Inescapable Escapism

The lumpy mattress dug into my back but I couldn’t bring myself to move. I hurt. My whole body ached and every breath made me wince slightly. I wasn’t really sure why but I assumed it was probably my posture at dinner. Mom told me off for that fairly often. Apparently, I lean over too much and round my shoulders. Mom always shakes her head at me and sighs when she notices it. It’ll cause a back hump, according to her but I’m not sure if I believe her.

It doesn’t really matter though. She still warned me, no matter how I reacted. At this rate, in her eyes, no one will want to marry me and I’ll be destined for a life of bell ringing at some French cathedral which I still don’t think sounds that bad. Mom always made it sound like it would be but I wasn’t so sure. It sounded peaceful, kind of. Plus, Phoebe seemed to be having a good time in Paris now. She’d texted me about it when we were at dinner.

I lifted my phone, ignoring the screaming of my arm muscles as I did so. My eyes scanned the message again as my hand shook slightly. Phoebe had hidden in the bathroom to text me. Her message was full of typos, which made sense based on what it said. Her cousins had let her order wine with dinner to celebrate the fact that she was able to order food for herself and ask for the dish without…

I’m not sure what the last word was meant to say. Normally, I could work out what Phoebe was trying to write but, this time, I truly didn’t know. There was no word in the English dictionary that had that many vowels in, I was certain. I had asked her what she meant but I think she must have missed that text because instead, she had just told me that she didn’t actually like the taste of wine normally but that it was different in Paris. Or, at least, after the third glass it wasn’t that bad.

I let my hand fall to my side again, my body relieved to no longer be straining, as I fought the urge to return to my fantasy. We had finished the fitness testing, thankfully. The two hours that we’d spent in the gym sprinting, lifting ridiculously heavy things until my arms shook and then having to try to climb the climbing wall had drained me. I wasn’t sure why they made us do the wall last but it was so hard.

It was just a small one, not one of the cool ones Katie, Abbie and I had stumbled across but it felt near impossible. I managed to make it further than I expected but my fingers were too tired and I slipped, falling heavily to the barely padded ground.

The tutor, Jenna, had watched me fall, waiting to see if I was going to stand again before congratulating me. It sounds silly but I’d felt so proud of myself. Not many people managed to make it that far and only Seth made it all the way to the top of the wall, even though he was shaking with exertion after.

He’d looked directly at me after he reached the ground again, as if he wanted to make sure that I had seen, which made my stomach flutter. I knew what he was doing. He wanted me to see him succeed, to be impressed by him, and I wasn’t sure how to feel about that. I liked it but…

Seth had also noticed the badge I had pinned to my chest and then pretty much forgotten about. He’d pointed it out and then gestured to his own matching badge with a smile, telling me that we were in the same house. Katie had extremely unsubtly nudged me in the back at that, clearly noticing the flirting note in Seth’s voice. I tried to respond, to flirt back but… I had no clue what I was doing.

I didn’t flirt, I don’t. I had no real experience with flirting in that world or my real one. There was a small voice in the back of my head that was coaching me, telling me to smile and cock my head, to meet his gaze and let it linger. I didn’t quite have the confidence to do that but I tried.

My phone buzzed and I started to lift it, my arms straining from the effort.

“Just a small, sharp scratch,” a reassuring voice warned me before pain burned in the crook of my arm.

Dizziness hit me and I blinked as I looked around the bright room. The light stung my eyes and I almost recoiled away from it as nausea rocked me but luckily, I was sitting in a high-backed chair. My arm was being held down by the doctor who was smiling at me reassuringly as he plunged the needle into my arms, searching for my vein.

I sucked in a deep breath, aware of the sweat that was beading on my forehead as the urge to vomit built within me.

“That’s alright,” the doctor continued in the same soothing tone. “Lean your head back and look away. Take a deep breath. In… and out. In… and out.”

I did as he said, white spots exploding in my vision. For a moment, I was genuinely concerned that I was going to be sick on the doctor and ruin his white coat. Were they easy to clean? I wasn’t sure but I didn’t want to find out.

Slowly, the room stopped spinning and come into focus. My jaw unclenched as the nausea slowly retreated.

“Sorry,” I told him, my head dropped back against the headrest and my gaze fixed on the ceiling.

“That’s alright,” he replied immediately. “Some people struggle with blood tests. Have you had many before?”

I’d seen my records on his computer screen when I’d first walked in for my appointment so I knew that he already knew the answer but I still wanted to answer him.

“No. Not really.”

The man nodded as he attached another vial to the needle in my arm.

“That makes sense. People in the general population don’t get blood tests anywhere near as much as they should. Did you know that an estimated twenty-five percent of the population has iron deficiency? And the rate is even higher for people who menstruate and vegetarians,” he told me. “You really should be getting blood tests frequently.”

Even though his tone was gentle and informative, it felt like I was being told off and I had to fight the urge to apologise to him.

“Why is it higher for vegetarians?” I asked instead.

I wanted him to keep talking. Having something to focus on made it easier to ignore the lingering queasiness that still pulled at me. I was interested too. I’d never really heard the reasoning as to why it was something that needed to be monitored but I remembered a few people warning me about it when I first stopped eating meat. My dad had mentioned it once but I didn’t remember anything more than that.

Doctor Adda glanced up at my face before speaking, as if trying to determine how much detail I wanted.

“There are two types of iron found in food: heme iron and non-heme iron. Heme iron is only found in meat, in things such as red meat, liver or certain types of shellfish, whereas non-heme iron is found in both animal products and vegetables. You’ll find it in things like beans and leafy greens like kale or spinach,” he told me before looking at me again. “Do you eat foods like that often?”

I winced. The answer was no. I knew that my diet wasn’t particularly good. I had vegetables semi-regularly and fruit whenever we had it but it probably wasn’t enough. I definitely was not eating five servings a day.

“No, not really,” I told him, almost expecting him to tell me off.

“And you don’t eat fish, do you?”

“No.”

He nodded, removing the now full vial and slipping another plastic tube into its place to continue drawing my blood.

“Almost done, just a couple more to go. I’ll make a note in the system that you may need to be monitored for nutritional deficiencies a little bit more often than others,” he told me with a smile. “The issue is, if you’re a vegetarian, you won’t be getting heme iron which is absorbed a lot more easily and if you’re not eating foods rich in non-heme iron, it could be a problem but your diet should be pretty good here.”

“That makes sense,” I said.

It did and it made me a little concerned about my health in real life. All of my answers were true for that too so I knew I should probably consider speaking to a doctor or something about it.

“Okay, there we go,” Doctor Adda said, removing the final vial and pulling the needle out of my arm. “Here, press down on this nice and hard whilst I finish labelling your samples.”

I did as he instructed, pressing down on the cotton ball, but my mind was still spiralling.

“What… what are the symptoms of not having enough iron?” I asked.

He glanced up at me over his glasses.

“The main ones are fatigue and lack of energy, shortness of breath, palpitation and paleness but you might also experience frequent headaches, dizziness, low mood, hearing a whooshing noise in your ears, chest pain and difficulty concentrating. Do you experience any of those symptoms?”

“No,” I said but it sounded like a lie.

In truth, I wasn’t sure. I had some of them. Like, I was tired and drained a lot and pale, obviously. Then, I also had low mood and headaches but they seemed like just things that happened sometimes, not actual symptoms.

Doctor Adda examined me for a few seconds longer before nodding.

“Don’t worry, we’re doing a full blood count amongst some other tests to make sure that everything is alright,” he told me with a smile.

I nodded distractedly but he had already looked away. I watched him, having nothing else to do, as he stuck stickers onto the vials of my blood before sealing them in a plastic bag.

It was awkward. I wasn’t really sure what to do or say as he worked, humming to himself softly. There was nothing for me to do, not really, but I felt like I should offer to help him. But then, I didn’t know what I was doing and I didn’t really want to handle the tubes of my own blood. Not that I was squeamish, it just felt weird to me.

“Okay, that’s all sorted,” he said, finally looking up at me. “They’ll get sent off to the lab and I’ll get you booked in for another appointment once we get the results back.”

There was a dismissive tone to his voice but his expression was unchanged. He continued to smile at me pleasantly. I glanced at the clock behind him. According to my timetable, I still had almost fifty minutes left of the appointment.

“Great,” I replied before hesitating. “Um… should I go?”

“Oh, goodness, no!” he said with a slight chuckle. “We actually have a lot more to discuss! I just like to get the blood tests and questions about your physical health done and out of the way first.”

“Oh… that makes sense.”

“It does! It’s generally the bit that people are the most nervous about, I’ve found,” he told me as he rolled away from me towards the computer. “So, do you have any concerns about your physical health?”

“Um, no. I don’t think so,” I replied.

“Great! You’re fairly fit and healthy? No aches or pains, nothing you’d like to talk about?”

My chest twinged again but I ignored it.

“No, I don’t think so.”

“Fantastic! And how is your digestion? Do you experience much bloating or constipation?”

I felt my face flush at his question.

“No,” I said quickly.

“Great! How is your menstrual cycle?”

He looked away from the computer screen, meeting my gaze as my cheeks coloured even more. I wasn’t sure why it embarrassed me so much but I didn’t want to talk about it.

“It’s fine.”

“It’s fairly regular? You don’t experience any heavy bleeding, cramping or spotting?” he asked.

“Yeah,” I said before realising that I hadn’t answered his question properly. “I mean no. It’s all fine.”

He continued looking at me and I had to look away.

“I know I offered at the beginning of the appointment but if you’d like to speak to a female doctor, I can set that up,” he offered.

I shook my head, still not meeting his gaze.

“No, it’s okay,” I said, just wanting the questions to be done.

“Okay, if you change your mind, you can ask any of the tutors to organise it for you,” he told me.

I nodded.

I wasn’t sure if I would be more comfortable speaking to a female doctor, both would be awkward and uncomfortable for me. Not that it mattered, I didn’t have anything to say to them.

“Fantastic,” he said with a smile. “And how would you say your mental health is?”

“What?” I asked.

The question came from nowhere and I didn’t expect it. No one had really asked me about my mental health before and never in such a straightforwards way. I just didn’t know how to answer the question. I didn’t want to say something wrong, just in case it was enough to get me kicked out of the Academy. It wouldn’t be, I knew that logically, but I was still scared.

“Your mental health,” Doctor Adda repeated gently. “Do you experience low mood or anxiety?”

I swallowed nervously. The answer was yes to both of those but I couldn’t say it. My throat was dry, as was my mouth. I tried to speak, unsure of what I was even going to say, but no words came out. My hands felt like they were trembling, shaking, and I tried to say something again but fear blocked the words.

I gave up, looking away from the doctor and nodding.

“That’s alright. They’re both very common,” he said in a soft tone that made me need to blink hard to stop tears from forming in my eyes. “You know, I used to struggle with depression.”

That made me look at him again. I almost couldn’t believe it. Realistically, I knew that lots of people struggled with it but no one I knew, apart from Katie, had ever actually admitted it. However, there was something else that my mind was stuck on.

“Used to?” I asked.

He nodded.

“I no longer experience depression,” he confirmed. “I still get sad, don’t get me wrong. Sadness is a completely normal human emotion that everyone feels sometimes but it’s not quite so… all-consuming.”

His words caused something to blossom within me. I knew that it was stupid though. I knew nothing about him, nothing about his experience or what he had been through, but his words gave me hope. Maybe one day, I could feel differently. Maybe I would be able to talk about being sad so casually, as if it was something that I felt occasionally, not my constant state of being.

“Do you want to talk about it?” he asked softly.

I still couldn’t speak though. The most I could do was shake my head.

“That’s okay. For now, why don’t we keep an eye on it and see how you’re doing when you’ve been here a little bit longer? Sometimes, it can be caused by the environment you’re in so being removed from it and put into a completely different one can be quite helpful. Of course, it doesn’t always fix everything and if you are still struggling, we can talk about it when you feel ready to. How does that sound?”

I clenched my hands into fists, hoping that it would make me feel stronger and more in control. I felt vulnerable, exposed, and I didn’t like it. Maybe it would be nice to talk about it one day but, for now, all I felt was fear.

“Okay,” I said, the words barely above a whisper.

“Great,” he replied in a tone that was almost too reassuring. “We have some more questions that we need to run through today. Do you want to continue or do you need a break?”

I swallowed again. Ideally, I would have a break. It would give me a chance to stop feeling so shaky and uncertain but I didn’t want to admit that. What if he wrote that down? Would they see me as weak? Unsuitable to be a spy? I wasn’t willing to let that happen.

“I’m ready to continue,” I said, the words coming out a little less strong than I wanted them to.

It was definitely an improvement though.

“Okay, fantastic! We’re going to run through some questions and I need you to give quick answers, just the first thing that comes to the top of your head. Some of the questions might seem a little bit random or unexpected but you can ask questions at any time if you want me to clarify or rephrase something and if you need a break, just say. How does that sound?” he checked.

“Um, yeah. It sounds… good?”

He smiled at me before clicking something on his screen.

“Great. How do you find social situations?”

I couldn’t say the first thing that came to my mind, I knew it was the wrong answer.

“Oh… Alright, I guess?”

Doctor Adda clicked something on his screen but didn’t look up. I longed to move my chair so that I could see whatever he had selected. Had he seen through me? Did he know that I was lying?

“Okay, and do you find it easy to make friends?”

I opened my mouth to speak before hesitating. It hadn’t been that hard in this world, not like in reality. I pretty much had friends already, Katie and Abbie. And maybe Seth but… I wasn’t sure about him. I didn’t really want him to just be a friend, I kind of wanted more.

“Yeah. It’s not too bad,” I replied.

“Great! And, in school, how did you find group work? So, if you had a project to do or something like that, were you able to communicate with everyone in the group without any problems?”

I fought to keep the grimace off of my face. I hated group work more than anything. It wasn’t so bad if I was in a group with Phoebe or Duncan but if it was people I didn’t really know or like, it was harder. In those situations, I barely spoke and tried to fade into the background and do whatever was asked of me without bringing much attention to myself.

Sometimes, if it was a subject I really liked, it was easy. I could take charge, tell others what to do. I liked that. It made me feel in control and that was better. I couldn’t always do that though. I didn’t have it in me to do it all the time. But I couldn’t just say that. I was training to be a spy, that’s why I had been brought to the Academy. I wasn’t sure but I assumed a spy needed to be able to work well with others.

“It depends,” I said carefully.

“Oh, yeah?” the doctor replied.

Somehow, I hadn’t expected him to ask any kind of follow-up question.

“Yeah… I mean, it depends on the group.”

That felt like a safe answer.

“That makes sense!” he said, making relief wash through me. “How do you find small talk?”

“It’s… alright?” I replied after a pause.

It wasn’t too bad, not really. I just didn’t really feel the need to do it. I mean, I did. When I was around people, I felt like I had to talk sometimes. I couldn’t exactly just sit there in silence but it would be so much better if people just got to the point and said what they needed to say. Phoebe did that a lot and I liked it. It made it easier, we could just talk without it being awkward or boring.

“Okay, and do you have go-to phrases or questions that you ask when you are in situations where you’re expected to make small talk?”

I didn’t but it was a great idea. I always felt a little bit more comfortable in situations where I knew what was going to happen or what I was going to say. If I had some phrases, like he suggested, I could just rely on those.

“No,” I told him, my mind already searching for options.

“And how do you find eye contact?” he asked.

I glanced at him again, realising that I had looked away whilst thinking. He was staring at me, his eyes boring into mine. I hadn’t been thinking about it before but, now that he had mentioned it, I was uncomfortable. I couldn’t look away though and I wasn’t sure why. It just felt wrong, like I’d get into trouble. Normal people didn’t struggle with things like that, I knew it.

“It’s fine,” I said, still staring at him.

“Great!” he replied, finally looking away. “And would you say you have a vivid imagination?”

I fought to keep the shock from my face.

“Um… what do you mean?”

“Are you able to imagine things in great detail or do you daydream a lot?” he asked.

“Yes,” I said, the answer slipping out before I could stop it.

It felt dangerous. I wasn’t sure what exactly the risk was but I felt like we were circling towards talking about my dreams, about the other worlds, and I didn’t want to do that.

“Okay,” he said with a nod, typing something on the computer. “And when you are imagining things or daydreaming, is it highly detailed or very real feeling?”

I looked around the room, my eyes roaming over the many certificates on the walls, the pictures and portraits. The realistic-looking medical equipment and computer before landing on the doctor again.

“Yes.”