Disclaimer: I don't own Glee, nor do I completely own Nick and Jeff (although I'm pretty much creating their personalities myself since we haven't gotten to know them too well on the show).

It wasn't exactly what Nick had expected, if he was being completely honest. Things looked nice enough, but the staff was a little… harsher than he'd expected. He'd already been questioned by one nurse about various things – what medications he was taking, the various things he had done as far as maintaining his weight, whether or not he had any history of self-injury, what he'd done so far in terms of treatment. And then he'd been led into another room, where his suitcase and backpack had been left.

Nick sat and watched as the staff of the center went through his bag and checked his shoes for any contraband. Things like candy, laxatives, razors – anything that he might use to make himself sick or hurt himself in some way. "I don't understand…"

"Self-injury is common. We can't let you have anything that someone might use to hurt themselves."

"But my shoes…?" Nick began. He couldn't understand why this woman was saying the old pair of trainers he'd worn on the plane ride from North Carolina.

"Laces." The answer was short and clipped, as if that was the most obvious thing in the world. Not that Nick really understood exactly why that was a problem. "You were told to bring shoes you could slip on for a reason." Nick watched as they finally started putting his things back into his bag, with the exception of a plastic box that contained a few of the things he hadn't realized could be harmful. "These things will be locked up in the offices until you're ready to leave. Now we're going to the nutritionist's office down the hall."

Nick stood up and followed the woman that had spoken to him, even though she hadn't ever introduced herself, while the man that had been in the room going through his bag remained with his things. He found it strange, that none of these people seemed to care if he knew who they were or not.

Finally the woman opened a door and motioned for Nick to enter. An older woman sat at the desk, smiling at him and motioning for him to sit on the exam table in the room. "Have a seat… we're going to talk first, before anything else." Nick nodded, doing as he was told. "I'm Mary, the nutritionist here. You'll see me every day to be weighed and to talk about making good food choices when that time comes. And you can talk to me about any problems you might have with food while you're here." Nick nodded silently. "So, how long have you been in outpatient treatment?"

"Six weeks or so," Nick replied. He watched as the woman made a notation in a chart.

"Do you know how much you weigh right now?"

"I haven't seen a scale since I started treatment… the nurse at school wouldn't let me look, and my parents put the scale in their bathroom where I couldn't check," Nick replied.

"That's okay… you're probably better off not knowing exactly how much you weigh, and we're going to weigh you in a few minutes anyway. How have you been doing with eating?" Nick shrugged, sighing.

"It's gotten harder since I left school… there, my friends were always reminding me to eat and pushing me to try eating a little more at meals because they knew I needed that. But I think my parents don't really fully understand all of that. They tried, but they don't always remember that I have to be reminded."

"Family members don't always understand… most of the therapists here will do family sessions to talk to them, so that they can understand what you need when you leave the program here. How many calories do you eat in a day?" Nick shrugged.

"I don't really keep track… I eat until I'm full, or until I feel too sick to eat anything else." Nick watched as the woman nodded, writing down some more things in the chart.

"Can you give me a guesstimate?" Nick bit down on his bottom lip, trying to figure out how much he ate on a regular basis.

"Maybe 800… on a good day. On bad days, maybe a couple hundred tops," Nick replied. "But I haven't been keeping track since I started treatment. I don't want to think about it, because it'll just make me feel worse."

"That'll have to change once you're off plated meals… you'll need to make sure that you're getting enough calories in a day." Nick nodded. "Let's get you on the scale, so that I can get started making a plan for your diet goals for the next few weeks, until you're off plated meals."

Nick stepped on the scale slowly, making sure he kept his back to the digital display because he knew he wasn't allowed to see the number. It was a fight to keep himself from trying to peek, but he knew that it was necessary. As much as Nick wanted to know, knowing would only cause problems because he would start thinking too much about the numbers and not enough about his health. He stood there for a moment, until the woman stepped back to make another note in the chart.

"Alright, sweetie, you can step down now." Nick moved away, crossing his arms as he waited to see what was going to happen next. "You don't have to look so nervous. This is the easy part… the hard part comes later today, once you've started your therapy sessions with your new doctor." Nick nodded, knowing that she was right. It still didn't really make this part any easier.

"I've just never done this before…"

"You're one of the few here. Most of our patients are repeat visitors in treatment centers… you're going to see a lot of people who either don't want to get better and sabotage themselves at every turn, or who have tried and failed to get better more than once. You've got to push through and try to ignore the things people are going to tell you about food and calories around here, because there's a lot of misinformation. You should only listen to what you hear from staff members about nutrition and the foods we're having you eat." Nick nodded in response; the more he heard about everything that was going to happen and that he would have to do, the more reluctant Nick felt about actually doing this. "It's not as bad as it sounds, Nick. You can do this, and it'll be good for you." Nick nodded.

"I know."

"I think maybe it's time for you to be taken to your room. You can go back next door to get your things, and a staff member will show you where you need to go." Nick nodded again, shoving his hands into his pockets and following instructions because that was all that he could do. He'd signed his entire life over to these people for the next few weeks or months… and he just had to pray that it would work.

A/n: So it's official… I've hit crunchtime for the semester. I have a HUGE paper, another presentation (my FOURTH this semester), a lot of coursework, and three big tests coming up in the next month that I HAVE to do well on. So updates may be sparse at times – such as this week, because I have to get through a huge stack of library books AND turn in an Annotated Bibliography before Friday.

Anyways, I hope you all enjoy! I should clarify – I've never been in one of these facilities. My description of what happens in this chapter primarily comes from the documentaries I've watched about the Renfrew Center and Rhodes Farm. They're very informative pieces… definitely something I think anyone interested in learning more about ED should watch.