Anger Management

Running on Fumes

"Doc, you had better be kidding," Happy mumbled into the phone. It was 4 a.m. and Happy had just been rudely awoken by a shrill ringing noise. Once she established that asking the device to stop ringing wouldn't work, she fumbled around for it until she picked it out.

"No, Happy. I'm as serious as a bladder infection. You need to wake up. Now." Toby sounder chipper for so early in the morning. How the hell did anyone function at this time of the day?

"What in the hell for?"

"Well you see, if you really want these classes to work, you need to be willing to put in effort. And what effort is more agonising than getting up in the middle of the night to go running?"

Happy swore. "I don't run. And it's not the middle of the night, it's 4 a.m.-"

"Yeah, yeah, whatever." Toby said. "Just get into running clothes. And if you go back to sleep, so help me, I will come over there and drag you out of bed."

Happy groaned and hung up. This wasn't how psychology worked, was it? She was almost sure normal doctors didn't wake their patients up to go running. This had better be important, she thought.

**

Happy opened her front door to find a shivering Toby sitting on her porch chair. He looked up when she walked outside, and gestured for her to join him. He was dressed in running clothes, too.

"Correct me if I'm wrong, but this doesn't seem like a conventional psychological treatment. In fact, it doesn't seem like a conventional anything." Happy could feel Toby watching her.

"You're right, it's not a conventional treatment. But I'm not a conventional doctor. So suck it up and keep moving."

As Happy picked up her pace, she couldn't help but wonder if Toby did this with his other patients, too.

He didn't seem to have trouble keeping up with her. After a gruelling run, Happy found herself wanting to stop. Just when she was about to swallow her pride and ask Toby to slow down, he spoke. "I think that's enough for tonight?" He gasped out and bent down with his hands on his knees, trying to catch his breath.

"Giving up so soon?" Happy taunted, glad she wasn't the one to throw in the towel first.

Toby laughed. "Happy, I saw how tired you were getting and decided to stop for your benefit."

Happy scoffed. "Whatever you say, Doc."

Once the pair had made their way back to Happy's house, they had seemed to catch their breath.

Happy offered Toby a drink of water, which he gladly accepted. As she was getting some ice from the freezer, she thought to ask him the purpose of their run.

"As you might have already guessed, this had no actual scientific purpose."

Happy rolled her eyes and gestured for him to continue.

"You trusted me, though it took some convincing. And that, my dear Happy, was the purpose of our run." Toby said with a smirk.

"Call me dear again, and I'll hit you so hard that you get brain damage. Got it?"

Toby laughed and looked at Happy. He could tell she didn't mean it. Well, not all that much. She looked happy. Toby chuckled at his own accidental pun.

Happy looked at him and made a face. "What are you laughing at?" She asked.

"Nothing, dear." He challenged.

Happy narrowed her eyes but to his surprise, and her credit, she didn't do anything.

Suddenly she stood up. "Since it's only about five, I'm going to catch some shut - eye. I trust you can let yourself out." She said, and started climbing the staircase to her bedroom.

Toby found himself looking around at her home. She had so many tools. Tools, everywhere. There were several nuts laying on her coffee table, wrenches on her couches and a blowtorch in the corner of the room. A blowtorch she probably wouldn't have any problem using on him if she found him snooping around her house. With a groan, Toby stood up. His legs were going to carry the burden of his eureka moment later today.

As he left, he spotted a picture of her and an older man sitting on the mantlepiece. Perhaps it was her father? Toby would be sure to ask her about it at their next therapy session.