"...Right. Uh, Vanya? Can you - tell me how you're feeling and what bothers you?" 

The kid picks at the sleeve of his shirt. "I spend most of my time wishing I were dead and it makes it hard to focus on classes." 

What are you even supposed to SAY to that aaaaaaaah. 

"I'm really sorry?" 

This really seems more like a Lan Xichen problem than a Wen Qing problem but she will do her best.

"Have you tried planning a pleasant thing for every day and getting enough sleep and eating enough and avoiding building too much mana?"

Vanya gives her the tired and dubious look of someone who keeps getting TOLD to do this by EVERYONE and really cannot see the point and is sick of it. 

"We - try to help him with that," Larisa says quietly. "This week is especially rough because, um..." 

"They don't let me have anything I could use to kill myself in my room," Vanya says dully. "- I don't need anything sharp to fight off mals, and I don't have songs to..." He trails off. 

"But, um, some freshman from Toronto decided to kill herself by walking into the void last night. Which apparently - works. And we....can't take that away." 

"I'm not going to!" Vanya protests. "...I mean I - it's - I know I shouldn't. I know you need me. It's just -" 

This is agonizingly awkward aaaaaaaaaaaah also she had no idea the void was dangerous and maybe she should stop hanging out half in it when she's alone and wants less of her body to be exposed to possible death monsters. 

But mostly aaaaaaaaaaaaah. She is so not qualified to help this kid! Why couldn't they have gotten someone else who had any idea what to say or do! 

"Do you have an idea about the brain medicine?" Wen Qing asks Marian. "Does the bad parent medicine work only for bad parents?"

"- We were coming to ask about that! I - we met this freshman girl earlier, Ribo, do you know her? She knew some sort of diagnostic spell and she had some advice. I - damn it, I know I wrote it down somewhere -" 

The girl starts sorting through pockets. 

"The...bad parent medicine?" Vanya says, with a flicker of actual curiosity. 

Wow. Somehow Marian hadn't thought at all about how awkward it would be if - when - Wen Qing inevitably described it that way out loud to a native English speaker. (Presumably native? Both of the kids have a faint accent but she can't quite place it.) 

"Uh, the other day I was explaining antidepressants to Wen Qing," she says dully. 

"They are good medicine which helps when you are sad for the wrong reasons and you can't afford to have Lan Xichen casting the calm-down spells all the time. The calm-down spells are what we do in Shanghai, it's too expensive if you don't have someone with an affinity but perhaps you could spring for one to get him to eat and so on."

"I do eat!" Vanya grumbles, with what sounds like considerable pent-up resentment.

"Does that...come up a lot, in the Shanghai enclave?" 

Marian was thinking the SAME THING. 

She is also thinking that apparently a kid committed suicide last night???? And she totally missed it and had no idea???? She is managing to mess up this job so badly and she's so worried about this entire school full of kids and what is she supposed to do. 

"We have many parents that are not good and then their children hit tables with purple electricity whips instead of talking about their problems. --Not Nie Huaisang, the crying boy at orientation, though," she clarifies. "His parents are fine. He's just like that." 

Larisa's expression is that of someone who is definitely not laughing at this but is having to put some effort into that. 

"- And, oh, right. The girl who did the diagnostic spell said - fluoxetine? And that then he could try adding lamotrigine which does things about moods?" 

"Oh, right. Wen Qing, I think we talked about the SSRI drug class before. Fluoxetine is one of those. The diagnostic spell thought that one specifically was best? I guess I'll see if the void is in a good mood today." 

"Should I sing it a song," Vanya said tonelessly. 

"No, no, it's– wait, what?"

"Um, at the start of freshman year he composed a very cute little song that's all flattery to the void. And - yeah, it does seem to make it a little bit better-behaved."