monster » isaac lahey [1] ✓

psychological pain

An obnoxious ringing filled the car, bouncing off the walls and pounding against Adrianna's already hurting head.

Lydia glanced back at her, then to Allison with a worried look. She took in a deep breath, attempting to give herself some false confidence before she picked up the ringing phone. "Hey Stiles. Yeah, we're just about to walk into a movie, uh, you know, the popcorn and-"

Stiles cut her off by saying something. Lydia visibly deflated, giving up her ridiculous lie. "Okay." She pulled the phone from her ear and held it out between everyone. She put it on speaker.

"Okay, look, Scott's still hurt." Stiles voiced through the phone, the fear rather evident in his tone.

Adrianna frowned, pushing herself off the window and attempting to move closer to the phone. Her body screamed at the sudden use of her limbs and the stretching of her skin around the wound. She collapsed against the back of the middle seat, her breathing still ragged.

Allison looked to the phone, her eyebrows furrowed in deep confusion and fear. "What do you mean still? He's not healing?"

"No, he's not healing. I think he's actually getting worse. The bloods turning like a black colour." Stiles sounded almost disgusted.

"W-What's wrong with him?" Lydia wondered

"What's wrong with him? I don't-Do I have a PhD in lycanthropy? How am i supposed to know that?" Stiles was frustrated and concerned and was starting to panic.

Adrianna nearly laughed except it hurt to even do that. She knew she shouldn't be laughing, but his panic was somewhat amusing.

Allison put her head in her hand, letting out a hot breath. "We need to get him off the bus."

"And take him where? A hospital?" Lydia spoke what they were all thinking.

"If he's dying, yeah." Allison argued.

Adrianna opened her eyes, looking to her cousin with her furrowed eyebrows and wrinkles of concern spread across her face. This wasn't fair on her, this wasn't fair on any of them.

"Stiles, there's a rest area about a mile up. Tell the coach to pull over." Allison ordered.

"Yeah, I've been trying." The frustration returned to his voice.

"Well, reason with him." Allison argued.

"Reason? Have you met this guy?"

Allison was now angry, she wanted Scott off that bus, she wanted to help him and Stiles needed to do whatever he could do get them off that bus. "Just try something."

---

Allison and Stiles had an arm each of Scotts draped over their shoulders as they rushed him to the bathroom as quickly as they could. Lydia gently held Adrianna up, being careful not to move her in any way that would cause pain.

Allison and Stiles carefully lowered Scott between two of the sinks, receiving a groan of pain from Scott. Adrianna leaned against one of the walls, her arm protectively wrapped around her torso. She let out deep breaths, she had to focus on Scott, she would be fine.

Allison pulled Scotts shirt up as carefully as she could, trying to touch any part of his skin where the blood stain was. "Oh my god." Allison breathed out, her eyes landing on the claw marks that had smeared red blood and was practically dripping a black liquid. "Why didn't you tell us?"

Scotts eyes were barely open, his face dripping with sweat and too pale for it to be healthy. "Sorry" He croaked out.

"Okay." Allison lowered the shirt back down. "Just give us a second."

They started walking away from Scott and towards the wall that Adrianna was leaning against.

"This shouldn't be happening. I've seen him heal from worse than this." Allison stressed out to the group.

"Okay, what do we do then? Do we just call an ambulance?" Stiles suggested.

"What if-What if it's too late? What if they can't help?" Allison probed.

"We gotta do something."

Adrianna frowned, looking over to Scott as he sat barely breathing against the wall. She pushed down the pain, the throbbing, the warm blood still slipping down her skin and for once, listened. She listened to her empathy, trying to pick up on something that wasn't quite right with Scott. She could feel his pain, but not physically. It was mental. It was an overwhelming sadness and darkness and anguish that he was drowning in. "What if it's psychological?"

The three teens snapped their heads up to her, wincing at her croaky voice and pale complexation. She looked like Scott, close to death.

Stiles frowned, his mouth fumbling for words. "What-what do you mean? Like psychosomatic?"

"Somatoformic." Lydia answered for her, picking up on her train of thought. It made sense, a lot more sense than their previous theories.

"Som-"

"A physical illness from a psychogenic cause." Lydia answered his unspoken question.

Stiles stared at them with wide eyes, his mind not processing any of the words the girls were spitting out.

"It's all in his head." Adrianna simplified.

"All in his head?" Stiles looked down, his mind whirring to fit the pieces together. What could be so bad that it made him not be able to heal from a wound, to torture himself. He slowly raised his eyes to meet Adrianna's, the reason for her gloom clicking the final pieces into place. "Because of Derek. He's not letting himself heal because Derek died."

Adrianna broke his gaze, involuntarily cradling in the wall more as thoughts she didn't want to think about surfaced.

"So what do we do?" Allison questioned.

Lydia started rummaging through her bag until she pulled out some wire and needles. "Stitch him up."

Allison let out a shaky breath as she eyed the dangerous equipment. This could easily go very wrong.

"I'm serious. Maybe all he needs to do is believe it's healing." Lydia looked between Allison and Stiles, unable to notice their reluctant expressions. She turned to Adrianna, needing support on this idea because it was the only one they had.

Adrianna eyed the needles before raising to meet Lydias determined eyes. "We have to try."

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