Karedevil

Shut in

"It's unbearable. It's like when your foot falls asleep, so much it stings to move it, but over my whole body. I'm getting a migraine from all the noise. It's like dozens of movies are playing all at once. I can't pick out my own voice. I can't even hear myself think. When I open my eyes, I just see thousands of lights. They change when you move—they're you—but all I see are dots of color."

She goes back to doctor after doctor and gets an MRI that shows her whole brain is lit up like the Fourth of July. They tell her, with the help of Matt's refreshable Braille display, that it's sensory overload. She knows. Each signal, from every vibration in her ears, every nerve in her skin, and every rod and cone in her eyes, is shouting at her. Maybe if she'd just taken the right dose, she would have stripped away just enough pre-processing to access fine details in every sense like Matt, but instead she wiped it out completely. She as much detail as is physically possible and no way to understand it. The doctors don't know how to reverse it, and they don't even have a pill to suppress it. They tell her to buy noise-cancelling headphones, wear sunglasses, pick less scratchy clothing, and generally just avoid everything.

The autism specialist paints a picture of gradually, over the course of many years, and possibly her whole life, relearning how to process sensory input. The stroke recovery specialist thinks anything's possible. She may never recover at all. She might gradually improve. She might even regain everything at once, like an amnesiac who recovers all their memories years later after one little trigger. Or she might deteriorate even further. "You really like to cover your bases, huh? Tell me what happens most often."

"People recover a little for the first few months after the stroke, but they never regain their full capacity. You're one of the lucky ones. You're disabled now, but you're still you. Your friend says you're the same as ever, and you still recognize him too, and that's not something to take for granted."

Foggy is a saint, but she can't see him or hear him, and somehow it feels even more like being alone when he's there. It's not long before he asks about the needle. "It's not addictive," she sighs, "if that's any comfort." She told the doctors what it was, but they couldn't help. "I did this to myself, Foggy. I swore to my brother," on the day they buried him without her, "that I'd never shoot up again. I deserve this." She doesn't really want to explain what she was trying to do. Foggy's already mad enough at Matt, and she doesn't want to give him something else to blame on him. She just wants Matt back.

When Foggy takes her home from the hospital, she turns off all the lights in her apartment, shuts the blinds, and curls up with a bottle of aspirin. She can only stay awake for a couple hours at a time before succumbing to crushing migraines, and she can't sleep without sedatives. She wants to find Matt, but she can barely even function. Maybe if she'd just taken the right dose... but she doesn't know if she could live with herself right now, knowing she might never see Matt again, if she hadn't tried everything.

Even having done everything in her power, she's not sure how she can go on. When she's not asleep, she's crying about Matt, worrying about what's going to happen to her, and trying desperately to squeeze the searing pain out of her skull. Every day is another day he doesn't walk in the door and make everything better. Every day is another day she feels like her brain's been sautéed with onions and red peppers. Every day is one more day closer to learning to live like this.

She wishes they hadn't told her she might improve. She's learning to rely a lot more in touch, and her sense of smell is unmistakably stronger, so maybe the chemicals are actually working there, but it's not ideal in New York City. Her world is on fire, but not like Matt's. It's more of a dumpster fire than a superpower.

Her first week out of the hospital passes, and she has to get up eventually. She has to go buy groceries, or get out of the apartment, or do anything at all, but her head hurts, so she curls up again and tosses and turns until she falls asleep again. Maybe tomorrow.

Foggy wakes her up to give her a Greek salad and get her signatures on hospital paperwork. "Eat up," he types. She nods and pokes at her food with a fork. "I brought you some books. You're getting really good at Braille."

"Thanks Foggy." She takes a few bites of salad and pauses. "Do you smell that?"

"No?"

"Never mind. My head feels better." The pain always comes back when she's awake long enough, but she actually feels a bit different this time. "I'll take a shower and maybe practice reading a bit." No response. "You there still? I'll sign those papers before you go. Foggy?" She reaches out and feels nothing. "Foggy?" Her heart beats faster and her hair stands on end. She can't see or hear what's going on, but her instincts are telling her she's not alone. She smells blood.