My mother decided that Sammy needed to be seen by a psychologist for his abnormal behavior, burst of random violence, lack of speech entirely, and overall strange appearance. When this was mentioned to Sammy his reaction wasn't far from off. He just stared, but it wasn't the normal blank stare he had possessed over the past few weeks. It was a wicked stare. The corner of his mouth turned upward into a smirk. It was the most expression I've seen from him in a long time and even though my mother wants him to get better, I'd rather him be expressionless than make that face again.

It was a very quiet, long drive there. I didn't feel comfortable with Sammy in the back seat. My mom is driving and I'm in the passenger seat and it felt like we were being held up at gun point by a stranger in the back. Any move and the trigger will be pulled, killing us both. The trigger remained unfired. Even though it felt like it had already been shot.

When we arrived, in big bold letters at the top of the building, it read "Oakwood Counseling Center". The building was very large with glass windows surrounding it and tall pillars. Many trees were near by, filling the silence with the sound of bird chirping. They seemed to smack this building into the perfect setting, too bad this setting wasn't beautiful enough to cover all the ugly that our thoughts possessed.

When we walked inside we were sent to an elevator to the 10th floor, third office to our right. A women with light brown hair, tan skin, and very calming brown eyes smiled at us. Her name tag said Caroline.

"Hello Mrs. Johnson, nice to finally meet you" she said, shaking my mother's hand.

"Nice to meet you too and you can call me Helen" she responded, not obvious to her but obvious to me that she didn't want to be called Mrs. Johnson.

Caroline leaned over and smiled at me.

"You must be Matthew, right?" she asked me.

"Yes and this.." I started, "Is my brother -"

"Hi, I'm Sammy!" Sammy exclaimed happily to Caroline, smiling from ear to ear like a fool.

I had to blink twice because I couldn't believe what I was seeing. I had a whiplash and the force of it made my neck spring with pain. He hasn't spoken in weeks.

My mother stared in disbelief. Her eyes widened and her mouth appeared to slightly fall open. Caroline seemed kind of taken back by it too, making a confused face, like she's been told misinformation. Tears started to form in her mother's eyes as she stared at Caroline and whispered,

"He hasn't spoken in weeks, I don't know what's going on. I thought I'd never hear his voice again"

Caroline cleared her throat and said,

"Hello Sammy, why don't we all take a seat inside?"

My mother nodded and Sammy and I followed behind. She offers us to take a seat on large couches that seemed fit for a living room in a family's house rather than a small room like this. We all sat.

Caroline sat down in a lounge chair across from us. She asked,

"So Sammy, how are you feeling?" she asked, smiling politely.

"I'm feeling good" he answered. He looked at me and smiled like everything was okay. I looked at him and realized that he didn't look very pale anymore. His appearance has altered but now in a different way. He appeared to be a normal nine
year old boy. He would look fine to strangers out side but I knew he was playing a game, a game that I did not want to play.