She was sitting there, eyes staring at the television as if she were watching the program. But the reflection of the dancing images on the screen in her glassy eyes revealed that those images were not penetrating beyond the surface of her eye—she was focusing on something else, something invisible to all but her. Her fingers slightly scratched against her arm, leaving faint white marks that faded away when the blood rushed back to the spot. She was picking at a blister—a blister that was developing on her brain.
That was how she pictured it, anyway. Her emotional and mental stress, when it became powerful enough to hurt her, would begin to develop a small and painful blister on her brain that would throb and twinge relentless. If the distress began to ease away, the blister would simply lose its swelling and disappear on its own—but oftentimes her stresses would gain strength and the blister would begin to fester and grow.
Right now the blister had manifested on the lower left base of her skull, right where her brain and spine connect at the neck. Occasionally she could be seen twitching her head or rolling her shoulders slightly as she attempted to relieve the tension and pain caused by the unwanted scab throbbing inside her head. She could see it in her mind’s eye—bright red and pulsating in some sort of mocking way, taunting her with its presence and letting her know that she couldn’t dislodge it. Something that most would consider small and insignificant, she had discovered was something much worse. She had no control, no power over it—and it plagued her with its tormenting, mocking pain just to amuse itself.
For a moment her whole body tremored in pain before she closed her eyes for a few seconds and returned her empty, transfixed gaze back to the television. Her fingers traced more roads down her arm, the white lines slowly turning pinkish and remaining on her skin instead of fading away. She was dwelling on the cause of her ailment, trying to process and understand the situation that had injured her brain. But the wound was too fresh and it was far too soon for her to be able to properly address the problem. Instead of leaving it alone, the poor girl prodded and accosted it relentlessly—the same way a child picks at a scab. In her misguided attempts to heal herself, she was pouring too much rubbing alcohol on a fresh and open wound… and while at first, the rubbing alcohol was helping, it was now doing nothing but harm—stinging sharp, eating away at the flesh, burning already inflamed and sensitive skin… seeping into the bloodstream and poisoning from within.
Pressure began forming in the space between the matter of her brain and the hard bone of her skull. Precious limited space began flooding with a tense and expanding force that gnawed away at what little relief the gap provided. The blister grew large enough that its throbbing red surface rubbed against her skull and caused intense, nauseating waves of agony to seep through to the muscles in her neck and shoulders. That accursed little blister was beginning to ravage its way through her body, much like it was already tearing away at her psyche.
So much destruction—all caused by a damn blister.
She was beginning to feel nauseated and retreated to her room. But despite this space normally being a safe place in which she sought sanctuary, for the time it had turned into an examination room. She stared into the mirror, looking back at the ill-looking girl that forlornly gazed back—cheeks slightly flushed from earlier anger; eyes dull, red, and watery from the abrupt downpour that stormed out of her minutes ago; face slightly green from nausea caused by all of the anguish. She looked harshly at this frail child and felt her mouth trying to curl up into a disgusted snarl. From somewhere in her throat, the faint purring of a nasty growl rumbled through her vocal cords. Her fingers scraped trails down her arms, leaving red lines to remind her of their path. She tried to drown it all in more proverbial rubbing alcohol by trying to understand her plight and calm her anguish—but the healing was proving toxic and she writhed in a distressed rage.
The examination room transformed now into a cold prison cell. She lied down on the hard, unforgiving cot and stared up at the ceiling. The rhythmic, painful quivering in her skull seeped down through her shoulders and into her spine. It rattled her stomach and made her severely nauseous. Her head began to feel as if it was swelling, much like that blister that was refusing to be dormant on her brain. She shut her eyes in a desperate effort for some sort of relief, but her eyes burned and stung as they lay against her eyelids; the deprivation of her sense of sight heightened her ability to feel. She whimpered to herself and mentally cried.
​ Please make it stop. Please make it go away.
She could almost hear that blister, which now had festered and filled with so much thick pus that it grew painfully hard—the blister that had developed a white crown atop its red surface, almost as if it were wearing a trophy of its accomplishment upon its twisted little head—taunting her as it had developed a soul.
​You can’t stop me—you will feel whatever I want you to feel. I control you.
But this couldn’t be—a nasty little wound cannot speak and she knew it. She could rationalize this in her mind all she wanted… but her mind was located in her brain, which was being twisted and manipulated by a twisted, insane monster. The pressure in her head was immense and strangling her brain, depriving it of the ability to operate clearly. Her head was swollen and felt as though it would burst if anything sharp dare to so much as caress it. Her eyes were blurry and throbbing; her stomach sick and her heart racing. The damn pressure boiling in her head was now billowing throughout her entire being, and she couldn’t stop it.
Hot tears streamed down her face, feeling more like blood than saline. She furiously wiped them away, scratching her face and leaving wounds for any tears she missed to seep into—literally pouring salt into the wound. She felt helpless—and felt rage for being so pathetic. She couldn’t even manage to help herself… no, everything was to her detriment. How could every last little thing she try be for naught? All because of one little stressor... one little mental injury…
One little brain blister…
She peered up once more into the mirror at the sobbing, miserable girl reflected back at her. This image inspired such cold rage… such a strong hatred… from the depths of her chest, a burst of energy rocketed up through her throat and into her mouth. Rushing out of her was a sharp cry of fury—and when that sound escaped her lips the pain in her head reached its zenith.
She heard in the back of her mind a horrid cracking sound—and when that mental gunshot erupted in her ears, the blister on her head gave one massive spasm and ruptured with an awesome violence. The nasty poison that had been brewing and stewing in the cauldron of inflamed skin had matured into a most vile elixir that now infected her brain and began to make its way down her spine and through her veins. Her head felt as is if had suddenly exploded and her vision even grew temporarily blind as if a bright bolt of lightning struck just before her feet. When her senses returned back to her, there was nothing—her eyes saw a blurred mass of fuzzy colors and shapes; her ears heard the hollow whisper of empty nothingness; the nerves in her body that had been writhing with intense painful sensations all now were dead.
Her motions became robotic as she stared at the girl she had just momentarily ago been so repulsed by. The girl was the only form she could appear to make out, but she lingered for only a moment. As her eyes met those of her reflection’s, the girl in the mirror seemed to smile almost sadly for a split second before fading away into the blurry oblivion that was now all around. She blinked and it was then that she realized the girl had become nothing but a ghost. Her body received its relief at last—numbed so much now that it was effectively dead—as she returned her head to her pillows. The prison cell was gone—now it was a closed, empty space that felt as cold and still as a casket—as she exhaled a quavering breath that contained both great pain and sedated relief. Nothing now... as she stared up at the ceiling, there was absolutely nothing. The corners of her mouth unconsciously seemed to roll up in the slightest of smiles… if only due to disorientated bliss. And to think it had all been the result of one little injury…
One little blister…
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