“What made you second guess your options? Two days ago, you were determined to set things straight, but today you don’t seem so brave.”
“I had a panic attack,” I admitted, pulling my knees up to my chest and turning to look out the window again.
“Hmmm,” she said. “Was it the first time you’ve had one?”
“No.” I shook my head. “I’ve had a few, but Collin always gave me something.”
“Who’s Collin?”
“A friend? Ace’s on-call doctor, I guess you could call him. He’s been there when...well, for a lot of stuff since I found out about everything.”
“Okay,” she said, most likely trying to wrap her own mind around everything. I had to be one messed up case.
“It’s all kind of confusing,” I confessed. “He’s grown on me over the past month or so. I don’t know what he really is to me.”
“It seems like you have a lot of people who care about you.”
“I do,” I agreed.
“Have you talked to him since you got settled in?”
I shook my head. The idea caused my chest to tighten, and I wasn’t even sure why.
“All right, so back to your attack…Any idea with what brought it on?”
“I felt it coming on the past couple of days, but I didn’t think it’d hit that hard.”
“You have been through a lot, Scarlett. It’s not something to be ashamed of. It’s the way your brain attempts to process everything. I hate to say it, but it may not get better for a while.”
“Great,” I huffed with a blink.
“Now, I can prescribe you a medication that will help, along with a few tricks that can lessen the attacks when they hit.”
“I don’t want pills.”
“Have you thought about maybe CBD, then? They seem to help better than medication sometimes.”
“Never heard of them.” I turned to look at her.
“They come in different forms, so it’s all up to the person on what works best. There are drops that can go under your tongue before you go to sleep at night, or pills, and even gummies. Here.” she stood up and walked to her desk. After finding a pamphlet in one of her drawers, she came back in front of me. “Here’s a list of types of ways to use hemp oil. Most of my patients prefer the gummies.
“I suggest to start off with the smallest dose, then increase until you find what works. The nice thing with most of these options is that they don’t make you feel like you don’t have any control. Sure, they make you feel sleepy, which is why taking them right before bed helps the most, but they also help lessen anxiety.”
“Okay,” I said, feeling slightly better.
“Our time is up today, but please, if you need me, don’t hesitate to call. And I’d love to see you at the group session this evening.”
“We’ll see,” I said.
L ess than an hour later, I found myself standing on the sidewalk in front of an all-natural vitamin store. I wasn’t sure I could do this. I wasn’t even sure what I was looking for.
“Hey, you!” Sawyer said, bouncing out of the store with a huge smile on her face. “You seem lost.”
“I’m…just…” What was I doing?
“Come on in,” she said, turning around and heading back inside. “Let’s find whatever you came to look for.”
When I didn’t move, she sighed and half stomped back to me. Then, she grabbed my hand lightly and pulled me towards the door. Her grip was light enough that I could have broken it if I wanted to.
“So, what are you looking for?”
The inside of the store had walls filled with a number of different styles and brands of vitamins, shelves and rows of more than anything I’d ever seen before.
“Sawyer,” huffed an older gal with a pair of small glasses on the tip of her nose. “You don’t need to bring people if they don’t want to come in.”
“She’s fine,” I whispered.
“She’s my new neighbor I was telling you about,” Sawyer stated with a bounce. “I owe her for making her spill her coffee!”
“Don’t let her talk you into things you don’t want,” the older woman laughed. “Welcome to Vitamin Needs.” Then, she hobbled back behind a short desk with a number of papers laid across it.
“So, what are you looking for? We have just about everything you could possibly want.”
“CBD.” The words were quiet, as I wasn’t even sure what I was looking for.
Her eyes lit up and she told me to follow her to the back wall. I slowly followed, one step in front of the other.
“So, you have a few options, depending on what exactly you’re looking for,” she started off, talking almost too quickly for me to keep up. “Sleep aid, stress relief, and anxiety. Now, nearly all of them help with just about everything, but the sleep aids have more melatonin in them.”
“Anxiety, I guess,” I said.
“Okay, so this one,” she pulled a bottle filled with gummy bears of different colors from the shelf, “has hemp oil, along with extra Vitamin B-12 and E. I find this brand to help the most myself. Now,” she pulled another, smaller bottle from the shelf, “this one has a bit less of the extra vitamins, but the flavor is the melt-in-your-mouth kind. I think I’d start out with these. Start off with one, then increase as you get a feel for how they affect you.”
“Uh…” I said, trying to get all that information to stick in my mind.
“I talked to fast, didn’t I?” she asked sheepishly. “Sorry about that. I just can’t help it.”
“I don’t think I’d understand anything, anyhow,” I said.
“Okay, so go with this one. If it doesn’t do what you want it to, then come back and I’ll hook you up with something else.”
“Okay.”
“You aren’t the talking type, are ya?” she asked, leading the way to the front check-out.
“I don’t think she can even get a word in, girl,” the older lady said.
“Don’t mind Mindy,” Sawyer stage-whispered.
“I heard that!”
Sawyer barked out a laugh before ringing me up. I handed over my card, and she swiped it through the machine before handing it back.
“Do you have plans later tonight? We should so hang out. I have something I gotta do, but after that, I’d love to get to know my new neighbor.”
“I don’t know,” I shrugged.
“You don’t know about hanging out, or that you aren’t doing something?”
“Doing something. I’m kinda trying to figure out what I should be doing.”
“Perfect! You can figure that out with me, then!”
“Maybe,” I said, giving her a tight smile. “Just knock on the door, I guess, when you get back.”
Would it be acceptable to not answer?
“Perfect!” she said, seeming content enough with that answer.
“See ya later, then,” I said before leaving.
Before I left the store, I could hear Mindy teasing her about her ways of approaching customers. It made me smile, since it didn’t seem as if Sawyer cared one bit. She seemed like she was the type who planned things at the last minute and didn’t care what anyone thought of her.