Alan, a college student, learns from a neighbor's phone call that his mother has had a stroke. Wasting no time, he runs to catch a ride that will take him to the Central Maine Medical Center. But the whole way to the center turns into one endless nightmare... On March 14, 2000, the author was the first in history to publish this story on the Internet without simultaneously releasing it in paper version. Each user could download an electronic copy by paying $2.5. Although Stephen King sold $450,000 worth of copies in the first three days, this experiment, which was supposed to show whether new ways to profit from intellectual property such as a book, was possible, did not satisfy Stephen King with the end result.