Turbatus Torqueo
J. M. Strother

The worst nightmare I ever had occured the night after I had my wisdom teeth taken out. Come to think of it, the whole wisdom tooth thing was kind of a nightmare in it's own right, but noting compared to the hours that followed.

You are not allowed to take aspirin after any surgical procedure, oral or otherwise, so they gave me so prescription pain killer to dull the pain. Aspirin has always been, and remains, my preferred substance of abuse. Most of that other stuff, including the prescription stuff, can't even touch it. But it thins your blood, and you tend to bleed after surgery, so no aspirin.

Needless to say, I did not feel like doing much after the teeth came out. My dad drove me home from the oral surgeon's, and while I was still groggy form the general anesthesia everything was hunky dory. I just went up to bed and slept in senseless bliss. Alas, the anesthesia eventually wore off, and aching jaws soon woke me up.

I had a caring parents, so of course by the time I woke up they had dutifully gone to the pharmacy and gotten the prescription for the pain killer filled. My mom brought it up to me, along with a glass of water. She told me I should take it so I could sleep. I did.

What a mistake.

I don't recall the name of the the drug, but I'm sure J.K. Rowling would have dubbed it something like “Turbatus torqueo”, the restless torment potion. Even Snape could not have devised a more sinister concoction.

Instead of giving me dreamless, pain free sleep, this drug made me restless, so that I tossed and turned constantly, waking up every half hour or so. And every time I woke up I could vividly remember the nightmare I had been having. It was always the same nightmare, and when I would drift back off to sleep it would pick up right where it left off.

I was running for my life, on a sort of weird interchange that twisted and turned and seemed to go on forever. I was running with everyone I had ever know and loved, or even sort of liked. We all ran, desperate to escape what was chasing us – death itself. As I would run some of my friends and family would out pace me, leaving me behind to my fate or, perhaps even worse, I would out pace someone I knew and loved, and realize they were doomed. Then I would wake up in a could sweat, go to the bathroom, and go back to face it all again.

After a night of this Hell I went to the bathroom, dumped the pills in the toilet, and took some aspirin. Ah, at last, blissful sleep.

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It strikes me, Suzanne, that my actual nightmare is not unlike your poem. I was reminded of it when I read your piece. You did a great job of capturing the essence of the experience. Keep on posting.

~jon

 
~jon
My Blog - Mad Utopia Writing in a new era.