A balloon was inflating in her chest, struggling but unable to pop. All she wanted was sleep, something only she could give herself and at last denied herself. Instead a deep shiver budded between her lungs, and a sickle-moon of migraine cleft her skull, smearing her vision. She pulled her hair into her mouth; when her fingers snagged, she pulled harder and moaned in formless schwas, hoping to discharge the pain as sound.
