Never Forgotten || l.p (au)

Chapter 33

-Destiney-

I looked ahead of me, at the large flight of stairs sitting there, waiting to take me down. There were so many steps. So, so many. "Liam..that's a lot of stairs."

"I've got you," he whispered and slid his hand into mine, squeezing it. His hand was warm; it felt great.

"Okay, I'm trusting you," I mumbled. I took the first step and began going up. It was alright at first, I could still breathe okay thanks to the tubes of oxygen shoved up my nose. But about three fourth's of the way to the top, I started to feel light headed and my chest hurt.

"You're okay?" I heard Liam behind me. I nodded my head and kept going on, ignoring the burning feeling in my chest. We reached the top step at last, and I immediately sat down on it and held my head in my hands.

"Need..a minute.." I whispered. I felt him sit down beside me, and I could sense people walking past us. They were most likely staring.

"Are you alright, dear?" came the voice of an older man, and I looked up to meet his eyes. He only had a little gray hair on the sides of his head and his face was wrinkled, but he looked kind.

"I'll be okay, thanks," I nodded, forcing the sweetest smile I could muster. He smiled back before continuing on with whatever he was doing.

"I'm.." Liam began, but he backed down and kept quiet. I wasn't sure what he was going to say, but I assumed it was probably going to be an apology.

"Okay," I said aloud about 3 minutes later. "Let's go." Liam stood up with me and we quietly made our way to the room he was supposed to see his counselor in.

"Come with me," he whispered softly, carefully taking my hand and opening the door. I was worried about Liam. I have been for some time now. He's nothing like I remember. He may be mentally ill, but there's still almost nothing about him that's the same as it was.

His speech was obviously the biggest issue. I still can't understand why he ever stopped talking. It didn't make sense to me, because I remember him singing and belting out lyrics every day when we were in school.

And he can't be alone. The only time he's ever alone is when using the bathroom, other than that I'm by his side 24/7. I'm not complaining, but it worries me that he can't be left on his own for more than 5 minutes. Most people like some alone time.

I haven't figured out his eating pattern, either. He doesn't eat breakfast, but he eats a fairly good amount of food during lunch, then at dinner he just picks at everything and doesn't really eat much of it. He's practically living off of one meal a day and that's not good, he's not going to ever get better that way.

And finally, his depression. It was something beyond my perspective, because I've never had it or had feelings of it. But it seemed like the majority of the effects were being negative about yourself and never being motivated to do anything. I hated having Liam like that all the time.

I'd be a fool not to be worried about Liam, or at least concerned. But I don't know what else to do besides these counseling sessions. It's the only option we really have left, but I'm not sure if it's even working.

"-iney? Are you with us?" I snapped my thoughts back to reality at the sound of my name. "You are Destiney, correct?"

"Yeah," I nodded my head and shook his hand, giving a quick glance at Liam. He was staring at the ground, seemingly in his own world. "And you are?"

"I'm Dr. Palmer, but you can just call me Mark." I nodded to show him I understood and leaned back in the chair, taking a semi-deep breath. Something was telling me this won't go well.