My Choice (Third in the "Baby Brother Series)

Four

"I look like a space cadet from planet fuckwad," Bill groans.

"Seriously, we have got to work on your mouth," Tom chuckles. "Besides, we wanna know what happened...at least I do."

"I do too. It's just um..." Yet again, Bill's eyes widen and he gets a startled look in his eye. He doesn't break his stare, at first moving to get up. Tom stops him and gets closer to press the button on the side to alert someone.

"Hey, it's okay," Tom coos. "You're just doing that check out thing again and you're gonna be fine." The teen makes the attempt to move again, looking down to almost terrifyingly mess with the rails beside the bed.

"Hey, it's gonna be okay, you're safe, Billy." The doctor walks in with a few nurses. Dr. Hansen gently gets Tom to back away and pulls out her penlight. Seeing his blown pupils, she sighs and puts up a finger.

"Bill, can you hear me? Follow my finger if you can hear me. Come on, you can do it, follow my finger." It takes a moment but soon his head is following along with Dr. Hansen.

"Good. You're doing good. You're back with us," the proud doctor smiles. "How do you feel?"

"Tuh—."

"I'm here, Billy," Tom interjects, placing his hand upon his brother's shoulder. "Is that going to keep happening?"

"Unfortunately," the doctor frowns. "One of the side effects of your brother's antidepressant medication is seizures. It's rare, 1 in 30,000 patients, but it can occur."

"So we have to take him off of it," Tom responds. "Then they'll stop."

"I wish it were that easy. But these side effects aren't always temporary," the doctor sighs. "We could run some more tests. Try taking him off of the medications, see if they stop. If not, we should start working on getting him on some seizure medication."

"I don't understand. How is this even possible?"

"Billy, would you like to rest? We should continue our conversation outside."

"No, I wanna know what's going on with me too," Bill sighs. "And it's just Bill."

"Right, well then the side effects of the medication you were on could be causing the seizures, meaning the drugs have changed the chemistry in your brain," Dr. Hansen sighs. "Which means you could have these seizures for the rest of your life. Or, we could take you off this medication combination and they could stop as well. It's 20/80."

Bill leans tiredly into his brother and exhales. "I just wanna go home."

"I understand. But for now, we have to run more tests. We're going to pull your medication for the next two days. We need to see if this causes a decrease or increase in the seizures. We'll send you home with a eeg unit and when you feel that same headache sensation, if at all, just press the button and it'll record your brainwaves," the doctor smiles. "Brother, you're gonna do the same thing. If you're with him over the next two days and he has anymore of his attacks, press the button."

"So, does that mean he can go home?"

"Yes. But he's to do no strenuous activities and he is to remain in a safe environment. What he's having is called Complex Partial Seizures. He's completely unaware of all the little things that's he's doing," Dr. Hansen writes down more notes and then pulls a pamphlet from her pocket. She hands the three fold card to him and Tom looks at her with a curious expression.

"What's this?" Tom asks.

"It's a first aid booklet for different types of seizures. Bill has not had any of the larger ones, but in the event that he does, I recommend reading it just to be on the safe side."