New Year, New You [OTA]

[abrightboy]

Who: Malcolm Bright and YOU
When: The first half of January.
Where: B1, ADI offices, around town.
Summary: Malcolm is aware that he has problems. Time to get rid of them for good! Because mental health works like that, right?!
Warnings: mental health struggles, vomit


There's a TV playing in the cafeteria at ADI when he goes down to get lunch after the new year. He's going to order soup; he already knows this. He's not even paying attention to the TV. He's lost in his own thoughts. But, as he waits in line, he changes his mind. Maybe he won't have soup after all. He's going to have a hamburger! And fries! Time to do like his mother says: stop all this nonsense. It's all in your head, Bright, he tells himself. That admonition is in a lot of people's voices from throughout his life.

He spends most of the afternoon in the men's room on that floor throwing up.

But Rome wasn't built in a day.

Back at B1 a few days later, he's staring at the tidy line of pill bottles on the kitchen counter. He's considering just throwing them away. He has to force himself to be normal; he can see it now.

At the coffee shop down the street, on another day, he orders his usual mocha and a big slice of chocolate cake. He'll try not to throw it up on the street but no promises. It takes time for a body to get used to new habits, is all. And if he's a little jittery, anxious, more unraveled than usual, well it's probably because he quit his meds cold turkey but he'll adapt. It's not to worry. He'll adapt.

Maybe he should stop relying on the restraints to sleep.

Maybe he should start going out to bars to meet people.

Maybe he should break curfew and crash with friends at Bonnie's.



Somebody stop him.

Comments

[bossyboiler]

"I've never seen you eat such heavy food."

[abrightboy]

"Oh," he shrugs. "I'm just... going to get over that. You know? Just. Buck up and get over it." He takes a big bite of cake for emphasis.

[bossyboiler]

"Get over it?" Kate regards Malcolm with a great amount of skepticism. "Is just getting over something how it normally works?"

[abrightboy]

“It must be,” Malcolm tells her. “It’s every piece of advice I’ve ever been given.”

[bossyboiler]

"It's stupid advice." Kate does not hold back on how she really feels. "You need therapy."

[abrightboy]

“I’ve been in therapy since I was eleven. Is anything really going to change at this point if I don’t…”

He pauses, then - without saying anything - runs outside. He gets as far as the curb before he’s throwing up chocolate in the gutter.

[bossyboiler]

"If you don't..." Kate asks but Malcolm is up and running outside. She exhales a deep breath before standing so that she can go the door to see if she can spot him. She does spot him and makes a face when she discovers that he is being sick at the curb.

She turns and grabs some napkins from a dispenser before heading outside herself. Kate does not have a complete lack of compassion. (It varies.) She offers Malcolm the napkins without asking if he's okay when clearly he is not.

[abrightboy]

“Thank you,” Malcolm manages as he accepts them, about to wipe his mouth when he turns and retches some more.

[bossyboiler]

"You're welcome." Kate winces in sympathy before reaching out and patting his shoulder. She has plenty of napkins. It'll be okay.

[abrightboy]

A few minutes later, he ambles a few feet away from his mess and drops down to sit on the curb, wiping his mouth with the napkins, wincing slightly at the aftertaste in his mouth.

[bossyboiler]

Kate is silent for a few moments and watches him. With no one else around, she supposed that it falls onto herself to take responsibility for Malcolm and make sure that he gets home safely. Who else is going to do it? He shouldn't be alone and she isn't yet a truly terrible person.

Eventually, she walks over to him and sits down on his right side. She reaches into her bag and pulls out a small tube. "Would you like a mint?"

[abrightboy]

He makes an awkward gesture with his shaking right hand.

“Might be a bit soon for that,” he tells her. Or maybe warns her.

He attempts just breathing for another moment, then looks at her.

“I’m really okay,” he says. “If you have things to do. I’m fine. This is, like… growing pains. The body doesn’t like change, but it’s good for it.”

[bossyboiler]

Kate scoots to the right a little bit knowing full well that if Malcolm throws up on her, she may have to injure him (at least in her head she will).

"You are not okay and I am not leaving you." She puts the mints back into her bag and gives Malcolm another highly dubious look. "Why are you acting this way? I know. I know. You said you've been told to suck it up your entire life but why now?" She still thinks it's a dumb idea.

[abrightboy]

"Why not now? A new year calls for a new you. We're not going anywhere any time soon and I have roommates and I have... to just... shape up, okay?" Malcolm tells her.

[bossyboiler]

"Then I guess you're stuck with me for a while." She watches him. "What do your roommates have to do with your resolution?" Which for the record, she still thinks it is a dumb idea but she's already said that once. It doesn't need to be repeated and Malcolm doesn't need to hear it twice.

[abrightboy]

"I don't want to be a burden on them. Screaming in the night. Barely eating anything. Their lives would be easier if I were normal. Since they're... stuck with me for a while," he replies with a wry smile.

[bossyboiler]

"You have nightmares?" Kate is silent for a few moments. "If they're really your friends, they won't think you're a burden." If she was a different person she'd wrap him in a big hug but she's not. She's has tried the hugging therapy route and it had not gone well. "Did they say something to you?"

[abrightboy]

"I have night terrors, complete with running and fighting and falling down stairs and off balconies to the point that I sleep in restraints. But no, they've never said anything. They're great about it. But. That doesn't mean it's okay to just be like that," he tells her.

[bossyboiler]

"That must be incredibly frustrating to have go to through but it's not your fault Malcolm." Kate knows what he has been through (mostly). "You've been through a lot." She says and might just make the understatement of the decade.

"How would you feel if one of your friends were saying the same things that you're saying?"

[abrightboy]

“They don’t need to. They’re not disruptive and off-putting,” Malcolm points out reasonably.

[bossyboiler]

"You're not that off-putting, Malcolm. You just overshare too much sometimes." And you call people murderers.

[abrightboy]

"I can't control that. I mean. The old me couldn't. But that's good feedback for the new me. The new me is going to be... likeable. Normal. Fun," he muses.

[bossyboiler]

"I really don't know where all of this is coming from. It can't just be a news years resolution." She would have started with a smaller resolution such as not accusing people of becoming murderers.

[abrightboy]

"Why not?" he asks. "When is enough enough of being kicked around? I'm tired of it. I want to get better. I want to fit in," he tells her.

[bossyboiler]

"It seems like you're hurting yourself to fit in and that can't be healthy." She's not a psychologist. "Like eating rich foods when you're not used to it."