Baby Fat

forty-one

After spending an hour and a half talking to his doctors about his fucking emotions just a few days about, Corrie doesn't feel too ecstatic to sit down and talk about his medication. Unfortunately for him, Jennifer sprung it on him that he needed to take another suicide assessment. Thankfully, he was deemed safe by the doctors. They still want to watch him closely but they aren't putting him under suicide watch.

"Corrie, you with me?" Dr. Whitman asks with a concerned smile with.

"Yeah, yeah," Corrie looks up from the ground. He feels the goosebumps rise on his arms. He rubs his arms, hoping to warm himself up.

"So, your medication?' Dr. Whitman looks at his laptop briefly before saying, "it looks like you've been on the new combination of medication for about a month. How has it been treating you?"

He bites his lower lip. "It's okay." He doesn't know how to describe it, not in words at least. He swings his feet because they barely touch the ground. The paper makes an loud and awkward crinkly sound when Corrie shifts his weight.

"Okay?" Dr. Whitman raises an eyebrow slightly. He puts his right ankle on his left knee.

"It's," Corrie lets out an exasperated sigh. He shuts his eyes and breaths. He just wants to find the right words for this. "Numb."

"What do you mean?" Dr. Whitman quickly types on his laptop before looking back at Corrie waiting for him to continue.

"I--I feel...numb." Corrie groans. "Fuck." He rubs his temples, hoping he can make all the scrambled thoughts in his head come out sensible. He wants the doctor to understand, he wants to make sense.

Dr. Whitman gives Corrie a small look of sympathy. "Take a deep breath. Collect yourself."

"Easier said than done," Corrie mumbles under his breath. He bites his bottom lip and looks up at the bright lights on the ceiling.

"Whenever you're ready."

Corrie knows what he wants to say, it's just not coming out the way he wants. "Numb. It's not the kind of numb I felt after I fought. That kind of numb was freeing. I didn't have to feel when I didn't want to, maybe that was the drugs on top of the fighting," Corrie chuckles. "These meds, sometimes I feel everything. All the heartbreak, all the fucked up messes. But sometimes I can't feel. I'm empty and hollow, and I just can't."

Dr. Whitman nods his head slightly. He takes a few seconds to think about it before he goes back to his laptop and types a few things. "Do you have any suicidal thoughts?"

"Maybe."

Dr. Whitman replies softly. "Alright, Corrie. We're going to get the right combination. You're going to feel better."

They go back and forth with questions for a little bit longer until Dr. Whitman releases Corrie back to his nurse.

"How'd it go?" Nurse Bailey asks him as they walk to the common room.

"I don't want to go to the common room," Corrie whines high in his throat. "Why the fuck is it a requirement for me to spend time in there?" His face twists up in disgust.

Nurse Bailey sighs. "We've been over this Corrie."

Corrie's feet drag as Nurse Bailey continues to guide him. "It's stupid. I don't need to be more social."

"C'mon, Corrie. Don't make this harder than it has to be. You spend half an hour doing puzzles or games with a few of the other patients then you can go back to your room. The doctors and your parents really want you to make friends."

They reach the open doorway of the common room, and Corrie stands on the edge where the carpet of the common room meets the tile of the hallway. "Please don't make me."