Chapter Text
I walked carefully, keeping weight off my right leg. It had always been a bit prone to pain, but lately it had been hurting a lot more.
I wasn’t sure why, I hadn’t done much. Just mid-run it had gotten a lot worse and I didn’t understand what was going on.
But I didn’t want to worry mom, she had so much work to do it didn’t seem fair to make her worry about my leg too.
It would probably get better on its own, right?
Maybe soaking it in a bath would help, that always made me feel better.
OO OO OO
Mom was frowning at me.
“Percy, are you okay?”
I nodded quickly, “Yeah.”
“You’re limping.”
“I just tripped earlier, it’s okay.”
She pursed her lips but nodded. “Alright, let me know if it doesn’t feel better in a few hours.”
I did my best to not let on that it had been hurting for over two weeks now.
OO OO OO
Mom gave me an ice pack and had me sit my leg on a pillow.
“How does it feel now?”
I shrugged, “It’s okay. Kinda cold.”
Mom wiped a tear from my cheek.
“I know you want to be strong honey, but you don’t need to hide your pain from me. I want to make sure you’re healthy. I wish you’d told me sooner.”
I leaned into her.
“Sorry, I didn’t wanna worry you.”
“It’s my job to worry, please let me.”
“Okay,” I mumbled.
OO OO OO
Icing it helped a bit, but not enough. It still hurt to walk on.
Mom was thinking about going to the doctor for it, but so far hadn’t. She bought me a knee brace from the CVS nearby though, it helped some too.
School was hard though, it was a lot of walking to class and that made my knee ache a lot by the end of the day. The pain was starting to be sharper too.
I wasn’t sure what to do, why didn’t mom’s solutions work?
I didn’t like the pain.
OO OO OO
Gabe was yelling at mom, I didn’t like it.
I was curled in my room, my leg stretched out carefully to keep it from hurting too much, listening to him yell.
I couldn’t really hear many words, but it seemed to be about money.
I hoped things were okay.
OO OO OO
“It’s definitely swollen,” mom muttered. “Does this hurt?”
I winced as she prodded the side of my knee.
“Yea-yeah.”
She frowned, “I think we’ll need to take you to a doctor. It’s been over a month and you’re getting worse.”
I shook my head, “It’s not that bad-“
“Percy,” she murmured. “It’s okay. I want to make sure it’s nothing serious.”
I bit my lip but nodded reluctantly.
I didn’t want her to have to spend any extra money on me, but I really wanted to make the pain stop.
“I’ll set up an appointment.”
OO OO OO
“Hmm, I’m not sure. It doesn’t seem like a sprain… you might need to see a specialist.”
Mom grimaced, “Are you sure? Can you do an x-ray maybe?”
The doctor shrugged, “We can try, but this doesn’t seem like a bone issue. And it’s not strained or sprained. It’s localized along the joint with a bit of radiating pain… but we’ll double check.”
“Thank you.”
OO OO OO
The x-ray was weird. They laid me down on a metal table and put a heavy blanket like cover on my chest.
Then the person left the room and the thing made a weird noise before they came back out. They did my leg in several ways too, making me lay in different ways.
I hoped it had a solution so mom didn’t need to take me to anyone else.
OO OO OO
“You wanna take the kid to a different doctor? Sally, we’ve already wasted enough money on this!”
“He’s hurting! I won’t refuse him medical treatment when I can get it for him.”
“We don’t have the money for it!”
“I’m picking up extra shifts, I’ll have the money for it if I have to take out a loan.”
There was a crashing noise.
“Listen here-“
“I won’t let my son hurt because I can’t provide for him,” mom snapped.
OO OO OO
“Mom want a pancake?”
She shook her head, “No thank you Percy. I’m not hungry right now.”
Mom was eating less, I thought at least. She used to eat breakfast with me, but she wasn’t doing it much anymore.
I bit my lip but went back to eating my pancakes. They were still blue like she always did, but there were less of them.
I made sure to eat all the ones mom made me.
OO OO OO
I was hot. I didn’t know why but I was getting hot a lot nowadays.
I kicked my covers off with a groan and curled up. It wasn’t even summer, why was I hot?
I got up, wincing at the pang in my knee, and opened the window.
The cold winter air was a balm on my skin. The cold washing over me and cooling me off.
I’d just… leave the window open.
OO OO OO
“You have a fever, 99.8,” Mom murmured. “Let me get you some medicine.”
I didn’t feel sick, I wondered why I was having a fever.
Mom gave me some fever meds and sent me back to bed before heading off to work.
I curled up in bed and rested.
OO OO OO
Mom was bringing me to a hospital, I wasn’t sure why. I wasn’t bad enough for a hospital doctor right? But she said we were seeing a doctor here.
She checked us in and sat in the lobby, sitting me down next to her. I looked around curiously, gaze drawn to the fishies in the tank.
“Mom, can I go look at the fish?”
She hummed, “sure, but be careful dear.”
I nodded and eagerly went to look at the fish.
They were colorful, and a bunch swam near me. I liked to imagine I could hear them talking, calling me little lord and wishing me well.
I imagined one asked me why I was there, so I whispered that I was seeing a special doctor to make my pain go away.
The fish swam in circles briefly, and I giggled, imagining they were concerned for me. I smiled brightly.
“Don’t worry, fishies, the doctor will make me better. Mom says that’s their job.”
I wished I could touch the fish, but theses ones seemed nice.
I tapped on the glass for a minute, watching the fish follow my finger, before I heard my name called.
Mom held out a hand and I moved back to her.
OO OO OO
I swung my good leg while sitting on the doctor seat thing. I wasn’t sure what it was called, but the paper was fun to crinkle.
“Alright, so I’ve finished looking him over,” the doctor said as he pushed his glasses up. “It seems like he pulled the muscle right here-“ he leaned over and pointed to a place on my leg “-so I’m going to prescribe physical therapy and some low level pain killers, along with a better brace.”
“Will that fix it?”
“If he completes the physical therapy then he should be all better, the pain meds are just in case. You probably won’t need them but make sure to monitor their use.”
The doctor flashed me a smile, “You’re a brave boy to handle the pain like this. Do you want a lollypop?”
I perked up, “Yes, please.”
He handed me a lollypop and started talking to mom about some more doctor stuff.
OO OO OO
Physical therapy hurt. They made me ride a bike and do stuff with bands on my leg.
I had to do some stuff at home too, stretches and stuff. It wasn’t fun.
And I was always so hot these days. I was glad it was winter because I could stand outside to cool off but I didn’t understand.
But still, I hated the exercises.
I did them anyways, mom was working so much more to pay for it. I almost never saw her anymore because of her work schedule.
Insurance only paid for so much.
OO OO OO
I didn’t get better by the end of physical therapy. Well, the right leg was a little better, but my left leg started hurting too.
I hated it.
Mom scheduled me to go back to the special doctor (she called him an Or-tho-ped-ic).
I didn’t want her to worry but I was kind of scared.
What if it never stopped?
OO OO OO
The doctor was saying a bunch of terms I didn’t know. Telling my mom I might have Lupus, or Lyme disease, or something like that.
I didn’t know what those were but mom seemed very worried.
“And then there’s this bone degeneration disorder, it’s best to test for everything. If you’re able. The tests can be expensive, insurance doesn’t usually cover all of them.”
“Can we try to narrow it down more, first?”
He nodded, “We can. There’s several things we can do first, would you like to go over possible treatments for him while we narrow it down?”
OO OO OO
Mom had me keep up the physical therapy at home, insurance wouldn’t pay for it in the place anymore.
It was harder with both legs hurting though.
I yawned, I was tired too. But I was sleeping the same as before. Ugh, I hated this.
I was pretty sure I was sick too, the fever kept coming and going.
On top of the physical therapy I was supposed to do hot and cold therapy. But Gabe didn’t like me going down when he was there, and I hated how the heat made me feel anyways, so I didn’t do that one so much.
OO OO OO
I rubbed my wrist, why did that hurt? I had been writing a lot so it was probably that.
It had to be that.
OO OO OO
My wrists had started hurting too. This one was worst because I had to write for class and that always made it bad quickly.
Mom got me wrist braces and took me in to see the specialist again.
OO OO OO
“Alright, we’ll need to do these blood tests and an MRI. We have a few things it could be so we’ll need to test for all. Once we have that figured out we’ll be able to start treating you properly.”
I listened nervously as he talked about the blood tests. He said that they could get the blood that day, but we’d need to schedule the MRI for a later date.
Was that going to work? Mom would have to take off from work again-
“Alright, thank you for the help.”
“Of course, we’ll do our best to get your son feeling better. And you-“ he looked at me “-are being very brave. I know this must be scary but we’re going to help you out, okay?”
I nodded.
OO OO OO
The blood tests weren’t fun.
Mom held my hand though, and they had a TV show playing on a small TV in the room. The lady taking my blood was nice too.
She had to take a lot of blood though, lots of bottles. They were different sizes, with different colored tops.
It was in my arm awhile. Putting it in didn’t hurt too much but taking it out stung a bunch.
She gave me a lollypop and a sticker, plus a fun band-aid.
Mom wrapped me in a hug and ushered me off.
OO OO OO
We were at a different doctor this time. Apparently they were gonna put me in a big machine to look inside me for a bit.
They gave me headphones to play music and warned me the machine would be loud, but I had to stay still.
Then they put me on, with some plastic things around me around my legs and chest.
It was loud. And worse it was hot.
I was growing to hate the heat.
I did my best to stay still though. Even though it hurt, and made me nauseous, and I had a headache. And I wanted to sleep but it was loud and I was uncomfortable.
Did I mention I was hot too?
It lasted forever too. They said I would be in there for an hour and it felt like longer.
I couldn’t move or anything.
OO OO OO
Mom and I were sitting at the doctor again as he went over the test results with my mom.
“So, you see, he tested positive for anti-cyclic citrullinated peptide. It’s an antibody that appears in those with Rheumatoid Arthritis. We’ll get you a recommendation for a rheumatologist to start treatment.”
“What does that mean for Percy?” Mom asked with a frown. “Can it be cured.”
The doctor put the papers aside and gave a tight smile.
“Rheumatoid Arthritis, or in your son’s case Juvenile Rheumatoid Arthritis, is a chronic autoimmune condition. It- well in children there’s a chance of putting it permanently into remission so he’ll never need treatment again. But only if he’s better by the time he’s seventeen.”
She wrung her hands, “So he can get better?”
He nodded, “Yes, with treatment it’s possible he can get better. It will require medication and physical therapy, but he can recover and live a full, pain-free, life.”
She relaxed, “Alright, that’s good. I’m glad. So when can we see this- uh, specialist.”
“I’ll get in contact with them. Would you like some information sheets on JRA?”
“Yes, please.”
OO OO OO
“Okay, so Percy. You have something called Juvenile Rheumatoid Arthritis, or JRA.”
I nodded, listening to mom closely.
“It’s a condition where your immune system, the stuff that keeps you from being sick, starts hurting your joints.”
“Why?”
She grimaced, “It thinks your joints are making you sick, so it’s hurting them. It’s why you’ve been getting those fevers too. Fevers are your body trying to heat up what makes you sick really hot so it goes away.”
I nodded slowly, “So- so my immune system is hurting me? How do we get it to stop?”
“You’ll probably need to take medicine, maybe a lot of it. And you’ll need to do more physical therapy. Do you think you can do that for me?”
“Yes mom,” I assured her quickly. I’d do whatever it took to handle this, if only to make sure mom wouldn’t worry.
She hugged me, “It’ll be okay. You can get better. Don’t worry about it.”
I hugged her back, “I know, I’m okay.”