Page 53 of Cuckoo (aka Claire, Darling)

Chapter Fifty-Three

I do not want to return to that courtroom. I am exhausted. My headache is now a constant distracting thrum, and we have fallen into an unspoken ritual whereby whenever we have a break, Grosvenor silently slides two Ibuprofen over to me with a glass of water. I think she’s noticed how I’m constantly massaging my temples, trying to ease out the months of stress that are reverberating painfully against my skull.

For just a moment, I close my eyes and wonder if there is some way that I can hide the Ibuprofen from her, put them under my tongue temporarily, hoard them up and then end this quickly. But a memory stirs, some sort of documentary I must have watched sometime, and I’m sure the quantities it would take to kill me would be impossible to squirrel away. As though on cue, a streaking pain almost blinds me, ripping through from the back of my skull, and I find myself acknowledging that I would be totally incapable of turning down any painkiller offered to me, even if death were the reward. I squeeze my eyes shut and begin to massage my temples, already reaching for the glass of water in front of me.

‘Migraine?’ one of the prison guards asks.

‘Mmm,’ I grunt back.

‘Killer,’ he replies.