VIMH

[WP] A woman has been hearing voices for her entire life. One day on a routine medical checkup doctors find out she has a brain tumor and, when she's about to be given anaesthesia for the surgery to remove the tumor, the voices tell the woman goodbye.

*****

Don't, don't, don't, the voice implored. I ignored it. I marched into the lobby to register.

Seriously, you're gonna die.

"Fine with that," I mumbled grimly.

The receptionist paused in her typing and looked up, pleasantly puzzled. "Pardon me?" she asked.

I blushed a little. "Nothing. Just a little pre-op nerves."

"Of course," she agreed smoothly, encircling my wrist with a plastic bracelet.

You're freaking crazy, the voice complained as I followed a nurse down a long white hall.

This was not an unusual phenomenon. That voice had always spoken in my head, quite clearly and independently. I thought of it sort of like Jiminy Cricket for a while, you know--my conscience or some crap--until it became obvious that the voice was distinctly not divine in nature. Far from it. It was actually pretty self-interested, whiney, sheisty, and obnoxious.

I was long used to its commentary and mostly ignored it. Everyone's mind did weird stuff, I told myself. Internal monoogue or whatever. It wasn't like I thought it was real. I wasn't "crazy," right?

I was feeling pretty sheepish at the moment. I ought to be terrified, because I was having brain surgery in a few hours, but honestly I was more concerned with what my records might say about my mental state.

You see, the voice had finally gotten to me not long ago. That constant grating nag, the shots at my judgement, my appearance, my habits. The voice was just an asshole, tbh, and god did it SUCK to have a random asshole just yukking it up in your skull.

I was feeling low in the first place that night because it was Saturday and I'd been stood up for a date. Instead of being out with a fun bachelor with a sociology degree, I'd been scrolling my phone on the couch, minding my own damn business, when the voice piped up,

You really should lower your standards.

"Yeah yeah."

No really, like, we're never gonna get any action this way.

"We?"

Hell yeah, what did you think, I'm just some kind of nebula? I have needs too.

"Ew! Dude. Stay out of my sex life."

What sex life?

"Augh! Quit...being...a...shit!!!" I screamed, cracking. With each word, I slammed my head sideways into the wall.

The voice went quiet for a minute, which gave me time to realize I had probably just given myself some kind of concussion. My ears were ringing. My vision was sparkly. Nausea welled up under my ribs.

Reluctantly, I decided I'd better get that checked.

I called an uber and went to the ER, where the sheepishness commenced. But then, one CT scan later, a very serious lab-coated specialist was talking about "minor concussion," and then "incidental findings," "shadow on the scan," "further testing..."

I began hyperventilating gently. Trust me. Trust me and my antagonistic inner monologue to bash my stupid skull and then just incidentally have a freaking brain tumor.

Further testing was done. The tumor was a solid mass curled within my superior temporal gyrus, whatever the hell that was. It was about the size of a gumball. The surgeon felt confident that it was a discrete mass and could be safely removed.

All through the diagnostic process, the voice gaslit me furiously.

Hypochondriac. You aren't seriously going to go through with all this are you?

Freaking brain surgery? Are you nuts?

They're gonna shave your head, you know.

What if they screw you up for good?

I persisted. The tumor was probably benign, but it was taking up a fair amount of space in my skull that was probably needed for whatever brains I had to put there. And it was...gross. Knowing it was there, lurking in my healthy tissue, a foreign thing. When I closed my eyes I saw that ovoid shadow on the CT. Despite the voice trying with increasing desperation to convince me otherwise, I scheduled the surgery.

Dumbass, was the last thing I heard as the anaesthesiologist counted down from ten.

I woke with a headache and a weird silence inside. No comment from the voice. Not even a grumble. There was a nurse at my bedside. She informed me that my surgery had been a success, but there was something a bit strained about her chipper smile.

It was later when the sugeon made a visit. I wasn't feeling too horrible, considering I'd basically just been trepanned. That shortly ceased.

Pathology had confirmed my diagnosis. Intracranial teratoma. I had had unabsorbed and slowly maturing fetal tissue from a doomed parasitic twin lodged inside my brain.

All my life.

The last thing I heard before I brgan uncontrollably screaming was,

"...it had teeth."

*****

THE END.