Following the death of an uncle, a woman moves through a CT scanner to the brink of her own mortality.

Originally published in Going Some Place: Creative Nonfiction Across Canada, edited by Lynne Van Luven, Coteau Books (2000).

Beep. Take a breath and hold it.

That is all.

Beep. Take a breath and hold it.

That is all.

Beep. Take a breath and hold it.

The machine gives the command and I obey, sucking in air as if through a straw. But have I taken in enough? My lungs are so full they quiver. Perhaps I have taken too much.