ꜱʜᴀᴅᴏᴡꜱ: ᴊᴜᴅɢᴍᴇɴᴛ ᴅᴀʏ

003 Just The Beginning

Leah grabbed his hand -his hands were always much colder than hers for some reason- before entering the hallway the woman had gestured before. Jamie began to feel sick and slowed down a bit, causing his sister to turn around to look at him.

"Hey," She said as she lowered herself to look at the boy in the eyes. He was so tiny even if he was already seven years old, it made her heart ache with guilt, "What's going on?"

"I don't want to go in." He whispered, "Can't we go home?"

Home. Home for Jamie was the shabby building that reeked of mold and wet dog. How shitty was that?

"It's going to be quick." Leah tried to reason, "You need this."

Jamie's eyes watered as he shook his head, "I don't want to." He whined, "Please don't make me."

Sometimes Jamie wished Leah was his mother. If she had been his mother maybe he wouldn't have to be here. But Leah was his sister even if she too wished she had been his mother.

"C'mon, I'll hold your hand." She murmured as she finally managed to successfully make Jamie move again. Yes, she was already used to being an adult.

Jamie counted twenty-three steps before they stopped to a halt in front of a white door and Leah whipped her hands on the front of her jeans before bringing her knuckles down the wooden surface, a man's voice came from the other side a few seconds later, inviting them to come it.

Leah took her brother's hand again before twisting the handle open, entering the room. Jamie liked staying with Leah because she wasn't an adult even if she acted like one. No adult would keep holding his hands as they spoke to a doctor and no adult would act so quick to step in front of him when he was getting agitated.

"I already said that he won't reply, ask me what you have to ask." His sister sighed when the man wearing a white coat tried to ask him again what his symptoms were.

"He needs to be the one to tell me what he is feeling." The doctor replied, but Leah wouldn't hear it, "He's not going to tell you anything."

Jamie was weird, he knew it. Leah knew it too. His brain was different from other people. He wasn't going to say anything, he couldn't, not even if he wanted to.

The doctor decided to drop it and instead told him to sit on the white cot and that he was going to be back in a second. His feet were dangling midair again as Leah stood next to him, his hand still in hers. She kept rubbing circles with her thumb on the back of his hand with the intent of soothing him, but instead, he was growing more and more anxious.

A weird thing was tied around his elbow and the doctor pressed another weird thing that made the band around Jamie's arm inflate more and more. Blood pressure Leah mouthed him as if to explain what the doctor was checking. Jamie weakly nodded as he looked down at the thing on his arm again.

Then it was time to check his heart rate, which meant the doctor had to press a cold thing on his back and he had to breathe a lot. In the meanwhile, the man asked for his medical history, which was near to zero. Leah just explained about the surgery he had three years before and that he did these checkups two times a year, which, based on the way the man scoffed, was not enough.

"All done." The doctor announced.

Jamie was content that it was over, but, when he looked over to Leah, she had a face that told me she wished the visit had lasted longer. Jamie felt bad for being relieved -he forgot that it wasn't free.

He tugged the hem of Leah's shirt to gain her attention, "I forgot Zuppo in the other room." He whispered in her ear once she had knelt, "Can we go get it?" He hoped that was enough to get them out, but the doctor cleared his throat, gaining his sister's attention back.