Migraines and Metamorphosis
by L. B. Zinger
Part 1 appears in this issue.
conclusion
Yes, I remember you from yesterday, Doctor. I roll the word on my tongue. You had a lot of questions, but I’m not sure you got the answers you were expecting. I understand that you don’t believe in dissociation during migraine headaches, but it happens to me. I’d like to debate that, but I see you shaking your head already. Your hair is tied back tightly again, but today you have a single strand falling over your eyes. I’d stick it back in the bun for you, but my hands are chained to this bar in the center of the table.
I slept well. No, I didn’t have any nightmares. Of course I dream: I dreamt about walking on the beach at Cape Cod again, but there wasn’t anyone else there. I saw shells and gulls and pieces of driftwood. The tide was out and I could walk out on the sand bar for miles. Yes, it was very relaxing.
You bring up my book of Scandinavian Fairy Tales and ask for a name or an author. I shake my head. The book has been long destroyed. The pictures were torn out and someone colored the pages with a marker. It’s all in the past. I shake my head that there’s nothing more I can tell you.
You want me to tell you about other migraines I’ve had where I seem to be somewhere else?
I really don’t like to talk about my migraines because sometimes just talking triggers them. I can’t control them as well as I used to before...I stop talking. That ventures into an area I don’t want to discuss. I sense your eagerness to press on, but I really don’t think it’s a good idea.
Okay, we can talk about my marriage. I married my husband when I was twenty-three and had my son when I was twenty-five. He was a beautiful baby. No, there weren’t any problems with the pregnancy, and he was beautiful. For a time, everything was perfect. I was able to nurse him. And while I was nursing him, I didn’t have any migraines. None at all. It was a miracle.
I don’t want to talk any more about my son. I don’t know what happened. It will make me sick to talk about it. Can I get a glass of water?
You ring for the guard, who brings me two plastic cups with water and my noon pills. I drink the water and palm the pills, sliding them under my buttocks. You don’t seem to notice.
I’ll try to be helpful. What else do you want me to tell you? Yes, we can talk about other experiences I had during my migraines.
A lot of times I was just sleeping when I had the dream about the beach on Cape Cod, but it wasn’t really Cape Cod, was it? I remember one time I tried to get on the road leading away from the beach and walk into a town I could vaguely see in the distance. There was an old guardhouse with a gate rusted and broken. There wasn’t a guard, so I walked toward it.
As I approached there was the sound of hoofbeats, and from behind the dunes came an armored soldier riding a warhorse, who pointed his lance at me and nudged me back to the beach. There was no face, just a helmet with a shiny steel visor from which he glared at me with cold silver eyes.
That time, I woke up sweating, my heart pounding, with a headache so intense that I thought my head would explode. I ran to the bathroom to vomit and woke up on the floor with my hands cut and bleeding. See, you can still see scars. No, I didn’t cut myself; I don’t do that. No, I’ve never even thought of suicide; that record isn’t true. That time I actually took some painkillers for my headache, but all they did was make me sick.
That last dream? It has happened over and over again. The soldier never touches me or does anything other than threaten me and push me back onto the beach. I’m cold and frightened and don’t have any shelter, but I’m not allowed to leave. Sometimes there are animals: cats, wolves, lizards, snakes that come after me, but I fight them off with rocks and sticks.
What do I think it means? I haven’t thought about it much. In the Fairy Tales, the enemy comes from the sea, but I’m not the enemy! I’m not going to attack the village!
No, I don’t remember specific dates and times of any other episodes and I don’t want to talk any more about it today. You write something on the computer and the monitor reflects off your glasses. The light makes my vision flicker.
I take a drink of water, clutching the cup tightly. My thoughts are racing, unfocused.
I look at you under my eyelashes. Today you have on a pink pointelle twinset and a gold chain necklace with some shimmering pendant on it. It catches the light and reflects it into my eyes. I don’t like it and I look away. The fluorescent lights in the room flicker once, twice. Not good either. It is close to midday and the sun is breaking through the clouds to shine into our little room. The light is too much for my eyes. I close them and start to shuffle my feet.
You don’t look up.
The light, the pendant and the sun are bothering me. I’m worried that a migraine is coming on and shut my eyes again. I’m cold.
You ask me if I am all right.
I’m not sure. I think I’m getting a migraine. I feel like I’m losing control. I ask you how long today’s session will be, but you don’t answer. You don’t notice that I’m sweating and shifting in my seat. I force myself to stay calm and pinch the muscle below my thumb. I’ve read that acupressure there helps prevent migraines.
You ask me about my son again.
I suspect there’s no way I can continue to avoid this subject. I check my vision, my hearing, my level of euphoria. It’s touchy. I could be okay, but you never know. I tell you about Adam, my beautiful baby boy, and how he was an engaging, precocious toddler of three. I was anticipating going back to work full time in a few weeks and everything was arranged with a good preschool and a safe place for him to stay while I was at work. There were marital troubles, too — a difference of opinion about work schedules and work-sharing — but nothing out of the ordinary.
As I tell you this, the edge of my vision starts to shimmer and tingle. The dancing lights start to move closer to the center of my eyes. I feel like I must appear out of focus to you, but you are writing on your computer and don’t notice. I am agitated. This is not what I want to happen today. I knew that Adam should have been off limits.
For twenty minutes, I wrestle with my loss of vision and stumble through the story about how I don’t know what happened to Adam and how upset I am that he has permanent voice damage from whatever it was you say I did. I tell you how hard I have cried because I can’t see him. It’s been over ten years. He is a teenager who cannot speak. His father hasn’t sent a picture or a video since I was released from the hospital, and I don’t even know where they live.
You keep typing.
As I reach the end of the tale, my vision clears and I can see you again. You look worried about something I said and make me repeat my recollections of the day Adam got hurt, not once but twice. I know that the statements match, since I’ve repeated them over and over for ten years.
You finally look at me and ask me to please tell you what really happened to Adam. You are calm; I am not. A bubble of frustration breaks inside me, and I blurt out that he was coloring in my books and tearing out pages. I grabbed the markers away from him. Then he wouldn’t stop screaming. My head was about to explode. I must have passed out. When I woke up, my hands were around his little neck and my husband was pulling me off and yelling at me.
You nod, and I see a slight smile of satisfaction. You are happy to have broken through my walls and complete your assessment of me.
The headache begins to encroach on my thoughts. I am becoming unable to speak clearly, and my thoughts are in a muddle.
You don’t seem to notice.
I stare at the panic button between us, and my hand reaches toward it. I’ve had enough. I don’t feel safe. I almost push it.
You don’t see.
You ask more questions, but I don’t hear you. My eyes are closed, blocking out the light. I’m somewhere else. My eyes open and once again I am on that stormy, rock-strewn beach. The sand is black, hot, and there is a carcass of an old wreck on it. It’s the same, but not the same. The wind blows mightily from the north. I’m standing at the water’s edge where it touches the hot, black sand. There are no footprints leading to the water. How did I get here? I am tempted to lie down to get warm. The wind is cold and my hospital gown isn’t much protection.
Ahead of me is a path leading to houses I can barely make out in the near darkness. There are a few flickering lights in the distance and trails of smoke from the chimneys. I shiver and know I need to move faster to find shelter. There is danger in leaving the beach, but I have to try. I never know how long I will be in this place and how much time I have before the predators find me.
My feet shuffle slowly toward the path. Why can’t I move faster? I look down. Although my ankles are shackled and connected to my legs, my feet have elongated, with prehensile toes and long savage nails. My hands have become webbed claws and the chain swings back and forth between the loose cuffs. I touch my face which is sharp and pointed and feel rows of sharp teeth where my mouth should be. My heart thumps wildly, and I try to focus on who I am and where I belong. I remember that I was just in an interrogation room when the headache started, but I don’t know how to get back. I shuffle faster. I am almost at the path. Maybe this time I can get off this cursed beach.
A bolt of lightning shreds the sky, and a sound distracts me. I turn to look. Crawling out of the sea is a large snake with a forked tongue reaching out for me. It stares at me with dull, black eyes. I start to run, but the beast slithers faster than I can move, crushing boulders with its massive body. The tail loops around me and scoops me up to its mouth. It examines me with alien eyes and explores me with its tongue. I wrap my hands around its neck, using the chain to give me additional leverage. I pull and try to cut off its breath. I am sweating, panting, and sure that I am going to die.
Suddenly, I am no longer on the beach and find myself sprawled over the table between us. The end of an electrode is buried in my left shoulder, and I am numb on my left side. I hear alarms and realize that someone has pushed the panic button. I look down. My right hand is wrapped around your throat, clutching the chain holding the pendant, and pulling you closer to me, tightening as your tongue protrudes through your teeth and your breaths become shallower and shallower. The chain around my handcuffs now binds us both to the table. Your eyes are glazed and unfocused. Good. I told you I didn’t want to talk about my migraines.
The guards unwrap my hands from your throat and begin CPR on you. My body is wrapped in a straitjacket because I’m too dangerous without it. I feel no remorse, only contempt for you as I watch them working on you. I told you I didn’t want to talk about Adam, but you didn’t listen. You watched your screen and not me.
Copyright © 2021 by L. B. Zinger
