Here's a little more of Skye in this chapter. This idea was suggested to me by Salkri Kachemench. I'm sure I ruined the good idea I was given, but this was the best I could do with it.
"Phil, can you come in here for a second?"
"Wait just a moment," he responded from downstairs. He was helping Leo to cut his steak as the boy was just stabbing it instead of actually cutting it into small pieces. Once he was done, he went upstairs, "What's the matter?" he asked as he walked in the bathroom.
May simply pointed at Skye. He saw her sitting on the bathtub with her hair full of shampoo and a plane toy sunk in the tub next to her.
"Is she -" the man began asking, taking a look at her face.
"Sleeping? Yes, she is," May confirmed. "I was washing her hair and she just fell asleep."
"Well, you can do special things with your fingers. When you give me a massage, I-"
"Does it look like I'm joking around?" May asked, crossing her arms over her chest, glaring her husband.
"I'm not joking around either. You should take it as a compliment."
"What I think is that we have to take her to a doctor."
Coulson sighed and adopted a serious posture, "This is not normal. The amount of time she sleeps, and the places she falls asleep at, aren't at all normal."
"Thank you for agreeing with me," May said sarcastically, "Would you look up the number of a sleep specialist while I awake her up and finish bathing her?"
"I will, but before I do," he said as he walked out the bathroom, "I'll just make sure Leo isn't still stabbing his steak anymore."
When Coulson talked to the receptionist to schedule an appointment for Skye, she was really enlightening. She told them to take the girl's latest physical exam and to bring a bag with her overnight clothes and her stuffed animal (if she had one) because, if the doctor suspected she had any sleep disorder, he'd like to run tests on her that night.
The doctor welcomed the three of them into his office, showed them to their seats, and took a seat behind his desk.
He presented his hand to Skye and was graced with a handshake, "What's your name?"
"I'm Skye. Daddy calls me energetic monkey."
"I'm Martin," he introduced himself with a smile, "My Dad used to call me Scooby-Doo."
Skye giggled. Doctor Martin was probably one of the best doctors Coulson and May had ever been to. Even though he a sleep specialist, he was amazing with children (easily explained by a photo on his desk of himself, his wife and five children). Skye loved him immediately which was impressive since she hated all doctors, even the pediatrician who always offered her a lollipop.
"But do tell me," the doctor turned to Coulson and May, "what seems to be the problem with your little girl?"
May began explaining, "She's always tired and sleepy. It's a struggle to get her out of bed, and then she falls asleep at the strangest times and places. Last night she fell asleep in the bathtub. I don't think that's normal."
"It certainly is not. How would you describe her sleep time? Constant, irregular?"
"I think 'too much' is a good description," Coulson admitted, "Skye's a sleepyhead. The kindergarten teacher tells us that she disappears to the room where the younger kids are and joins them for nap time. We've asked her not to let her take afternoon naps because next year she'll be going to elementary school and she won't be able to take naps in the midafternoon, but apparently she goes into the room anyways."
The doctor took in the explanations and said, "It seems like your energetic monkey has narcolepsy. I'd like to ask you something. It might seem strange, but it's crucial. Skye, can you stand up, please?" The girl climbed down from her mother's lap as ordered and the doctor turned to her parents again, "I'd like you to make her laugh. Make her laugh as hysterically as you can."
May smirked and glanced at her husband, "This is up to you."
Coulson tilted his neck to the left, then to right, loosening his arm muscles and breathing in deeply. "I'm sorry Skye, but Daddy is going to undergo a very strange transformation."
"No," Skye wheezed, mid-laugh, "not the tickle monster."
He only walked closer to her, wiggling his fingers and Skye was already hysterical. Doctor Martin looked at May and confided, "You're husband is good at it."
"He's child himself," she smiled but quickly changed her posture when Skye wobbled.
"It's alright, it's alright," The doctor rapidly assured, patting the chair for Skye to sit again, "I wanted it to happen."
"I got weak on my knees," Skye said with a big grin and unsteady breathing, climbing up to the chair again.
"You sure did. That's called cataplexy and it is very common. When narcoleptic people are overwhelmed by a stress or a strong emotion, they very suddenly, and also very briefly, lose control of their muscles and wobble. Some people lose their balance and collapse on the floor."
"Thanks goodness I didn't," Skye chirped and it caused the doctor to smile because of her word choice, "the floor looks hard."
"It sure is. Thank goodness you didn't collapse. Now tell me something," he crouched next to her chair, "when you wake up, do you feel like you can't talk or move your body?"
Skye nodded her head, "Yeah. It's scary sometimes. What if a monster comes to attack me? I can't defend myself if I can't move or scream."
And with that she had just confirmed two of his theories: Skye suffered of sleep paralysis and hypnagogic hallucinations, which were also very common.
"That's very scary indeed." The doctor put in, "I think you should get a stuffed animal to protect you, or do you have one already?"
"I have a teddy bear, Marshmallow."
"Perfect. Teddy bears are the best at protecting children from scary monsters. Did you bring him with you today?"
"Oopsie," she grinned, "I forgot him in the waiting room."
Martin smiled and lightly pinched her cheek, "Why don't you go and get Marshmallow? I think he's feeling lonely out there."
Skye nodded her head and walked to the waiting room to pick up her stuffed animal.
The doctor carried on with questions more aimed at her parents, "Do you feel that Skye has memory loss, lack of concentration, low motivation, sluggishness? Does she have difficulty keeping up with friends, siblings, or even difficulty completing menial tasks?"
Coulson and May looked at each other; he ended up answering, "I think it's safe to say she has a bit of all of those. We used to think she was simply lazy and uninterested."
"That's perfectly normal, don't feel bad about it. Diagnosing children as young as Skye is always hard, and it is perfectly understandable that people make more linear judgments. It's much easier to conceive the idea that a child is lazy than to immediately jump to the possibility of a narcoleptic disorder."
"So can we, right now, strongly assume that Skye is narcoleptic?" May questioned.
"I'd say I'm 80% sure she suffers from narcolepsy. I'd like to run the two exams I've briefly told you about earlier. I'll get into detail later, don't worry. Now, since you told me earlier she's not your biological daughter, we'll rule out the medical history exams, and since you've brought me her latest physical exam I'd say I have everything I need to skip to the actual tests."
"I got Marshmallow," Skye said as she walked in the room again.
"Good. And you arrived just at the right time. I'll explain to you and your Mom and Dad what exams you'll have to do here, alright?" Skye returned to her seat to listen to the doctor, "Tonight, you'll have to sleep here at our laboratory. Don't worry, one of your parents will stay here with you. And you have Marshmallow too. My nurses will glue some funny things in your forehead called electrodes and we'll know what's happening inside your brain. All you have to do is sleep. The wires are a bit uncomfortable, but I'm sure you'll do great. We'll do an exam called polysomnogram, big word, I know. Then tomorrow we'll do another test. That one is called the multiple sleep latency test. You'll take five naps during the day and then we'll let you go home."
"Cool. I love to take naps."
"I'm sure you do." Doctor Martin walked to the door and opened it, pointing at the nurse at the end of the hall, "See that woman over there? That's Nurse Piper. Could you go with her to get you ready? You know, you have to dress your jammies, get comfortable in bed. Your parents and I will join you in a while, alright?"
Skye nodded and walked to nurse Piper as the doctor asked her to.
"I'll stay with her tonight," Coulson said to his wife, "I'll spend the day here with her so you don't have to miss work." Looking at the doctor once he closed the door, Coulson asked, "If Skye really suffers from narcolepsy, what advice can you give us?"
"I won't prescribe medication. Maybe when she's older she might need it, but not now," Doctor Martin affirmed, sitting at his chair. "But you shouldn't let her drink coffee, tea, cola, or even some non-cola pops, energy drinks, or eat chocolate in the late afternoon. Once I present to you my final diagnosis, I'll help you sketch a strict sleeping schedule, which might include afternoon naps too. You can already warn family members and teachers, whoever she has close contact with about her disorder, just to give them a heads-up. And of course, the most important: have Skye start exercising regularly and decrease repetitive or boring tasks. If you don't do that, it will ruin her sleeping schedule and directly affect yours. She needs to be exhausted by bedtime."
Coulson and May nodded and then they walked with Doctor Martin to the room where Skye was. May bid her farewells and left the girl with Coulson. Once May was home, all the kids were sleeping. She only had to greatly thank Mimi for having looked after them and then slipped into bed. She didn't really sleep much as she and Coulson were talking to each other almost every hour because of Skye.
The results of Skye's exams were revealed two days later. She did indeed have narcolepsy. Coulson explained to the other kids what being narcoleptic meant. Maybe he should have left the explanations to May. Saying that narcolepsy means that people like to sleep wasn't the best explanation because in the following morning all the kids had self-diagnosed themselves as narcoleptic.
So, I've been counting the upcoming chapters and ordering them and all that, and I really hope you can endure me at least until chapter 20, because that's how many chapters I have planned... Anyways, next chapter is going to be Grant's backstory.
Leave me your reviews and your ideas.