He woke on occasion to see his bedpan being changed, and to see himself being bathed by some dyke nurses. On other occasions he woke to crazy lights in his eyes and echoing questions in his dreams. Once he woke with splinters being jammed under his finger nails while a hot brand was blazing in his face and some Hispanic guy screamed questions at him; another time to water dripping on his forehead. His favorite game was when they put a shirt over his head and kept pouring buckets of water on his face. However, when they put those little metal potato chip clips on his fingers, toes, nipples—well, the one he had left—and penis, and then electrocuted him, well, that really hurt! But Mother was always there in the musky cavern at the back of his mind to comfort him.

On other occasions he woke to Joan’s scent or touch or voice—but never all three, and became erect. Once he felt himself being jerked off by an uncaring hand—one of the dyke nurses I bet—as another person held something that smelled like Joan under his nose.

On many occasions he woke in different positions, sometimes even being spun around or hung upside down. On a few occasions he woke in a half-sleeping state in a swimming pool, being walked around by some big fat black man. It was also common for him to wake up in a hot sauna wearing a rubber suit and then naked in a tub of ice and water, and sometimes in reverse order.

He woke up once naked, in an ice-coated tunnel that howled with wind. Down the hall—no it wasn’t a hall because he could not stand but had to crawl—he could see a side of meat, fresh, still bleeding, being gnawed on by two Doberman Pincers. He was hungry, had not eaten for who knows how long. He crawled quickly to them, and then one snarled.

He never felt more alive as when he was crawling faster than most people could run, naked down that icy tunnel toward the two snarling dogs. That was his favorite exercise, and the dogs tasted even better than the beef. He feasted on all three until his belly swelled up like it had a basketball in it, keeping his hands and feet warm in the freshly torn bellies of the dogs. Then came the hissing sound that he dreaded, the snakes that made you fall asleep when you were having fun.

Ma! More pudding, Ma!

He would sometimes wake to see them changing the tubes and wires or even taking tissue samples from him. Once Wong had his knee opened up looking into it with Irvine and some Jock Doc like the football teams have. In each case he still drifted off. He had no sense of the passage of time and could have been strapped to this rubber-covered stainless steel board for days, weeks or even months.