jumpthegun | IC Inbox (v1.0)

[It's been a bit of a night. But John summons up his best friendly doctor tone. He's not doing video just now for... reasons. But he will if Kid seems to need it. His voice is quiet, but concerned.]

Of course. Are you all right, Kid? Has something happened?

[Why else would he be calling at this hour?]

Nothing's happened. [Breathe. It's easy to watch Kid remind himself of the sequence of steps to take to keep himself together, if one is looking. Breathe, think, then talk. But his typically impeccable practice had frayed significantly by lack of sleep and it shows in the dim light. Already, the teen can feel his hands trembling; the camera view shifts slightly as he sets it on the floor.] I...saw the conversation you had with Mr. Solomons.

[He opens his mouth to speak again, and then closes it abruptly, the barest flush crawling up his cheeks.] I apologize for calling so late. I've..I've wanted-- [He swallows, one hand scratching nervously at the stripes in his hair.] I...have wanted to speak with you since

[Ah... That's, well, it's good to know it caught Kid's eye, he supposes, even if Stein's been insistent about it being normal.]

It's all right, kid. I'm happy to talk about that. Sorry I interrupted your conversation with him, but it wasn't sitting right with me, him calling you a nutter. Ignorance can make people cruel, even when they don't mean to be.

Where d'you want to start?

[Please let him focus on your problems and not his own, Kid.]

I--

[Unfortunately, it might take a bit for the teen to open up despite being the initiator, if the averted gaze is any indication. Stein had called the Lines of Sanzu a mark of the divine, but Kid looks every inch a child now with his shoulders hunched and head bowed, arms crossed over his chest.] I don't--

Mr. Solomons is not the first person. I have had professors, classmates, even my Weapon partners--

I...appreciate your intervention. [Kid's voice hitches, just slightly.] However, I don't doubt it will happen again.

[All right. He's not looking his best, but this demands a video conversation on his side, too. There's no pity in John's expression when the screen flips on, but there is empathy.]

I'm really sorry you've had to deal with that, Kid. Really, no one should have to. There are a lot of ignorant people in the world, though. You're right. It'll probably happen again. But I can teach you the words to use to shut them down like I did with Mr. Solomons, if you'd like. It shouldn't be your obligation to explain or educate, though. If you don't feel like it, you can send them right to me, and I'll set them straight.

I don't know anything about magic or how normal this is for a person with... spiritual energy, but what I can see is that it's making it hard for you to interact with other people like you might want to. That's something we should fix, and it's not just your side of things. It's all of the rest of them that need work, too.

Can I tell you a secret?

[Here is Watson again, talking about fixing the problem--Kid peers up through the fringe of badly-in-need-of-a-trim bangs and swallows.] Fixed? Everyone seems to think it's just what Mr. Solomons saw. They don't...the arranging, counting, cleaning, tapping and clicking and sorting and moving again and again and again and nothing is ever right here--just so it's quiet for a little while [The gold eyes that were watching him very abruptly shift back to the floor.] That can get better?

[His head bobs up and down in a nod, not looking from his point off screen.] ...of course. I will not tell anyone.

[It's honestly heartbreaking to learn that this is the first time in Kid's life that he's heard anything like this before. Does his school not have counsellors? Isn't Stein trained? The technology level isn't so far back that they wouldn't have the DSM.]

That can absolutely get better. Where I come from, people treat it with a combination of therapy and medicine to help with the anxiety. A therapist can help you channel those impulses in ways that won't be as disruptive for your life, and the medicine helps regulate things in your brain so that you don't feel that stress about everything quite as much.

I've struggled with anxiety. It didn't manifest like yours does, but it started affecting my life. I was in a war in Afghanistan, but I was shot in the back. I had to go home. I left everyone I knew as brothers back there, they told me I might not be able to work as a surgeon again because the shot affected my arm. I started having pain and tremors that had nothing to do with my injuries. It made it so I couldn't work, couldn't go back, and that was worse and worse, just made me more anxious I was letting people down, y'know? The Army put me in therapy to help with it. It gets better.

[He'll just leave out that it wasn't really therapy that helped him. Yep.]

[Kid hasn't looked up, his fingers tapping a meticulous pattern on his arms as he kept them tightly folded. Mental health was simply not well understood where Kid was from. There was no expectation that Kid's brand of disordered behavior was in any way fixable--it was just something to be tolerated.

He's barely whispering.] ...really?

[Watson's story finally pulls Kid's gaze from the floor.] You--? I would never... [Now he is fully looking at the camera again, revealing the tracks of tears on his face. He doesn't wipe them; they're even.] You don't seem at all as though--rather, perhaps I should say you seem so...calm.

[John offers a sad smile.]

You just haven't seen me on my bad days. I can still fall into bad habits. Sometimes I get so angry and frustrated I can't think straight. Some days, my leg starts to hurt again. You work it out, though. I've worked it out how to deal with it for the most part. It took me a good long while, and I'm still working through it along with other things. I've been lucky enough to find a few people here who help. People I can talk to.

Do you have anyone like that? If not, I'd be happy to be one of those people. Any time the anxiety starts getting to be too much, any time you feel like you can't help your compulsions, we can talk, if you'd like. I'm not a therapist, but I'm a good listener.

[The tapping fingers tighten into the fabric of his suit jacket, so tight his knuckles turn white, shoulders shaking.
He's only able to half-swallow his sob and tucks his face into the crook of his arm.]

It...it's very often. [His voice is small and he can't bring himself to admit that "very often" is in fact "nearly constant", though the unspoken likely does that for him. ]

[He's shifted so his face is ducked from the camera, hair wound tightly in his fingers.] And I'm...unsure of where 'too much' starts, if there's rarely quiet at all.

Edited (Finally I wrote the tag. But I forgot to choose an icon the first time whoops) 2016-09-04 08:56 (UTC)

Let's set it out as when you can't push through it and travel in a timely manner for the day, or when you're in a house and can't focus on anything except the anxiety, no matter how much you try. D'you have any techniques that help calm you down? Anything you do that helps?

[Kid swallows, careful to keep his tear-stained face away from the camera.]

C-counting, or cleaning, or p-putting things in order, or arranging the r-room so it's symmetrical-- [He laughs weakly, scrubbing his eyes.] I...that's not what you mean, is it?

We can work with that, sure. Why don't you pick your favorite number above 100 and count to that. Then, I want you to tell yourself, out-loud, if you need to and feel comfortable doing it: 'I'm going to be all right. This will pass.' Then start over counting again. Keep doing that as many times as you need to until it passes and you're feeling a little more level.

D'you think you can do that?

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@jwatson; audio

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...I found this tag hidden in my inbox as I tried to clean it I'm so sorry

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