A Cure for Burnout

Flash Fiction February (Day 16)

Feb 17, 2025

A woman with black fingertips covering her face. — Image: Jacqueline Day via Unsplash

This story is set before the events of my first Substack story, Widowmaker. You can find a link to that story at the end. CW: Strong language, blood, and gore.

When I woke up, I couldn’t move. Buckles and restraints tied me down. They covered my arms, my legs, and my head.

A man hovered into view. Kind eyes and a warm smile. It almost felt genuine.

Almost.

"Hey there Laura, can you hear me?" he asked.

"Yeah, I can hear you just fine. Why am I tied down?" I asked.

"Well, you just came out of a pretty bad case of Burnout. I'm going to undo the strap on your head. Don't do anything drastic, okay?"

The doctor unbuckled the thick leather belt that spanned my forehead. I lifted my head and looked down at my body, surveying it like a foreign land.

I could see bruises forming around my ankles and wrists. I had fought like hell to escape, but I barely remembered it.

"We're going to try again, okay?" The doctor asked.

"Try what again?"

"The treatment. It's imperative that we find a cure. Imagine the damage you would have done if you had an episode while free," the doctor said.

Memories of the world I lived in came flooding back, like a recap at the beginning of a TV show.

This disease of the mind, this Burnout, had spread like wildfire. People just snapped. Thousands of years of evolution went out the window. They turned into rabid animals with an insatiable bloodlust.

No one knew where it came from, but everyone affected remembered what they did when it wore off. Those memories always came later, though. Bubbling to the surface like a repressed memory.

"Ready to try again?" the doctor asked.

I nodded as he buckled the leather strap back over my head.

The doctor fixed his device to my head, covering my eyes with a screen and my head with neural probes that would map my messy trauma onto a neat little screen.

The doctor was convinced this would end the Burnout. That, somehow, applying numbers to pain would result in an equation that made sense.

I felt a sharp stab in the back of my head as the sounds of the world melted away.

I was back in that room. That fucking living room.

The one where the Burnout first took control.

Another me, perfect in every way, stepped out from the shadows. She approached the fireplace on the back wall, carefully adjusting the portrait of the family above it.

"Welcome back!" she said.

I looked away from that perfect copy—the one who never stopped eating healthy and never started drinking.

My eyes wandered over to the drawings framed on the wall. They were simple still-life pieces, bowls of fruit, and pitchers of lemonade. Simple yet elegant, but art all the same.

"Listen, I don't want to repeat this song and dance any more than you do, so why don't we get straight to the point?" The other me asked.

"What are you?" I asked.

She laughed. “I'm the Burnout, baby! I'm the part of you that wants to grab a scalpel and carve up that doctor like he's a Thanksgiving turkey!"

"Where did you come from? What do you want?"

The other me chuckled as she grabbed an iron poker from the tools beside the fireplace.

"You ask that question every time, you know that? God, this is so fucking boring! Okay, let’s raise the stakes, shall we?"

I sighed. "Why would I ever bargain with you?"

"Because I’m in control, friend. I could take you over permanently, but I haven’t. Wanna know why?” she asked.

“I’m sure you’ll tell me,” I replied.

“You have a certain je ne sais quoi that I enjoy. Call it imagination, call it creativity; I don't give a fuck. Convince me it's worth saving, and we'll strike a deal,” she winked, “Sound fun?"

I stood up. "How am I going to convince you?"

The other me sat in a recliner on the opposite side of the coffee table.

"You're a writer; tell me a story!"

I knew what story she wanted to hear, but I wasn't sure I wanted to tell it.

Guess I don’t have a choice...

It all started in that same living room. I was visiting a friend; they were hosting a party. As I fell back into that moment, I heard the other me talking inside my head.

A good old-fashioned all-American cookout.

They were going to be providing commentary the whole time. Lucky me.

I had an ice-cold beer in my hand, a cozy covering the glass bottle. The sliding glass door in the back of the living room was open. It was a beautiful spring day.

Boring! No one cares about set dressing; just get to the action!

I had been hearing reports about this new mental illness that was popping up seemingly at random. The news stories were calling it The Burnout.

Those stupid fucking doctors. Thinking they can just cure it. THE NERVE!

I took a sip of my beer, smiling as the smell of burgers and hot dogs on the grill outside wafted in through the sliding glass door.

GET TO THE FUCKING ACTION!

That’s when it happened. It was like a switch flipping inside my brain. One minute, I was me, and the next…I wasn’t.

HELL YEAH!

I turned the beer upside down, the liquid splashing against the wood floors. I smashed the bottom against the coffee table and spun around. Two guests were chatting, drinks in hand, in front of the children’s paintings on the wall.

I gripped the top of the bottle and ran at them with a demonic grin. They barely had time to react before I stabbed the jagged glass into their necks. First, the one on the left, then the one on the right.

They dropped their red solo cups as their blood splattered against the wall in thick streams. Even as they hit the ground, I kept stabbing them until their faces were unrecognizable.

NOW THAT’S WHAT I CALL ART!

I dropped the bottle and stood up. I heard someone scream, but it was distant. A woman ran up to me. I grabbed her by the shoulders and threw her through the glass on the left side of the open door.

She hit the ground, surrounded by shards of glass. The guests in the backyard panicked, running around like ants.

Oh, do the grill, use the grill!

I picked her up by her ponytail and dragged her to the grill. The house’s owner, a man with a metal spatula and an apron that read Grill Master, stood with his mouth agape as I slammed the woman’s head down onto the hot metal grates.

Burgers and hotdogs flew from the grill as the flames seared her skin. Her screams were music to my ears. She fought hard as her hair caught fire.

YES! YES! I’LL TAKE MINE WELL DONE!

When she stopped moving, I let go of her, and just like that, the switch flipped back. I was disoriented, confused, and covered in blood. I had no idea what had happened.

But soon, I would remember…

I blinked, and I was back in the living room with my duplicate. She applauded enthusiastically.

“Phenomenal, fucking phenomenal! I loved how you had fun with it and that trick with the grill? Genius!”

I shut my eyes, hoping she would go away. When I opened them, she was still there.

“Okay, here’s the deal. I need your imagination for those times when I take the wheel, so I’ll keep you around, but I get to take a joyride with your body whenever I want.”

She got closer, making eye contact with me as he grinned. “A little free-use policy, if you get my drift,” she said with a wink.

“I just want to get rid of you! How do I kill you?” I shouted.

The other me danced and cackled, spinning in place. “You can’t kill something that’s never lived, sweetheart. I’m here to stay, and this is the best deal you’re gonna get. Now, play along, and we’ll convince Doctor Dickweed his little treatment is working. You get out of this never-ending hell loop, and I get my freedom. Win-Win!”

“Fine. Sure,” I said.

The other me snapped her fingers, and I woke up.

The device rose up off my face. I was back in the real world. The doctor stared at the screen nearby, nodding as he scanned the data.

“This is good! This is really good! I think we may be on to something here. We’ll, of course, need to add some sort of medication to the treatment, but now that I’ve mapped the neural pathways, I can target the source of The Burnout!”

He sat down on his stool and wheeled it over to my bedside. “We’ll have you cured in no time!”

I faked a smile. “That’s great news.”

He started unbuckling the restraints. I saw the other me standing in the corner. A devilish smile crawled across her face.

There we go, that’s a good girl.