Work Text:
I jog up to the halls Beanie lives in, breathing heavily. I've been running for a while, working up a sweat, and it's not exactly something I do often. I work out differently -- cycling, or the gym.
Then again, its entirely possible that I would be sweating regardless.
Beanie hasn't been showing up to classes. She hasn't turned in a single piece of homework for weeks. My texts get one-word responses. I'm worried. Her professors are worried. Our friends are worried.
And the door is locked. Locked to me, her girlfriend.
"Beans?" I call, knocking gently. "Beanie?"
"What?" comes a voice, the small worried voice I know so so well. I breathe a sigh of relief: she's alive.
"Beans, we're all worried about you. You haven't shown up to class in weeks."
"Oh my god," she mumbles through the door, and I hear movement. "Kitty? Am I in trouble? Is someone telling you to come here because I'm going to be kicked out of the university? I can probably be packed in a few minutes, just give me a second --"
My heart very nearly breaks. "No! No, Beanie, there's nobody coming to kick you out. Nobody. Just your girlfriend, coming to check on her girlfriend because..." I let my voice drop. "Because we're all worried, because that's what you are when someone you love drops off the face of the earth!"
My voice is too frantic. It's going to spook her.
That's what I think, but instead, Beanie fumbles with some keys and the doorknob, jangling all the while, and the door opens. We're face to face.
Beanie, what have you done?
She's a mess, and so's her room. There are clothes and takeaway containers I don't know how she's affording and overdue library books and everything she's ever used for her coursework everywhere. Art supplies and essays and half-finished sketches with sweet-and-sour chicken sauce on them. Her bed is unmade, and from the smell she hasn't showered in weeks.
"Beanie," I say, because it's all I can think to say.
"I know," she says, all in a quiet rush, hyperventilating. "I know I need to clean up, and I know I need to shower, and I know I should be working and eating and all of that but I can't, Kitty! I can't!"
She sobs.
"You're in your pyjamas," I say.
"I can get changed," she says, rushing to her wardrobe. I doubt there's anything in there, what with all the clothes on the floor. "I'll get changed and then you can take me out of here and to wherever they put the stupid people who can't do the work."
"Beans, you're not... you're not stupid." I half-laugh.
"Then what am I? Am I lazy?"
"Are you enjoying yourself?"
"No!"
"Then you're not lazy either. Lazy people enjoy themselves. But you're tearing yourself apart over this -- whatever this is. I can tell."
"I can't do it," she says, sitting down on the bed. "I can't keep up. I can't do the work properly, Kitty! I can't!"
"Hey," I say softly, sitting next to her and putting my arm around her. "Hey, Beans. Don't worry about it right now. Don't worry about the work. It doesn't matter. Just... just get dressed? Do you think you can do that?" She nods. "Doesn't matter what you put on. Anything is fine. And then we can go for a walk, and we can talk if you want, but I don't think you've left this room for a while, and I think that would be good for you. Am I right?"
"Yeah," she whispers. "I haven't."
"I'll grab you some clothes?"
"Thanks."
"Alright." I get up from the bed and walk over to her wardrobe. "What do we have here? We've got some tops. Would you rather the one with the shells or the one with the chevron?" I hold up both.
"Chevron please," she says. I throw it to her.
"Trousers or skirt?"
"Skirt. And some shorts please. I don't mind which, just pass me some."
"Here you go. These alright?" I throw her a long pink flowy skirt and a pair of bicycle shorts.
"They're great. Thank you, Kitty."
"No problem. I love you, and I don't want you to be overwhelmed." When she doesn't respond, I continue. "You know... you can always come to me, right? Like, if you killed someone, my first question is where are we hiding the body."
"Don't joke about murder," she says, face serious and set. "We've seen too many dead bodies for that."
"Sorry, Beans. It was just an analogy. I didn't mean it like that." We're skipping rocks to each other, skimming a puck across an air hockey table. I'm just wondering when the bottom drops out of the lake.
It's not now. "It's alright," she says, pulling on the skirt. "And I'm changed now. We can go for that walk if you want."
"Good job, Beans. Good job." I take her hand and pull her up. I have never felt more out of my depth. Fuck, I'm eighteen years old and pickled my brain in alcohol not two days ago. I'm reading fashion design! Fashion design! And I'm trying to counsel my girlfriend through what is clearly some sort of mental health crisis.
I think I'm doing a decent job.
We make it out of the building without incident. Beanie clutches my hand when we get on the lift, and doesn't ease up until we're out of it. I don't mention the elephant, instead prattling on about people she doesn't know in classes she doesn't take.
"Do you want to go to Fitzbillies?" I say. It's a pretty transparent attempt to get her to eat, and drink something that's not caffeinated.
She accepts anyway. "Alright," she says. "Let's go."
I clutch her hand in mine, like I'm scared she's going to blow away. She's lost weight -- anyone would, eating only crap from the Chinese place Hazel won't let us go to with her around -- and she wasn't exactly big to begin with. She's a feather, and I am not going to lose her to the wind.
"So." I let it hang there.
"Yeah."
"You really scared us, Beanie."
"I'm sorry," she says, small and cowed like when teachers used to yell at us in Deepdean hallways. I hated it just as much then as I do now. "I didn't want to make anyone angry, and I couldn't do it. So I thought the right thing to do was to hide."
"Screw the right thing, Beans. What matters -- what will always matter to me most is that you are alright. That's the same for all your friends. That's the same for your professors too. They don't want you to suffer."
"But I couldn't figure it out. I didn't know what to do. And it kept piling up and up and up."
"That doesn't mean you deserve to suffer in silence. What started it, Beans?"
"I was..." she shrinks away, and says in the tiniest little voice I can imagine, "I was two days late -- behind, really, it wasn't even late -- on an essay, and then my professor set another one. And I couldn't think how to do all of it and still have time to spend with all of you guys, and I didn't want you to be mad at me, so I went out with you guys and I didn't get the essays done, and then there was more and more and it felt like a lot, and I couldn't think what to do so I didn't do anything."
"Beans." I take both her hands and face her. A guy gives me a dirty look because we're blocking the street. I imagine Lavinia giving him the finger. "You can come to us if that happens again. We will never get mad if you say you can't because of work. Hazel does it all the time! And I'm not saying be more like Hazel, because she might be amazing but she isn't you, but... we're not going to be mad."
"Now I feel stupid."
"You were in an anxiety spiral. That's nothing stupid. Now, what do you say that we go into Fitzbillies" -- I point across the street -- "and eat some buns and think about how you're gonna get all that work done -- or not get it done, I'm sure your professors will understand if you can't do it."
She's looking at me with something I can't quite figure out. "I think... I think that sounds great, actually. That's awesome."
I smile. "Let's do it then."
And we walk -- hand in hand, united -- over to the tea rooms, and I know we can do anything.
Kitty: all alright now, we have acquired a beans
Kitty: [image of the two of them eating Chelsea buns and drinking hot chocolates]
Hazel: <3
Daisy: i'm so glad you're all ok
Amina: Feeling better Beans? <3
Alexander: George wants you to know he has gone to your professors and refused to leave their offices until they agreed to give you longer deadlines
Alexander: He can't tell you himself, because he is currently in a staring contest with your art history lecturer
Alexander: I think it's a dominance tactic
Alexander: Update: he won
Lavinia: I went to your room and threw away all the random crap on your floor. I also cleaned up your desk a bit. I hope that was alright.
Lavinia: [image of Beanie's room, much cleaner, with clothes hung up in the wardrobe and all the Chinese food containers in the bin]
Daisy: you went to THE FORBIDDEN CHINESE PLACE? /j
Hazel: I forgive you beans /lh
Kitty: beanie would like you all to know that she appreciates it a lot, and that lavinia has put all her clothes in the wrong place and she will have to sort that out later
Lavinia: Well excuse me for not knowing fashion!
Kitty: it's not fashion it's the BLOODY RAINBOW
Daisy: everyone on this chat should know how to do that
Daisy: except maybe alexander
Daisy: i don't trust him to know
Alexander: The colours of the rainbow are not secret gay knowledge, Daisy
Kitty: and that's my cue to leave
Hazel: Take this to private chat, you two, I am not moderating this feud again
Kitty: beanie here, and i just want to say thank you for being so awesome. kitty really helped me today, and now everything seems a lot more possible, so thanks sm <3
Hazel: I think I speak for all of us when I say we love you, Beanie, and we're glad you let us help you <3
Daisy: speak for yourself
Amina: DAISY
Daisy: fine fine yeah we love you /lh