WARNING: MOST OF THIS CHAPTER DESCRIBES RILEY HAVING A SERIOUS PANIC ATTACK. AS IN, THE PHYSICAL AND EMOTIONAL EXPERIENCES SHE'S GOING THROUGH. IF THIS MAY TRIGGER YOU, STAY SAFE AND READ THE SUMMARY AT THE BOTTOM OF THE CHAPTER INSTEAD.


By the second Friday of the new school year, Riley was ready to hit someone. Or maybe cry. The rumours had evolved, becoming more and more specific, and more and more outlandish. Someone in the halls asked her if Aaron Ellings had posted the picture because she broke up with him for Lucas. People who normally greeted her in the halls turned away instead. The label of "snitch" clung to her like sweat. It became the only thing about her that mattered.

Allen Elling's post didn't even matter. As it turned out, no one cared if she was seeing the school counsellor. What mattered was that she was a snitch and needed to be made an example of. So she was tripped up in the hallways, and the juniors left comments on her AASN page, ridiculing her "childish" likes and warning other students away from her. She tried her best to keep it quiet {she only told Farkle because Farkle would understand, he'd been there before, he knew what it was like} but, eventually, she fell off the precariously-balanced throne that her friends and family had constructed for her.

From the moment she woke, she could feel her worries just under her skin. It was like she was standing on the thinnest piece of ice, and if she even breathed, the ice would shatter and send her crashing into the frozen water below. So she stayed quiet because it was the surest way to keep the tears out of her eyes and the tremor out of her voice. She stayed quiet and swallowed down every fear, storing her pain somewhere behind her heart.

She watched as if from thousands of miles away as she drifted through the day, letting organic chemistry and the civil war blow by her with the same disinterest. She pressed perfunctory kisses to Lucas's lips and let Maya intertwine their fingers without thinking about what it meant.

And that was before everything went to Hell.

She was already late to class- she'd been most of the way there before realizing that she'd left her water bottle in Chemistry, and had to all but sprint back to retrieve it. Now she was going downstairs two at a time, hoping to make it to class before the late bell rang. The stairwell was overflowing with other students also trying to make their way to class before the bell rang, which was probably why she didn't notice Allen Ellings at first.

But a second later, she was well aware of his presence when her foot caught on the one he'd stuck out and she tripped head over heels.

At first, it was just a feeling of weightlessness. But almost as soon as she'd been confused about what was happening, she'd figured it out as well. It was as if she was seeing the entire situation through someone else's eyes- his outstretched foot, her hand spread out in front of her as if she could catch herself, she students who'd been in front of her clearing a path so that she didn't cause a domino effect.

And before she could make up her mind over what to do about it, it was over. She was sprawled across the floor on the opposite end of the hall, her knees likely bruised and her books scattered around her.

She tried to assess her situation but found that she could barely look around. Instead, her eyes were fixed on the ground in front of her, turned pointedly down. She was fairly certain that there was a senior offering her a hand up, but she couldn't take it.

A thousand scenarios ran through her head- she could get up, shake it off, and continue on to class as if nothing had happened. Not give him the satisfaction. She could stand up for herself- ask him what the fuck gave him the right. She could turn to the teacher who'd just stepped out of her classroom and was watching the scene with an air of confusion.

She didn't do any of that.

Her breath was coming out jagged- three breaths in and three breaths out in the time she'd normally breathe once. A voice in the back of her head told her that she was letting her panic run away from her- that she should calm her breathing before it overwhelmed her entirely. It was the same voice telling her to stand up, to not let him see he was affecting her.

But he was affecting her. Her breathing was coming faster and faster, and she couldn't get her legs working, couldn't send the messages that would say stand up, walk away, take this person's hand, go ask Mrs Murray for help.

She felt the tears start to roll down her cheeks, and could hear the soft whine that was coming with her short breaths now, but it was all so distant. She couldn't control it if she tried.

Her fingernails dug into the nearest flesh, which turned out to be her thigh. She'd worn a skirt today, as well. As if it wasn't humiliating enough being tripped down the stairs alone.

She was blinking fast, too, trying to keep the tears at bay, but she only seemed to be sending them down her cheeks faster. Someone called out for help.

"Breathe, Riley, breathe." They said, and she tried to follow their instructions, but her breath was going too fast for even her to catch up with it now. In the next seconds, she felt herself being scooped up and cradled between someone's arms.

Someone's arms- Farkle's arms, she thought. Probably.

"Riley, I need you to stop struggling. I can't get you to the nurse like this. Please, I'm just trying to help."

Something in those words, in the tone or the voice, struck the correct cord in her brain. She still wasn't moving by her own will- she hadn't realised she'd been struggling against the arm when they'd picked her up, even- but at least now she wasn't moving at all.

There were people looking at them- looking at her. She knew this with greater clarity than she knew just about anything else.

There was nothing she could do about it, though, because it turned out that Allen Ellings was right- she was a snitch, and she was a fucking psycho.

She could feel his breath against her hair, and she thought that someone else had stopped them, was trying to take over. She curled tighter, and Farkle snapped something she couldn't understand above her head.

Someone's arms were reaching out to touch her, and the switch in her brain flicked again. She was crying again, the whine high pitched in her throat as she tried to communicate the lack of air in her lungs, the ache deep inside her skull.

What felt like seconds later, but couldn't be, she was being set down upon a mattress- the kind they have in school sick rooms and infirmaries, small and stiff with sheets that had been folded down to as to be all but immovable.

The arms- Farkle's arms- tried to retract, when they were certain that she was stable on the bed, and she blindly grabbed out for him again. Because Farkle was safe, he knew what was happening, and he'd know how to fix it.

There was more murmuring, and then his long, thin fingers wove their way through hers. She squeezed tight, then, and was glad to find her muscles responding to her instructions.

Her breathing was still fast, though.

"Ms Matthews, can you try to match my breathing, please?" Another voice managed to make its way through the fog- though, she should be able to hear things through the fog, shouldn't she? Her sight should be the problem. But she could see just fine, and it was the nurse's garbled instructions that made no sense-

"Riley, you have to breathe," Farkle told her, voice firm, "or you'll pass out. Come on now, follow me."

He held their intertwined hands up to his chest, being sure to press hers against his heart, and started a slow breathing pace.

In, two, three four.

Hold, two, three, four.

Out, two, three, four.

In, two, three four.

Hold, two, three, four.

Out, two, three, four.

Riley swallowed some of her tears back down, and her throat felt thicker than before. But she managed to copy Farkle's timing, though her breaths were still shakier than his.

She suddenly became aware that her eyes had been open during the entire event. It felt wrong- it still felt wrong, she thought, realising that she didn't know where to look, now. Not at Farkle, who would just be understanding and kind and soft and sorry in a way she wasn't ready for. Not at the nurse, who was trying to quietly coach Farkle on what he should be doing with a familiar look of pity in his eyes. Not at the white walls of the nurse's room, too stark and cold and too much of a reminder of what was happening and too likely to send her spiralling back down.

Not at her father, who was standing just inside the door of the nurse's office, looking terrified as he watched his daughter crumble.

So she screwed them shut, as tight as she could, and squeezed Farkle's hand again, gratified when he squeezed back.

The barest traces of a smile found themselves at the corners of her lips- you're a liar. You're a fake. How can you cause so much fucking drama in the middle of the school and then calm down when you're alone. You're the fucking attention-seeking stereotype everyone's always joking about.

The voice was cold and spiteful, and yet also smug; like it couldn't wait to say I told you so.

She bit down hard on her inner cheek, trying not to let her breathing pick up speed again, but it wasn't quite working and Farkle was going to be angry and her dad would never forgive her and-

"Come back to me, Riles," Farkle whispered softly, pressing her hand more firmly against his chest.

In, two, three, four.

Hold, two, three, four.

Out, two, three, four.

The inner commentary was wrong, she remembered, because this was Farkle.

This was Farkle, and even when they fought or got mad at each other, they were still a team. They'd promised, and beyond that, it was one of those truisms. A fundamental law of the universe, or something. They were a team, and she wasn't faking it, she knew that. It didn't matter what anyone else thought {well, she could say that as much as she wanted, but that didn't make it true. She cared about what her family thought, and what her boyfriend and best friends thought}.

She sucked in a deep breath, out of time with Farkle's breathing pattern, but somehow much more calming, because it was a choice that she'd made, to take that breath, which meant that she was back in control of her body.

She exhaled, long and low, and then did it twice more before she felt prepared enough to open her eyes again. She looked to Farkle first- obviously she did, of course she did. She would always look to him first.

Her mouth picked up into a half-smile again, and this time, she didn't berate herself. Recovery is good, she chanted internally. The goal is to recover.

Farkle was watching her solemnly, and she was pretty sure that his eyes were shinier than usual, that his lip was quivering just slightly {you're best friends. He cares about you. People care about you}. But he still smiled back at her, even when his brows were still creased with worry.

He raised his other hand- the one that wasn't holding hers like it was a lifeline {for both of them}- to her cheek, skimming his fingers across the skin there, silently asking her to let go of the flesh that was still clenched between her teeth.

She did so silently, letting her tongue run over the indents her teeth had left- she hadn't caused bleeding, but the skin was raw raised, and she'd have to be careful over the next couple of days that she didn't bite on it unthinkingly and actually start bleeding.

The nurse was whispering to her father, but she couldn't be bothered to try and hear what they were saying, not when Farkle's hand was still on her cheek and her hand was still against his heart and their eyes were still met.

Her breathing was slow, now, slower than her regular breathing even, and Farkle was matching his breathing to the rise and fall of her chest.

"I'm sorry," she whispered. He blinked a couple of times, and let his hand drop from her cheek, falling to take her other hand, which was still in her lap.

"Never be sorry for this," Farkle told her, and he was whispering too, but his voice was fierce and for the first time, she could hear anger in his voice. "That- he- the school should have fucking dealt with him before something like this happened."

"None of this is your fault. None of it," he emphasized when she opened her mouth. She smiled warmly.

"I wasn't going to disagree," she informed him softly. "I was going to say thank you."

He didn't say anything to that, just watched her with those sharp eyes- like she was an equation he hadn't cracked yet, an experiment that had yielded unexpected results.

"We're on the same side," he said simply, and that was enough. He didn't need to say anything else. They were perfectly on the same page.

The nurse coughed lightly from somewhere behind her. Farkle's eyes slipped past her to look at him.

"Thank you," Farkle said to him, and he grinned slightly.

"This is my job, man," he said, rubbing his hand over the back of his neck. "But you were probably more helpful this time than I was. Don't tell anyone I said that."

They both shook their heads lightly. Farkle had only been more useful because it was them- Riley and Farkle. They exchanged a small smile.

"Right, Miss Matthews, I am going to have to ask you a couple of questions. Firstly, your father said that you fell down the stairs, is that right?"

Riley's eyes flickered around the room- to the roof, to Farkle, back to the nurse, to anywhere but her father. "Uh, yeah. Yeah, I guess."

Her voice was softer than usual, her vocal cords still thick with tears. "Sorry, could I get a glass of water or something?"

Farkle silently handed her her water bottle- the thing that had started this whole mess in the first place. She silently unscrewed the cap and tilted her head back, taking several deep sips. Eventually, though, she ran out of water and set the bottle down next to her, wiping at her mouth with her hand.

He reached out for her hand again, and she took it gratefully.

"Right, so, first. I just want to make sure that you didn't injure anything- you're not feeling any pain in your joints- nothing feels broken or sprained?"

Riley took stock for a second before firmly shaking her head. Her hips where she'd landed would likely be bruised, and she'd left small crescent-shaped indents on her inner thighs, but nothing felt wrong, per se.

"Okay, okay, that's good. Not even when I press like this?" He palpated lightly along her knees, ankles and wrists. She shook her head again.

"Okay, that's good. Just have to be sure, though. It'll really damage your joints if they're injured and you don't take careful measures to not out further strain on them. Now, these next questions-" he hesitated- "I think you'd probably prefer answering them alone? Your dad and boyfriend can wait outside."

"Oh, she's not- we're not-" Farkle stuttered, dropping her hand like it hand burned him. She was fairly certain her own cheeks were bright red, even though she couldn't help but smile {it was kind of funny, okay}.

"Farkle's my best friend," she told the nurse, who nodded understandingly. "Right, well, still. It would probably be best if you guys waited outside." He spoke to Farkle and her dad directly this time. She nodded at Farkle, who pressed a soft kiss to her temple and left without saying anything.

Her dad lingered, though.

"Dad, I'll be fine," she reassured, even though her smile still felt brittle, "It's cool." Her dad stood for a second longer, evaluating the situation, before nodding once and leaving, closing the door behind him. She could just see the top of his head through the office window as he sat down next to Farkle.

"Okay, Miss Matthews. Are you aware that you have just experienced a panic attack?" She nodded, a sharp jerk of her head. The nurse stared at her for a second, before marking something down on a clipboard that he picked up.

"Have you experienced panic attacks before?" He asked, and she couldn't help but let her eyes dart to where her father was sitting.

"Miss Matthews, unless you are directly causing harm to yourself or others, I will not tell your parents what we speak about in this room." He correctly guessed her fears.

"Doctor-patient confidentiality extends to school nurses as well?" She joked dryly.

"Something like that."

She let her gaze focus on something just beyond her vision. "Yeah, I have. Had panic attacks before, I mean. But they've never been as bad as this one-" she felt the need to clarify.

"Thank you. For how long, would you say?"

"Uh- I don't- I'll have to think back. Only in the last year, I'm pretty sure. I wasn't having them in middle school. But that's- I don't know the day specifically. Sorry."

"Don't stress yourself about it. I'm just trying to see the bigger picture here," he reassured her. There was a second of silence as he read something on his clipboard, and then he looked up, making eye contact with her.

"Miss Matthews, it's really important that you answer this question honestly. I want to help you, but I can only do that if you're willing to be helped. Do you understand what I'm saying?" She nodded quickly in response, bobbing her head up and down several times.

"Riley, have you ever self-harmed, or thought about self-harm?"

It was a question she'd known was coming. It was part of the reason she'd been trying to put this- this whole 'people finding out' thing- off for so long.

"No," she said, and she meant it.

"I noticed that you dig your fingernails into your skin sometimes," he prompted, keeping his eyes on her face, even as hers flickered down to where her hands were clenched into tight fists.

"Yeah, but that's not like- I'm not thinking about that when I do it." She argued. "I'm not trying to hurt myself, it's just what I do with my hands."

"Have you ever done it hard enough to draw blood?" He asked, and she shook her head vigorously.

"It's not a coping mechanism or anything," she promised. "It's just a habit."

He nodded and wrote something more down. "Have you told anyone about the panic attacks?"

"Farkle knows," she told him. He raised a confused eyebrow. "The guy who was in here? Farkle?" She prompted, and his face lit up with understanding.

"He was there when it first started happening, though, so I guess I didn't have to tell him, cause he kind of always knew."

"But no one else?" The nurse prompted, and she shook her head again.

"I didn't need anyone else," she tried to explain. "Farkle and I always look out for each other." The nurse nodded along, but she was pretty sure he still didn't understand.

"And you've never considered seeing a professional about it?" He asked.

She sat silently, wondering how to answer his question.

"It's not as simple as all that," she tried.

"Can you make it simple?" The nurse asked, and she fell silent, thinking.

"No," she said finally. "I can't. There's too much- there are so many layers to this, so many things that I don't know how to explain, not to you." She didn't mean it cruelly, but it was true. He wasn't involved in this, he didn't know about her grades and her family and her friendships and relationship. Wouldn't be able to understand what the ski lodge had been like- it wasn't just teen drama, though it might have looked like it from the outside.

It had been a decision about what her life would be like.

{She wasn't sure she'd made the right decision}.

"Okay." he accepted. "Thank you for being honest with me." He paused, looking down at his clipboard, again.

"I do have to tell your dad that you had a panic attack. I won't tell him what we've talked about unless you want me to, but a panic attack is a health issue, and I do have to tell your parents if you have a health issue at school."

She opened her mouth to speak, thought better of it, and closed it again. But he caught her.

"Did you have a question?"

"Yes. Yes, I think I do." She took a steadying breath. "Can- can I tell him?"

The nurse examined her closely but gave nothing away. Eventually, he agreed- "if you'd feel more comfortable."

"I'm going to invite your dad back in now if that's cool with you?"

She nodded briefly, before hesitating- "Bring Farkle in as well."

"You sure?" He checked, and she nodded again, with much more certainty.

They walked in together, and the first thing she noticed was the tension in Farkle's shoulders. His jaw was clenched, too, and he wasn't looking at her dad. She swallowed heavily.

Her dad was chewing his nails, which meant he was really worried. Her mom had been trying to break him out of the habit for years {even though it was probably better than the pack of cigarettes she kept in her nightstand for particularly stressful days}.

Farkle went right back to where he'd been sitting before, in a stiff plastic chair that looked like it probably belonged to a set of garden furniture.

"Riley, what happened? I-" the nurse cut her dad off before he could say anything more.

"Cory, maybe you should let Riley speak first?" He prompted gently. Her dad deflated, bringing the hands whose nails he'd been biting up to rub between his eyebrows, likely trying to dissolve a stress headache. She got them too.

"Yeah. Yeah, you're right. Um..." He trailed off, and she almost smiled, because this was so very much like her dad.

But, now that she could speak to him, she had no clue what she might say.

"I, um. That is-" she stuttered for several moments, before looking towards the nurse hopelessly. She wanted to be the one to tell her dad, but when she was faced with him, she found that she didn't have the words.

"Riley has just had a panic attack, Cory."

"Like when your mother told you about the opportunity in London?" Her dad asked, and, oh, yeah. She'd forgotten about that. The panic attacks sort of blended together in her mind, after a point when all the feeling were the same- so awful and overwhelming- and the reasons just kind of faded into the background. Still, she hummed in agreement.

"Yeah, pretty much exactly like that," she confirmed. "I've been having them for a while, now."

"This has happened before?" Her dad asked incredulously, and she winced.

"Um, yeah. Yes. Kind of."

"For how long?" Her dad didn't sound angry, but he sounded disappointed {he's disappointed in you, you're supposed to be better than this, you don't have a reason to feel like this}.

"Riley had her first panic attack on the 23rd of November, 2015," Farkle added quietly, and the nurse's eyes, as well as her dad's, flickered to him in surprise.

Farkle glanced down bashfully, knuckles going white from his grip on his knee.

"I was there," he tells them, still not meeting their eyes. She does it for him, defying either one of them to say something.

Her father, apparently, does not get the message.

"And you didn't tell us? Farkle, you lived at our house for most of the summer, and, what? You didn't think this was something we should know?" And Riley wants to defend him- he told her to tell them, but she wasn't ready, still isn't ready even though it's too late and it's happened now.

The silence in the nurse's room is thick. Her dad is disappointed in her and Farkle, and she's terrified of and disappointed in her dad, and ashamed that this has to be happening. She doesn't know how Farkle feels, because he won't look at her.

She blinks back fresh tears that are threatening to flow over, steeling her jaw. But she still says nothing, stuck in the awkward space between wanting to explain, not wanting to explain, and having no words to do it anyway.

"I mean, what should we do?" Her dad asks the nurse. "What's the next course of action here?"

"Well, that depends a lot on Riley. What she's ready for. I do think she should go see Grace- Dr Anderson," he corrected himself quickly, blushing slightly. "I'm not a mental health expert or anything. If she sees Dr Anderson, at least you can get a professional opinion."

He glances back at her and then continues speaking to her dad. "It depends on whether Riley is ready to get help."

She doesn't need help, she wants to say. She and Farkle have been managing just fine. This will all go away eventually.

Instead, she puts her hand over Farkles, rubbing her thumb over his knuckles, trying to relax him, and lets herself zone out as her dad speaks about her, not to her.


They leave before the final bell rings. She doesn't want to see everyone else- not the random kids who'd been around in the hallway, whose faces and names she couldn't recall no matter how hard she tried, and not her friends, who she didn't tell about her problems even though they know they can come to her for help. She doesn't want to see the judgement on the faces of strangers, nor the disappointment on the faces of friends.

She doesn't want to see Lucas, her boyfriend, her significant other, the one she's supposed to turn to when she needs help but doesn't because she has Farkle.

Her dad walks them all to his car, Farkle carrying both their bags. Her dad had tried to send him back to class, but Farkle had finally met his gaze again, determination blazing in him.

"My dad won't care that I left early; Marzia will just respond to any email the school sends saying it was for a family thing. I'm coming with." And that was the end of that discussion {it was also a whole other issue- but this time, Riley couldn't escape her problems by trying to fix someone else's}.

They both sat in the backseat, her legs flung over his. No one spoke for the first couple of minutes.

"When'd you get strong enough to pick me up?" Riley broke the silence. Farkle shrugged.

"It's about the application of physics, mostly."

"I'm not exactly light," Riley countered.

"Riley, you're not heavy, either," he deflected. She rolled her eyes fondly and settled back against him.

"Thank you," she said, soft enough that her dad wouldn't be able to make out what she was saying.

"It was never a question, Riley," Farkle told her, and the response didn't quite fit what she said, but she knew what he meant.

"Thank you," she repeats herself, firmer. He wriggled one of his hands out from where it was trapped underneath her legs and pulled a few locks of hair separate from the rest of it. She grinned softly to herself, and let her eyes sink closed as he started a thin braid.

Her dad said nothing, not until they were just outside the apartment door.

"Your mother's home," he informed Riley, and her eyes widened.

"I- but- she-"

"We care about you more," her father told her, effectively silencing anything Riley might have said {what might she have said? I didn't think she'd care enough? Will she be mad that she had to take time out of her schedule for this?}

Farkle put his arm around her shoulders as her dad walked in, and they entered the apartment together.


SUMMARY:

This chapter is set roughly a week after Chapter 15. In the beginning, she thinks about a couple of times she's been bullied recently- she's been cyberbullied and people keep tripping her in the corridors. The bulling is less a result of the implication that she has a mental health disorder than it is because of the label of a snitch. Cause, you know. Kids suck.

Then the same kid who made the post in the previous chapter trips her down a staircase. She lands on the floor and is relatively unharmed, but she goes into shock and has a pretty bad panic attack. It gets so bad that she can't move, and eventually, Farkle has to carry her to the nurse's office, where he and the nurse help her out of her panic.

The nurse speaks tor her privately, asking about her history with panic attacks, and she answers him honestly. Eventually, he invites her dad in, and she asks Farkle to come back in as well, and they explain to Cory that she had a panic attack and that she's had several over the last year.

Farkle admits to having known about it the whole time, and Cory gets frustrated with him, saying that he lived with them all summer, and should have told him and Topanga.

Riley, Cory and Farkle all leave early, and as they reach the apartment, Cory tells Riley that Topanga has left early. Riley is kind of surprised because she'd assumed that Topanga would be too busy for this. Farkle offers her support, and the chapter ends with them walking into the apartment together.

Okay, so, by some miracle, I have finally figured out the timeline for this entire fic up until this point, and it only took me like 20 minutes. You can see it on my tumblr (theharleyqueen-fanfiction). But you should be aware of two things: Everyone is one year older (Lucas was born in 1999, Riley, Maya and Farkle were born in 2000). This is because half of my writing made literally no sense otherwise. The other thing is that, in the now we're patriots 'verse, Obergefell v. Hodges was decided on the 19th of November 2015, instead of 26 June 2015.


On a more personal note, this chapter is a combination of a couple of things that have happened to me- I was actually once tripped down the stairs at school when I was thirteen. The guy who did it was an asshole, and luckily he left the school two years later. I wasn't hurt, and I actually just stood up and continued on to where I was going. I was forced to sit next to him in class because the teacher was labouring under the delusion that I could be a good influence, but that's a whole other story.

Point is, it kind of sucked, and I can tell you from personal experience that Riley's reaction was about right.

The rest of her reaction is basically a description of the worst panic attack I ever had. This is kind of the climax of the panic disorder arc, and it felt appropriate.

If any of you ever, ever feel like Riley, please speak to someone. Find yourself a Farkle, and then also find yourself a Dr Anderson. I haven't had a panic attack anywhere close to the one I described here in years, and it's because my therapist helped me learn how to cope with the kind of feelings I talk about in this chapter.

I love you all, I hope you're staying safe. Don't get complacent. Wear a mask, sanitize as much as you can, social distance when possible. Vote in your elections, whether you live in the US or not. Look after your mental health.

Love,
Harley