A/N: Hello! I have been frantically writing this chapter and the one for my other fic in the little time I have had free from classes, work, and pharmacy tech training. Ya girl's been busy, guys. Usually busy is good for me, but it kind of feels like I'm drowning a little bit right now. However, I gotta push through. Still, I ask myself sometimes, "Isn't this the reason you were hospitalized in the first place? Overworking and then your depression and anxiety got to you and you just... gave up?"

I try to ignore that voice as often as it lets me.

Anyway, enough of my fucking dark ass. I know that the last chapter didn't exactly seem to be a fan favorite (and that's probably at least partially because it wasn't a favorite of mine to write so that devotion and dedication and love didn't seep through) but I am excited to write this one! I'm gonna try and fill it with more talk between Connor and Evan as well as some meaningful content. I'm so sorry that the last one didn't really move us along, plot-wise!

Okay, guys! I hope that you enjoy!

Connor was sitting in the media room, staring blankly at the television. He was barely registering the colors flickering before his eyes - and who could blame him? It was hard enough to see the screen, let alone process what was happening on it. The TV was encased in a large wooden display case type thing with plexiglass instead of actual glass. The glare from the sunshine behind him made it nearly impossible to see what was happening underneath.

"Alright, guys," a tall, thin blonde lady came in, shutting whatever had been playing off. She turned to face most of the other people outside in the day room. "It's time for some group therapy!"

Internally, Connor groaned. Were they gonna talk about their feelings now? What about braid each other's hair?

A moment later, he winced. This was why he was here: to get help. Well, that and he'd botched his own suicide attempt. He decided to actually try and learn something from this if he could.

The blonde woman came over to him, practically shoving a composition notebook into his hands. "Here, you're new. You'll be needing one of these."

Connor grasped the notebook and blinked at it a moment. Finally, he asked. "Well, how am I supposed to write in it? What am I supposed to write in it?"

The woman smiled a little bit, but he wasn't quite sure if it was genuine or not. "You write anything you want in there, silly. We also will give you assignments to do that you can complete in there."

Connor nodded, noting vaguely that his name was written on the cover in black, cursive Sharpie. "Okay, that answers the 'what,' but how about the 'how'?"

The blonde smiled a little. "We don't let you keep pencils in here, but you are allowed to use them. If you want one when we aren't in group, you're going to have to ask for one at the front desk."

She picked up the pencil container and passed it to Connor. When he took one out of the box, he looked into the yellow-orange sea and noticed that none of them were sharped to a point. Every single one of them was dull and had been worn down, which made him wonder whose job it was to make them like that. It seems like a ridiculous task, but maybe they really were that dedicated to patient safety after all.

The woman glanced down at his bandaged arms, smiled tightly, and took the box back in a slightly jerky motion. Connor felt rage kind of bubbling in his chest; how dare she think that he would hurt himself with a box of pencils? What was he going to do, toss them backwards at himself? Scatter them everywhere and hope that one of them hit the right spot with enough force to break skin? He'd do more damage with his one than with the forty or so that she now possessed.

The only thing that broke Connor from these all-consuming thoughts was the sight of a sleepy Evan walking through the sliding doors. It was weird because he had not felt like this in a long time, but a nervous tickle ran through Connor's stomach. God damn was this dude cute.

Connor had never come out to anyone, honestly. He accepted his admiration for the male body and also the fact that men in promiscuous situations aroused him while women in the same state did not. Still, he did not consider himself to be gay. In fact, in the midst of all of his self-loathing and anger, it didn't seem that important, really.

Until now.

The thing was, Connor had been attracted to men, but never because of who they were. He merely enjoyed the view. With this nervous wreck, on the other hand, he wanted something more. That was terrifying and also exciting and holy fuck was it strange. He kept finding himself having these non-sexual fantasies of the two of them walking through the woods, holding hands. He would ask Evan to tell him about trees, and the smaller man would give his best Apprentice Park Ranger speech for Connor. There also might have been a sunset involved.

The long-haired man dropped his head into his hands and huffed. This was too much all at once he decided and tried to push the daydreams away.

Evan gave Connor an exhausted smile and plopped down into the chair next to him.

"Are you doing okay?" Connor asked softly as more patients filed in.

Evan gave a small nod. "Just... had a bit of a panic attack is all."

Connor bit his lip and just nodded. He knew very little about panic attacks, just that they were horrible. He used to have some as a kid when his father would yell at him for things he let Zoe get away with, but he could not remember those very well. Now, when he panicked he usually just lashed out.

"Are you feeling any better?" He asked in a small voice, unsure what else to do. He wanted to help this guy as much as he could; he wanted to be a friend.

Evan went to shrug and then kind of smiled a small, sad smile and nodded instead.

Connor didn't believe him, but there was no time to ask anything else. The blonde lady was taking her stand in the middle of the room. Her shoulders were pushed back and her head was held high. It must be easy to have that kind of confidence in a pretty red work-appropriate dress - especially in a plethora of mentally ill patients who are all wearing the same blue scrubs.

"Hello, guys. My name is Carol and today I'm gonna talk to you about coping mechanisms..."

Carol began to go on and on about coping mechanisms and what they looked like and when to use them. Connor had started to zone out when she asked, "What are some examples that you guys utilize?"

A couple of people rose their hands and said theirs but they weren't exactly stellar advice: walk away; count to ten; go eat and drink something.

Then, Evan put his hand up. "Um, I like to try to, um. Say-say-say the alphabet... I mean, the alphabet backwards."

Connor had never heard such amazing advice. Granted, it was probably because of who gave it, but he could have written an ode and performed an interpretive dance solely based on how good it was.

Carol nodded. "Uh-huh, that's a very good one, Evan. It gives you something semi-difficult to focus on, but not so difficult that you start to get even more panicked or scared or angry. Sometimes, when it gets like this, it's really hard to see the forest for the trees, isn't it?"

There were soft murmurs all around and Connor started to zone out again.

When group was finally over, the patients shuffled out of the room quietly. According to the board, the next activity that they had was lunch and that was a little ways off.

Passing his piece of art on the table, Connor frowned at it for a moment. It felt like it needed something. As he was contemplating this, he heard Evan being called into an office thing on the left side of the dayroom. A moment later, a nurse called Connor over to the desk.

"You have a call on line one, sweetheart. Says it's your mom. Just pick up any of the phones over there and you should be able to talk." The nurse said kindly, giving Connor a sweet smile.

Striding across the room, the long-haired man picked up the phone and slid into the neighboring chair. "Hello?"

"Oh, Connor!" Cynthia was openly sobbing into the receiver, breathing hard. "Are you doing okay there? Are they nice to you? Have you been eating?"

Connor nodded, trying, and failing, not to get emotional himself. He had always felt like his mother was overbearing and expected more than he could give, but right now he'd never been so happy to hear her voice. "I-I'm okay. They're nice. I haven't seen a doctor yet, but..."

There was a long moment where both of them were kind of crying a little bit. In the silence, Connor could hear Margot and a nurse bickering. The former was getting furious.

When she finally got her voice back, Cynthia asked, "Is it really as nice as they say, Con?"

"What do you mean?"

"When I was on hold, the recorded message kept saying that it was a 'resort-like getaway.'"

Connor took a moment, listening to Margot screaming and knocking chairs around. He thought for another half a minute before murmuring, "Something like that."