By: Kevin Armor Harris

The business with the pressure in my ears, that horrid popping I had in my head that I couldn’t explain, this is what happened. I went back to the hospital, the clinician had the scan shot, up on the lightbox. I guess she felt like a film director. See this dark area here she said, this is towards the back of your skull, precisely between your ears. OK maybe she was a film director, accustomed to talking to actors. Of course I believed her, Uh-huh I said, convincingly. Size of a large marble. I asked what could be in it. I think this is the cause of your discomfort, she non-answered, as if deliberately playing out the revelation of dreadful news. Is it fluid? I asked, supposing this might be some perverse revenge for lying to them about my alcohol consumption. The question was reasonable given my primitive knowledge of physiology and medicine, or you might say, my pitiful ignorance. It might as well have been a moon crater. It’s a bubble, she said. A bubble, I mimicked—not just in the interests of maintaining my family’s reputation for gormlessness, but also conscientiously, because that is just what patients in my situation are expected to do. Good, so far. A bubble? I said again, partly to help you keep up with the fierce flow of this narrative, and this time with an almost visible rhetorical question mark to really assert myself in the role. Listen, it’s not easy relating the furious and intense pace at which this interview was conducted. The health service, notoriously, is under great pressure, and most such consultations require both participants speaking rapidly at the same time. This is called general practice. Without pausing—not allowed, see above—I asked, What kind of bubble? I think she must then have acknowledged the power and incisiveness of the intellect before her. A speech bubble, she said. At this point it is possible that I repeated her words, as I was most probably in character, which is where I am usually to be found, I honestly don’t remember. Rather cleverly, I thought, she then managed to divert attention by zooming in on the scan. Her voice slightly lower now, secretive—We sent it to the Photowhatsitometry Lab and they managed to make out what it says. What does it say, I was of course asking as she spoke. You see how attentively I was able to contribute to the professional pattern of the interaction. I am not averse to playing my part in life’s necessary momentum. It says—she looked at me rather more closely than I found comfortable—‘You have a speech bubble in your head’. This was a breakthrough of some sort, a delayed first diagnosis confirming the second opinion, which preceded it.

But the symptoms persisted, so there I was a week later once more sat staring at a snap of a blobby x-ray, which had been processed by the aforementioned lab. I asked, What does it say this time? ‘YOU ARE IN DENIAL’. What?!? In capitals? She nodded, in a noddy sort of way. Well, I’m not, I said, that’s nonsense, I’m not in denial. There was a pause—I don’t know how that sneaked in, they’re strictly prohibited. Are you sure it’s mine, it can’t be I said. I meant the scan. Well then, it must be someone else’s bubble. Quite possibly, she said, but this is your scan, we can just make out a small portion of brain there lower down.

Still the symptoms persisted, so a third time—I’m not going back after this, I’m telling you—there I was once more sat staring at the now-familiar grey map, fresh from the Photowhatsitometry Lab, asking feebly, What does it say this time? She peered. It says, ‘It’s all so meaningless, we might as well be…’ I hung, but wary of pausing I prompted, ‘Be what?’ ‘[Illegible]’ she said.[1]

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Kevin Armor Harris lives in England and writes poetry, short fiction and prose poems. His work has appeared in sources such as Dream Catcher, Short Fiction, Thin Skin, Streetcake, Modern Literature, Metaworker, Literary Yard, GaiaLit (issue 7) and Flash Fiction North.

[1] “It’s all so meaningless, we might as well be extraordinary”. Francis Bacon, https://www.stevensandswan.com/francis-bacon/revelations/excerpt