After a very brief conversation with Mr. Stratford, I spent the whole day taking advantage of the videos that the hospital library had on its shelves. I was so absorbed trying to capture everything that happened in the videos and paying attention to the explanations that the surgeons gave, that if it weren't for Neil reminding me of the time, I probably would have left the hospital late again.
Returning to House's office, I found the man also preparing to leave. "Look who's finally here," House said falsely surprised. "Has your marathon of boring movies ended?" he asked sarcastically while grabbing his backpack.
"I wasn't watching boring movies," I defended myself. "They are surgical procedures."
"Same boring thing," House said disinterestedly.
"Sure, because soap operas are much more interesting," I sarcastically replied to him.
"I'm glad you understand," House said with an exaggerated smile. "Look, kid, this has been fun and all, but I have to be somewhere else, you know, doing things," he continued quickly as he walked out of the office, avoiding any response from me.
Gathering my things, I followed House, who had been intercepted by the pregnant woman from the previous day's consultation, presumably her husband. She seemed nervous as she spoke to House, obviously silently pleading with him, possibly to maintain some lie.
Seeing House's exasperation at the unpleasant conversation, I walked calmly towards the hospital exit.
In the emergency room waiting area, at the reception desk where Mom and her colleagues work, I said goodbye to the other nurses while helping Mom carry her things to her car. "See you at home," I said as I closed the passenger door of Mom's car after putting her things inside before walking over to 'Debbie'.
The day continued and ended with the relative normalcy of every day: some time with my siblings separately, family dinner, and exercising in the garage with Bob and Gabe.
The next day, just like the previous day, as soon as I arrived at school, I was the subject of looks and whispers among my classmates, obviously discussing what had happened the day before.
Ignoring the looks of the people I passed, I walked quickly, trying to keep my expression completely neutral as I headed to my locker.
So the day went on, during classes, although my competition with Sheldon remained smooth, answering each teacher's questions without a problem, I could sense a certain degree of pity when, especially the female teachers, gave me the floor to respond.
Having noticed these sudden expressions of pity that the teachers threw at me every now and then during class, I couldn't help but notice them in many more people now. While for the male population of the school, I could sense a shared feeling of disbelief directed at me, the expressions of the women in general matched those of the teachers with a certain degree of pity.
In the cafeteria, I could still see this strange phenomenon happening. "There are many girls worried about you," Kat, sitting next to me again, said discreetly.
"What?" I asked, taken by surprise by her sudden statement.
"Yep," Kat said amusingly, "if you feel like all the looks you're getting are too much, try to imagine a bunch of teenagers repeatedly asking you how you managed to go out with the 'perfect' PJ Duncan to try it out for themselves," she sarcastically continued.
"At first, I explained the real reason we were at the mall that day, but after the tenth question, I found it funny to invent situations," Kat explained.
"Wait, what?" I asked again.
"Oh yeah, one of them thinks my dad pays you to go out with me," Kat said, amused, taking a sip from a juice box.
"Oh, Kat, come on," I had enough with a rumor spreading about me at school; I didn't need another, let alone one where it seemed like I was prostituting myself.
"At least it's better than what the guys think of you," adding to the conversation, David, who was sitting in front of us, said.
"They think I'm crazy or stupid," I said, trying to guess.
"Yeah, they don't understand how you cheated Regina George into..." David was saying, suddenly falling silent as he remembered Kat was there.
"I have a name, you know?" Kat ironically asked.
"Yeah, sorry, I didn't mean to," David was apologizing. "None taken," Kat interrupted him calmly.
"So, your dad pays me, huh?" breaking a small awkward silence generated by David's embarrassment, I asked Kat.
"What?" Kat asked defensively. "It's funny even to think about it; my dad hates you for some reason," she affirmed with a small insolent smile.
"Oh, really?" I asked, imitating her insolent smile. "Funny you should say that. Yesterday your dad stopped me at the hospital to talk to me; he had something very interesting to tell me about you," I said before biting into my lunch apple.
"What?" Kat asked this time surprised.
Ignoring all the questions the teenager had about my conversation with her father, lunch continued without any event that caught everyone's attention. Regina and her friends never made it to the cafeteria again.
With some changes, including the decrease in attention drawn in the school hallways and Regina and her two friends reclaiming the table in the center of the cafeteria for themselves again, the days passed.
Completing the 'assignments' that House had left me, the small notebook that I now also carried with me everywhere served as a record of the things I observed about people.
With the first 'assignment' House had given me, I had practiced a lot my observational skills regarding visible symptoms of a person, shifting the focus from merely medical symptoms to really anything about a person it was particularly difficult, at least for first few days and the first dozens of people observed, but as I paid attention to every little thing, the work gradually became easier.
By paying attention to every little thing like the small hand movements someone made while talking to another person, the small tics like touching their hair every so often, or the direction each of their feet pointed during a conversation, each time showed me how easy it was to discern someone's mood just by paying attention.
Even in my own conversations, studying the behavior of my friends was an easier task than studying strangers. David, Georgie, and Brock were like open books once I had discerned certain points to consider when studying them, even Kat once I had enough conversations with her.
The only different one was Alan.
On Friday after practice in the locker room, I was sitting on one of the benches tying my shoelaces while trying to study Alan from the corner of my eye as he was calmly talking with one of our teammates.
As always, Alan had a surprising ability to stay still during a conversation, both his hands and feet always pointing towards whoever he was talking to, no involuntary movement or combustion of attention to other things.
After finishing his conversation with our teammate, as always bidding farewell with a small nod and a small smile that I could at least discern as fake, Alan walked over to where I was sitting.
"Stop," he said quietly, leaning slightly towards me and taking a seat beside me.
"What?" I asked, puzzled by the suddenness of the question.
"It's funny when you do it to other people, but it feels weird to be watched all the time," Alan explained as he began to dress. "I've seen how you do it, and I can see how quickly you're improving, but it's not going to work with me," he continued, tying his shoes.
"I don't understand what you're talking about," I said, for some reason lying; strangely, it felt weird to be caught.
"Oh, you know," with a small smile that I could internally confirm was genuine, Alan said, "obviously, you can't see yourself, but when you lie, you make a small movement with your nose, it's almost imperceptible, but it's there."
Standing up after tying his shoes, "you're good, and it seems like you have a natural talent, but it's still not enough," Alan said, giving my shoulder a small pat before walking away again with a genuine smile.
The next day, Saturday, as I had promised Gabe last week, I planned to have a 'siblings day', so early in the morning, before either of us could have breakfast, I asked them to get dressed to go out after informing my parents.
"So where are we going?" Teddy asked from the passenger seat of 'Debbie'.
"PJ said whatever I want," Gabe, excited, said from the back of the car. "How about we go to the comic store first?" the excited boy asked.
"I remember telling you that we'd do something Teddy wants to do too, buddy. Later, you and I can go to the comic store," I reminded the kid.
"Okay," defeated, Gabe agreed.
"Thank you," relieved, Teddy said in a whisper.
"Well, our first stop is some breakfast," I said, feeling a bit hungry. "How about some pancakes?" I asked.
"Yes!" Gabe exclaimed excitedly again from the back of the car.
"Yeah, that's fine with me too," Teddy said, shrugging her shoulders.
After several hours at the restaurant, talking with my siblings about anything that was on their minds, I paid for our breakfast before we headed out again. "So what do you want to do now?" I asked when we were inside 'Debbie'.
"How about going to the mall for shopping?" Teddy asked hopefully this time.
"No," Gabe exclaimed immediately with displeasure, "shopping is boring," he continued.
Ignoring Gabe, Teddy, widening her eyes obviously as a tactic to silently convince me, asked again.
"You heard him, it has to be something you both want to do," I quickly started the car, avoiding my sister's pleading eyes.
"How about the arcade? My friend Kevin says it's a fun place," Gabe said.
Seeing Teddy with doubt, I received from the teenager a not-so-sure nod before accelerating the car out of the breakfast restaurant's parking lot.
After asking for directions from someone on the street, we arrived at a colorful place with neon lights covering practically every space on the front facade.
Inside, there were many machines with various video games, scattered everywhere. "You're supposed to give me money to change it," standing in front of me inside the arcade, Gabe said, stretching his hand, "okay, little one," I said, taking out a five-dollar bill that was quickly snatched from my hand by an excited child who immediately ran to the store manager, a teenager surely several years older than me, who also seemed obviously tired.
"Do you want to play something, Teddy?" my sister, beside me, was unusually quiet, staring fixedly at something or specifically someone in the distance.
Following her gaze, I saw a small group of teenagers possibly the same age as her playing with a machine to measure strength behind a punch.
"Who is he?" I asked, leaning towards her, managing to surprise her and therefore withdraw her attention.
"Who?" nervously, she quickly asked, "nobody," and answered on her own, "it's nobody," she continued, "did you see that? It's a water shooting machine. I'm sure I can beat you," pointing to one of the many machines in the arcade obviously trying to divert my attention from the group of teenagers, she said.
"Yes, I don't think you can beat me, but before, if you don't mind, I'll probably go and talk to him," taking a step towards the group of teenagers, I said, feigning disinterest.
"No!" Teddy exclaimed quickly, grabbing my arm.
"Then who is he, and more specifically which one of them is he?" I said again, teasing my sister.
"He's nobody," she answered again, avoiding my gaze.
"I can ask," I said again, pretending to take another step, I wouldn't really do anything if Teddy didn't want me to; I wouldn't embarrass Teddy, at least not that much.
"No," stopping my arm again, Teddy said, "okay, fine, he's Ryan McCarthy," again embarrassed, Teddy admitted.
"And who is this Ryan?" I asked, narrowing my eyes.
"He's the one in the center," seeing her shoes, Teddy admitted.
Ryan, in a nutshell, looked quite like Regina in the concerning parts. His friends, although they seemed funny around him, always stood by his side and seemed instinctively to seek his approval after saying something before laughing completely. From his clothes and shoes, the teenager obviously came from a wealthy family, and from his attitude after his friends hit the machine, he didn't seem to care about hiding his contempt for those he saw as inferior to him.
"I don't like him," I said, turning towards the teenage store attendant.
"Why not?" following me, Teddy quickly asked.
"Just a feeling," I said as I arrived in front of the attendant, handing a bill for change; being close to the other teenager, I noticed other things that I hadn't noticed from a distance before.
His face was full of badly treated acne marks; he had obviously greasy hair, and I could perceive a smell that after living so many years in Los Angeles, I could recognize anywhere; he clearly wasn't tired.
"Look, if we manage to get a thousand tickets, we can win a stuffed whale," I said, pointing to the shelf behind the arcade attendant.
"What kind of feeling?" annoyed, ignoring me, Teddy asked again, standing by my side.
"He doesn't seem like a good guy, Teddy," I explained calmly to my sister, silently thanking the attendant and walking to one of the machines.
"How could you know, you don't know him, you only saw him for a few seconds," exasperated Teddy said as I inserted a coin into one of the machines in the arcade, specifically the machine Teddy had seen earlier.
"Yeah, that was enough for me," I replied again as I shot a stream of water into the open mouth of a crocodile.
"You can't just see someone for a few seconds and decide you don't like them; you have to get to know them before you judge them," offended, Teddy said.
"You're right," finishing my turn, I said, turning to my now annoyed sister and handing her a coin, "I'm sorry," I continued, nodding towards the game.
Shaking her head, Teddy inserted the coin, getting ready to shoot as well.
While my sister was focused on the game again, I glanced at the group of teenagers, studying the so-called Ryan before forming a complete idea in my head.
It seemed to be his turn to hit the machine's ball, rudely shoving one of his friends aside, he positioned himself beside the machine, rotating on his hip and quickly striking the machine, waiting with his chest puffed out for the numbers on the machine to finish changing before turning to his group of friends with an arrogant smile and wide-open eyes, he seemed strangely ecstatic after achieving a strong hit on the machine.
Approaching one of his friends, Ryan with two slaps to the other teenager's face said something that obviously affected the beaten teenager before moving on with his entourage behind him; yeah, I definitely didn't like him.
"I told you, look at my score and weep," excitedly Teddy said, pointing at the machine.
"Darn it," exaggerating my reaction, I said, annoyed, "take the tickets; let's find a machine where I can beat you," I continued before moving on to another equally interesting machine.
"We probably won't find one in this state," arrogantly Teddy said after tearing off the papers the machine had spat out.
"We'll see," I said, putting another coin into another of the machines, equally arrogantly.
After a few more machines, Gabe arrived with a bunch of tickets in his hands, wearing a big smile. "Hey, squirt, did you mug someone on your way here?" taking the incredibly large amount of papers from the younger boy's hands, I asked.
"No, you just have to climb the basketball machine, there's some kind of sensor in the hoop, and if you quickly pass your hand through it, it counts as if you scored, I broke the machine's record, and it gave me all these tickets," shamelessly, Gabe said with a big smile, possibly not understanding that he cheated or simply not caring.
"Did anyone see you?" I asked, gauging his reaction.
"Nope," proud of himself, Gabe replied.
Obviously, he knew what he was doing.
"Cheating is only for people who doubt their abilities, therefore, for cowards," I said, shaking his head, "never cheat again, Gabe," I said seriously to the boy, fortunately managing to make him look ashamed of his actions.
"Well, we have one last coin, Teddy, do you want to use it on something else?" I asked my sister, who disinterestedly shook her head, apparently already bored.
"Okay, then it's my coin," I affirmed, and immediately Gabe put on an offended expression for not having been asked, "don't cheat next time," interrupting any excuse he might give, I handed all the tickets to Teddy, who quickly started sorting them.
Being the last coin, I decided, why not, to use it on a luck machine, a big wheel with only one lever; without expecting anything, I inserted the coin and pulled the lever. "Really?, a luck game, these are so boring, you never win anything," unbelievingly, Gabe said.
"Well, Gabe, it was the last coin, and the—" I was saying, but a bunch of sirens and alarms cut me off. Turning to see what was causing such noise, I saw that the wheel had landed on an incredibly small spot with the word "jackpot" written along it. "You won!" excitedly exclaimed Gabe, running over to where the machine continuously spewed out tickets.
"I told you I'd find a machine where I could beat you," I arrogantly said to Teddy, who was also surprised, watching the seemingly endless line of tickets that Gabe was struggling to carry.
After several minutes, the machine finished spitting out all the tickets it had to give. The amount of papers we obtained surprisingly equaled the number of tickets we already had.
Carrying the pile of papers over to the counter where the teenager was now munching on chips with great pleasure, I asked the attendant, who simply pointed to a small machine on the other side of the counter.
After counting all the tickets in the machine with the little help from the teenage attendant, we managed to get two prizes: the plush whale I had seen when we arrived and a small plastic ball gun that Gabe chose.
"That was amazing! Did you see everyone's faces when we came with all those tickets?" excitedly asked Gabe, bouncing along the sidewalk.
"Yeah, we're good at this," Teddy, also amused, said. "We have to come again!" exclaimed Gabe obviously.
"Yeah, sure, we can come again another day," I assured my siblings as we got into 'Debbie', "but it has to be on another 'sibling day', possibly in a month to make it a regular thing," I continued, disappointing Gabe in the back seat of the car.
"Not until a month?" he practically shouted incredulously from the back seat of the car.
"It's just an idea, buddy," I said as I pulled out of the arcade parking lot.
"How about ice cream before going home?" I asked, already knowing the answer as I drove to the ice cream shop.
"Yes!" Teddy and Gabe quickly said in unison.
"Okay," I commented, amused, parking the car a few steps from the ice cream shop.
After we all got out of the car and before we could reach the ice cream shop, Teddy suddenly stopped. "Isn't that Regina George?" she said, pointing to one of the public benches on the street.
"Well, yeah, that's Regina," I said, noticing another teenager sitting beneath Regina, or more accurately, under Regina was another teenager, "oh my God, she's eating that guy's face," I said exaggeratedly, joking with my brother, who nodded with a mixed expression of disgust and amusement.
The public indecency Regina was showing with her new, boyfriend? was especially surprising, following House's whole profile, it would be contrary to the idea Regina was selling on her 'show' by yelling at me in front of everyone; that or she simply didn't think beyond that.
"Wasn't she your girlfriend?" worried and offended, Teddy asked.
"You're right about that, she was," I said, trying to reassure the teenager.
"Don't you mind?" Teddy asked incredulously, pointing to the couple, who were completely indifferent to the world around them.
"I mean, no," I really didn't mind. As the week went by, the few encounters I had with Regina at school only cemented everything House had described to me about her. Despite her pretending to be sad in front of a crowd, when there wasn't enough audience, I could tell her sadness was fake. In addition to this, I could also notice how the other girls in school behaved around her. Contrary to what I thought before, it wasn't a strange kind of admiration; it was fear.
"No, Gabe," Teddy said, snapping me out of my thoughts. Looking at my younger brother to find what he did, I caught him slowly lowering his new toy with a mischievous smile.
Immediately understanding what he did, I snatched the toy from his hands. "That's not okay," I said, showing a disappointed expression, although internally I was amused. The balls didn't hurt, much less from the distance we were at.
The small ball Gabe shot served its purpose, separating the couple, searching for whatever hit them until they found the small ball on the ground a few inches away.
Finding the projectile, the teenager, whom I had never seen before, searched for who threw it until he came to me, holding the plastic gun, oh.
I hadn't thought about it, quickly handing the gun back to my brother, I smiled innocently while the little boy, caught in his mischief, quickly ran into the ice cream shop.
It seemed like the hormonal teenager wanted to stand up aggressively towards me, but surprisingly Regina stopped him. She was trying to hide her embarrassment; I could tell because unlike when we crossed paths in the school hallways, she consciously avoided looking in my direction.
Being pulled by the arm, the teenager followed Regina in the opposite direction from where Teddy and I were standing, still sending me occasional hateful glances.
"That guy gave me a bad feeling," Teddy said.
"I told you, that happens sometimes," triumphantly laughing, I told Teddy.
---
Author Thoughts:
As always, I'm not American and not a doctor.
Once again, a chapter with a time skip. The timeline I'm using for this first volume is practically the same as that of Young Sheldon, so you can expect the next chapter to also have a time skip (but when will this chapter be?).
This chapter served to showcase PJ's development with what House wanted him to do of 'reading' people. Again, I'm not Sherlock Holmes or a detective, so all the BS you see about this topic throughout the novel will have to be taken as real.
I must say that the final event with Regina in this chapter serves to introduce an important character for another moment in the first volume. Obviously, it's the other teenager, but I feel like I didn't use the resource as well as I would have liked.
Another chapter has passed, so new thanks are in order. I would like to especially thank:
keyakedo
RandomPasserby96
11332223
(When I write this, the podium is at risk of changing; RandomPasserby96 is a few points below the first place of keyakedo, specifically 3 points. Will it soon be time to name a new number one?)
With that said,
I think that's all. As always, if you find any errors, please let me know, and I'll correct them immediately.
Thank you for reading! :D
PS: PLEASE LEAVE A REVIEW.
PS2: By the way, a few days ago was my birthday, I accept power stones as a gift.