Quiet As A Mouse (Outsiders Fanfic)

Chapter 14- Depressed?

        I glumly got in the car when Two-Bit pulled up to the sidewalk next to the psychologist's office.

        "Don't tell me, you're being transferred to an insane asylum," Two-Bit says jokingly the minute he sees me.

        I shot him a glare but didn't say--well, write--anything.

        He must have gotten the hint that I wasn't in the mood for jokes, so instead he resorted to his other most annoying habits, curiosity and sticking his nose in other people's business.

        "What's that?" he asked, gesturing to the white paper bag clutched in my hand.

        I would have sighed if I could as I flipped open the notebook, turning to a clean page after the conversation I'd had with the psychologist to write down an answer, because I know Two-Bit wouldn't stop bugging me about it until I told him. 

        I had thought this psychologist would be just like the other two, who just spouted a bunch of big words about all the things that were messed up about me and why but never telling me an effective way to fix it, but I was wrong.  He seemed different than the others the minute I walked in there, but that might have been because he was a lot younger and his arm was in a cast...  He offered to have a written conversation with me rather than him asking questions and me writing answers, except for that his right arm was broken and he was right handed so he couldn't write.  He told me he broke it by falling down the stairs after he tripped over his cat, which was definitely an interesting way to break a bone.  Right away he seemed more like a big brother than some crazy old shrink, which might be why I actually told him about the nightmares.  Though telling the truth resulted in me now having to take a bunch of drugs.

        'Anti-depressants,' I wrote.

        My cousin gave me a confused look and then asked, "You're depressed?"

        I shrugged and scribbled down, 'Apparently.'

        "I didn't think that my jokes were that bad that they could make someone that depressed," he mused to himself, only half-joking.

        'It's not your fault,' I wrote.

        He answered, "It's not really your fault either, Mickey," for once being serious and meaning what he said.

        I didn't know what to say to that, but then he was back to his grinning usual self and we had just pulled into the Curtis's driveway, so I was spared from racking my brain for some truthful-sounding lie.  It really was my fault, because it was my brain that wouldn't shut down and let me forget about stuff that happened to me years ago.

        When we walked in the house, I heard everyone yelling and the noise of cartoons on T.V. and the songs on the radio radio, as always.

        "You are too cheating, Steve," Soda argued as he knocked Steve's cards out of his hand.

        "Stop it, Dal," Johnny complained because Dally was bugging him about something or other.

        "Nah, I don't feel like it," Dally croaked, his voice coming out as a raw raspy whisper because he still hadn't gotten better from being out in the rain.  If anyone else's voice sounded like that, they'd probably sound like a dying old man, but for some reason it just made Dally seem like the devil incarnate or some scary figure from my nightmares.

        "Ponyboy, did you get your homework done?" Darry called from the kitchen over the noise of running water and clanking dishes.

        "Yes," Pony answered his big brother in an of-course-so-why-do-you-keep-asking voice. 

        I had used that same tone of voice a million times before when I could still talk and He had asked me something similar.  I shuddered as the memory of His laughing grin that still reminded me so much of Sodapop's was replaced with the painful memory of rejection after He left.

        "What about that science project that's due next week?  You're not waiting till last minute to finish it like last time," Darry warned.

        Pony sighed and muttered, "Fine," before heading down the hall and returning a while later with a Biology textbook and a notebook tucked under his arm.  He set them on the kitchen table and  began digging around in a drawer filled with an assortment of random items, ranging from paperclips to plastic forks to a bottle of glue.

        "Mickey, did you get the project done yet?" Pony asked me out of curiosity, turning around to look at me.

        I shook my head no because I hadn't even thought about starting on it, much less thought about it at all.  I barely remember the teacher assigning the project on Wednesday cause I had fallen asleep in class, again.  With how often I was taking naps in class at school now that I couldn't sleep at night, I was surprised that I hadn't gotten in trouble more often or moved to the dumb classes or something.

        "Do you know which one you're doing it on?" he asked as he sat down across from me, having finally found a pencil which is what he must have been looking for in the drawer.

       I thought for a moment before writing down the question, 'What's it supposed to be on?'

        "We're supposed to pick an animal and then go through the phylogeny of it and explain each category.  We've been talking about it all week," he answered.

        Ponyboy and I had the same Biology class--same teacher, different periods--because he was so smart.

        Well, I had missed that little detail of the project assignment, and I guess the clueless look on my face must have conveyed that because then Pony said, a bit warily, "Do you want me to help you with it?"

        I was going to say no, that I could do it myself, but honestly I had been sleeping in class so much I had no idea what in the world phylogeny was or what it had to do with animals.  I remembered what my aunt had said about trying this time, so I gave in.

        'Yeah, that'd be nice,' I wrote, and Pony spent the rest of the afternoon reteaching me everything we had learned that week.