Chapter 37 – The First Day is the Worst

"Come with me, young man", Mitsuhiro snorted as he grabbed Inuyasha from his bicep and dragged the boy through the main corridor towards the 'isolation wing'.

It is the smallest wing in this ward. That's where the normal and limb restration isolation rooms were. But there was one more room like no other. The calm down room.

And that's where Mitsuhiro was taking Inuyasha to.

It was the first stage of the ways of calming down a patient. The next stage was taking sedatives as pills, and if that didn't work out, they were given as injections. If that wasn't enough, the straightjacket was used, and the final way was limb restraition.

In the calm down room there were no limb restraition beds, no padded walls. The whole room, pretty small, was actually a huge playpen-like ring of pillows, with stuffed toys and one huge green Fat Boy -beanbag. There were lights, but they were kept shut so that it would be easier for the patient to calm down. This room was used when the patient seemed to be tense or clearly on the way to something worse, but it could be still avoided. And now Inuyasha was acting aggressively, and so Mitsuhiro decided to take him to the room. He was really not in mood of a fight with the boy. He felt a bit tired of everything. He WAS having his double shift today, after all.

"There, sit down", the man said with a calm voice. He pet the Fat Boy and sat down next to it. Inuyasha stared at him, not really looking angry. He just had that vacant stare of his. Even though Inuyasha usually seemed to be grumpy or angry, it wasn't unusual to see sad and blank expressions on his face.

Inuyasha crashed down on th bean bag and tried to relax, but tapped his finger and toe in the same beat.

There was one drawer next to the door. Mitsuhiro took something from there. He walked to Inuyasha, knelt down before him and showed what he had taken. It was a pair of headphones. Then he took his iPod from his pocket and sat down next to the boy.

"Here, this will help you calm down."

And so Inuyasha put on the headphones. Mitsuhiro turned on the music. His iPod had Bluetooth so he could choose the songs.

For a while nothing happened. Inuyasha didn't seem to react to the music at all. But finally he growled and pulled off the headphones. Mitsuhiro sighed and took them. But Inuyasha didn't attack him, like Mitsuhiro had thought, but only leaned back against the bag.

Then he had an idea!

"I don't know do you remember the day of winter a while ago when you had pneumonia. When I sat beside your bed and told you how we got to know each other."

Inuyasha turned his eyes towards him.

"I was just wondering, would you like to hear some more?"

Inuyasha tweaked his ears.

"Alright then!" Mitsuhiro winked.

The story started.

It was Inuyasha's first whole day at Kuroshima's mental hospital's childrens' ward. Yesterday he had been taken here by an ambulance in his father's arms. The separation was fierce as the little Inuyasha tried his best to leave with his father. But after he was gone and Inuyasha had calmed down a bit, he got into the ward and got to know his new own nurse Mitsuhiro. He wanted to make sure to the boy that he was on his side. And as Inuyasha couldn't sleep, Mitsuhiro sat on his nightstand and waited for the boy to fall asleep.

Now it was the first morning of Inuyasha being here. It wasn't really uncommon for a nurse to work in both shifts, morning and evening. But Mitsuhiro had promised to be working both shifts every day for all of the next week.

"Are you sure you can do it?" a young female nurse, Murasaki, asked. "No-one here has ever done anything like that."

"Heh, that means I'm going to make history!" Mitsuhiro laughed as he was having his morning coffee in the nurses' break room. The children were still sleeping.

Mitsuhiro was given a folder by one other nurse. She had said it came from the ward's doctor, and Mitsuhiro should read it before the children wake up.

"Hmm..." Mitsuhiro leaned on the chair's back rest and opened the folder.

An eight-year-old dog-hanyou boy, who arrived in the hospital of Kuroshima's childrens' ward in July 2002. He has a hard history of being violent and aggressive, acting like an animal, almost mute, only a few words per year, and is clearly somewhat mentally retarded, nowadays on only a very small child's level. He is completely helpless in many daily tasks like washing and dressing himself, can't read or write. He is also maybe a bit smaller than children his age, but he is pretty strong - you must always look out for his claws and fangs.

His height and weight are good, has a good appetite, and is simply physically in very good shape.

The text would last a bit longer, but Mitsuhiro had had enough. He closed the folder and put it on the table.

"Okay, let's go wake up the kids", said Murasaki.

Even though this ward was for very different aged children, from 4-13 years of age, everyone was woken up at 9 AM. The nurses woke up every child one by one.

Now it was Inuyasha's turn. Mitsushiro knocked his door gently.

"Knock knock", he said and opened the door quietly. He walked slowly through the room and opened the blue curtains.

"Wake up, sleeping handsome", he said with a smile and shook the boy's shoulder gently. Inuyasha opened his eyes and turned his side towards the nurse. They stared at each other, and finally Inuyasha got up slowly. He turned his ears back and bared his fangs. Mitsuhiro sighed.

"You know, Inuyasha, since you are acting up severely, we have been thinking we should give you some medicine through a needle. But don't worry, it won't really hurt. You'll feel a lot calm and better."

Inuyasha didn't know what to think. He saw his room's door open and saw nurses coming in and gathering around him – and one of them had a syringe in her hand. Now the boy freaked out.

"Grab him!"

As said in those papers Mitsuhiro had read a few hours back said, even though Inuyasha was quite small, maybe even a bit smaller in size than usually kids his size, he was pretty tough.

The injection was done. The medicine wasn't as strong as the ones used in adult wards. Inuyasha was a biz dazed, but he could stand. Mitsuhiro helped the boy up and pet his shoulder.

"Now we'll take a shower."

Inuyasha hadn't been to the bathroom of the ward yet. He walked hand in hand with Mitsuhiro all the way through the ward to the bathroom.

"There you go", he said as he opened the door and pushed him in gently.

"Lets get your clothes off."

Inuyasha raised his hands towards the ceiling so that Mitsuhiro could pull his shirt off. Then he took away his pants. Inuyasha was wearing hospital pajamas. He was used to get his clothes being taken off by someone else.

"So, here I have your own shampoo and conditioner your daddy had packed for you", Mitsuhiro said as he examined the bottles. "He invests in you, heh. These are pretty expensive."

Mitsuhiro put the shower hanging in a handle and put the water on. Inuyasha stood still like a statue as Mitsuhiro squeezed the shampoo goo on his hands and started rubbing the boy's hair.

"What do you think, ain't I the most awesome nurse ever?" Mitsuhiro laughed. Inuyasha pulled his right dog ear and bit his lip.

Mitsuhiro showered and rubbed with shower gel his little patient from top to bottom. Then he took a white towel and wrapped the boy in it.

"Let's go put your day clothes."

As the duo walked through the ward, Inuyasha left wet footprints behind him. Then they got to his room. Inuyasha threw the towel on the floor and stood in front of Mitsuhiro – all naked, baring his fangs and growling very quietly. But as Mitsuhiro had worked as a mental health nurse for years and years, he had bathed people all ages countless and countless of times, he had seen naked people a billion times. But after working at adult wards, he finally chose children's, since he loved how true and shameless they were. He also liked to read books and play with toys and games.

"Sit down", Mitsuhiro said as he pet the bed. Inuyasha stared at him but did as told. "Let me dry you up."

And so the man started drying the child from starting from his feet. Inuyasha looked at him, feeling nothing. Simply nothing. Even you might think the most usual and strongest feeling he was would be anger and hate, he was more like sad and simply lost in void.

"So, there you are – clean and dry!" Mitsuhiro smiled handed over Inuyasha's clothes: a striped green shirt and grey hospital pants. He helped the boy with dressing up, and then took his little hand in his big, sturdy hand.

"Let's go for some breakfast."

As they walked the corridor, Inuyasha noticed how all the kids they walked by stared and pointed at him, whispered something in their ears, scared. Inuyasha was the only patient in the whole ward who was not a human. The most thing the kids were scared of were his eyes – but they could even laugh a bit about his ears. Inuyasha growled and bared his fangs, which made the kids back off.

"Don't mind them", Mitsuhiro sighed. "They will accept you in time."

Though Mitsuhiro knew Inuyasha had never beed accepted anywhere. As there was written in his papers that Inuyasha has never had a single friend, he had never spoke but maybe a few words a year, and haven't even been to school. Not one day.

The duo arrived to the dining hall, and Inuyasha took the chair farthest from other kids. Mitsuhiro looked at him with a sad face as he put some food on his tray. Cereal, cocoa and a pot of yoghurt. He carried it to the boy and sat down next to him.

"Here", he said and gave him a spoon. The boy took it with a bit shaking hands, looked at it for a while, and started eating.

It took a while. All other kids had already left the hall when Inuyasha finally finished his meal.

After the meal was done, Mitsuhiro had thought of what to do next. Then he got it! He took Inuyasha with him, hand in hand as always. He knew he couldn't leave the boy alone, not only because he already trusted him, even though they had just met, and simply because of other kids' safety.

Mitsuhiro led the boy to a drawer, and opened the lowest box. There was an another box inside, and he took it. There was something written on it, but as Inuyasha couldn't read, he had no idea what would be inside it.

So they walked to the calm down room. Mitsuhiro put down the box and Inuyasha got on all fours, starting to sniff it. Mitsuhiro chuckled and raised his finger.

"Can you guess what's inside?"

Inuyasha stared at him. The man opened the box... It was filled with colourful duplos. Mitsuhiro emptied the box by pouring the blocks on the floor.

"What do you say, should we make something? Maybe... A house?" he asked, smiling. Inuyasha took a big, red block in his hand, turned in aroung, and finally put it in his mouth, starting to gnaw it.

"Hey!" Mitsuhiro cried out and quickly took the block away. "These are not edible. You can't eat them. They are not food."

Inuyasha looked vacant. Mitsuhiro sighed.

"Maybe I should get you a chewing toy."

After this pretty short play session Mitsuhiro took Inuyasha back in his room and, like last night, waited beside him for him to fall asleep for a nap. Then he retreated to the nurses' break room for some coffee.

"But that's a good idea!" one nurse nodded after Mitsuhiro had told about his idea. "I guess he would really like a chewing toy. Maybe it would lessen him biting us."

There was no real nap time here, but if the child felt like a little sleep, it was okay. Now Inuyasha had slept for almost three hours, when Mitsuhiro came to wake him up.

"Inuyasha..." he whispered as he laid his hand on the boy's shoulder. Inuyasha opened his eyes and stared at him. He sat up and did something Mitsuhiro wouldn't ever have dreamed of – Inuyasha opened his arms and crushed against the man's chest. For a few seconds Mitsuhiro just stared at him, but finally hugged him back gently. He couldn't believe it! They had known each other for one day, and he was already hugging him!

What were they thinking? Violent, heartless beast? That would never describe Inuyasha. He was only one very sick child, who could love and care when you get inside his heart.

Mitsuhiro finished his story. He looked at the patient and smiled a bit.

"Do you remember that day?"

Inuyasha got up and walked towards the door.

"He-hey!" Mitsuhiro cried out, but the boy just walked out. "Where are you going?"

Inuyasha led the nurse all through the ward – and there, in the livingroom, was also a wooden box. The items in there were almost never used. But Inuyasha grabbed it and started walking back towards the calm down room. Mitsuhiro was all confused, but followed him.

Inuyasha stopped in front of the room's door.

"You seriously want to go there?" Mitsuhiro ensured. Inuyasha didn't give any kind of an answer, and so the man opened the door. Inuyasha carried the box with him and placed it in the middle of the room, sitting beside it. As Mitsuhiro sat down on the floor, he suddenly recognised the box. This made him grin.

"Heh, buddy..."

Inuyasha emptied the box – duplos!

Inuyasha started building up a tower. Mitsuhiro followed it, smiling. It was wonderful to see the boy actually Do something.

"Would you now like some music?" Mitsuhiro asked. Inuyasha concentrated on the duplos, and so he put on some calming classic music.

They spent more than an hour in the calm down room. Inuyasha had stopped playing with the duplos, he had relaxed in the bean bag, on the verge of falling asleep.

Mitsuhiro crawled to him, sat down next to him on his knees and laid his arm on the boy's shoulder.

"That's a good boy... Good boy..." he smiled as he rocked the boy slowly. Inuyasha didn't react at first, but finally closed his eyes and his ears went drooping.

"You know, I'm happy that You are my own patient. You, no-one else", Mitsuhiro said.