Ryder's POV

 Things have been going smoothly over these past couple of days. Liam was getting closer with his Target friend, Callum was getting used to working with Tanner, and Jax seemed to be doing better now that he had his punching bag. He was using it for at least 30 minutes every day, always eating a pretty small snack when he was done.

 Jax honestly seemed to be doing the best out of all of us, which was actually kind of surprising since all of us were expecting for him to have a harder time.

Really, Liam and Callum were doing better than I thought they would too, especially Liam. I knew he was going to have a hard time adjusting and getting social again since he doesn't really trust strangers but now that he has James, he seems to be way better. 

And Callum was getting less annoyed with Tanner and was learning how to control himself with rude customers. He was keeping his lack of out burst streak alive. He hasn't blown up since we left camp and was even the one calming the rest of us down the other night.

The only one who wasn't making any progress was me. 

 I still couldn't manage more than an hour at the hospital without getting anxious and needing Patrick to take me home. 

 I can't help but sigh to myself as I remove my hand from my mom's before laying her's back down on the bed. 

 "I'll be back tomorrow," I promised as I stood up. Patrick only shot me a sad smile as he stood up with me and began leading me out of the hospital but as soon as we passed the nurse' station I stopped at the sound of someone calling my name. 

"Mr. Mason, we need to talk before you leave," Nancy said as she waved me over with a sad smile. My heart clenched at that. That smile normally meant something bad was about to happen. 

"You can just call me Ryder," I say as I eased up to the front desk. 

 "We need to talk about updating your payment plan," she said as she went to type something into the computer. "It says a place called Camp New Life used to cover everything but when we tried to charge it them this time, the check wouldn't go through."

 "I don't know why. I've been using their insurance for three years now."

"But you aren't in camp anymore," Patrick said with a frown. "Once you leave camp, they can't afford to take care of expenses like that." It felt like my heart stopped beating for a second. 

 I force myself to take a deep breath to try not to freak out. 

"How much is the usual bill?" 

"Before your camp's insurance it was 3,000 a month. Do you have any other insurance you would like to add today?"

 3,000 dollars per month? That was like five paychecks per month down the drain just like that.  

"Uh, no. I don't have any insurance. When is the bill due?"

 "It will be due August 12. All of her bills are due by the 12 of the next month."

 Well it was July 20th now so I had about 23 days to find a job, find an insurance that will take my mom with her health records, and attempt to make everything insurance didn't cover. Fucking fantastic. 

 "Okay," I said with a forced smile. "Do you take cash payments or am I going to link payment to a credit or debit card account?"

 "We prefer credit or debit accounts because they are more reliable but we do still take cash as long as you have a copy of your bill but we also take checks," she says as she hands me an envelope with my name an address on it. I don't even know how they got my address. 

"Okay well I will get you the bill by the 12 then. It will be a cash payment so we are done for right now. Thanks Nancy." I don't give her time to say another word as I turn and head back to the door with Patrick following close behind me. 

"You okay," Patrick asked when we were only a few minutes away from the apartment. "You're being uncharacteristically quiet."

"Oh I'm fine," I say with another forced smile as I tried to blink back the tears. "I just have to find an insurance company that will actually help me because of I don't I will have to try to find a to pay 3,000 dollars in medical bills."

"I'm sure Andrew and the boys will help you call around for companies and if they won't then I will."

Andrew, probably, my boyfriends, no. I didn't want them to be worrying about my problems. They all had enough to worry about without having to stress about paying my bills. Plus they were all finally starting to a little bit better; this would only freak them out even more.

I've paid these kinds of bills before; I can definitely pay them now that I was old enough to get an actual job.

I could get through this without having to rely on my boyfriends. I did it before and I could do it again. 

I sigh to myself as I get out of the car and head up to the apartment. 

 First things first, insurance. If I could get a coverage it would help me decide how much I would paying which would decide if I could take a part time job or if I was going to have to get full time. 

My next several hours were spent looking up insurances, taking quizzes to see if a company would even help me, and making a few phone calls to promising companies only to be disappointed when they said they wouldn't be able to help me. 

I hadn't even noticed how late it had been until I heard the front door open. 

My heart froze for a second as my hand surged forward to grab the bill I got from the hospital and shoving it under the couch cushions. 

"Did you have a nice walk today," Callum asked as he came in with a smile. 

"Yea," I say as I come up to him and wrap my arms around his waist. "It was amazing."

Jax's POV

"You ready to get your tattoo started," Dayton asked as he sat down in his chair, the woman he as tattooing sat in client chair with a huge smile on her face. 

"I'm so excited to see what designs you came up with."

"Well I don't know if you remember but this is Jax," he said as he pointed to me. "He actually drew up a few things of his own. I did a few too so hopefully you find one that you like." 

The woman's smile only brightened when Dayton handed her the folder with everything in it.

In the end she used one of Dayton's but she said that was going to pick one of mine until she saw Dayton's last design so that took a bit of the sting out.

The next three hours were spent with me doing more designs for other clients while Dayton waved me over every now and then to show me how he did a certain thing or how he personally liked to shade and color. 

 It was decent I guess but I still haven't had the chance to work the gun. Dayton was going to show me a while ago but then a walk in came in so there wasn't any time left.

 I've been meaning to bring it up again but I knew I was probably becoming annoying at this point so I kept it to myself for now. 

For now this would be my routine. Come in early, design, set up appointments, get Dayton's station set up, clean his station up once he was done, stay really late, and finally go home to let everything out on my punching bag. 

 I was just happy that Carter was getting slightly better at handling Bram. Ever since he built that pillow fort for him he hasn't fronted and apparently stays in there pretty much all the time and he seems to be happy in it so that was good at least. 

My head still felt weird though and I didn't understand why. I know Andrew said it would mean a new alter was about to come in but when Bram came up he only needed a few days. This new alter was taking their sweet time. It has been almost a week since I started feeling weird and they still weren't here. It was kind of starting to piss me off.

At this point I wished they would just appear and get it over with. 

 "How would you feel about going home early today," Dayton asked as I wiped down everything now that his appointment was over with. 

"That depends, would I be going home because I did a good job or because I did a bad job at something?"

 "Neither," he said with a shrug. "I just have something to do and you are supposed to be ghosting me so without me here, you don't really have a reason to stick around unless you want to shadow Kate for the rest of the day?"

Maybe Kate would teach me how to use the gun.

I was just about to tell him I would stay when Carter spoke up. 

I kind of want to go home. I'm not feeling too good. I'm not sure I could handle being around someone we don't know that well.

I can't help but frown at that. 

 I really did want to shadow Kate just to see how other people do the same job but I knew that if things were reversed and I was the one feeling bad, Carter would go home without a second thought. 

"I think I'll head home then."

"Sounds perfect to me. I'll see you tomorrow."

 "Yea, see you tomorrow," I say as he walks out of the room, trying to keep the disappointment out of my voice.

Last updated June 26, 2021