011 ~ A Mileven Fanfic

Part III

Prologue

I'm not telling you the POV cause suspeeeeence.

"How old, again?"

"18 on saturday." I say nervously, drumming my fingers against the cold upholstery of this stark white arm chair.

"And how long have the symptoms been occuring?"

"About a year."

"And you believe that dire help is needed."

"Well there were some things that happened in the past that could possibly make these things, well, real so it was either you or the police and for some reason I came to you first, so you interpret that."

The doctor nods and turns to a nurse in the corner where they begin to speak in hushed tones. I strain my ears to hear their conversation but I just hear snippets like, "around the age it begins to appear," and "but he's not here."

I know what they mean by the last one and I immediately feel guilty yet I'm snapped out of my thoughts as the doctor turns to face me again.

She gives me a warm smile, as if bracing me for what's about to come, and then takes a deep breath before saying,

"Karen, your son has paranoid schizophrenia."

Part III

In which Mike struggles with his mental health, the kids struggle with senior year and college, and everyone begins to lose themselves, dissolving into chaos.

NOTES

-I know in the 80's they thought schizophrenia had the symptoms of multi personality disorder and they just had it wrong but i cant bear to be so wrong about this, as a possible psych major, so i'm writing it in the correct way

-there is a time skip, it now starts around christmas of fall break and a lot has happened

WHAT HAS HAPPENED BETWEEN PART II AND III (VERY IMPORTANT, PLEASE READ)

Part II ended 3rd quarter of Junior year, with mike and el broken up and the kids feeling betrayed by El. However, Dustin and Max are quick to forgive and stay together, despite their relationship not being the same after learning that Max liked Lucas and only artificially likes Dustin. Will was crushed about Christopher, the boy he had been "dating" and is still not totally over it (they were in a very serious relationship), yet now fully out. However, he saw how bad El felt about it and how she just wanted to help, so he forgave her. They all reconciled with Lucas after now seeing that he was not the culprit and while the relationship seems to go back to normal, the love triangle is now more tense than it's ever been due to the fact that they all now have a great amount of knowledge about each other.

Lastly, Mike was the most hesitant to forgive El except finally, the group wore him down so much that he forgave her and they got back together around September of senior year. They're now stronger than ever. El also has recently moved in with Hopper who bought a house only 5 minutes away from the wheelers.

The diagnosis of schizophrenia came about a month ago (prologue set a month ago), and all of the friends know about and are all, especially El, very helpful and supportive. Mike's schizophrenia is not as serious as most, considering its a spectrum disorder, so he still plans on living his life and going to Columbia.

They all just sent in their college applications and are very apprehensive yet relaxed for now, considering winter break just started and they're all ready just to hang out together, with less drama than they usually have (of course there's still some drama, come on, it's them) and now, only stressed by school, like the normal childhood they should've gotten.