Fweeeee
Fweeeee
Thump-Thump
Fweeeee
"Whoever's whistling please stop." Ash looked around the room. Nobody said anything. "Thank you."
Fweeeee
"Ahhhhhh! Please stop!" There was silence. All the elemental masters glanced at each other before turning their focus to Ash.
Fweeeee
"THAT IS IT!" Ash jumped out of his seat and stomped out the door. Camille followed right behind him, attempting to calm him down. The other elemental masters continued their conversations. An occasion whistle or thump was heard but nobody paid any attention to it. The only one not talking was Neuro.
Neuro observed each and every person closely. He paid attention to every small little detail. Everybody was different. Griffin Turner moved his hands around when he talked, Tox nodded her head, and Jay whistled occasionally.
Wait… whistled? Neuro watched Jay closely, observing his every move. Sometimes, Jay would hit the table twice, making a 'thump-thump' sound. There were a few moments where he would blink his eyes rabidly for a few seconds in a small pattern; roll eyes to back of head, blink quickly for four seconds, close eyes completely for two second, blink once more, and roll eyes back to normal position. Other times, when he wasn't the one speaking (which was rare since he never shuts up) he would whistle once or twice. Nobody talking to him seemed to notice.
"Uh, Jay. Can I, uh, have a word with you please?" Jay looked up at the master of mind.
"Sure." Fweeeee.
"In private please." Neuro jerked his head back to the door. Jay followed him out into the courtyard.
"So, what did you want to talk about? Is something wrong? Do you need advice? If you need advice you might want to talk to Zane, he's better at this stuff. Don't be afr-"
"I don't need advice. I wanted to talk to you about something else." Neuro studied Jay's behavior closely. Instead of responding right away, he blinked, the weird blinking from earlier, a few times. He also jerked his head to the side twice before sniffing.
"W-what do you want to talk to me about" Jay jerked his head to the side more and sniffed again. Neuro noticed that Jay sometimes kept to head to the side and shivered before throwing his head upright. His sniffing was constant, but Neuro knew he didn't have a cold.
Jay stopped moving completely. He stared directly at Neuro. Before the latter could even blink, Jay threw himself to the ground. His head jerking back and forth, sometimes it got stuck sideways and Jay shivered and threw his head the other way. His right arm looked as if it was throwing something. Jay held a closed fist by his chest. Whenever he shivered, he threw his hand away from himself and opened his fist. He was constantly sniffing and blinking. When things seemed most calm, Jay would whistle just a little bit.
Neuro watched in horror at the episode that took place in front of him. He stared at the younger male with worried eyes. His body leaned forward, as if he was going to grab Jay, but straightened back to standing position. Slowly, the fit died down. Neuro kneeled down next to Jay, who had curled himself into a ball with his hands on his head. "Are you okay?"
"N-no. My head hurts and my neck hurts and my arm hurts." A few tears escaped the ninja's eyes. Neuro offered a hand and pulled Jay into standing position.
"Does that happen often?" Neuro helped Jay over to a bench. Jay put his head back into his hands and began to massage his temples.
"Only when my emotions get out of hand. Usually I can isolate myself before it happens. The last time I did something like that was before I became a ninja. It was the night I finished my invention. I was so excited I lost control of myself." Jay looked over at Neuro. "Can't you just read my thoughts and find out all things you need to know."
"I wanted to talk first. It's more polite. Besides, I would only invade your mind if it was a very serious situation, like during the tournament of Elements. This is, wasn't, that serious."
"Did you wanna talk about the weird things I do? Because what I experienced here today is relatively different from a couple years ago. In fact, everything except the sniffing and blinking are new. I started sniffing and blinking when I was around the age of eight. After –"
"I think you might have Tourette Syndrome." Neuro cut Jay off a second time. When Jay didn't object, he continued. "I think that you might have Tourette Syndrome. It's a neurological disorder that causes the person who has it to have vocal, motor, and mental tics. Tics are the sniffing and jerking that you just experienced recently. Vocal tics are sounds and motor is things like blinking, jerking your head and arms, tapping stuff. Mental tics are when you get fixated on something and you can't let go of that thought, or having a thought run through your head again and again."
"Isn't Tourette Syndrome the thing where you cuss a lot?"
Neuro shook his head. "No and yes. Only about ten percent of people who have Tourette's actually have the tic that causes cussing. Everybody else has tics that resemble yours, either better or worse."
"Oh…" Jay looked at his feet. "So, how do I know if I have Tourette's?"
Neuro pulled a business card out of his pocket and handed it to Jay. "I want you to connect this guy as soon as possible. His name's Dr. Gille. He knows the most about Tourette's. We're good friends. Tell him about my suspicions and ask if he can test you. Don't forget to mention me, alright? We're good friends."
Jay nodded quickly and jumped to his feet. "I'm going to call him now." With that, Jay took off into the building, dialing the numbers as he ran.
Neuro only smiled and shook his head. "I'm never going to understand him. Or any of the ninja for that matter."
Jay stood in front of the door. His heart pounded in his chest and he could hear his blood rushing. Shivers raced down his spine as Jay jerked a little bit. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. When he opened his eyes, Jay grabbed the door handle and threw the door open. He took small, hesitant steps over to the receptionist.
"Hello there. You must be Jason Walker." The lady had a nice, warming smile that Jay couldn't help but smile back to.
"Y-yeah, that's me. How did you know?"
"Dr. Gille doesn't have a lot of patients come in on Monday." Jay nodded lightly. Monday was the only day that Jay could get Sensei to let him skip training. Wu wasn't too happy about the idea, but when Neuro backed Jay up, he reluctantly agreed. Jay would just have to start training early and end later for the rest of the week.
"Jason Walker. Nice to meet you. How are ya?" A middle age man spoke up from behind Jay. He offered a hand to Jay, which he took hesitantly. "Scared a bit, aren't ya?"
"Just a bit. I've never been tested for anything."
The man gave a nice, deep laugh. "Don't ya worry kid. Ima trained professional. Besides, it's not like I'm going to be stabbing you with needles." Jay paled at the thought of a shot. The man grabbed a clipboard from the receptionist. "Come on. Back this way. I'm Dr. Gille by the way."
"Did you finish filling out the clipboard?" Jay nodded his head and handed the board to Dr. Gille. "Wonderful. I'm going to give you one last test while I run through the answers to the others. Okay?"
"Okay." Dr. Gille nodded his head in approval. He motioned for jay to follow him to the room next door.
"This is an ADD/ADHD test. It's administered on that computer. You where these headphones and if you hear a sound, press the left button. If you see a color on the screen, press the right button. Got it?" Jay gave a thumbs up and adjusted the headphones. "Good. Bailey here is going to supervise and take notes on this."
Dr. Gilles left the room. Bailey turned to Jay. "I'm going to be behind this divider, alright sweetheart. Any questions before we begin?"
"Nope."
"Great. After this test, you can just go sit out in the waiting room for a few minutes while we get the final diagnosis. Then we will call you back here."
"Alright. I can do that." Jay positioned himself in front of the computer. One hand over the right button, another over the left. His torso was leaning toward the computer, eyes staring straight at the screen. Bailey gave a small smile before clicking a button on her computer to start the test.
"So I got the results back." Jay spoke into his phone. He was riding his elemental dragon back to what used to be, Chen's island. Skylor owned the place and sometimes she would invite the other elemental masters to come join her for dinner. Kai always agreed to go, so the other ninja came just to be polite.
"And…" Neuro's voice came in scratchy.
"Ahh. You were right. No! I do have Tourette's – Wait! I'll call you back." Jay hung up the phone and repositioned his bag. The buckle had broken and it kept tipping over, threatening to spill all of Jay's paper.
Luckily for Jay, he was close to the island already and only had to spend a few more minutes with the broken bag. When he landed, Jay was greeted by his friends and the smell of delicious noodles.
"Neuro said that you had something to tell us." Cole looked Jay directly in the eye. "What is it?"
Jay was a little taken back by the fact that Neuro talked to the guys. On the other hand, he mentally slapped himself for forgetting that he had to tell the others about it. "I-I'll tell you at dinner."
"I guess it's a good thing that dinner is ready then." With that, Cole made his way to the dining area. When Jay finally entered the room, he was stopped by Kai.
"Spill."
Jay took a deep breath. "I have Tourette Syndrome and ADHD. I'm also borderline Autism Spectrum Disorder."
The others just stared at him. Jay paled as he looked around. Did they hate him? Were they going to ignore him?
"Okay." Lloyd was the first to speak up. "You're still our brother. Besides, you haven't changed at all. You've always had Tourette's and ADHD. Now you just have the names. Nothing different."
Jay stared at Lloyd. The latter pulled out his signature grin and Jay couldn't help but stare back. "Yeah. I guess you're right."
"Does that mean that the whistling is still going to be going on?" Ash asked Jay.
"Yep. But don't worry. I picked up some earmuffs so you wouldn't have to listen to it." Jay grabbed a pair of gray earmuffs out of his bag. Ash crossed his arms on the table and buried his head into them. He mutter to himself. The rest of the elemental masters laughed. Camille took the earmuffs and placed them on her boyfriend's head. Ash gave a muffled thanks and leaned in closer to his girlfriend. Camille rolled her eyes and stroked his hair in a calming fashion. She muttered something under her breath about dating a child, which only caused the others to laugh harder.
Fweeeee.