On Thursday morning I definitely did not want to get out of bed. Charlie had scheduled our appointments after each others, mine being at 11:30 and his thirty minutes later. He woke me up at 9am by opening my bedroom door and half shouting "Morning Bella." Startling me into alertness. I definitely preferred Renee's method.
I groaned as I tried to keep my eyes open. I definitely did not want to get out of bed. I shoved the covers aside and immediately went to my bags to pick out some clothing. I settled on some leggings and a baggy 3/4 sleeved top, the sky outside was dark, rain was definitely on the cards for today.
I peeked outside the curtain, the sky was one continuous gray cloud. The girl wasn't on her swing this morning. I shut the curtain and hurried downstairs to get some breakfast. While I waited for the coffee machine to heat up, I stood in front of the cupboards, trying to decided what exactly I was hungry for this morning. I opened the fridge and stared at its contents for a good minute, before grabbing the milk for my coffee and closing the door again. In truth, I wasn't hungry for anything, but I knew that I should eat. I turned my attention back the cupboards and opened and closed a couple before I spotted an unopened packet of chocolate chip cookies on one of the shelves. I grabbed it and turned my attention back to my coffee before taking them both upstairs to my chair to enjoy.
I sat in the chair and dunked a couple of the sweet cookies into the hot coffee, the chips melted with the heat of the water. I only managed to eat three of them before I gave up and set the packet down on my desk. I sat and sipped my now sweetened coffee slowly before Charlie appeared in my doorway once more.
"Time to go Bella, its gonna take us around an hour to drive to Port Angeles."
"Port Angeles? I-I-I thought there was a doctor here in Forks." I asked, my brows knitted in confusion.
"There is, but the practice there has more specialised doctors." He looks at his watch in watch I assume is supposed to be a subtle hint at me to get moving. "Meet you downstairs? I'll go start up the cruiser, the key is in the back of the door."
He disappears again, and I follow after, shrugging my small bag across my shoulders as I leave the room.
I lock the front door and get into the car as slowly as I possibly can, a feeble attempt at delaying our departure. The last time Renee took me the doctors she told them I was crazy and they put my on these tablets that zombified me. They made focusing so difficult, I'd find myself just stuck for unknown periods of time just gazing at the corners of rooms, or winding up in the wrong neighbourhood entirely because I had missed my stop on the bus. I was adamant that I wouldn't be put on those pills again.
We drove to Port Angeles in silence, the drone of the local talk radio station filling the cruiser for us. I found myself making tight fists, my fingernails digging sharply into the palms of my hands. I shoved them flat under my thighs the moment I noticed what I was doing and turned my eyes to the blur of greenery out of the window as we sped down the highway, my foot lightly shaking as we got ever closer to our destination.
The hospital in Port Angeles was a large white concrete building surrounded entirely by parking lots. Charlie followed the street around to the rear of the building before pulling into a significantly smaller lot on the opposite side of the street outside an unassuming strip mall that advertised itself as a Primary Care clinic. We found a space in the tiny lot far quicker than I would have liked, and before I could protest that I was fine and I really didn't need to see a doctor at all, Charlie was out of the car and waiting for me. I suppressed a sigh before getting out and shuffling behind him into the building.
Charlie walked over to the reception desk and waited patiently for the lady managing it to finish a phone call.
"Hi there, I'm here with my daughter, Isabella Swan, she has an appointment at 11:30." He said when she was done.
She typed something on her keyboard before saying. "Ah yes, Isabella, you have an appointment with Dr. Thompson, she's in room D. If you want to head down that corridor and take a seat just outside the room. She's running early so she should be able to see you pretty soon." The lady smiles, pointing towards the appropriate corridor with her entire hand as she speaks.
"Thanks." Charlie says, ushering me towards the row of seating in the small, dimly lit corridor.
I slump into one of the chairs, my palms are sweating.
"So, want me to come in with you Bells?" Charlie asks, leaning back in his own chair and looking at me. "Because I can if you want me to."
"Err, uh, no thanks. I, I'm good." I croak out, unable to add that I still do not want to go in there at all.
"Okay sweetheart. I'll be right outside when you're done."
We sit there for less than a minute before an elderly lady walks out of the door to my left and the doctor appears in the doorframe.
"Isabella Swan?" She asks, I stand, nodding, and follow her into the room.
"Take a seat Isabella." She says, motioning me towards the hard plastic chair nearest to the door as she closes it behind us.
"So, what can I do for you today Isabella?"
I sit, looking at my hands for a moment before I answer.
"My parents think that I need help." I tell her, unable to look her directly in the eye. She's not wearing a white coat I notice, just regular office wear, black pants and a blue jumper with a white shirt collar poking out of it.
"And what makes you think that?" She asks, her fingers hovering over the keyboard on the desk.
"I-I-I guess because I stopped going to school."
From the corner of my eye I see her eyebrows raise while I say this.
"And why did you stop going?" She types something as she asks this. My throat is dry. She probably thinks I'm useless.
"Because I couldn't." Is all I say.
"And why couldn't you?"
"Look, I'm not crazy. That what my mum told the last doctor I saw. She said I was crazy. But I'm not crazy. I'm just tired all the time. So tired." It all comes out in one frantic stream. Theres no way, hearing all that, that this doctor does think I'm not crazy.
"Okay, so you're tired, extremely tired." She types something again. "What other symptoms have you been having? How has your mood been?"
"Uh, low, I think. Or numb. Both." I'm staring at the ugly green carpet tiles on the floor.
"You said you'd stopped going to school, would you say that you've also lost interest in the things that you used to enjoy doing?"
"Yeah."
"Okay, have you lost or gained any weight recently?"
I stare at my wrist, noticing that the bone there is more prominent than I once was.
"I guess I've lost a little weight, sure."
"Okay… You said you were more tired than usual. How have you been sleeping?"
"A lot. Like I can just fall asleep all the time. Thats why I've been missing school, because I cant wake up in the mornings." I figure I might as well be honest. Its better than Renee just telling the doctor that I'm crazy with exactly no context.
"That must be tough." The doctor's voice becomes a little condescending but I try to ignore it. "What about your friends? Have your relationships with them suffered?"
"I, er, I just moved here and the school year is over so, I, I don't have any friends yet." I tell her.
"Okay, what about your friends in…" She glances at the computer screen before finishing. "…Scottsdale?"
"They stopped calling when I stopped coming in to school or calling back. We weren't exactly close."
I blink away a memory, but it confronts me anyway. It was in the early days of my missing school, when I was still making it there a couple of days a week. I had heard them– my friends– talking about me from the water fountain around the corner. Their words had not been kind. I had not spoken to them since.
She types a few things on her screen before printing a few sheets of paper out.
"Okay, Isabella. Heres the plan." She grabs the printouts and moves them in front of her. "I believe you are experiencing a bout of clinical depression. You're definitely not crazy. However I am going to prescribe you some pills. They're a type of antidepressant and they work by increasing the serotonin levels in your brain. Now they do have some negative side effects, thats what this sheet is about," She points towards one of the sheets of paper. "But, those should not last more than a couple of weeks. If they do, or if they aren't working as they should after two months, then we can try switching you to another type. How does that sound?"
I just look at her for a few seconds, trying to process everything she's just told me. She's definitely more thorough than the doctor in Arizona.
"Fine." I reply.
"Perfect. Was that your father outside?"
"…Yes?"
"Okay good. If you could just send him in, and wait outside. I just need to talk to him for a second."
I stand up, obliging. But this is the part where she tells him that I am crazy.
"Dad, she wants to talk to you." I mutter before sitting on the chair I had sat in earlier.
Charlie can out a minute or so later, folding the sheets of paper that Dr Thompson had printed out into his jacket pocket as he walked.
"Thanks so much Dr. Thompson. You good to go Bella?"
"Sure." I stand and follow Charlie out down the and back outside.
"Ok so, my appointment is across the street in the hospital. Its probably going to take a few minutes. There a coffee shop just along this next block." He fishes a ten dollar bin from his wallet and presses it into my hand. "Go wait for me in there. Do you have your phone?"
"Of course."
"Good, I'll call you when I'm done."
"Okay."
Charlie turns and heads towards the crosswalk. I face the other direction. The sky is still covered in a blanket of cloud, blocking the heat of the summer sun from having any effect on the temperature. The on shore wind has a distinct chill. I can see the coffee shop from here, its nothing special, just a generic chain. Still, I'm sure its warmer inside than it is out here.
I order a large vanilla latte, purely out of habit, and sit myself down at a table towards the far side of the building, as far away from the door as is available. I sipped my drink slowly. It tasted slightly funny, definitely not of vanilla. But the taste wasn't unpleasant, whatever it was, so I continued drinking, slowly. There was still a good quarter of it left when Charlie text me to meet him back at the cruiser. I gulped down the remainder of my drink and headed off.
I beat him back to the cruiser. I can see him over the other side of the street, walking incredibly slowly clucking a white paper bag that must surely contain our prescriptions. I try not to watch too intently as his slowly approaches the crosswalk. I've never seen my Dad look so frail, so, old. Only now do I realise that I don't really know how he injured himself. I'm not even sure I know what his injuries are.
When I hear the crosswalk beeping, I fumble in my bag for my phone and fix my eyes on the screen, pretending that something has caught my interest. Somehow it feels that Charlie's obvious weakness will be one of those things we just never talk about. So its better to pretend that I haven't noticed.
Our journey back to Forks begins in a predictable silence. Its not until we've been in the car for around thirty minutes that Charlie reaches over and turns off the radio.
"Bella. Thank you for talking to the doctor. I was worried that you'd just go in there and not say anything."
I just shrug so he continues.
"Look, I know you stopped taking your medication in Scottsdale. Your mum spoke to me about it. But I need you to try and take these ones Bella. You need to help yourself. If you can't prove to me that you're taking them on your own then you're going to have to take them in front of me? Okay?" He takes his eyes off of the road for a second and looks at me, I turn my face away from him and look out of the window.
"Thats all I'm going to say about it."
He turns the radio back on, and I spend the rest of the journey with my body contorted towards the window. Refusing to look at my father.
I'm sorry this chapter is a little shorter than the others.
I've had a really nasty vomiting bug this week so its a miracle I even got this bit done.
Thanks to everyone who is reading, favouriting and reviewing this story.
I'll see you guys again real soon.
Liv.