The Great Book of One-Shots

Psych ward

Ian was brought back to reality by the nurse handing him a clipboard. "Remember, you just need to deal with him for 12 weeks and you'll graduate."

Deal with him. The words echoed in Ian's mind. Why did she make it seem like he was so much of a trouble? Was he really so bad of a patient?

"Huh? Oh, yeah, I'm looking...forward to the next few weeks." It would definitely be...interesting.

"Whatever you say." She sounded like she didn't believe him. "I'll be on my way. Like I said earlier, if you have any questions Dr. Xeen and Jordan could answer them. See you later."

As she left the room Ian was left to wonder what else he had been too zoned out to hear. After all, this was the first he had heard about the other two people in the room.

Hoping to get a few answers, he looked at the clipboard in his hands. It didn't take but a glance for Ian to recognize the patient file forms.

NAME: Benjamin Dreyer Vestergaard

SEX: M

DATE OF BIRTH: December 12, 1994

DATE OF ADMISSION: February 18, 2010

CONDITION: Depression

CONDITION SEVERITY: Severe

SPECIAL INSTRUCTIONS: Only remove gag to feed him several small meals throughout the day; he will bite his lip in an attempt to bleed out.

NOTES: None of the medications or therapy tried on him has worked. He is very unpredictable and will take every chance to end his own life. He is on a strict diet of applesauce, pudding, and liquids as he will try to choke himself to death on any solid foods. He has stopped talking without the aid of medications to make him more cooperative.

After introducing himself with a smile and having a one-sided conversation for much longer than he probably should have, Ian got him to say his name and home country - which wouldn't of been such a big deal if it wasn't for the fact that he hadn't willingly spoken in years. Wanting to do a little test, Ian decides to leave the gag off after their little chat and goes off to do other work. 

After about half an hour, he gets a notification that something was wrong with Ben and rushes back to see medics trying to get his lip to stop bleeding and put the gag back on. Ian interrupts them to say that he's in charge now and has them leave. He gently holds cotton to Ben's lips until bleeding stops.

A few more times of this and Ian realizes that Ben only hurts himself after he's gone for a while. So, he starts spending more time with Ben and Ben starts hurting himself less and less.

He makes it a normal thing to sit with Ben as much as possible; during breaks, free time - even when he wasn't on duty he'd sit with the smaller as he worked on his laptop, chatting about whatever subject came up.

One day during his lunch break, he notices that Ben's watching him eat. He notices how he's focused on one particular food item with a look of something close to longing on his face and gives a small smile before feeding some to Ben. Ben's overwhelming happiness at eating something different than the 'diet' he'd been fed for who knows how long hurts Ian's heart.

It's not too long after that that Ben starts talking to Ian normally. Starts sharing information about himself that quickly turns into deeply personal stories - stories that he'd never dare tell anyone before.

He tells how his depression started. How he started cutting at such a young age. How his first suicide attempt was at 13. How he had been stopped and that only made things worse. How he had tried more and more the longer the school year went. How, as soon as his Sophomore year began, he began trying to kill him self at every chance he got. How it quickly became too much and he was sent to the mental institute. How it all started with his childhood bullying. How middle school was worse. How high school was the final straw.