Chapter Text
Sea Pines was a terrible name for a building that was located nowhere near the sea or pine trees, in Tyler’s opinion. The nickname that the “guests” there gave it was a much more suitable title. What better name for a rehabilitation centre than Sick Minds? Tyler didn’t belong in Sick Minds. Sick Minds was for druggies and nut cases, not 17 year old boys with promising futures in basketball and a loving family. Tyler had never even so much as touched drugs or alcohol, and he rarely left his house.
He didn’t know why he needed to be here. He wasn’t broken, there wasn’t anything wrong with him. He was just a normal teenage boy, one who did his schoolwork and played basketball every day and liked to play music when he got the chance. He shouldn’t be locked up just because he got sad sometimes.
He stared down at his hands as he miserably thought about how he ended up here, and how he could get out. All of the exit doors sounded an alarm when opened, so he couldn’t exactly make a run for it. And according to the staff at Sick Minds, he was “resisting treatment,” and wouldn’t get out anytime soon.
“Tyler?” Todd said, his voice overly happy. Tyler would never understand how somebody who worked with “troubled teens,” as they were so nicely labelled, could possibly be as happy as Todd always was. “Why don’t you share some thoughts?” Todd continued hopefully, knowing that it wouldn’t work.
Tyler continued to stare down at his hands, picking at his nails slightly as he bit his tongue. He sat there silent for what felt like an eternity, before Todd sighed and moved on the next victim. Tyler had been here for three weeks now, and he hadn’t spoken a word since he’d gotten here. Todd tried every day to get him to speak, but it hadn’t worked yet. His silence had earned him a nickname within his group, “Silent Treatment”, and he still wasn’t sure whether or not it was a bad thing.
Tyler’s group therapy consisted of eight guys in total. There was their counsellor Todd, a lanky guy with long dark hair and a patchy beard, who was too friendly for the group he was in. He often told stories of his past addiction, which would be lovely if he didn’t constantly repeat the same phrase: “the lord has saved me.” It wasn’t as if Tyler wasn’t a bit religious himself, it was just that being stuck in a rehabilitation centre with a group of angry teenage boys with religion added on to that got old really fast.
Besides Tyler and Todd, there were six others. There was only one guy there with “food issues,” as they were so vaguely called, and he was usually pretty quiet during meetings. He was quite shy, and really short. He apparently had a lot of comments about his weight, and people rarely believed that somebody his size could be starving themselves. He would speak when spoken to during meetings, but spent most of the time staring down at his lap like Tyler did. Tyler couldn’t quite remember his name, but he felt like it started with a P.
There were two others there for the same reason as Tyler, though they actually talked about it in meetings. Pete, the oldest in the group besides Todd, was the loudest member of their group, and made Tyler want to speak long enough to tell him to shut the hell up. He didn’t wear long sleeves like Tyler always did, and Tyler often found himself staring at his arms. Pete’s recovery was much more evident than Tyler’s. The marks there were much more faded than his own, some of which were still fresh.
The other boy, Brendon, was rarely seen without his hoodie on, effectively covering the few marks on his forearms. He had spoken before in meetings about how he hadn’t often harmed himself on his arms, instead doing it places where it could be easily covered. He was friends with Pete, but it was obvious that even he got annoyed by him easily.
The other three were in for addiction, and Tyler was a bit wary of them. Two of them had gotten into coke when they were way too young; Alex because of his friends and Ryan because of his father. Ryan was rarely seen without Brendon and Pete, who he had been rooming with since he got there. Josh was the last member of his therapy group, and he had been in the facility for a few months. Tyler couldn’t remember too much about him, besides that he was hooked on prescription medication and was a year or two older than him. Tyler had spent most of their therapy sessions trying not to stare at Josh, and failing quite terribly.
Alex was the second oldest, but he had been there the longest. Tyler had been rooming with Alex for the few short weeks he had there, and now that Alex was “graduating” from the program, he would be getting a new roommate. When it was announced to their group that Alex would be leaving this week, Todd had told Tyler of his new roommate. Sea Pines didn’t allow the self-harmers to have single rooms, so Tyler would be moving into one of the older boy’s rooms.
Tyler rolled his eyes as Pete launched into yet another long-winded and ultimately pointless story, sitting up in his seat to avoid falling asleep. It wasn’t too long before his eyes landed on Josh, and then he was gone. He would never understand how his dyed hair still looked so bright despite being without hair dye for months. He suspected that he got people to sneak dye in for him.
The worst thing about being stuck in Sick Minds wasn’t the therapy, or being away from his family, or even having to put up with Pete. In the end, the worst thing to Tyler was his ridiculous little crush on the drug addict in his therapy group.
|-/
After group therapy was supper, and Tyler appreciated the break from being expected to talk. However, his group was all assigned to the same table during lunch, and they always tried to include him in their conversations. The only time Tyler had ever contributed was when they asked if he agreed on how disgusting the food was, and he nodded. Today’s meal of choice was some sort of meat in a mysterious grey sauce, with half-cooked rice and overcooked carrots. The hardest part about the meals at Sick Minds had to be the utensils you were expected to eat with. At every meal, the oldest person at each table was in charge of handing out and collecting the plastic sporks they were required to eat with. Knives and forks were too dangerous to eat with apparently, and even the sporks had to be taken away at the end of the meal.
There was a surprisingly long list of items that you weren’t allowed to have at Sick Minds. Forks, knives, razors, pencils and pens…the list goes on. They were allowed to shave their faces every couple of days, with a disposable razor and under the careful eye of a nurse. The same went for pencils during homework hours, and utensils at meals.
After Tyler took his spork from Pete, he stared down at his food and tried to figure out how in the world he could eat what appeared to be a pork chop with a spork. He looked up for a moment, his eyes falling on the boy sitting across from him. Josh had apparently decided that the best way to eat his meat was to stab his spork into the centre of it and pick the entire thing up. Tyler looked back down at his own plate, shrugging slightly to himself before driving his useless utensil into the middle of his meat, sending his carrots flying to the ground.
“Nice one, S.T.!” Pete laughed, and Tyler could feel his cheeks heating up as the other boys laughed along.
Tyler quickly dove under the table to retrieve the fallen food, silently cursing Pete for being such a loud asshole. As he scrambled to collect all of the carrots, he caught a glimpse of something in one of the boy’s laps. After a moment of squinting at it, he realized that it was a napkin full of food. He swallowed, wondering if he should mention it or not before crawling back into his seat.
Tyler’s cheeks were still a bit pink as he sat in his chair, tossing his carrots into his napkin and continuing his attempts at eating. He was still thinking about the blonde boy across the table that was sitting with Pete - Patrick maybe? - and felt guilt pool in his stomach. If he said something, Patrick might hate him forever. If he didn’t, nobody but him would know that Patrick still wasn’t eating much. He ultimately decided to keep it to himself, at least until he saw anything else happening, and quickly finished his meal.
Tyler’s big plans for the evening always included sitting in the lounge area and ignoring everyone before he was allowed to go to bed. His plans were changed by Alex moving out, and he was sent to help him strip their beds and take the sheets down to the laundry room. Tyler waved goodbye to him as he left, not looking forward to packing everything he had up again. After shoving everything he had brought with him into his suitcase, he pulled it down the hallway to his new room.
As he walked up to the room that he was assigned to, he peered into the empty room through the archway. One of the other brilliant things about Sick Minds was the lack of bedroom doors, meaning that every little sound would echo throughout the entire hallway. Tyler looked up at the sign hanging above the archway, its bubble letters only saying one name, “Josh.”
Tyler’s stomach sank as he realized who his new roommate would be, and he hesitantly pulled his bag into the small room. The bed by the window was ready claimed by Josh, so Tyler shoved his bag under the bed closer to the hall. He quickly made his bed, knowing that he didn’t have much time before one of the nurses would come looking for him. He thought briefly about just going to bed, but he knew that the consequences much outweighed the extra hour of sleep.
He dragged himself back down the hallway towards the lounge area, where most of the other boys were crowded around to watch Family Feud. Patrick was across the room, playing Connect 4 with Ryan, and Tyler didn’t really know where he should go. He scanned the room, contemplating if he should go back to his new room to grab some homework or not before Brendon started to wave him over to the couch.
Tyler shrugged, heading over to the tiny couch where the remaining four teenagers were trying to squish themselves together. Tyler chose to sit on the floor instead of on somebody’s lap, and smiled slightly to himself as everyone continued to shout out answers to the questions. Game show nights always seemed fun for everyone involved, and Tyler wished that one day he would speak enough to join in.
After the show was over, a nurse came in to escort everyone back to their rooms for the night. Tyler was a bit scared to be rooming with a stranger, as he had just gotten used to Alex. Especially a stranger who he was oddly attracted to.
The rooms at Sick Minds were a lot like hospital rooms in disguise. They had beds with bars on the foot and sides, and the tracks from the curtains that used to be around them were still on the ceiling. All of the medical equipment had been removed, but most of the original furniture was still there. Each room had a small bathroom off to one side, which were supposedly off-limits, even though everyone used them anyway. Most people didn’t want to anyway, as instead of a door with a lock, the bathrooms had archways and thin curtains. The main difference was that, in an attempt to brighten up the rooms, all of the walls were painted a sickening shade of yellow. Tyler hated everything about it.
Tyler got back to his room before Josh did, and a part of him was hoping that Josh had made a run for it. He quickly undressed for bed and crawled under the covers, only there for a minute or two before his new roommate walked through the doorway.
“Hey, S.T.,” Josh greeted, walking across the room to grab something from his small dresser. “Looks like we’re roomies now.”
Tyler blinked over at Josh, wanting to say hello to the other boy but not wanting to at the same time. He hadn’t spoke to anyone in three weeks, and he wasn’t about to break his streak now.
“It’s okay if you don’t want to talk,” Josh continued, turning to look at Tyler. “You’re new here. You don’t know any of us.” Josh stared at Tyler for a moment, before standing up and heading into the small bathroom that was joined to their room.
Tyler couldn’t help but to feel a little bit guilty for not trying to get to know anyone. He felt like he should at least talk to his roommate, or the other guys in his therapy group. Even his personal therapist had never heard him speak, and he really should have fixed that.
The sound of the shower started suddenly, and the noise comforted Tyler somewhat. It blocked out the sounds from the hallways, the gentle sobbing that could be heard every night coming from the other bedrooms. It was a familiar sound, and it helped lul Tyler to sleep.
|-/
Weekends were non-existent in rehab, as Tyler quickly realized. He was used to relaxing on Saturdays, as much as he could, though Sunday nights usually turned to anxiety about going back to school. Tyler was somewhat glad that Sea Pines didn’t have breaks, at least that way the routine was always the same.
On Saturday morning, Tyler was woken up at 7 in the morning by a nurse, who was there to let them know that breakfast would be at 8. He groggily dragged himself out of bed, rubbing at his eyes as he entered the bathroom to quickly shower and brush his teeth. Josh was still sound asleep in his bed, and Tyler grumbled at himself for not thinking of showering at night.
After he was clean and dressed in leggings and a baggy hoodie, he slipped on his shoes and started to unpack his bag. There was still about a half hour left until breakfast, so he started to shove all of his clothes into the dresser next to his bed. Saturdays were also the days that family was allowed to visit, and although he doubted that anyone would come for him, he didn’t want his room to be messy if they did.
As Tyler was shoving his notebooks and pens into his nightstand, he heard a low groan from behind him. He froze for a moment, before remembering Josh. He turned to look at the older boy, waving slightly before turning back to his now empty suitcase. He kicked the bag under his bed, fixing his blankets before siting on the edge of his bed.
Tyler looked over at Josh for a moment, who blinked before sitting up in bed. Tyler could feel his cheeks heat up as he saw that Josh slept shirtless, and he turned away. He heard Josh chuckle quietly from behind him, before getting up.
“I should probably put clothes on,” he mumbled sleepily, pulling a shirt on. “Not that I don’t love making you blush.”
Tyler whipped his head around, staring at Josh with wide eyes. He opened his mouth as if to speak, before closing it again and just shaking his head. Josh just laughed again, walking into the bathroom to rush his teeth, wiggling his hips as he did so.
Tyler’s mind was reeling at this point, and he kind of wanted to throw up. He couldn’t tell if Josh was just teasing like he did to everyone else, or if he had picked up on Tyler’s infatuation. Either way, Tyler couldn’t stand being in the room anymore, and he headed down to breakfast a few minutes early.
Once he was seated with his toast and cereal - way easier to eat with a spork than pork chops - Tyler stared down at his plate. He had a therapy session by himself right after breakfast, and then time to do homework and such until visiting hours. He thought once again about trying to make a run for it, not wanting the awkwardness of sitting in a room silent for an hour.
He looked up from his plate when he heard the unmistakable obnoxious sound of Pete Wentz entering the cafeteria, being just as loud as he always was. There was no doubt in Tyler’s mind that Pete was the worst person to have ever existed. Ever.
Tyler quickly set to eating his breakfast, not wanting to have Pete try to rope him into another conversation. He didn’t look up as Josh sat next to him, either. He felt his cheeks heat up slightly as he saw Josh smirk out of the corner of his eye.
If Pete Wentz was the Worst Person In The World, Josh Dun was definitely in the running to steal his title.