Back To Our Roots, Book One

CXXV. He Really Cares About You

"Maybe this was a bad idea."

"Oh, no." Jeff stopped Nick as he tried to turn back. "We're already here, it's too late."

Nick bit his lip. "I just... I don't know. I'm nervous."

"Come on, I'll be right beside you."

He nodded, gripping Jeff's hand.

They headed into the waiting room and Jeff signed them in, Nick too nervous to talk. They sat down, although it wasn't easy to find two chairs next to each other in the rather full room.

"Fags," a voice muttered. Nick immediately dropped Jeff's hand, crossing his arms uncomfortably.

"Sorry," he mumbled.

Jeff didn't say anything. Nobody'd really said that to him before. Or at him, really. He didn't want to make things worse by attempting to stand up for himself. They were in Ohio, after all, not somewhere with accepting people. People were still racist in Ohio. You'd think everyone would be past that by now.

"Nicholas?"

They both stood up, following the nurse back to the room. She took Nick's blood pressure and then handed him a clipboard, leaving.

"What is this?" he asked nobody in particular, scanning the sheet on it.

"Probably an anxiety questionnaire. You basically rate how much different problems have effected you in the last two weeks and then add up your score," Jeff said, walking over to look at it. "Yeah, see, you circle which of those it is."

Nick nodded. "How did you know how it works before you looked at it?" he asked curiously.

He shrugged, putting his hands in his pockets. "I've filled one out before. Not for anxiety, but it was the same concept."

He nodded again, Jeff sitting back down as he began to fill it out.

Before long a doctor walked in. They dealt with introductions– Jeff introduced both himself and Nick, as Nick was too anxious to say much– and he looked over the questionnaire, raising an eyebrow. "It looks like you have some pretty bad anxiety there, Nick."

Realizing he expected a response, Nick half-nodded. He was having second thoughts about all of this.

"Do you remember about when this all started?"

He shook his head softly, looking over at Jeff. He'd told him all his answers to the questions he thought they might ask, knowing what would happen.

"It's been going on since he can remember, but it's gotten worse recently," Jeff promptly filled in. Nick nodded.

The doctor looked between the two of them. "Any idea what made it worse?"

Nick nodded once again, looking at Jeff.

"It got worse the night his parents got arrested. They were, um, abusive. Before that they had gone on trial but won."

He nodded as Jeff spoke, making notes on his computer. "Now, Nick, the last time we had information on you put in our system was when you broke your arm. You would have been seven. I guess I'm wondering why you haven't gotten a checkup between now and then."

Jeff looked at Nick worriedly. Nick bit his lip. He opened his mouth, as if to speak, but shut it again. Then he took a breath. "I– I... M-my f-fam-family did-didn't ta-take m-me," he managed to get out, voice hardly audible. This was all so wrong. So, so wrong.

He nodded, making a note. Jeff couldn't help it.

"Sir, we're not just here for general anxiety. I mean, yes, that too, but it's some sort of reaction triggered by being alone. If I leave the room and he can't see me or he's completely alone it gets set off. He can't even sleep for fear that I won't be in our dorm when he wakes up. It's killing me to see him like this." Jeff was desperate. Someone needed to help Nick, and they needed to help him now.

If Nick had been able to speak in the first place, he would be speechless. Jeff sounded so worried, so caring, so loving– it was incredible. His emotions were all out there, every single one of them saying to please help his boyfriend.

It broke Nick's heart a bit but healed it even more.