Disappearing1

He remembered having done this before. It was during his first year of college. Everything had seemed to be coming at him at once from every direction. The demands of his classes, his part time job, and trying to live in a noisy dorm room with the most popular party guy in the building. He had needed to take control of his life, at least some aspect of his life.

And it was so easy at first. It made him feel so good, so proud of himself. He might have to show up at his classes on time and do his assignments and perform like a trained seal for his professors who all expected the best of the sixteen-year old advanced student. He might have to clear out of his own room to go study in the library because his roommate was having friends in. He might have to work every weekend and two evenings a week waiting tables at the local Pizza Hut.

But in this one area of his life, no one could tell him what to do. He was in complete control over what he chose to put in his mouth. He didn't have to eat or drink anything he didn't want to.

He couldn't give in and eat it because then he wouldn't be in control. And if he lost that, lost that one area of his life that he was in control, then he would lose himself.

He wasn't sixteen now. He was thirty. And when he thought about that it made him want to cry. In the logical part of his brain, he understood that it was okay for him to still be in the same place at the age of thirty that he was in at the age of sixteen. He was, after all, working on his doctorate, an advanced degree that took years of one's life to achieve. He knew that there was a big difference between a first year college student seeking his first degree and a doctoral student going for that advanced degree. But deep within his heart, he knew that he had stagnated in his life. How else would he still be doing the same thing fourteen years later?

Yeah, there were some differences, some important changes in his life since he had been that insecure sixteen-year-old. He had found his sentinel, his dissertation subject. And he had moved into Jim's home and his life, and he had found happiness there. And gradually he had come to realize that his years of work on his sentinel study were worth no more than the paper they were printed on. Because now he knew that he could never publish a paper on his sentinel.

Jim Ellison had become his friend, his brother, and now his safe haven in the midst of life's storms. There was no way he could ever put him in the spotlight by revealing his sentinel abilities. And there was no way he could publish a dissertation on his study of a sentinel without someone connecting it with Jim. No amount of anonymity would hold up under even the most superficial scrutiny of his life.

So here he was, a thirty-year-old grad student, a doctoral candidate, a teaching fellow and observer with the Cascade Police Major Crimes Division, stuck in this moment of time with no where to go. He was living a lie, letting everyone around him believe that he was working on his dissertation, that he was making progress toward a goal, that he was the same over achiever that he had always been, that he appeared to be.

And that same feeling of lack of control over anything in his life had taken hold again. He might have to teach his classes and pretend to work on his paper. He might have to go to work with Jim and act like he was there as an observer and not there just because he wanted to spend time with Jim and help him with his senses. He might have to keep going out at least once or twice a week pretending to go on dates so Jim wouldn't clue in to the fact that he had no interest in a social life anymore.

But he didn't have to eat or drink anything he didn't want to. And if he wanted to eat something so much that he thought about it all day long and maybe even dreamed about it at night, he didn't have to give in and eat it. Because he was in control and even though everything else in his life at the moment seemed to be out of his control, this little piece of his life was completely his.

So he got out of bed to face another day and he dressed in several layers because he was cold all the time and besides it made him feel more secure. He walked out into the kitchen and got himself a cup of coffee, feeling Jim's eyes on his every move.

He sat down at the table across from his roommate and sipped at his coffee being careful not to make eye contact. Jim ate his last bite of toast and drank his orange juice and then spoke.

He grabbed his jacket and followed Jim out the door, careful not to move too fast. He had noticed a bit of a lightheaded feeling lately if he moved too fast. Couldn't have that happening in front of Jim.

Blair whipped through the paperwork in his usual efficient manner. They ate lunch at Jim's desk, getting in on the office food run from the deli across the street. Jim got a roast beef sandwich and a bag of chips. Blair got a garden salad. Jim watched him as he threw away the salad dressing in the little tub that came with it and proceeded to pick the lettuce out of his salad and eat it with his hands. Jim remembered a few months ago when they had last ordered from the deli for lunch. Blair had gotten a garden salad and had poured every last drop of the house dressing on it and had even licked the inside of the tub clean saying how that deli had the absolute best house dressing and he wished they'd bottle it so he could buy it to use at home.

Jim mentally added this to the list of strange things he'd been noticing about Sandburg lately, but he didn't say anything about it. His roommate had been a little on the touchy side recently, and he didn't want to get him upset at the office. He didn't want to get him upset anywhere, but he was going to figure out what was up with him sooner or later. And it didn't seem like that information was going to come without a fight.

Jim ate his sandwich with his usual gusto, crunching chips in between bites. Blair glanced over as a chip crumb fell, bouncing off the desk and landing on the floor. Blair looked down at the tiny scrap of potato chip and thought about how good it would taste, how the salt and grease would mingle with the potato flavor, how satisfying the crunch would be and he wondered how he was going to get through dinner.

Joel Taggart sat at his desk across the room and watched Blair Sandburg. Joel had just finished spending the last six months of his life dropping fifty pounds of excess weight. He still had a few more pounds to lose, but he felt and looked a lot better than he had in years. Losing weight that quickly had not come without a price. He had become intimately familiar with the feeling of intense hunger that could make a person obsess over food. And when he looked at Blair munching his lettuce leaf while glancing surreptitiously at Jim's chips, he recognized that feeling in the police observer's expression. And it worried him.

As a former Bomb Squad Captain, Joel didn't consider himself to be a super great detective. He was still learning, following the examples set by the experienced detectives around him. But he was enough of a detective to have noticed the change in Sandburg's behavior during the last few months.

Major Crime's favorite and only observer had gotten quiet. He'd lost his usual penchant for non-stop conversation, for friendly banter among the detectives. He'd become distant, stopped paying attention to the people around him, only speaking when spoken to, never asking questions and giving short succinct answers to any asked of him.

He also realized that he hardly ever saw Sandburg eat anything anymore. When everyone else was getting donuts and muffins from the cart as Donna made her rounds each morning, Blair made himself scarce. When the detectives made a food run for lunch, Blair got a salad and picked at it for an hour before throwing most of it away. The other night when they had all gone to Simon's house for poker night and everyone else was snacking, Blair spent the whole night sipping from a bottle of spring water, never touching the food even though he had made his own ostrich chili for the event.

And there was something else, something that nagged at Joel but he couldn't quite put his finger on, something that made him think that Blair didn't look right, didn't look healthy. At first he had thought maybe he was imagining it, but for the last couple of days he had been paying extra close attention and today he had watched as the last clue had fallen into place. Now he was almost positive. He was almost positive that Blair Sandburg had an eating disorder.

They stopped at the grocery store on the way home so Blair could buy ricotta. Jim went in with him, thinking maybe he'd see something that would look good for dessert. Blair grabbed a hand-basket and they walked down the aisle where the dairy products were displayed. Jim grabbed a pint size carton of ready to drink chocolate milk while he stood back and watched Blair examine every container of ricotta cheese in the dairy case, finally deciding on a big tub of fat free. He didn't usually buy fat free. Jim was sure he usually bought the regular part-skim ricotta.

Blair nodded and they headed off to the cash registers. Jim stood behind Blair in line and watched him tap his foot and bounce from one leg to the other, occasionally swinging the basket between his hands. He seemed a lot more fidgety lately than he used to be. Jim added that to the list he was keeping in his head. It was getting to be a pretty long list. He thought maybe he should write it all down before confronting Blair with it.

Blair set their plates down on the table as Jim sat down. The lasagna looked great and the loft smelled like Italian heaven. Jim watched as his roommate pulled the pan of garlic bread out of the oven and plunked it down between their plates before taking a seat at the other side of the table.

Jim looked down at his plate of lasagna trying not to stare. He had realized today that he hadn't actually seen Blair eat anything more than lettuce in the last few weeks. He knew he had to be eating something sometime, but he wasn't eating much of anything in front of Jim.

The lasagna was good. Jim decided he would never have known the ricotta was fat free if he hadn't been at the store with Blair. The garlic bread was good too although not as wonderfully greasy as usual.

He glanced over at Blair and saw that he had eaten about half the lasagna on his plate and was taking another bite of garlic bread. Maybe he was wrong. Maybe he should cross that one clue off his list: the one that said Blair wasn't eating. Maybe it was just some weird kind of coincidence that Jim just hadn't been seeing him eat lately.

Jim enjoyed his dinner, relieved that his guide was eating with him. He began to think that the whole thing had been his imagination. Blair was fine, maybe a little quieter than he used to be but everyone went through different phases didn't they? Everyone had introspective periods in their lives where maybe they weren't quite as out-going as usual. It would blow over soon and be forgotten. Jim relaxed and had another slice of garlic bread.

Blair savored the bite of garlic bread, chewing it slowly. His taste buds seemed to be hypersensitive lately, and that made whatever he allowed himself to eat taste really good. Even the texture seemed heightened as if his tongue had developed some new sensitivity. Hey, he had a sentinel mouth. He suppressed a giggle as that thought occurred to him.

He set the bread down on his napkin and took another fork-full of lasagna. He was glad Jim hadn't insisted on him buying the regular ricotta. He had determined after giving it much thought this afternoon that he would allow himself to eat it if he used fat free ricotta.

Blair ate the last bite of his lasagna and set his fork down. He looked up and saw Jim watching him and plastered a smile on his face. Inside he was already feeling guilty. His stomach felt stuffed and uncomfortable, and he wished he had taken a smaller serving.

Jim smiled as he cleaned up and allowed himself to feel content. He had just shared a nice meal with his best friend and was getting ready to spend the evening watching a movie. He had been worrying for nothing. Blair was just fine.

Blair walked down to the video store at the end of the block, quickly picked out a movie and some popcorn, paid for it and walked out. Then he ran up the alley and back down, turning around at the end and running back. His stomach felt too full, and he felt like he had failed. He should have only eaten half the amount he had eaten. Now it was sitting like a lump in his stomach and he could feel himself getting fat. As he ran back and forth up and down the short alley he felt his stomach with his hand. It felt huge and bloated. He must look like he was pregnant or something. How could he have been such a pig?

This wasn't working. It wasn't getting any better, he realized. He stopped running and stood next to the dumpster where he was out of sight of anybody walking by on the sidewalk. He thought about how to make himself feel better, but he didn't know if he could do it. He hated throwing up almost as much as he hated feeling full like this.

He set the bag from the video store down and kneeled, pushing his fist into his stomach. He opened his mouth and with his other hand stuck his fingers down into the back of his mouth tickling his throat. He thought about the last thing that he'd seen that had made him feel sick, an autopsy he had been to. Dan Wolfe had been alternating between cutting into organs and taking sips of his soda, which had been sitting right on the autopsy table with the mangled body.

After a few minutes of heaving, he pulled out a handkerchief and wiped his face, leaving the soiled handkerchief on top of the undigested vomit. He stood up and took a deep breath. He felt much better. His stomach was back to that comforting empty feeling. He just hoped Jim wouldn't smell anything on him. Maybe he should go right in and take a shower. Yeah, that was probably a good idea.

He bent over to pick up the video store bag from the ground and his vision went black. Staying still for a few minutes allowed the lightheaded feeling to fade away. He straightened up and walked back toward home, smiling and swinging the bag as he walked.

It got easier after that. He didn't do it very often, only once in a while when he found himself in the position of having to eat a big meal. He still didn't like to throw up, but it was easier to do now than it used to be. He didn't even have to stick his fingers in his throat now. He could just lean over, put a little pressure on his stomach and think disgusting thoughts.

Which is exactly what he was doing now, having just returned from a big lunch with Jim and Simon. Maybe it wasn't the smartest thing to do, throwing up in the men's room right down the hall from Major Crimes. But he had to get rid of this terrible full feeling. Knowing he could get rid of it had made him feel like he had a license to be a pig and he had let himself eat way too much. Now he had no choice. He couldn't let all that food stay in there and make him puff up like some kind of out of control whale.

He closed the door on the stall he was in, leaned over the toilet using both fists to press into his full stomach and began expelling his lunch. He didn't hear the door open.

Blair opened the stall door and stepped out right into the immovable chest of Joel Taggart. The former Bomb Squad Captain was standing straight and stiff and looking at Blair sternly.

Joel stood as if to continue blocking him from the sink, then abruptly stepped back and waved him through. Blair washed his hands and used them to slurp some water into his mouth, which he spit back into the sink. He turned and grabbed a towel, drying his hands as he walked toward the door.

"Blair, either you go with me and talk or we can get Jim to come along with us and include him in the conversation." Joel crossed his arms, determination in his stance.

Joel brushed past him and stalked down the hallway toward the interrogation rooms. Blair reluctantly followed; glancing toward the bullpen as he passed, hoping Jim was occupied and wouldn't notice his absence.

Joel stopped pacing and stood facing Blair, standing very still with arms crossed. He stared at Blair waiting for the younger man to look at him, but Blair kept his eyes to the floor.

Blair looked up and smiled tenderly. "Joel, man, I know you think you know what you're talking about. I know you're only trying to help. But, please, you've got to believe me, you're wrong about this. What you think is happening here, is not. I'm just fine."

"All right, Blair. If that's the way you're going to play it. But please remember if you change your mind and decide you really do need help, you can come to me. I had a niece a few years ago who literally starved herself to death, and I can't just stand by and watch you do it too."

"Listen, Joel, I really appreciate you looking out for me. It means a lot to me that you care about me and want to help, but I honestly don't have a problem here and I don't need any help. Everything's fine, okay?"

He knew Joel was just trying to be a good friend. But it kind of bothered him that if anyone was going to notice him not eating and throwing up once in a while that it was Joel and not Jim. He lived with a sentinel. You would think if anyone were going to pay attention to him, it would be his own roommate, the guy with the heightened senses and the blessed protector instinct. Not that he wanted Jim to notice, but really it was kind of disappointing that he hadn't.

Jim stayed in his bed and listened as Blair paced around his room. His guide's voice mumbled something over and over again, but even with sentinel hearing, he couldn't make out what he was saying.

He dreamed he was standing on the shore, watching a boat drift away from him. On the deck of the boat stood Blair, arms stretched out reaching for his sentinel, mouth moving but no words coming out. As the boat drifted farther and farther away, his guide got thinner and thinner until finally he was a pencil with Blair's head and then he disappeared.

Jim woke up gasping for air, his chest feeling heavy and tears in his eyes. Right away he listened for Blair and was calmed by his roommates steady heartbeat and breathing in the room below him.

He looked at the clock. It was six in the morning, almost time to get up anyway. He pushed himself out of bed and headed for the shower to wash the sweat of his nightmare away.

Blair walked behind Jim into the house. There were several uniformed cops standing around by the doors guarding the crime scene while a forensics team gathered what evidence they could find.

The body was in the kitchen. Blair stood in the doorway watching as Jim went in and knelt beside the girl. She must have been only about sixteen or seventeen-years old, once a pretty blonde haired girl, and even now an innocence shown in her face. She was on her stomach, her incredibly thin frame clothed in sweat pants and a bulky sweatshirt, blood pooled under her and around her chest area, her hands tucked under her as if clutching her own heart. This was how her distraught mother had found her. Her body hadn't been moved yet. The cause of death was unknown but seemed obviously to be due to blood loss.

It was a penknife, the Girl Scout emblem on it barely visible beneath the blood that coated the handle and the blade. It lay on the floor in the pool of blood that had accumulated under the girl after she had apparently slit her wrists.

Jim nodded to Dan that he was done with the scene and they could go ahead and remove the body. Then he got up to find and interview the mother. An investigation would still need to be done even though it appeared to be a suicide. The autopsy would reveal something to either support or deny that impression. Meanwhile, he'd have to investigate it as a possible homicide.

Mrs. McClarey had a sad story to tell. She sat at the table in interrogation room three. Across from her sat Blair, and next to Blair sat Jim. Simon watched and listened from the observation booth.

"She's been going to the Cascade Memorial Eating Disorder's Clinic for a month now as an outpatient. Before that, she spent two weeks as an inpatient. I wish they had kept her in there. She wasn't ready to leave. She had them fooled though. They made her eat and she gained a few pounds just like they wanted her to. She conned them, made them think she was following the program, cooperating. But all the time she was planning this. I didn't expect her to kill herself. I thought she was getting better. They told me she was getting better"

Jim glanced at Blair, seeming to expect his sensitive caring partner to jump in. Blair knew he was usually the one who was best at comforting the bereaved relatives and at getting them to talk. Mrs. McClarey didn't seem to have any trouble talking. And he wasn't much in the mood to comfort anyone.

Blair glanced up and his eyes connected with hers. He tried to look away but she stared at him, looking down at his now bony fingers working to keep still on the table in front of him and then back up at his hollowed out cheeks and he knew she could tell. She could take one look at him and see in him what she had been looking at in her own daughter for the past year.

"I'd like to call my sister. I'm sure I can go stay with her for a while. She lives just a few blocks from here. I don't want to go back home. I don't know if I can ever go back there."

He glanced at the mirror across the room and hoped that no one was left in the observation room. Then he took a deep breath and looked back at her. He couldn't lie to her any more than he could keep lying to himself. He nodded.

He nodded and gave her a weak smile briefly cursing a world where a stranger could see right into the depth of your heart when to everyone who knew you it was invisible.

Again he glanced at the mirror and hoped no one was listening to them. He looked over as the door opened and Jim walked stiffly in carrying a telephone, which he plugged into the phone jack on the table and set in front of Mrs. McClarey.

Blair choked back the tears that tried to escape him and looked down at his hands. He took a deep breath and tried to prepare himself for the conversation he knew would be coming.

"I swear, Jim, I was just humoring her, letting her feel good. She thought she saw something in me that just isn't true but, man, she just lost her daughter. I couldn't argue with her."

Jim almost believed him. He wanted to believe him. He wanted to believe him because he didn't want to believe that Blair was having any kind of problem that could eventually lead him to take his own life like Donna McClarey had apparently done.

But the physical evidence was working against Blair's protests. Now that he was taking a critical look, Jim could see that his guide's face had lost its round fullness and his fingers were bony parodies of their former selves. As for the rest of his body, he wouldn't know since Blair had become especially adept at keeping it well hidden. Layers of t-shirts and flannels covered him, but his legs didn't really seem much thinner.

Blair cringed. There was no way he wanted to get on a scale. He had been weighing himself on the scale he had bought and kept in his office. He knew he had lost a fairly significant amount of weight in the past couple of months. He could hide it easily enough with his clothes, but the scale wouldn't lie.

"It's not a matter of trust and you know it. You have a problem and you need help. I want to help you, Chief. You know I only want to help you, and you don't want to let me. I think it's you who has a problem with trust."

"Chief, I really need to see how much you weigh. I know you've lost weight. I just want to see for myself if you're in any kind of danger here. Can't you let me see that? If I see for myself that it's not as bad as I think, then I can stop worrying, okay?"

Blair looked at the expression on his sentinel's face. It wasn't just worry. It looked more like fear. Jim was afraid. Suddenly he was feeling guilty for causing his sentinel to be afraid.

What kind of a guide was he when he couldn't even keep his own life in order? He was useless. Maybe he should just let Jim see for himself and realize that Blair just wasn't up to the job. Maybe then he should just help Jim find himself a new guide before it was too late, before Blair failed him.

But he didn't want Jim to find a new guide. He wanted to stay with Jim forever. That was the problem in the first place wasn't it? He wanted to stay with Jim forever, but he couldn't think of even one reason why Jim would allow him to once he found out that he was no longer writing a dissertation on sentinels.

The tears came and he couldn't stop them. They forced their way out of his eyes but he swallowed down the sobs that bubbled up from deep within. He turned away, trying not to let Jim see him cry.

Then Jim's arms were around him, holding him tight, so tight that he could almost feel the warmth of the sentinel's body even through the four layers he wore over his skin.

He hid his face in the front of Jim's shirt, trying desperately to stop the tears. Somewhere far away he could hear his partner's soothing voice, but he couldn't make out the words.

The scale in the locker room of the police gym stood up against the far wall in the corner to afford some privacy for those who wanted to check their weight. It was a heavy-duty doctor's scale, the old fashioned balancing kind that used actual weights. No new fangled digital scales for the men and women in blue of Cascade.

Blair stood reluctantly in front of it, wishing he could have had a chance to hide some weights somewhere on his body. But Jim had hustled him down here as soon as he had stopped crying. At least his sentinel had cleared everybody out of the room before leading Blair over to the scale.

Now Jim stood patiently waiting as Blair eyed the scale as if it were a serpent waiting to attack him. He looked at Jim and saw the determination in his eyes and he knew he wasn't getting out of this room without getting on this scale first. He took a deep breath and briefly wondered if air weighed anything while it was in your lungs. Then he stepped onto the scale and closed his eyes.

Jim looked at the tight expression of fear on his guide's face. He moved the one hundred pound weight over on the scale. Then he moved the fifty-pound weight over, immediately seeing that this was too much. He knew the weight listed on Blair's driver's license was one hundred fifty-five pounds. He quickly moved the weights around on the scale until it was balanced perfectly giving the true correct weight.

Blair opened his eyes and looked at Jim. His sentinel's eyes were full of unshed tears, his hands were shaking and he was looking at him as if Blair were standing there dying right in front of him.

The moments passed as Blair relaxed in the hold of his sentinel, feeling loved and cherished. It felt good and he knew if he could stay here in Jim's arms forever he'd be all right. Nothing could hurt him here.

"No, I'm fine. I just haven't been hungry that much lately. I just have a lot of things going on and I don't have time to eat. I'm fine. You see me eat. Didn't I go out with you and Simon the other day and eat a big meal?"

"Blair, you need help. They have people who know all about eating disorders, people who can help you deal with this, get your life back in order. I don't know how to help you. I don't understand it. Please, Chief, let me get you the help you need before it's too late. I need you. I need you to guide me and I need you to be my partner and my roommate. You're closer to me than anyone has ever been in my life. I can't stand to lose you, especially like this."

"I'm not going anywhere, Jim. You're not losing me. But if you really feel that way, why do you want to put me away in a hospital? I need to be home with you, not in some hospital with a bunch of strangers."

Jim looked carefully at Blair's face as if by examining it he could determine whether his guide was obfuscating or speaking the truth. Blair stood still for long moments waiting for Jim's verdict, knowing that if he tried to force him to go to the hospital he would have to leave and he didn't want to leave.

"Okay, Chief. I'll make a deal with you. We come back here every day together and you get weighed. If you lose any more weight, even an eighth of a pound, you go to the hospital. We find you someone to see, some professional who knows about eating disorders and you go by what they say. If they say you need to be in the hospital, you go and you don't argue."

"I'll agree to go see someone, but no hospital. I'm not crazy. I know how they treat people with this kind of problem. They come out worse off than when they went in. I'd be better off locking myself in my room."

Jim waited impatiently in the outer office, flipping through magazine after magazine, seeing only the scared look in his partner's face everywhere he looked. He felt guilty for making Blair come here. He felt stupid for feeling guilty. Blair needed help. Why was it so hard for him to make sure he got it? Why did he feel like such a bad guy when all he was trying to do was save Blair from himself?

He glanced around at the other people seated about the waiting room. A thin teenaged girl huddled in the corner chair, her face dipped behind a teen magazine, her feet tapping on the edge of her chair as she fervently turned pages. A woman sat in the seat beside her, a vacant stare occasionally interrupted by a glance at her watch. Jim pegged her as the girl's mother.

Strange to realize that the woman was only about his age and was mother to a teenaged girl. It made him think about how he would feel if he were here with his son today instead of his roommate. He wouldn't feel any different, he thought. In spite of not being old enough to be Blair's father, he had very familial feelings for his guide. Maybe he didn't want to be Blair's father, but he did care about him and worry about him and want to help him with any problems he faced in life: all things that he was sure the average father felt.

On the other side of the room sat a woman about Blair's age. She was average build, maybe just a tad on the plump side. Her hair was pulled up into a very tight secure bun, not a wisp out of place. Her clothing was all very neat and perfectly in order, even down to the clean white tennis shoes with the strings tied exactly in the middle with neat little bows. She sat with her legs crossed, serenely reading a romance novel. Her only movement other than turning pages was the short even breaths she took. Jim wondered what her problem might be. Maybe some kind of compulsive disorder, he thought. She seemed kind of obsessed with her appearance.

Jim tried to keep his ears from tuning into his guide's voice. That was the hardest thing about sitting here waiting. They were just behind that door, down the hall a few feet and in the office to the right. He had heard them walk there when they had called Blair back.

He had listened as the door was closed and the psychologist had asked Blair to take a seat. He had tried to stop listening, but had been unable to direct his hearing away when Blair had told her he'd had this problem before when he was sixteen and it wasn't as bad this time so he didn't really think he needed help because he was sure it would get better on its own just like it did fourteen years ago.

Then the ringing of the phone at the reception desk had distracted him and the guilt from listening in when he knew it was wrong had made him stop. It was almost impossible to sit here and not listen. He wondered if it'd be easier if he'd waited in the truck.

An hour had to have passed by now. He looked at his watch. Ten more minutes before his hour was up and Blair would come out. The door opened and Blair stepped out, smiling timidly at Jim.

"I've advised Blair that I feel he should be admitted to the Cascade Memorial Eating Disorder's Clinic but he assures me he will improve without that intervention. I can't force him to go in the hospital."

"Blair has agreed to work on gaining weight at the rate of at least two pounds a week for the next four weeks and a pound a week thereafter until he is back up to a more appropriate weight of one-hundred-fifty pounds."

Dr. Morris nodded. "I want you both to understand that I am reluctant to agree to this. It is my opinion that Blair needs to be hospitalized. He has lost a significant amount of weight. He shows signs of dehydration and loss of muscle tone. He is prone to loss of consciousness due to low blood sugar or complications from an irregular heartbeat or even stroke. Starvation involves quite a high degree of risk of damage to major organs."

Jim stared at Blair fidgeting in his chair. He tried not to let the anger he was feeling show on his face. It was hard not to be angry when it seemed that his guide was purposely destroying his own health like this. He had to keep reminding himself that this was a disorder, that Blair was not doing this on purpose, that it was not a conscious effort.

"I'm going to give you a list of books on anorexia and bulimia. I want you to do some reading, Jim. It will help you understand what Blair is going through, how he might be feeling. I want to see him every other day for a few weeks until I see some improvement. He swears to me that he has not been making himself vomit. I hope that is the case because bulimia carries with it a whole additional set of risks. I'm giving him a meal guideline and, Jim; I want you to make sure he follows it. Right now he needs a watchdog and since you're his roommate you're going to be it. Later, once he's improved substantially I'll be more willing to trust him to take care of himself. Do you both understand and agree to everything we've talked about here?"

"One week from today he'll come in here and get on my scale. If, at that time, he has not gained two pounds, I will call over and have the paperwork done within the hour and you will drive him directly over there. You can always take him some clothing and personal items after he's admitted."

He thought it would be easy. He really did. Sitting at the doctor's office, he had felt better already. They had talked about his stress and why he thought he had a problem. He couldn't tell her about the sentinel thing, of course, so he just told her that his dissertation wasn't working out the way he'd expected and he wasn't making much progress and he felt like everyone expected too much of him. She had seemed very understanding, in spite of her insistence that he couldn't handle this alone and he'd be better off going in the hospital.

Jim was watching everything he ate, making sure he stayed within the guidelines Dr. Morris had given him. It seemed like an awful lot of food and it made him feel bloated and sad. But he ate it because Jim was watching. And he smiled and pretended he was doing fine with it. Whenever he got the chance he threw it back up. But Jim didn't let him get the chance very often.

Jim also didn't let him walk it off or run up and down the stairs like he'd been doing. The doctor had called him Blair's watchdog and Jim was obviously trying to live up to that name. Blair was beginning to feel like he couldn't take a breath without Jim noticing.

He had been back to see Dr. Morris a second time. Jim had waited in the truck, saying he was more comfortable out there, that Blair would feel like he had more privacy that way. Jim would come in with him on the weigh-in day. Of course, he wanted to be there for that so that he could cart Blair right off to the hospital. Well, that wasn't going to happen. He didn't care if he didn't gain all that weight, he wasn't going to the hospital. Two pounds a week was too much to try to gain anyway. What right did she have to try to make him gain weight that fast?

Dr. Morris had asked him what had happened when he was sixteen. He told her he had lost about thirty pounds but then he had gotten better and hadn't had any problem since then. He couldn't remember anything happening to change things. He thought he had just gotten up one morning and felt like eating a little more than usual and before he knew it he was back to his usual weight.

She had him describe his freshman year at college. He didn't see how that could relate to his problem now but he humored her. He remembered that he had passed out a couple of times toward the end of the school year. Once they had sent him off to the hospital in an ambulance while he was still unconscious. The doctor there had yelled at him for not taking care of himself, saying his blood sugar was low. They had made him stay until the glucose IV was absorbed and then cut him loose.

After that he remembered the semester ending and his mother showing up with a new uncle for him to meet and they had all gone off together for a summer at the beach in Santa Monica. Uncle Freddie had a beach house. He was a weight lifting Karate instructor and ran a class out of a small gym in his converted garage. Blair had toughened up under Freddie's watchful eye, learning some Karate, lifting weights, swimming, and eating all the best summertime fruits and seafood.

Now he remembered: they had kept him so busy all summer long he hadn't had a chance to worry about anything. He'd just enjoyed the long hot summer playing in the surf and relaxing. When he'd gone back to school with a new build and a new tan, it seemed his problems had all disappeared. Getting assigned a new dorm roommate who wasn't the most popular party guy in school helped a bit, too.

Dr. Morris asked him why he thought he'd gone along fine all this time and just recently begun to have problems again but he didn't know, couldn't think of anything that was different now. She told him to think about it and they could talk about it some more next time.

He didn't think he could talk about it. He couldn't tell her anything about Jim being a sentinel so he couldn't tell her about his decision not to submit the dissertation that he had finished writing three months ago. He couldn't tell her that his greatest fear was that someone would find out he wasn't going to get his doctorate and Jim would send him away.

Joel Taggart glanced up from his desk as Blair hustled out the door. He looked over toward Jim's desk to see that Jim wasn't there. He scanned the room and saw that Jim was in the office with Simon. So, where was Blair scooting off to while his partner was occupied?

They only went one floor down. Joel looked through the tiny window in the door and watched Blair go into the men's room before he walked out into the hall. This floor housed the records department, staffed mostly with women. The men's room would be relatively unoccupied most of the time.

"What do you mean, how you heard it? Jim told you. He told you what she said? He told you about the agreement?" Anger made his face red and his hands curl into fists. He turned to storm through the door.

"Wait, Blair, wait! He didn't tell me any of that, only that she wanted to put you in the hospital." Joel followed after the charging bull, cursing himself for having said anything. He only wanted to help. He only wanted Blair to be all right, to be back to his normal self.

Fury pushed Blair through the bullpen and right into Simon's office where Jim and Simon were talking supposedly about the Robbins case, but now Blair wondered how much of their talk was about him. Apparently Jim thought it was just fine to talk to the guys about his problem, like it was any of their business.

Blair felt hot. His vision blurred and dimmed and he suddenly felt like he couldn't breathe. The anger that had seemed to encompass him only a moment before faded away and was replaced with a feeling of fear as his lungs forgot how to take a breath and his heart began to beat it's way out of his chest. He took a step toward his sentinel, reaching his hands out.

"He was upset. I made the mistake of letting him know you had told me the doctor wanted to put him in the hospital. He was mad. I guess he didn't think you should have told me. I'm sorry, Jim."

Jim shook his head. "Not your fault, Joel. Nothing any of us do around Blair seems to be the right thing these days. It's nobody's fault. He just has some problems he needs to work out."

Blair heard a siren somewhere close by. It hurt his ears. He tried to roll over to get away from it but gentle hands pushed him down to rest on his back. He groaned and opened his eyes. A stranger leaned over him, smiling.

He thought back to the last thing he remembered. He had been standing in Simon's office, yelling at Jim. He had been so mad. But then everything had started going black.

There was an IV stuck in his arm and he wondered how many calories were flowing into his veins right now. He read the bag. No, it was just saline. That should be all right.

He hoped they wouldn't try to run a whole bunch of tests on him. He'd sign himself out if he had to. They couldn't make him stay. After all, he had an agreement with Dr. Morris. Jim better not expect this to change anything. He didn't have to get weighed for another three days. And he didn't have to go into the hospital unless he got weighed and didn't gain the damn two pounds. There was nothing in the agreement about passing out.

Spotting the truck in the parking lot, Blair charged off toward it, ignoring Jim. He wanted to get home, the sooner the better. He wanted to get as far away from Cascade Memorial as possible. He used his key to unlock the door and settled himself in the passenger side of Jim's truck, watching as Jim stormed around to the driver's side and got in.

"How can you say that? You passed out because your electrolyte balance was all screwed up and it was all screwed up because you've been making yourself throw up. You told Dr. Morris that you weren't doing that. You lied."

"I'm eating way too much and it makes me feel sick. I don't make myself throw up but when I eat too much it just happens. I don't know how she expects me to gain two pounds a week anyway. That's too much!"

"I'm not going there! And if you think this little trip to the emergency room changes anything, you'd better think again. There was nothing in our agreement about passing out and I don't get weighed for three days so you might as well just shut up about this whole hospital thing right now."

Blair laughed and shook his head. "No way, Jim. She doesn't need this. I didn't need her around before and I don't need her around now. It would only make her upset if you call her."

"You're right. I'm sorry. It was only the first few minutes that one time. I tried not to listen, but sometimes it's hard to concentrate on keeping my hearing dialed down."

"It's okay, man. I know you didn't mean to. But I really don't want to talk to you about my past. I just wish you could let this go and stop worrying about it. I'll be fine. Some things just work themselves out better if you leave them alone."

The weigh in day had arrived, and Jim waited in the outer office, trying not to listen. He was sure Blair hadn't gained the required two pounds. He was sure Dr. Morris was going to be coming out to get him any minute to tell him to take Blair over to the hospital. He was so sure of it, he didn't bother picking up a magazine to try to pass the time. He didn't think there would be any time to pass. But as the minutes passed he realized they were having their regular session.

How could Blair have possibly gained two pounds? He had been eating more but he had also begun throwing up at least once each day. Jim tried to stop him but he couldn't be with him every moment of the day and whenever Blair got a chance, he was sneaking off to throw up. He denied it, of course, but Jim knew he was doing it.

He had called Dr. Morris to let her know about the emergency room visit. She had agreed that Blair really should be in the hospital but she also said that he wouldn't get well by force, that he had to be motivated to do it himself.

Jim wished that a person with anorexia or bulimia could be declared mentally incompetent so they could be forced to go into the hospital. How could somebody who would starve himself to the point of dying be mentally competent?

He almost wished Blair was a teenager and he was his roommate's father. Then he'd be able to make him go to the hospital. Then he'd have the ultimate word on Blair's treatment and he'd make sure he was at least kept alive long enough to get over this.

He extended his hearing just for a few moments and listened to Blair speaking. He was telling the doctor about his work at the police department, about his observer status and his dissertation on closed societies within the paramilitary structure of a modern city police department. He almost sounded like his old self, full of excitement and confidence. Then he told her he didn't know if he'd be able to finish it and he couldn't remember why he even wanted to.

Blair closed his bedroom door and sat down on the bed, a sigh of relief escaping him. He listened as Jim started his shower before he lifted his right pants leg and pulled off the two-pound weight that he'd worn velcroed to his ankle all day.

He was surprised Dr. Morris hadn't seemed suspicious when he'd turned up with a three-pound weight gain. He had surprised himself. At least he wasn't on his way to the hospital right now.

Next week he'd have to wear a two-pound weight on each ankle. But he wondered if that would be enough. He actually had gained a pound according to the doctor's scale. It must have been those breakfasts Jim had made him eat all week, and the dinners too. The only meals he'd been able to get rid of completely had been some of the lunches. Jim had stuck with him like glue after breakfast everyday and after dinner he had guarded the bathroom like it was his personal throne room. There was no way Blair could have thrown up in there with Jim listening right by the door like that.

He hid the weight under his bed and walked out to the kitchen, putting water on for tea. The warm drink would fill him up and had virtually no food value. That extra pound was bothering him. He knew it was for his own good and he should feel fine but it made him nervous. All week he had felt his control over his own life slipping away from him and now he had the evidence to prove it.

The kettle whistled just as the bathroom door opened to emit a steamy towel wrapped Jim. Blair turned off the burner and poured hot water into his cup. He was having cinnamon tea. It smelled like a cookie shop and he enjoyed the aroma.

Blair got another cup out and fixed Jim some tea, putting cream and sugar in it. He looked at the tiny sugar crystals as they spilled from the spoon to melt into the hot tea. He'd have liked to have sugar in his own tea but all those calories added up fast and right now he just didn't feel like he could allow it.

The following week seemed to go by quickly. Blair spent a bit more time away from Jim, staying at school late several evenings and going in very early a few times. Jim couldn't be with him for every meal, not even as many meals as he had been with him the week before. But Jim wasn't worried since Blair had gained his mandatory two pounds the week before and seemed to be in a better more positive mood.

The night before the weekly weigh-in Jim got tied up at work on a murder case. When Blair seemed so tired that Jim was afraid he was going to fall asleep standing up, he walked him in to the break room and suggested he take a nap on the couch. Blair didn't argue with him. He must have been really tired.

Jim still wasn't quite finished up the next morning when it came time for Blair's appointment with Dr. Morris. He let his roommate sleep until there was just enough time to go directly to her office if they wanted to make it there on time. He woke Blair and told him it was time to go.

He didn't have his weights with him and he knew he wasn't going to show a weight gain, not two pounds, not even two ounces. In fact, he was bound to show a weight loss since the three pounds he'd gotten credit for last week were gone now, one an actual lost pound and two, the two pound weight now hidden under his bed.

He had made a promise. He had agreed, but that was just to get out of going to the hospital right away. That was just to buy him some time, to put it off until he could figure out some way to get out of it entirely. What was he going to do now?

Blair wanted to turn around and run away. He looked back at Jim as he stepped through the door to follow her back. His sentinel was taking a seat and smiled at him just before the door closed between them.

"Blair, you know it doesn't work like that. We have an agreement. You can't go back on that agreement. Now come over here and get on the scale. You know what you have to do."

He stood there looking at the numbers on the scale and trying to figure a way out of this. He didn't want to go to the hospital but he had promised. He didn't want to lose Jim and he knew if he backed out of the agreement now he'd have to leave. Jim would be disappointed with him. Jim didn't like people who didn't keep their word.

There was a bulletin board by the doorway. It was littered with photographs of happy looking people, mostly teenagers, mostly girls. He knew these were the success stories. He knew their pictures were supposed to make you feel hopeful. He wondered if there'd ever be a picture of Blair up there.

They let him walk back with Blair to his room. They were double rooms but he was the only male in here right now so he was alone. They gave him a hospital gown to put on and left him to change. Jim stayed with him.

He folded each shirt as Blair removed it. Watching Blair take his clothes off reminded him of those little wooden nesting dolls that got smaller and smaller as you peeled off each layer until you got to the tiny one in the center. A sweatshirt, two flannel shirts, and two t-shirts later, Jim saw the emaciated chest of his guide.

His ribs were jutting out, each individually outlined with a thin layer of skin and a sunken hollow in between. His stomach was a concave disappearing at the waist inside a triple layer of long johns and sweatpants under jeans. No wonder his legs hadn't looked thinner.

Jim folded the rest of the clothing and stacked them all on the table on the other side of the room. Then he sat down on the bed next to his guide, cringing at the sight of the desperately skinny legs hanging over the side. There hardly seemed to be any muscle left. The term skin and bones was an all too accurate description.

Jim wondered how Blair had been managing to keep walking around and getting through each day. He didn't look like he should even be able to move. In all honesty, he looked like some kind of walking corpse and that thought made Jim want to grab hold of him and never let go.

"Don't worry, Jim. I'll be okay. You just be careful while I'm in here. Don't go out alone. Take Simon or Joel with you. Try not to zone. I won't be there to bring you out and I don't know if Simon can do it. We need to do some tests and train him."

"We'll be taking you down the hall to get weighed, then check your blood pressure and someone will be coming in to take blood for some tests. Lunch will be brought in at noon. If you choose to eat it and keep it down, you'll get afternoon privileges, which include going out to the family room where you can watch TV or socialize with the other patients. Tomorrow we'll be starting your counseling sessions. You'll have individual and group sessions and an art therapy class and in the evenings we have family counseling."

"We'll give you the rest of today to get used to the rules. Tomorrow they go fully into effect. If you can't eat your meals, you lose privileges and you drink a meal replacement. If you don't keep it down and this continues over several days or if at any time it becomes apparent that you are in danger, we'll insert a feeding tube and confine you to bed. This might seem harsh to you now, but we won't do it unless it's warranted. We don't allow people to kill themselves here. We're here to help you get better as quickly as possible so you can get back to your life outside the hospital. This is not a long-term facility. This is more like a crisis management setup. We save your life and then we do our best to see that you don't end up back in here. Now, I know I've thrown a lot at you in just a few minutes. Are there any questions?"

"Well, that depends somewhat on you. If you cooperate and work with us you will certainly spend less time here than if you fight your treatment every step of the way. Most of our patients spend two to three weeks as in-patients followed by another two to three weeks as day patients, then a bi-weekly visit for a few weeks after that. If during any of that time any regression occurs, we bring you back in as an inpatient until you're ready to try again. We have a ninety percent success rate that we're quite proud of so don't expect us to give up on you."

Jim felt a lot better after hearing the doctor explain the procedure here. It sounded like they knew what they were doing and he knew that with eating disorders a ninety percent success rate was nothing short of miraculous. In the books that Dr. Morris had recommended, he had read that overall the success rate in dealing with eating disorders was much lower than that, more like sixty or seventy percent.

The doctor stood up and looked at Jim. "Now, I'll give you a few minutes to say goodbye and then I'll be back to take you down to get weighed. Visiting hours are 7:30 to 9pm so you can come back to see him tonight. As far as tomorrow, we suggest you call in and check before coming in since he'll only be allowed visitors each evening if he eats all of the food served to him and cooperates with each of his counseling sessions. That can be tough for the first few days so don't be upset if you miss a few visits."

Jim nodded. It sounded like they were strict with the patients. Maybe that was what was needed: someone to take a strong position of authority and force them to cooperate. He hoped they'd be able to get Blair back to his old self. That wasn't too much to ask was it?

Jim nodded and walked out without looking back. It wasn't easy to leave Blair there. It wasn't easy at all. But then, some of the most necessary things you had to do in life were not easy.

Jim found Blair curled into a ball on his bed, his pillow wet with tears, his blanket pulled up to cover all but his face. His eyes were open and staring vacantly at nothing, tears still slipping unnoticed down his face. Jim felt his heart withering in his chest. Maybe this wasn't such a good idea. He'd only been here half a day and he looked ten times worse than he had this morning, just this morning when Jim had thought Blair was getting better.

He emptied his arms of Blair's backpack and overnight bag which he had packed only an hour before with everything he thought his partner might need for a two or three week hospital stay. He'd even remembered to pack all of Blair's hair care supplies. He had thought Blair would be pleased when he arrived, grateful to have his stuff from home, happy to see Jim. He hadn't pictured walking in to find his guide looking so totally devastated.

"They forced me to eat too much and it was meatloaf and it was all greasy and mashed potatoes with gobs of gravy all over them and green beans that were so mushy they were almost like baby food, but it was the grease in the meatloaf that messed up my stomach and I threw up. I couldn't help it. I didn't do it on purpose. But they got mad with me and they made me eat another whole plate of food and they said if I threw up again they'd just keep making me eat all over again and they sat in here with me and wouldn't even let me go to the bathroom and now my stomach hurts really bad."

"I'm sorry you feel so bad right now, Chief. But I think you need to give them a chance. I think you need to go with what they say for a few days and see how you feel then."