Everchanging

Mints

!!TW!! Description of seizures, vomit, cult, child abuse, and misogyny/internal misogyny

Sanemi shifted from foot to foot, his eyes watching as Shinobu checked over his baby brother. Genya had been unconscious since being transferred from Obanai's room, which was worrying to say the least. But thankfully, he hasn't seized anymore since then. Every person in the room cringed when Shinobu stripped the boy of his shirt, his inflamed scars out for everyone to see. Sanemi thought his medicine was supposed to help with that, but apparently he'd been wrong.

"What's wrong with him?" He couldn't stay quiet, eyes glued to the flush skin on Genya's chest and his whistling breathes. Sanemi pulled on his fingers, forcing himself to stay as far away from the bed as possible. He didn't want to touch Genya, lest he break for good.

Shinobu frowned, looking up at the brother and sighing. With a shake of her head, she went to head to her desk where her phone was. Kanao watched with owlish eyes, wide and terrified as she stared at the boy who was sitting next to her the whole day. She should've said something. Obanai tapped his foot on the ground, reaching forward to place his hand on his friend's shoulder. As scared as he was, he couldn't imagine what Sanemi was feeling.

"Has Genya been taking his medicine regularly?" Shinobu tapped her pen on the desk anxiously, eyes flicking back to the sick boy.

"Of course he has." Sanemi huffed, fear bubbling below his skin whenever he saw a twitch in the child's eyes, terrified that he would seize again.

"Are you sure? Are you absolutely positive?" Shinobu couldn't help the short tone she used, something was obviously wrong and she needed to find out what. "Because his injuries are inflamed and he's seizing despite being on medicine for both of those things."

"Wait, has Genya always had an issue with seizures?" Obanai didn't see anything like that in his medical file, just that the possibility was newfound.

"No, he had to get put on anti-seizure medicine after everything because of the sheer amount of head injuries he's gotten his entire life." Sanemi sighed, watching Kanao retrieve Genya's backpack from the corner of the room. The poor girl was shaking as she knelt down, eyes flashing to the adults before opening it and looking inside. "The doctors said that they didn't know how he managed to go this long without having a big seizure."

"And he's good with taking his medicine everyday?" Obanai didn't sound convinced, taking a step forward to watch Kanao fetch the daily pill container that Genya kept in his bag. It only held his daily dose, so Sanemi would have to refill it before they left for school every morning. Despite how tedious it was, it helped Genya feel a little more in control so Sanemi kept his complaints to himself.

"Yeah, he takes them whenever I ask him to or when his alarm goes off." Sanemi swore, eyes catching on the blue container that was empty. Genya had taken his pills. "See?"

"Wait." Kanao leaned further forward, frowning at the empty container. "What medicine does he take? What do they look like?"

"He takes Klonopin for the seizures, they're small and pale. And he just takes ibuprofen for his injuries. They didn't want to give him anything stronger." Sanemi thought out loud, wondering why the girl wanted to know. "But the Klonopin is small, round and like a pale bluish-white."

Kanao's face dropped, a gasp filling the room as she looked at the unconscious boy like he'd betrayed her. Sanemi could feel his stomach dropping when she turned back to him and spoke.

"He throws those away during lunch. I...we didn't know what they were." Kanao choked up, tears beading her eyelashes as her guilt felt all-consuming. She should have said something. "He told us that they were mints and we believed him. We...I...we let him throw them away everyday because we just thought he was tossing out mints from his lunch."