Doctor Sleep

Before dying, Barry told Crow that Abra was watching. The pornography—which he planned to display to Abra, which is why he went to District X to buy the adult film—shocked her enough that he glimpsed her appearance in the moment of vulnerability. He realized that the image of the train he’d been seeing was false, something they were showing him as a distraction. Crow Daddy informed Rose, who had left the decision making up to him at that point.

After being left in Aniston, he waits outside Emma’s house. When he sees the two girls leave, he recognizes Abra and calls Andi, but the call fails. When Billy leaves the truck, Crow manages to inject him with a sedative and shoves him back into the vehicle. From Emma’s house, Abra mentally watches the gunfight at the rest stop. She looks outside and sees Billy behind the wheel just as she hears Rose. She pushes her out of her head, sees Crow Daddy, and runs. He chases and injects her.

Abra says his friends are dead before he puts her in Billy’s truck and calls Rose. She says to kill Abra and surrender to the cops as a last resort. Crow Daddy finds a pistol in the glove compartment.

Abra wakes later. Crow Daddy says he’ll kill Billy unless she behaves. She is drugged and sluggish. He makes her gas up the car at a station before injecting her with another drop and letting her go to the restroom. She tries to contact Dan and hears Crow honking the horn.

Dan remembers Dick saying, “You will remember what was forgotten” (390), as Dave blames him for Abra’s capture. Dan says he can call the Deanes to see if they have noticed anything unusual, if he can be casual. They get their phone service back near dusk. When Dave calls to check with Mrs. Deane, she says Abra left earlier after complaints of menstrual cramps, which is when Billy saw them leave the house.

At the Stone house, Dave screams when he sees Abra’s backpack in the open garage. Dan instantly wants to drink but surrenders the urge in light of their bigger goal: “Dan had no problem with the Higher Power thing, because he had a bit of inside information. God remained an unproven hypothesis, but he knew there really was another plane of existence” (394).

Dan tells Dave to call Lucy and says that he and John have other business in Boston. He completely opens his mind as they travel. He gets a faint trace of Abra outside Boston and tells her that they have to do “swapsies” (397). This means that they are going to switch bodies. Abra will be driving the truck, using Dan’s body, and Dan will inhabit her body, wherever it is. They will see through the others’ eyes.

Abra screams with Dan’s vocal cords as Dan sees a man burst into the women’s room wherever Abra is. In the truck, Crow Daddy says Abra can’t lie to him again or he’ll shoot Billy in the stomach. Dan tries to find the powerful part of Abra that moved the spoons. He walks through her mind and pulls the switches that he sees.

Crow Daddy suddenly feels pain in his head. Abra stares as his gun grows heavier. Then, against his will, Crow points the gun at himself, but then resists for a moment, turning it back on Billy. Billy slams against Crow Daddy and the gun goes off between them. Then he turns the gun on Crow Daddy and breaks his wrists. The gun goes off, killing Crow Daddy, who disappears.

The True Knot members hear Rose screaming. She says they’re going to take steam and then get Abra. Some think they should let her go because she might not be worth the risk, but Rose says the girl is their only hope at not getting sick. As she rallies them, she hears Abra in her head, saying that she is coming to her.

Using Abra’s body, Dan buries the gun and Crow’s clothes under some leaves. Abra tells him that Crow shot her in the hand. Dan opens a shaken soda that sprays Billy, which wakes him fully. He drives to the Crown Motel and takes Abra inside, who is happy that they hurt Rose. She talks with Dave on the phone, and then Dan talks with Billy. Abra says none of the True are currently nearby. Rose takes steam and dares Abra to come find her.

Dan tells Dave to bring Lucy to the hospital after they drop him at Chetta’s facility. At the hospital, Dan tells a nurse they are there to transfer Concetta to hospice. Her room is filled with photos of Abra. Dan whispers something in her ear and helps her pass.

Lucy and Dave enter, and Lucy tells Dan to get away from her. That is when Dan tells Lucy that he is her half-brother because they shared a father. He also tells them about his father and the night he broke Danny’s arm. Dan noticed that Abra rubbed her mouth just like Jack. Before she died, Chetta told Dan she’d had an affair with an English professor, who was Dan’s father. He then sleeps for three hours and dreams that his father is chasing him. Dan says Concetta probably gave up on Jack Torrance by the time she learned she was pregnant. He tells Lucy about his history with Abra before he asks to use her computer to look at the Bluebell Campground.

Rose hears several members of her group leaving in the night. She is frustrated, but now the steam will go further. A woman named Silent Sarey enters. She was Andi’s partner, and Rose breathes steam into her and promises revenge.

Dan gives Abra a mission to infuriate Rose. She calls the Overlook Lodge and asks for Rose, then says she’ll call again in five minutes. Long Paul gives Rose the message. When she calls back, Abra calls her a coward and compares the True Knot to hyenas. She challenges Rose to a one-on-one confrontation, at five o’clock on Monday at Roof O’ the World, a viewing platform at the campground. Abra laughs about Crow Daddy’s death and Rose hangs up.

Exhausted and aching, Dan thinks of an AA tenet: “If you can’t love anybody today, at least try not to hurt anybody” (452). When he looks in the mirror, he sees flies on his own face.