Chapter Text
Originally, Silas thought it would be amazing, going to medical school. He loved learning all about the body and was sure he’d fly through all his classes. Afterall, he had a lot of practice from his brother. He had to forge a lot of paper work which would technically make his license illegal, but he didn’t care. But even with all that experience with his brother, med school was surprisingly a chore.
Classes felt so slowly paced and boring. He already knew most of the stuff and ended up zoning out. But that wasn’t the worst part. The school was packed full of other men. Silas was by far the smallest one there. When the campus would get crowded, he’d quickly feel overwhelmed by the amount of people and the pushing and loudness.
Not to mention, he had to constantly be self-aware of the stuff he did. He didn’t want people to find out he had the body of a girl and was the one who had veil sickness and destroyed Braxton’s. That would likely get him executed.
All this piled on top of each other was pretty stressful. But Silas learned how to deal with it. If he survived Braxton’s, he could survive this, he would tell himself.
But one day, it felt incredibly hard to keep up the mask and deal with it. When he woke up, he found himself engulfed in Daphne’s arms. She was a cuddler, which Silas mostly didn’t mind. Some days touch was a bit much, but most of the time, he loved cuddling with Daphne. Unfortunately though, it was too comfortable and he ended up falling back to sleep.
When he woke up again, he checked his pocket watch and realized he was going to be late. He quickly jumped out of bed, accidentally waking up his girlfriend in the process. She was still quite tired and managed to get back to sleep later, but he felt guilty for waking her up.
After getting dressed, he realized there wouldn’t be time to eat breakfast. Not that he minded. The only breakfast food they had were eggs and he did not feel like forcing them down his throat. He hopped on his bicycle and started riding to the school.
When he got to the lecture hall, he tried to be as quiet as possible to not interrupt the class. He opened the door gently and walked to his seat. Unfortunately, the professor seemed to have noticed.
“Mr. Barry! You’re late,” the professor announced. Everyone in the room turned to look at him. Silas felt the need to fidget or rock back and forth on his heels but with everyone looking at him, he refused.
“I- I know, sir. My apologies. It won’t happen again,” Silas apologized, putting on a somewhat deep voice. He’d been experimenting with lowering his voice to try and fit in with the rest of the boys there.
“Since this is your first time being late, I’ll let it slide. Take a seat and try to catch up,” the Professor told him. He nodded and sat down at an empty seat.
He hated the way everyone looked at him as he sat. It was extremely uncomfortable and made his heart race. He wanted to just hide under a blanket and never come out. But he forced himself to stay present and try to pay attention to class.
But then the worst thing happened. After a couple minutes of review, the professor handed out a pop quiz. Silas hated these written quizzes and tests. He would always get high grades on them, but the experience was horrible. He’d have to re-read the question a million times before his brain finally processed what it was asking. Then he’d have to figure out how to word the answer properly. He’d always be close to the last one done. It made him feel ashamed for this problem he had.
While taking the quiz, he could hear almost everything happening in the room. From the tapping of people’s pencils, to the coughs and scribbling. He couldn’t wait until he could go back home and see Daphne.
When the quiz was finally done, he turned it in and waited patiently to be dismissed for lunch break. It took a couple more minutes before the last person was finished and the professor excused them.
As everyone started to leave, the volume increased. Silas pressed his hands to his ears but then someone looked over at him weirdly and he quickly put his hands in his pockets.
Luckily, his lunch break was mostly okay. He sat under a tree in the courtyard and ate the lunch that Daphne had packed for him. He used this time to study a bit and read more from his textbook.
The last couple hours of his day at the school were probably the worst. He was already feeling very overwhelmed from, well, everything. It made masking and hiding his sickness (or uniqueness as Daphne wanted him to call it) way harder than normal. He wished he was just a regular boy with nothing wrong with him. Life would be so much easier if he was just normal.
Though because he felt overwhelmed, he needed an extra 15 minutes after class had ended to calm down. He found a small isolated place in the building and began flapping his hands rapidly while rocking from his heel to the tip of his toes. It felt nice to just release all his bad feelings and anxiety. He stayed there for a couple minutes mainly because he didn’t want to bother Daphne with all his weirdness when he got home.
After he was all done, he walked outside to go find his bicycle. The ride home was pretty good, the sky wasn’t too bright and the weather was perfect.
When he got home, he parked his bike outside the small Victorian building his and Daphne’s home was a part of. Silas walked up to the front door and turned the knob, walking inside.
“Daphne? I’m home!” He announced when he entered.
“I’m in the kitchen, Silas!” Daphne called back.
Silas took off his shoes and bag at the front and walked towards the kitchen. It was a very short walk, as the house was small, but that was alright. Daphne was sitting at the wooden table, going over finances and bills. Silas walked over to her and pressed a kiss to her forehead. She smiled and looked up at him, about to collide her lips with his, when she noticed how…exhausted, Silas looked.
“Are you alright?” She asked.
“I…I’m alright. Just had a busy day," he replied, trying not to make her worry. But Daphne could see right through him. She always did.
“Are you okay if I touch you?” She asked, waiting for permission. There was a hint of worry on her face. Silas nodded and she took his hand and led him into their bedroom.
She sat down on the bed, her back leaning against the headboard, waiting for him to join her. He giggled a little and climbed into bed with her as well. She pulled him against her body, his legs over her lap and tucked his head underneath her chin. Holding him like this did wonders for Silas. It made him feel safe.
When they first moved in together, they had come up with ways to help each other when the other was in distress. It was mainly for Silas though. Daphne hated it when he hid and masked his negative feelings, so she would try to help him whenever she noticed it happening. This usually meant comforting him until he was ready to talk. Some days he hated touch and other days he craved it. Daphne had made the mistake multiple times at first, forgetting to ask if he was okay with it. But she soon adapted very quickly and always made sure to ask for permission to comfort him via physical affection.
Silas snuggled against her body, curling up in her lap as she played with his wavy hair. They sat like this for a while, not speaking, just enjoying each other’s company.
“Do you feel like talking now?” She asked. Silas didn’t have much of a problem with being mute. It was pretty rare that he would go quiet, normally only happening when he was in distress or discomfort. Though whenever he didn’t really feel like talking, he could usually speak a few words. But Daphne never forced him to talk.
“Yeah. My day was just stressful…People were loud and there were a lot of them, and my bloody sickness kept making it hard to get through it,” Silas explained.
“It’s not a sickness, Si. You’re unique. And there's nothing wrong with that,” Daphne told him, “I’m sorry your day was rough. What did you learn about?”
He smiled when she asked that. She knew how easily talking about medical things could distract Silas from his bad thoughts. For the next hour, Silas talked about all that he learned that day and the test they had. He expressed his nervousness towards it, but Daphne kissed him and told him he did a great job.
While he disliked being abnormal, it all felt alright whenever Daphne reassured him. She was amazing and made him feel happy with his life for once.