A/N: TW: eating disorders. And I think that's the only one.
Also, I am not a med student or educated in medical sciences in anyway, so to anyone that is, some of the stuff in this chapter probably sounds ridiculous.
Nor am I educated in eating disorder treatment, and Google only helps so much.
…
There's a beeping sound coming from somewhere far away yet close at the same time. She wants to ask someone to turn it off, but she can't, and probably shouldn't, because her vocal chords feel like they've been ripped to shreds.
She swallows, and then semi-gasps in pain because the back of her throat feels like someone took a sheet of sandpaper and rubbed it raw.
Her eyelids feel heavy, like ten ton weights are strapped to them to keep them down, but she manages to open them slightly, and then she sees a man clad in light blue scrubs fiddling with something next to her bed.
She tries to say, "Where am I?" but it comes out as more of a sharp, scratchy, puff of breath, and the man looks up from the machine before smiling at her.
"Oh." He says, and then presses a few buttons before he stands up straight and grabs something off the foot of her bed before standing over her. "Good morning, Lucy."
She wonders how the hell he knows her name, but then he says, "I'm Doctor Hill, I'm sure you remember me."
She does – vaguely, because her mind is a little fuzzy right now – and she's pretty sure that when she broke her arm back when she was about to start fourth grade, it was Doctor Hill and a short, squat nurse that set her arm back in place and signed her cast with smiley faces and gave her a sucker before they discharged her home.
She nods, and then regrets it, because her head flares up in pain. Doctor Hill must catch her grimace because he pats a gentle hand to her shoulder and says, "You should take it easy."
His eyes flit across the papers on the clipboard in his hands, and he hums sadly to himself before returning his attention back to Lucy, who guesses that she's probably staring at him with heavily lidded eyes.
"Visiting hours are right now." He says. "And there's tons of people that would like to come see you, if that's alright."
If she knew how, she would answer. Instead she just stares.
"Oh. Sorry." He laughs. "Um, blink once for no and twice for yes?"
She blinks twice, with difficulty, and he nods before he says, "Be right back," and exits the room.
Taking a deep breath, she looks around the room and takes in the plastic chairs, the harsh white of the room, and the window with a view of the abandoned building across the street.
It's a hospital room, obviously, and there's annoyance hidden underneath the fear that spikes up when she realizes that she doesn't know why she's there.
Her parents walk into the room a second later, and her mom bursts into tears while her dad goes stark white. They pull up chairs next to her bed and then just look at her. She looks back.
"Baby. My baby." Her mom says, and then pulls tissues from the box on the nightstand. She wipes her eyes with one, and then blows her nose with another before she balls them up in her hands and folds them on her lap.
It's silent after that, and Lucy is glad that she isn't expected to say anything – and that she kind of can't say anything – because she has no idea what would come out of her mouth if she was.
So Lucy stares, and Russell fidgets, and her mom cries softly before putting a hand on Lucy's cheek and just looking at her and sniffling.
Lucy has no idea how she looks, but it must be pretty bad, because when Russell raises his head and catches her eye, he clenches his jaw and then blinks, hard, five times in succession.
Her mom leans over and presses and kiss to her forehead and it hurts.
…
She can talk, but only small statements or questions at a time, and when she asks a nurse, "Do you have any water?" she swallows around the cough that tries to climb up her throat. The nurse nods with a smile and then assures Lucy that she'll "be right back."
There's a cup of water on the pull out tray a few minutes later, and Lucy reaches over and pulls the cup to her chest and tips the straw toward her mouth to take a sip.
Lucy could cry, her throat feels so much better.
Knuckles rap the door frame and she jumps, splashing some water down the front of her gown before frowning at the door way.
Doctor Hill says, "Oh, geez, sorry Lucy. But um, there's people here to see you...?" He leaves it open ended.
"Yeah." Lucy says, and he steps inside.
Rachel and Sam rush in, holding flowers and a teddy bear respectively, and Lucy is reminded of a stampede for a second. They slam into the two chairs left at her bedside by her parents when they visited yesterday.
"How are you? Oh my god – "
"Shit, Luce, holy shit – "
"Are you hurt? Oh, my god, of course you're hurt you're in a hospital – "
"You can't scare us like that – "
She would tell them – or, yell over them, with how loud they were talking – to calm down, if she felt like she could.
They both stop, after about ten seconds, and then just stare at her, and Rachel rubs at her eyes while Sam blinks rapidly.
"I – um." Lucy tries, because she really doesn't want to say anything that will make them dissolve into tears. "Hi."
It has exactly the effect she doesn't want, because about a millisecond after she closes her mouth, Rachel starts sobbing into her hands, and Sam rubs a comforting hand up and down her back while he rubs at his own eyes and says, "Fuck, Luce. Jesus."
"I'm sorry." She says, and she winces at the raspiness of her voice.
"Sam, do you hear her." Rachel says through the tears tracking down her face. "Do you hear her apologizing, Sam? Oh my god."
Lucy decides then to just not speak unless spoken to, because making them cry is just making her feel terrible.
Rachel wipes at her eyes, and Sam plucks a tissue from the nightstand and hands it over to her. Rachel smiles her thanks, and then wipes at her eyes before taking a deep breath and clearing her throat and saying, "Okay. I'm – I think I'm good now."
"Good." Sam says.
Lucy looks down and starts toying with the plastic bracelet wrapped loosely around her wrist.
"How are you feeling?" She hears Rachel say, and she shrugs, because the only thing she knows is that her throat hurts and there's a dull throbbing in the back of her head; she's kind of numb to the rest of her body. It's probably the morphine that's still in her system.
"How long have I been here?" She wonders quietly, and watches both Rachel and Sam hesitate before Sam answers.
"About um, three days, I think." He says. "Your mom called my mom this morning and I – well I called Rach, obviously, so – "
Lucy nods, and then shifts her legs under the covers. "You didn't have to – "
"Don't you dare." Rachel says, in a tone that's low and final and so not-Rachel that Lucy just blinks, taken aback.
"Don't you dare." Her voice cracks on the last syllable, and Lucy averts her eyes down to her lap.
She hears an "excuse me" and then the sound of a tissue being plucked out of a box and then footsteps into the hallway.
Then it's just her and Sam, and he scoots his chair closer until his knees look uncomfortably squished against the plastic railing of the bed. "You – " He starts, but then stops, and looks down at his feet.
"My mom told me, this morning, that you we're in the hospital, and I – shit, I dunno, I thought you got like, t-boned by a truck or something but you didn't, you were just – "
"Being my regular, stupid self?" She has to clear her throat in the middle of her sentence.
"I – " Sam sighs, and then pinches the bridge of his nose. He laughs, a light, humorless chuckle. "Yeah. Yeah."
They're both quiet, and Lucy considers asking him why she's here and what he thinks is going to happen, but she doesn't. And she doesn't know if it's because she doesn't want to have that conversation at all or if it's because she doesn't want to have that conversation with him.
Rachel chooses then to reappear, and puts on a slight smile despite her bloodshot eyes and slightly mussed bangs. She takes a deep breath. "I'm – I've calmed down, now, so – "
Lucy nods and then smiles and then feels Rachel's hands slide to hold one of hers.
"You – how are you? Good?"
"Yeah."
"You're sure?"
"I – yes."
Lucy watches Rachel's eyes dart around her face, looking for the slightest clue that she's not being completely truthful.
Rachel clears her throat, and then glances over her shoulder at Sam. "Could you – "
"Oh. Yeah, yeah, of course." He says, and then gets up and shoots Lucy a smile on his way out.
It's a painfully quiet silence for a few moments, and for a few seconds they do that awkward "averting the eyes" thing when they catch each other staring and then quickly look away.
"You know." Rachel starts, making Lucy look up from starting to stare a hole in the bedsheets. "I should – I would slap you if we weren't in a hospital and you weren't hurt, but – "
"I'm not hurt." Lucy interrupts quietly. "Do I look hurt."
"I didn't mean physically."
Oh. Lucy nods, and swallows. "Right."
"So, anyway – I can't, well, shouldn't, slap you so I – " Rachel gets up, and smooths her skirt down, running a hand through her hair. Lucy starts to lean back subconsciously when Rachel leans forward, but relaxes a little bit when she hears a whispered, "I'm going to hug you now, okay?"
"Okay."
And then there's arms wrapping around her neck and her arms are wrapping around Rachel's waist and she turns her head to the side, making her temple rest against Rachel's shoulder.
"I really am sorry." She says, and she figures she can talk a little bit more since she's basically whispering, now. "I didn't – I probably made you and Sam just – flip out, or something, and I – sorry."
"Hush."
She unwinds her arms and brings them back to her lap, then watches as Rachel wipes at her watery eyes again. "I'm sorry. You probably don't like crying people."
Lucy just shakes her head, and smiles.
Sam comes back in, and then they just talk, before Sam's mom texts him to come back home, and since he's Rachel's ride, they both have to leave. Rachel hugs her again, and Sam presses a kiss to her head which makes Lucy shoot him a weird look that he either doesn't notice or chooses not to.
"We'll be back." They say.
Lucy nods, and then watches them leave.
…
"How did I get here?" She asks the next day, and Doctor Hill finishes her daily check-up before throwing his stethoscope around his neck and laughing, "You don't know?"
Lucy shakes her head, and he feels around behind him for a chair before he plops down on it. "Well. According to your chart, your parents found you in your bathroom on Tuesday morning, and you didn't wake up, so they brought you here. And," he waves a hand. "Here we are."
Lucy nods, and then tugs on her bracelet and asks, "What's – um. What am I being treated for?"
Doctor Hill's face falls a little bit, and he crosses one leg over the other. "Malnutrition."
Lucy's head raises in a flash, and she fixes Doctor Hill with a panicked gaze. "Did you tell – "
"Your parents? Yes. I had to. Though they seemed like they already knew, anyway."
She's silent for a long moment, and then she quietly wonders, "When can I leave?"
He sighs. "Monday."
"Okay."
He nods, then smiles at the nurse that walks into her room carrying a tray of food.
"I'm not hungry." Makes it's way out of Lucy's mouth before she can even think to stop it, and she bites her lip and ducks her head slightly.
And then Doctor Hill is hovering over her bedside and mumbling, "You'll get there," while patting her lightly on the shoulder.
…
She kind of gets there before she leaves, because on Sunday she eats all three meals (hospital food really isn't that bad, or maybe it's just this hospital) plus a few snacks here and there and accepts a plate of pancakes with a bowl of fruit on Monday morning.
She guesses that her parents handle the discharge paperwork and whatever else they had to do, because when she's changed into the clothes that they've brought for her, they head straight for the door and to their car.
"You have an appointment tomorrow." Her dad says after about three minutes of silence in the car.
"For what?"
"Doctor Hill recommended we send you to a...nutritional therapist."
Lucy almost says therapy is for crazy people, but then remembers Rachel telling her about her therapist, once, so she bites her tongue and swallows guiltily.
"Okay," is what she does say, and when she catches her dad's eye in the rear view mirror, he nods his head slightly.
Lucy rests her forehead against the cool glass of the window and sighs.
…
Her mom volunteers to drive, since the closest nutritional therapist they could find was in Columbus, and they weren't going to let her go alone.
It's an awkward uncomfortable silence, and Lucy's hand swings towards the radio when her mom says, "We were so scared, honey."
She freezes, pulling her hand back into her lap and taking a deep breath. "I know. I'm sorry for making you worry. I just..." She shrugs. "I don't know."
And then a warm hand is covering hers, squeezing lightly. She looks at her mom and feels her shoulders drop at how sad her profile looks.
…
She tells her mom, softly, that she doesn't have to wait for her, because she knows that typically therapist sessions last about an hour or so, and the waiting room doesn't look very comfortable; a short table with childrens' toys drilled onto the top (Lucy tries not to think about the fact that there have been kids here, kids young enough to play with things like that) and a TV that's playing some horrific soap opera.
Judy nods, smiles, and then leaves.
…
The receptionist shows her to the third to last room on the right, and she twists the handle hesitantly before stepping in. An older brunette lady smiles up at her, and when she hears to door click shit behind her she moves and sits on the couch opposite her.
It's a nice couch; leather and comfortable. She takes a deep breath and sinks back into it.
"Hello...Lucy, right?"
"Yeah. Hi, um..."
"Dorothy Meyers. But you can call me Doris. Or Meyers. Whichever you prefer."
Lucy likes her already, and she laughs, despite it not being that funny.
"So." Doris leans forward slightly. "Tell me about yourself?"
She's not expecting that question, not at all, and she stutters, "I – really? I thought we were going to talk about...uh."
"Your eating disorder?" Doris wonders.
"I – " Lucy bristles at that, visibly, if the suddenly upturned corners of Doris' mouth are any indication.
Doris smiles. "Forgive me for this, but you know the first step to solving a problem is admitting you have one."
"I know I have one." Lucy says, and she does. "I just don't like to put it so, um, bluntly. Obviously. Whatever."
"Are you embarrassed?"
"I don't – should I be?"
"Thirty-one percent of people your age have eating disorders, Lucy. It's hardly uncommon."
"That's – thirty-one percent?"
Doris nods the affirmative and Lucy sucks in a deep breath. "Wow."
"Yes. Wow. It's quite...well, depressing, don't you think?"
Lucy says, "Yeah."
"Hmm." Doris looks at her for a long second, then asks, "What's your venom?"
"I – sorry?"
"Do you like to throw up, or – "
"Okay." Lucy says quickly. "Okay, um. No, though. I like not eating. Or, I don't like it, um." No, she really doesn't like it; she likes the flat plane of her stomach after a few weeks of doing it.
It's rounding out a little bit, now, and she crosses her arms over it self-consciously.
Doris nods. "Okay. Well, good. I can help you with that."
"Can you?"
"Yes."
She's supposed to be honest with therapists, right? "I – I don't think I want you to."
Doris' eyebrows raise slightly, as though she's surprised, but only just. "No?"
"I mean, I know it's bad for me, because I was in the hospital and – um, my mom told me that they had to give me a feeding tube and like, my throat still kind of hurts, and stuff."
"But?"
"But I don't – I didn't like the way I was before. Like, I looked in the mirror, and I just saw a big fat cell, you know?"
She nods, and smiles slightly, and Lucy says, "Um," when she realizes all that she's just said.
"What do you see when you look in the mirror now?"
"A slightly smaller fat cell."
Doris snorts, and Lucy feels herself smile.
…
It's the first time in a long time that Lucy has woken up not hungry, and it's a really nice change.
She goes downstairs to the smell of something that's not toast or eggs or some type of simple breakfast food cooking and briefly she wonders if she somehow wondered into the wrong house.
She turns the corner and says, "What the hell?"
She guesses her mom chooses to ignore her, because she just says, "Good morning, dear," and flips open a waffle iron.
"Um." Lucy says, and she takes slow steps toward the island before sitting down. "I didn't even know we had one of those?"
"Oh, me neither." Her mom says, with an excited sort of energy that makes Lucy smile despite herself. "But I attempted some almost-winter cleaning the other day and found this!"
"That's...oh." Is all she can really think of to say.
"Mhm." Her mom hums, and then pushes a plate across to her, a fork following shortly afterward. "Now, eat."
"I'm not – " She starts, and then bites down so hard on her tongue that tears spring to her eyes.
"Sorry, sorry, I'm – " She says at her mom's suddenly pale face before slicing a piece of waffle off with the side of her fork. "It's – it's habit, okay, I'm sorry."
"It's fine, dear. It's...I know."
She studies her mom for a moment longer, then averts her eye's when she catches sight of he white knuckled grip that she has on the counter.
…
Lucy feels like something akin to...well, a celebrity, if she's honest, when she gets back to school.
She's been gone for a while, so it's understandable; all the whispering and trying-and-failing-to-not-be-obvious staring.
Understandable, yes. But annoying.
…
"Okay, so. Let's discuss possible triggers. "
"I'm not a...a gun. Jesus."
"No, no, Lucy you misunderstand - " Doris says, but Lucy shakes her head.
She knows what a trigger is, she's not that uneducated, but she knows that talking about what makes her not eat will make her want to go a home and...
Well. Not eat.
But she doesn't know how to tell her...nutritional therapist that.
"I don't – I don't want to."
Doris raises her eyebrows. "Why not?"
"Because. I just don't." She huffs, a little immaturely, before crossing her arms over her chest.
"Okay. That's okay." Doris smiles. "We can talk about...your progress?" At Lucy's shrug, she continues. "You're on a meal plan, correct?"
"Yes."
"Right. And how's that going?"
Lucy shrugs, and then says, at the risk of sounding extremely ungrateful, "It's...it's kind of annoying, actually."
And it is, because every time she's even near the kitchen her mom pushes something into her face and is like 'here, eat this' or 'oh, it's 6:30, time for dinner!'
She loves that she cares. So much that she actually feels a little bit guilty whenever she says, 'I'm not hungry' (because she's actually not), because then she has to watch her mom's face fall into an expression that's somewhere between intense sadness and borderline depression.
"How so?"
"I don't know. My mom is always on me about what I'm eating and whether I've done this and whether I've done that and –" She sighs."God, I sound like a – like a selfish bitch."
There's a sick part of her that kind of misses Judy's alcoholic inattentiveness.
Doris leans back, and crosses her legs. "I wouldn't say selfish bitch. You're adjusting. It's understandable."
"So I'm an adjusting bitch." Lucy doesn't think there's any part of this that could be labeled understandable, but she bites the inside of her cheek and nods anyway.
"If this is a – ah. Bad subject – because it seems to me like it would be – then I apologize in advance." Doris pauses. "But, it is sort of my job to ask you these things."
"Right. Okay."
"You always talk about your mother. I don't think your father's come up...once."
Maybe it's a mental thing – because the bruise healed a while ago – but her cheek tingles when she averts her eyes. "He's – I don't know."
"Is he not involved with your recovery?"
Lucy wants to say that that's pretty much how it's always been; not involved unless it affects him directly.
You would think that his daughter having an eating disorder would affect him pretty fucking directly, is what Lucy thinks as she lies, "No, he's very involved. I guess my mom just comes up more."
…
It's the first time that she's been back at Rachel's house since she's been in the hospital, and it's a lot more uncomfortable than she had originally planned.
Talking to Rachel is literally like maneuvering landmines, because talking or hinting or even fucking thinking about anything pertaining to her disorder – which is most of her life, at this specific moment in time – sends her either a.) into a dark, quiet silence or b.) into loud, heaving sobs, and Lucy isn't really jumping at the chance to deal with either of those.
"How are you doing?"
"Good. Better."
"Just...good?"
Lucy nods. "Yeah. Good isn't a bad thing, is it?"
"No. It's just...I was hoping for great. Or fantastic."
Lucy snorts. "Who even says fantastic anymore?"
"I don't know." Rachel says quietly, and Lucy bites her lips before nodding. "Do you – is there anything I can do to help?"
She smile softly. "God, Rachel. You do more than enough." She really doesn't do anything at all, besides just be Rachel, but honestly, to Lucy, that is more than enough.
But then Rachel just sort of nods, and then starts wringing her hands together, and Lucy's heart kind of drops at how much smaller than usual she looks, just standing there, leaning against her kitchen counter.
"Rach – " She says, and then gets up and moves over to her.
Rachel turns around and then opens the cabinets above her – for dramatic effect, maybe, Lucy thinks – and then asks, without turning around, "Do you want to bake a cake?"
Lucy laughs. "Don't you remember what happened the last time we did that?"
Rachel nods. "Right. Cookies, then?"
Lucy nods, and then watches Rachel as she ducks into her cabinets. "Hey."
"Hmm?" Rachel says, and then Lucy hears metal clanging as Rachel moves things around.
"Do I – " Lucy sighs. "I don't know. You just seem sort of...weird around me, lately?" It isn't meant to come out as a question, not really, but it reflects how Lucy feels at this moment; unsure and nervous.
Rachel sighs, but doesn't answer, and Lucy picks up the cookie dough and reads the back of it.
"Am I really?" Rachel asks, suddenly, and Lucy jumps a little bit. "Being weird?"
"Oh." Lucy says, like she's forgotten she's said it. "Yeah. Kind of. Ever since – um."
"You can say it. 'Ever since you were hospitalized'. I know." There's a bit of an edge to Rachel's voice that Lucy's not sure she's comfortable with.
She knows that she knows, but she also knows that mentioning it so directly and bluntly and nonchalantly hits at something inside Rachel. She can see it in the way that her small shoulders are suddenly tensed and her face less emotional than usual.
"I know. I'm just saying. You kind of – "
"Well, gee, forgive for not wanting to talk about my best friend being taken to the hospital for an eating disorder!"
Rachel's hands clap over her mouth, like she can't believe she said it, and Lucy watches her eyes start to tear up.
"Rachel, hey, Rach, come on." Lucy says, and moves over to remove her hands from her face. She wants to say, "Please don't cry, oh my god, I can't handle crying people," but figures that that might be more than a little selfish. Instead, she says, "It's okay – hey."
Rachel says something through her tears, but the only part that Lucy (barely) catches is, "and you're pretending that you're fine when you're not."
And maybe being hospitalized has given her some sick kind of confidence, but when Rachel goes to rub at her eyes, Lucy catches her wrist and then puts a shaky hand behind Rachel's neck and pulls her in for a kiss.
It's not what she expected, exactly. When she was little, she'd dream of her first kiss being show-stopping and ground-breaking, with explosions and fireworks and fucking volcanic eruptions and all that.
But it's not.
It's so much better, softer somehow, and the only things that she really feels is the flutter of butterflies against the inside of her stomach that double when she feels Rachel's lips pushing back against her own.
They disconnect silently, and Lucy's wide eyes meet Rachel's teary ones.
"I'm – um." Lucy says, and then releases Rachel's wrist before she steps back a little bit. "I don't know whether to apologize or not, so I – "
"Not." Rachel says. "I mean, don't. Apologize. It's not – it's not necessary."
"...oh."
Rachel shakes her head. "No just – come here," she asks, and Lucy steps forward hesitantly until her and Rachel are basically sharing the same air. A finger brushes the inside of Lucy's wrist, and then Rachel's hand is cupping her hip. Lucy reaches up to cup the back of Rachel's neck and then she stops and just stares for a second, trying not to let her breath hitch every time little puffs of air from Rachel hit her lips.
And then Rachel tips forward and up a little bit and they're kissing again. Lucy vaguely wonders if she put chapstick on this morning, but then Rachel adjusts slightly and Lucy is pretty sure that if she were a robot, she would be short circuiting.
"Hi," Lucy says when they separate, because that's literally the only thing that she can think to say that might make sense, right now.
"Hi," Rachel says back, and they both smile.
…
A/N: R&R.
Guest (that helped with all the medical stuff and stuff): That cleared a lot of things up for me and will help to make this story a bit more realistic, so thank you!
Also, this used to be two chapters but then I combined them. So.