Ghost Whispers |-/ Joshler

vex·a·tious |-/

/vekˈsāSHəs/
adjective
causing or tending to cause annoyance, frustration, or worry.

"SSRIs are meant to even out the chemical imbalance found in Tyler's brain. Messages are sent to the malfunctioning neurotransmitters and they're fixed. Now it's not exactly how that works, but you get the idea."

Chris and Kelly nodded along. Tyler sat silent and still in the bed, legs twitching from underutilization. He's been in bed for three days with only trips to the bathroom and shorts walks down to the end of the hall.

He didn't like going any further; too many people in the ICU were either skin and bones or violently hacking into a too-thin tissue.

Tilting his head back in boredom and embarrassment, Tyler found the room around him becoming warmer and warmer.

It was very off-putting. The heat was climbing and he was sure it wasn't just the overzealous heating system of the hospital.

The only way he could relieve some of the heat was to expose his neck to the world, breathing in deep.

Joshua liked it. The action showed off Tyler's Adam's apple, the thing he had come so close to touching the night before.

It was the halfway point between them now: the most important part that Joshua would remember for years to come.

To Joshua, Tyler's neck was the best thing in the world. Such a simple, perhaps odd infatuation, was unheard of, but Joshua just loved it.

Should his throat ever stop working to supply Tyler with the air he needed, Joshua would panic.

It's best that he keeps breathing.

"So if he reacts well to the SSRIs, he can go home?" Chris asked.

"Yes, he can. But he'll have to go to therapy three times a week and take the pills daily. No basketball until we set the balance straight."

Tyler sighed. In no reaction to any particular thing, he just felt the need to expel all the air from his lungs.

Reaching over the tubes and lines working their way up the bed like snakes in grass, Kelly tried to look her son in the eyes. He offered no such thing.

"It'll be okay, Tyler. We can beat this, together."

The words were wrong, all wrong. There was no together in this. It was just him, alone, standing tall against his own problems.

Except he doesn't even do that. He cowers and hides from his problems, never even facing them. They eat away at him until they sneak up and tear his mind apart.

"There is the option of inpatient therapy, instead of outpatient. Which one would you prefer?" The doctor asked, straightening his square glasses.

"Um, what's the difference again?" came the question from Chris.

Tyler didn't even pay attention as they went over it again. His mind drifted and he found his eyes unfocused on the space next to his bed.

For some reason, that boy kept popping into his head. That smile, those small eyes, they kept coming back.

Joshua was someone he had never met, yet he felt he knew him somehow. It was like seeing an old friend after so long, like a homecoming soldier.

"Tyler?"