Huang explained without slowing. "State-of-the-art facilities. You'll have your own room, your own bathroom. Meals are provided. We ask only that you remain on-site for the duration of the study."

"Seven nights, right?"

"Correct. You'll sleep here, eat here, and spend your waking hours here. We monitor your sleep cycles and brain activity throughout the night. During the day, you're free to study, read, use our recreation facilities. Many participants find it quite relaxing."

She led him into a small office and gestured to a chair across from her desk. The walls were covered with framed degrees and certificates—Stanford, MIT, Johns Hopkins. A photograph on the corner of her desk showed her shaking hands with someone in a suit, both of them smiling in front of a building DeShawn didn't recognize.

"Before we proceed," Dr. Huang said, settling into her own chair, "I need to ask you some questions. Standard screening. Nothing invasive."

The questions were exactly what he'd expected at first. Medical history. Medications. Sleep habits. Did he dream often? Did he remember his dreams? Had he ever experienced sleep paralysis, night terrors, or episodes of sleepwalking?

"No to all of those," DeShawn said. "I sleep like the dead, honestly. My roommate complains I could sleep through a fire alarm."

Dr. Huang made a note. "Good. That's actually ideal for our purposes." She looked up at him, and something in her expression shifted slightly. "I should tell you about one aspect of the study that participants sometimes find... unsettling."

DeShawn sat up straighter. "Okay."

"The neural imaging equipment we use is highly sensitive. It's designed to capture and record dream activity in unprecedented detail. As a side effect of this process, many participants report experiencing a common visual element in their dreams." She paused. "A figure in white."

"A figure?"

"It varies somewhat from person to person, but the core elements are consistent. A humanoid shape, dressed in white, appearing somewhere in the dream environment. Sometimes in the distance, sometimes closer." Dr. Huang's voice remained clinical, detached. "It's a known phenomenon. A kind of neural artifact generated by the interaction between the equipment and the dreaming brain. Completely harmless."

"Like a glitch?"

"Essentially, yes. The important thing—and I cannot stress this enough, Mr. Morris—is that you do not acknowledge the figure. Don't look at it directly. Don't speak to it. Don't interact with it in any way. Simply ignore it and continue with your dream as normal."

DeShawn felt a small chill run down his spine, but he forced a smile. "That's a weird instruction."

"I know. But it's based on extensive observation of participant experiences. Those who ignore the figure report no ill effects. Those who engage with it tend to experience... disrupted sleep patterns. Nightmares. The figure becomes more prominent in subsequent dreams, more intrusive. It can become quite distressing."

"So I just pretend it's not there."

"Exactly." Dr. Huang smiled for the first time. It didn't quite reach her eyes. "Think of it like a glare on a television screen. You learn to look past it."

DeShawn nodded slowly. Two thousand five hundred dollars. That was a lot of money to walk away from because of some weird dream glitch.

"I can do that," he said.

"Excellent." Dr. Huang stood and extended her hand again. "Welcome to the study, Mr. Morris. You'll begin on Monday."

---

The participant wing was nicer than his dorm room. Nicer than his apartment back home, for that matter. DeShawn set his bag on the bed and looked around: a desk with a comfortable chair, a small bookshelf stocked with paperbacks and magazines, a window looking out onto a courtyard garden. The bathroom had one of those rainfall showerheads he'd only ever seen in hotels.

"Not bad," he muttered to himself.

There were six other participants in the study, and he met them at dinner that first night. The dining room was communal, a long table set with real silverware and cloth napkins. The food was good too—better than the cafeteria, better than anything he could have afforded on his own.

Marcus was a senior, pre-med, with the kind of easy confidence that came from knowing exactly where he was going in life. "I've done three of these studies," he said, loading his plate with salmon. "Easy money. Sleep, eat, study for the MCAT. What's not to love?"

Antonia sat across from DeShawn, picking at her food. She was quiet, nervous, jumping slightly every time someone spoke too loudly. "First time," she admitted when he asked. "I needed the money for rent."

"Same," DeShawn said. "Textbooks."

The others filled in around them: Jackson, a grad student in philosophy who seemed more interested in the research itself than the payment; Bridget, a nursing student who kept asking technical questions about the equipment; Omar, who barely spoke at all and disappeared to his room as soon as dinner was over; and finally Yolanda, a theater major who treated the whole thing like an extended performance, narrating everything in a dramatic whisper.

"The figure in white," she said, leaning forward conspiratorially. "Did they tell you about it?"

"Yeah." DeShawn shrugged. "Some kind of visual artifact, right?"

"That's what they say." Yolanda's eyes gleamed. "But I've been reading about this research online. There are stories."

"What kind of stories?"

"People who didn't come back from the study. People who went crazy. People who—"

"That's enough." Marcus cut her off, his voice sharp. "Don't scare the new people with conspiracy theories. It's a sleep study, not a horror movie."

Yolanda held up her hands in mock surrender, but she was smiling. "Just saying. Keep your eyes open. Or closed, I guess, since we'll be asleep."

DeShawn laughed, but something about the conversation stayed with him as he walked back to his room. The hallway was quiet, the other doors closed. Through one of them, he heard the murmur of a television. Through another, nothing at all.

His room was exactly as he'd left it, but it felt different now. Smaller. The window that had seemed so pleasant earlier now showed only darkness, the courtyard garden invisible beyond the glass.

He unpacked his bag, arranged his books on the desk, and tried to shake the feeling that he was being watched.

---

The preparation for sleep was more involved than he'd expected. A technician named Gerald—middle-aged, soft-spoken, with the patient manner of someone who'd explained the same thing a thousand times—walked him through the process.

"These are the sensors." Gerald held up a mesh cap studded with small electrodes. "They'll monitor your brain activity throughout the night. You might feel a slight tingling sensation when we first turn on the equipment, but it passes quickly."

"Does it hurt?"

"Not at all. Most people forget they're wearing it within a few minutes." Gerald helped him into a hospital-style gown and guided him to the bed. The sheets were soft, the pillow just the right firmness. "We'll be monitoring you from the control room. If you need anything during the night, just speak aloud. We'll hear you."

"What if I need to use the bathroom?"

"The equipment is wireless. You can disconnect yourself if necessary. But try to sleep through the night if you can. It helps with the data collection."

DeShawn lay back and let Gerald fit the cap over his head. The electrodes were cool against his scalp, slightly damp with some kind of conductive gel. Gerald made small adjustments, checking readings on a tablet, murmuring to himself.

"All right," he said finally. "You're all set. Try to relax. The lights will dim automatically in about five minutes. Dr. Huang will check in with you in the morning."

"Thanks."

Gerald left, and DeShawn was alone.

The room was quiet. Too quiet, maybe—he was used to the ambient noise of the dorm, the footsteps and music and muffled conversations that formed the background of his life. Here, there was nothing. Just the soft hum of the equipment and the sound of his own breathing.

The lights dimmed, fading to a soft blue glow that reminded him of a nightlight. DeShawn closed his eyes and tried to relax.

Sleep came faster than he expected.

---

He was in his grandmother's house.

The realization came slowly, the way it always did in dreams—a gradual awareness that he was somewhere familiar, somewhere safe. The living room with its worn carpet and plastic-covered furniture. The smell of something cooking in the kitchen, something sweet and warm. Sunlight streaming through lace curtains.

DeShawn walked through the room, trailing his fingers along the back of the couch. Everything was exactly as he remembered it, exactly as it had been when he was a child. The photographs on the mantel. The old television with the rabbit ears. The Bible on the side table, its leather cover cracked and soft with age.

"Grandma?" he called.

No answer. The house was empty, but it didn't feel lonely. It felt peaceful. Like a memory preserved in amber.

He walked into the kitchen. The stove was on, a pot simmering on the burner, but no one was there. Through the window, he could see the backyard—the old oak tree, the rusted swing set, the fence that separated his grandmother's property from the neighbors.

And something else.

At the far end of the yard, near the fence, there was a figure. It was too far away to see clearly, but DeShawn could make out the basic shape: humanoid, standing perfectly still, dressed entirely in white.

He froze.

Don't acknowledge it. Don't look at it directly. Don't interact with it in any way.

Dr. Huang's words echoed in his mind. DeShawn forced himself to look away, to focus on the pot on the stove. It was full of oatmeal, thick and bubbling. His grandmother's recipe. Brown sugar and cinnamon and a little bit of butter.

When he looked back at the window, the figure was gone.

---

DeShawn woke to soft light and the sound of a door opening. Gerald was there, removing the cap from his head with practiced efficiency.

"Good morning. How did you sleep?"

"Fine." DeShawn sat up, rubbing his eyes. "Really fine, actually. That was... that was a nice dream."

"Good. Dr. Huang will want to speak with you after breakfast. Take your time getting ready."

The dining room was already half-full when DeShawn arrived. Marcus was there, looking as well-rested as DeShawn felt, along with Bridget and Jackson. Antonia came in a few minutes later, her eyes red and puffy.

"Bad night?" DeShawn asked.

She shook her head quickly. "No. Fine. Just... weird dreams."

"Did you see it?" Yolanda appeared at the table, sliding into the seat next to Antonia. "The figure?"

"I don't want to talk about it."

"I saw it." Yolanda's voice was hushed, excited. "At the edge of my dream. Just standing there, watching. It was creepy as hell, but also kind of... beautiful? Like something out of a painting."

"You're not supposed to look at it," Marcus said. "That's the whole point."

"I didn't look at it directly. I just... noticed it. There's a difference."

DeShawn thought about the figure in his grandmother's backyard. He hadn't looked at it directly either, but he'd seen it clearly enough. The white clothing. The stillness. The way it had simply stood there, waiting.

Waiting for what?

He pushed the thought away and focused on his breakfast.