Ad Nauseam

by C. W. LaSart

  ***

  Mark was in the toiletry aisle of the grocery store the first time the voice spoke to him. It was so clear and close that he stopped immediately and looked around. He was alone.

  Minutes later, at the meat counter, it spoke again.

  “Nipe msaada!” I need help!

  Looking around again, Mark caught the eye of a man waiting at the other end of the meat case.

  “Excuse me.” Mark smiled at the portly man, who returned the smile hesitantly. “Did you just hear someone speaking Swahili?”

  The other man shook his head, then looked at his watch and mumbled something about being late before hurrying away.

  The voice spoke to him for the third time as he sat at his kitchen table, eating a meal of beef stew and French bread.

  After a thorough search of his apartment, including closets and under the bed, Mark came to the unsettling conclusion that the voice was coming from his own head.

  Mark sat on his couch with the television on, but couldn’t pay attention to the show. That foreign voice in his head kept jabbering, sometimes laughing and other times sounding angry and harsh. His pulse raced as he fought to quell his rising panic.

  What the fuck is going on with me?

  Unbidden memories of his mother raced through his head. His mother worrying over a random fever, wringing her hands so hard her knuckles cracked. Her harassing phone calls whenever he went to a friend’s house, certain the other parents could never take care of him as she could. Then the time he found her in the shower, curled into a fetal position and shrieking. The paramedics took her away in restraints as she wailed for her son. She ended up killing herself with one bullet to the roof of her mouth after leaving a hastily scrawled note of apology to her only child.

  “No.” Mark said to the empty room, then again with more force. “No!”

  He was not going crazy. He had worked too hard to get where he was in life to let it be ruined by some inherited insanity. He would ignore it. He would will the voice away. He could do this.

  Mark went into the kitchen and pulled out a rocks glass, filling it with ice. A bottle of bourbon sat on the counter, untouched since he’d started taking medicine for the Loa loa worm. He poured the amber fluid into the glass, his nervousness causing him to spill a bit on the counter. Not bothering to wipe it up, he started back to the living room, then returned for the rest of the bottle.

  The bourbon burned down his throat, but he liked the feeling. When the glass was empty, he made to fill it again but changed his mind, swigging directly from the bottle. He felt the warmth of a pleasant buzz as the voice seemed to quiet down a bit, its interjection coming less and less.

  Mark kept drinking.

  Hours later, just before he passed out on the couch, Mark heard the voice speak one more time. He couldn’t help but laugh as the phantom in his head slurred in Swahili.

  ***

  The MRI hummed and clicked around him, but Mark lay on the table unfazed, drifting in and out of consciousness from the sedatives the nurse had given him. He’d learned years ago, after a failed MRI for a torn rotator cuff, that he was claustrophobic and needed sedation to remain still for the forty-five minute procedure.

  Drifting into sleep, Mark found himself in the jungles of the Congo once again, his guide speaking softly in accented English. The man’s pleasant face swam in and out of focus, but he could hear him warning of the dangers of the jungle.

  “The gorillas aren’t the only things to fear in the jungle, Sir. It’s a haunted place, full of many bad spirits. You be careful one doesn’t hop inside you.”

  A mango fly bit his leg and Mark watched it drink his blood, knowing he should slap it away, but unable to move.

  “Stop.” He giggled drunkenly. “You’ll give me the Loa loa.”

  Something crashed to his right, unseen in the deep darkness of the inner jungle and he was afraid. The gorillas. He had to be careful not to anger them. They could be lethal. The foliage parted and something huge and pale reared up before Mark. Not a gorilla, but a Loa loa worm, freakishly large and bearing down on him with an open mouth full of razor sharp teeth.

  Mark awoke with a cry.

  “It’s all right, Mr. Hanks. The testing is done.”

  He was laying on the table, his arms held down by his sides with heavy blankets and his head wedged into place by foam cushions on each side. A nurse removed the folded washcloth from his eyes, and he blinked at the sudden brightness of the overhead fluorescents.

  “Oh my God.” Mark said to the nurse, his right eye opened wide in alarm, his left still half-lidded from sedation.

  “What is it, Mr. Hanks? Are you going to be ill?” The nurse looked concerned, placing a gentle hand on his brow.

  “I know. I know what it is!” Mark tried to sit up, but a wave of dizziness overcame him. He needed to throw up, barely making it into the wastebasket the nurse held before his face. When he was finished, he wiped his mouth with a towel, his shoulders slumped.

  “Are you okay?” The nurse asked.

  “I don’t know. But I know what it is now. I need to talk to Alex.” Mark felt cold sweat trickle down his sides, tickling across his ribcage. He tried to stand, but the nurse put a restraining hand on his shoulder.

  “I don’t think you should stand just yet, Mr. Hanks. Let’s give the sedatives a chance to wear off.” She pulled up a stool and sat in front of him, patting him reassuringly on the knee. It felt like a weird gesture to Mark, not something a stranger would do. His mind spun with the knowledge his dream had uncovered.

  “I have to talk to Alex.” He said, then vomited again.

  ***

  “I’m not crazy, Alex.” Mark leaned across the table, his eyes boring into his friend’s.

  “Not saying you are, bud. It’s just a precaution.” Alex sipped his beer and shrugged. “Given your Mom’s history.”

  “She was schizophrenic. I’m not schizophrenic. When have you ever known me to be anything other than on an even keel? Have I ever done anything crazy around you? I mean, Christ Alex, we’ve been friends for years. You of all people should know I’m not insane.”

  “I know, Mark. The MRI was clear, but maybe that worm did something we can’t see. Changed your brain chemistry, or something. I just think it wouldn’t hurt to talk to a psychiatrist. If there’s damage we can’t see, maybe he can prescribe something to make your hallucinations go away. Hell, he might be able to get you the sight back in your eye if the cause is psychiatric. Please. Just go see him. Dr. Whitehead is the best. It’s a place to start until we can figure out where to turn next.”

  Mark sat back and closed his right eye, but the left stayed open of its own accord and looked around.

  “I don’t know.” He rubbed his temples.

  “Come on. It can’t hurt anything. If nothing else, it will prove you’re not schizophrenic. And you can’t tell me it’s not digging away at the back of your mind that it’s hereditary.” Alex smiled, but his eyes remained concerned. “Just do it for me. If Dr. Whitehead can’t help you, I promise I will hook you up with whatever specialists you need.”

  Mark finished his beer and grimaced as the voice yelled its foreign gibberish in his head.

  “All right. Schedule the appointment.”

  ***

  Dr. Emmanuel Whitehead was a pleasant looking man, with just a trace of a foreign accent that lent a certain trustworthiness to his words. He appeared to be anywhere from fifty to seventy, with grey hair, slightly stooped shoulders, and compassionate blue eyes.

  Under different circumstances, Mark would’ve enjoyed the man’s company; but given what his appointment was for, he felt anxious and skeptical instead. Dr. Whitehead had him sit in an overstuffed armchair identical to the one the doctor sat in. Mark recognized the tactic, making him feel as though they were equals. He wondered if it worked on crazy people.

  “So tell me what you think is going on with you, Mark.” Dr. Whitehead smiled and glanced at a notebook on his lap. He b
egan to scratch down notes before Mark even spoke.

  “Well, I know that the Loa loa is gone, and the eye doctor can’t explain the change in my left eye—”

  “The change?” The doctor raised a brow.

  “Yeah, my eye changed from blue to brown and I lost the sight in it, though the eye doctor said everything seems to work in there.”

  “Blue to brown? It hasn’t always been that way? Fascinating. What did he suppose happened there?”

  “I told you he doesn’t know. Anyway, there’s nothing on the MRI and I’ve started hearing a voice in my head.” Mark glanced up from his hands, trying to gauge the doctor’s reaction, but the man simply regarded him without expression. “The voice seems to be speaking Swahili.”

  “How do you know it’s Swahili? Do you speak Swahili?” Dr. Whitehead’s brow furrowed a bit.

  “No, I don’t. But I spent some time in the Congo a few years back. I’m a photographer and I had an assignment to photograph the gorillas. My guide spoke English, but a lot of the people I encountered didn’t. The voice sounds like they did, and I recognize a few words.”

  “So you don’t know for a fact that it’s Swahili.”

  “No. I guess not.” Mark frowned, unsure where this was going.

  “Would it be safe to say that the voice may not be speaking a language at all? That it could be gibberish?”

  “No. It’s not gibberish. I don’t understand what he’s saying, but I know it’s a language and it sounds like Swahili. He said I need help, at one point.”

  “He?” The doctor tilted his head, looking quizzical.

  “What?”

  “You just said he. Up until now, you have referred to the voice as it.”

  “What the hell does that matter? So I said he. The voice sounds male, deep like a man’s. I mean who gives a fuck?” Mark stood and began to pace the floor. “I told Alex this was a mistake.”

  “Please, Mark. I’m just trying to help you.” Dr. Whitehead’s placating tone made Mark want to punch the man in his pleasant face.

  “That’s better.” The doctor said as Mark reluctantly returned to his seat. “Do you have an idea as to the identity of this speaker in your mind?”

  “Yeah.” The anger ran out of Mark in a rush and he wilted in the chair. “It came to me in a dream during the MRI.”

  “A dream?”

  “If you keep repeating everything I say, I swear I’m out the door.”

  “I’m sorry, Mark. I will try to refrain. You were telling me about your dream.”

  “No I wasn’t. I don’t want to talk about the dream.”

  “We can’t get to the bottom of this if we don’t discuss it, Mark.”

  “Discuss it? You just repeat everything I say and scribble in your goddamn notebook! And you keep saying my name to make me feel like we’re buddies, but I doubt you’re even paying attention to me.” Mark glanced at his watch. “The hour is almost up, anyway.”

  Dr. Whitehead set the notebook and pen on the table between them before leaning forward in his seat and folding his hands between his knees. He stared unflinchingly at Mark with his soft eyes and smiled.

  “I’m listening, Mark. I mean, I’m listening. Please tell me about the dream. You have my undivided attention.”

  “No. There’s no time left. I’ll tell you what I think, though.” Mark stood. “I don’t know how it happened, and I don’t know why, but somehow one of those jungle spirits got into my head. Maybe he hitched a ride on the Loa loa and took up shop in my brain when the thing died, but he’s there. And he’s taken over my left eye. That’s why it turned brown and I can’t see out of it. Sure it still works. But it’s working for him. And I need to stop this before he takes over something else.”

  Dr. Whitehead said nothing at first, just sat there and looked thoughtful, as if he was honestly considering the possibility of Mark’s story. He then picked up the notebook and flipped back a few pages, squinting at his own illegible writing as he reviewed something in silence. When he looked at Mark again, his face looked both grave and sympathetic.

  “Mark, it says here that your mother was diagnosed schizophrenic—”

  “Fuck you.”

  ***

  Mark sat at the kitchen table with a makeup mirror purchased from a secondhand store propped up before him. He could hear the water on the stove boiling, signaling it was almost time. He waited, just the sound of the water and the prattle of his Swahili ghost to keep him company. It had been almost a week since he had stormed out of Dr. Whitehead’s office, and Alex had called him no less than thirty times before Mark finally told him to stop.

  Someone pounded on the door and Mark got up to peek through the peephole. It was Alex, his face distorted by the lens.

  “What do you want, Alex?” He yelled through the door.

  “Let me in, Mark. I want to talk to you. I’m worried about you.”

  “Nope. Go away. I don’t have anything to say to you.”

  “Goddamnit, Mark! Open up or I’m calling the cops!” Alex’s voice broke at the end, and Mark thought he might be close to tears.

  “No good, old friend. There’s no law against refusing to leave your house. But there is one against trespassing.” Mark walked back to the table and sat down. When his cell phone rang, he shut it off without looking, certain it was Alex again. The fucker had been talking to Dr. Whitehead. He wasn’t a friend of Mark’s anymore.

  Almost time, Mark thought, leaning in close to the mirror. Better test this out first. He raised his finger toward his left eye. It snapped shut, protecting itself from the questing digit. He heard the foreign voice in his head complain, but he ignored it. Prying the lid open with the thumb and forefinger of his left hand, Mark pressed on the eyeball with his right index finger, causing the voice to shriek in pain.

  Just as I thought. I can’t feel a thing.

  Mark stood and wandered into the kitchen to collect his tools. A bottle of rubbing alcohol awaited him on the counter and the pot still bubbled away on the stove. Turning off the burner, he used a pair of tongs to retrieve a long thin blade from the boiling water and set it on the counter. Finding a pot holder in the drawer, he carefully wrapped it around the handle of the knife and grabbed the alcohol in his other hand, then returned to his seat.

  Mark hadn’t enjoyed a moment’s peace in almost a week. All day and night the voice babbled, disappearing just long enough for him to fall asleep, only to wake him moments later with mocking laughter. It was a game for the spirit, one Mark was losing. He stopped eating altogether and only drank whisky, hoping to get the ghost drunk enough that it would allow him to rest. But nothing worked. Mark knew if he didn’t do something soon, he would die of hunger and exhaustion, leaving his body vacant for the spirit to completely take over. He refused to let that happen.

  Transferring the wrapped blade carefully to his left hand, he squeezed the bottle of alcohol between his thighs, unscrewing the cap with his right. The alcohol made a hissing sound when he poured it over the knife, giving off a cloud of astringent steam that burned his good eye. Before he could lose his nerve or allow the knife to cool anymore, he touched the tip of the blade to his left cheek, just under the eye and pushed. It was amazing how easily the blade cut through the flesh of the lid, spearing the eyeball beneath with a pop. The voice in his head gibbered its agony, wailing in a language he didn’t understand, but conveying a terror that satisfied Mark.

  “Take that, you bastard!” Mark twisted the knife in the socket, his stomach churning as thick jelly and dark blood welled from the wound, running down his face in a viscous rivulet. He felt nothing but triumph as he kept cutting, slicing away at his eyelids, carving out a raw, red hole in his skull. There wasn’t as much blood as he had expected, the hot blade cauterized most of the blood vessels, but soon the knife cooled and he no longer smelled the scorched tissues.

  Mark threw the knife back into the pot and returned it to a boil.

  Not done yet.

  He didn’t hav
e to understand the language to know the spirit was alternately pleading with him and cursing him. He felt no sympathy as he waited for the knife to heat again. He was going to get rid of it even if he killed himself in the process.

  Mark regarded his face in the mirror, too tired to feel any real shock as he looked at the ragged red hole where his left eye used to be. Thick fluids still oozed down his face, and he did nothing to clean them off.

  You look like shit, old boy! he thought, unable to stop the manic giggle that bubbled up from his chest. Almost done here. Then some rest.

  With the hot blade back in his right hand, he probed the empty socket with the tip, trying to determine the best angle for his task. Bracing himself for the force that would be required to breach his skull, Mark halted at the last second, adrenaline making his heart pound in his chest like a tribal drum.

  “Oh shit! Oh shit! I almost fucked up bad there.” He said to the voice in his head, which had gone eerily quiet. “You would’ve liked that wouldn’t you? You wanted me to make that mistake. Fuck you, though. I aced anatomy.”

  Pulling the tip of the knife out of his ruined eye socket, Mark winced when the blade touched the flesh beneath his right eye. This was going to hurt like hell, but it didn’t matter. He could take it. He could take anything to quiet that voice. He had come close to fucking it all up, but had remembered just in time. That’s right, one Anatomy class fifteen years ago had saved him from disaster. He smiled as he pressed down, ignoring the flaring pain. The left eye is controlled by the right brain.

  ***

  “This next case is an unfortunate one of Schizophrenia left undiagnosed.” Dr. Whitehead led a small group of residents down the hall, telling them the details of the patient in each room. As they walked, the men and women scribbled furiously in their notepads, trying to cram in every word the well-known psychiatrist said. “Jonathan, if you would.”