Just a little addition to the Inside Out neurodiversity fics. This was requested.
I am not a doctor, and this should not be used as medical advice. Consult your doctor if you are concerned about symptoms.
Joy whooped, slamming her hands on the control board. Riley had just led her hockey team to victory. Riley bounced up and down, happy to expend the rush of joy that filled her. She and the team were going to the championships. And to celebrate, they were going for pizza.
With a brief hug to her mother and father, she hurried toward one of the two vans. She managed to snag a seat with Veronica, a cool player whom she got along with very well. They were both talented, and they worked well together. They chatted for a few minutes as the van pulled out into traffic. Riley listened as her teammate laughed and talked about her little brother learning to talk.
As she listened, an odd, floating feeling began creeping up her head. Joy blinked, taking a step back.
"Do you guys feel that?" she asked.
Sadness groaned, and Disgust shrank away. Anger stiffened, his eyes flashing with terror.
"Not again!" Fear screeched.
Fear grabbed the controls like a lifeline, but as the purple flashed on the board, everything slowed down. All of the emotions were watching as Veronica spoke, laughing and flashing her teeth, but the sounds became distorted. There should have been an alarm that signaled discrepancies in the auditory section, but nothing happened. They could understand each word as it came out, but they couldn't string them together into a sentence. As the next word was being formed, the last slipped away like water.
It was like they were suspended in time as everything else continued forward. Veronica's smile faltered, and she spoke again, but each word was gone as soon as it was spoken.
The emotions were frozen. It was a brain freeze without pain. They couldn't blink, couldn't sense Riley breathing. The controls were frozen in a beam of purple, but no memories were forming. Suspended in that timeless moment, they could do nothing as Veronica snapped her fingers in their face, speaking her words that fell, down, down, down into nothingness.
"Riley!" Veronica screamed, and they heard it.
The sound came rushing back, filling their ears and making them jump. Riley blinked, looking around. The van was parked on the side of the road. Everybody was staring at her. The coach frowned, scanning her face.
The emotions didn't move, confused and slow. They became aware that they were sitting in Tina's mom's van, with everybody else from the team. It took a moment to remember that they had just won the game, they were going to go to the championships. But why were they parked on the side of the road instead of at the pizza parlor?
"What?" Riley asked, her face warming as Disgust leaned on the controls. Embarrassment flooded forward as she and Fear made a new memory.
"Are you okay, Riley?" Coach Brian asked.
Riley nodded, still a little numb and disoriented. "Yeah."
"I want you to call your parents when we get there," Coach Brian said. "You can eat pizza, but I need to talk to them."
Riley nodded, looking at her lap. This wasn't the first time she'd done that, whatever it was. It was hard to remember what had happened, but she knew she'd felt it before. She'd been able to play it off most of the time, but not this time. Too many people had seen it.
When they got to the restaurant, Riley called her mother and told her that Coach wanted to talk to them now, and she gave the name of the restaurant. She got her pizza and sat by herself, staring at her plate. Sadness took control with Fear tapping buttons every once in a while and Disgust flipping a wheel. The low level, constant embarrassment was overshadowed by sadness, and Riley tried not cry.
"Hey, are you okay?" Veronica asked, sitting across from her.
Riley shrugged as Disgust and Fear gripped the controls, a surging wave of heat rushing up her cheeks.
"Has it happened before?"
Riley hesitated then nodded. "Yeah."
Veronica took a bite of spinach Alfredo pizza. "Can I ask you a personal question?"
Riley nodded once, and Anger laid one hand on the controls. A single line of red appeared in the middle of the other three colors. If she called her crazy, Anger was going to leap down her throat.
"Do seizures run in your family?"
Anger blinked and all of the emotions stepped back. Fear and Joy glanced at each other and approached the controls. They both grasped levers, mixing their emotions to form surprise.
"What?"
"Seizures," Veronica said.
"I-I don't know," Riley replied. "Why?"
Veronica took a sip of soda. "Because my cousin does that same thing. Spacing out in the middle of conversations."
"That's not a seizure," Riley argued, and Anger stepped forward, narrowing his eyes as he pressed a button. "Seizures are when people fall down and twitch."
"That's tonic-clonic seizures," Veronica said. "But there's other kinds." She took another bite then spoke with her mouth full. "What does it feel like?"
Riley worried her bottom lip, trying to remember. It was so hazy. "It's like I can see and hear, but I can't remember what's going on. I can't move or think or anything." She paused then shrugged. "Its hard to explain."
"Well, my cousin has those spells. He's been diagnosed with absence seizures."
Fear clutched the panel with both hands. The entire board turned dark purple. Riley swallowed and pressed her hands over her face. Veronica reached over and grasped her hand.
"It's okay, Riley. It's not the end of the world. Conner still lives a normal life. He just has to take some medicine. It really helps. If you want, I'll talk to your parents and get my cousin's doctor's office to give to them."
Joy and Sadness joined Fear, producing a new memory full of sorrow and happiness that Veronica wasn't leaving her alone.
"Thanks," Riley said.
A month later, Veronica and Conner met her to hear the news. She was diagnosed with absence seizures, and the doctor thought the medication would work through most of the issues. It was Joy in control once again as they went out for a celebratory meal of burgers and milkshakes.