• Vol. 05
  • Chapter 05

Electroconvulsive

Little Mrs Worry Brown, timid-thin shins stretched on the gurney, tucks her hair tight back from the jelly-glue pads perched like horn buds on her furrow-faded brow, folds her eyes into herself & lays her quick-bird hands neatly by her sides. The brave bright slash of her cherry lipstick tricks her fear as she slides into oblivion. At the last moment she feels them force her lips apart, push the belted clamp behind her morning-scrubbed teeth & as the metal zing of singeing voltage sizzles into her frazzled brain, she bites down hard on the old familiar rotting bark of the scolds bridle. Mad-eyed she lunges forward, sinews snapping, arched back bucking, shackled ankles lurching loose, until the whizz-whirr chitter-chatter of her own mouth’s working clicks her into herself again & she looks up & laughs.
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