Listen to a reading of “Voltage” by Meg Tuite.
The doctor studies the body as a bee does a flower. His voice, a creaking door, calls for such and such. Nurses flit around each other, economy in motion. They adjust straps—one here, one there, just enough slack for trauma. One nurse swabs the patient’s temples with conductant; she secures the electrodes. She thinks she smells adrenaline, banking the body’s walls in frantic pursuit of escape. The truth of the matter is that this entire menagerie marching through our brains is no more stable than a tottering cabinet of
