Precautions of a Snakepit - Chapter 16

“Dr. Hudson?”

“Yeah, he was very knowledgeable about medicine and knew a drug or anything when he first saw it. You would think he was a doctor, not a patient. I think he was called Dr. Hudson because he called himself Dr. Hudson.”

“Wow, that’s surprising.”

Now that they thought about it, there was something… suspicious about his hospitalization. The junior nurse was curious, so the senior explained.

“A five-year senior’s senior… Let’s call him Daesangbae for convenience. He often talks to Dr. Hudson and he’s heard some strange things.”

“What do you mean?”

“He said that he was actually a doctor in this hospital, and Dr. Madison was a mental patient here. One day he woke up and it was said he was the patient and Dr. Madison was pretending to be a doctor.”

“What?”

The junior nurse’s eyes widened, but he soon burst out laughing.

“I’ve heard a lot of crazy things in my time here, but that’s wild.”

“… Right? It must be some bullshit, right?”

“Of course it is. Do you really believe it?”

The junior’s teasing made the senior furious.

“Wouldn’t you believe it? You suddenly want to be a doctor, so I’m telling you there is a way to do it.”

“You want me to be like Old Man Gugu? Oh, come on.”

Looking at the giggling junior, the senior scratched the back of his head.

“Yeah. That is ridiculous. Patients becoming doctors, common sense dictates that it can’t happen. By why, I wonder, does Dr. Madison’s eyes sometimes look like some patients?”

After years of working in psychiatric hospitals, he learned that there are some patients who are normal and others who aren’t. There are also normal people who could be mistaken for patients, but he never met a patient who could be mistaken for someone normal.

It was hard to explain what ‘feeling like a patient’ is. It was something one would understand after working in a psychiatric facility. They can tell just by looking at them. In a way, it’s like a detective recognizing a criminal. It’s not a judgment based on empirical data, so it isn’t a hundred percent accurate.

Dr. Madison was a boss who was a little on the cheap end, but not particularly problematic. The senior’s instincts were probably wrong, but the way Dr. Madison’s eyes turned to the monitor a moment ago and felt like they resembled a patient more than a normal person. 

The old guard came to that conclusion.

***

The ward runs facility-wide programs twice a day: once in the morning and once in the afternoon. Participation is not mandatory, but since there is nothing else to do, patients almost always participate. The morning program consists mainly of physical tasks, while the afternoon program consists of mental activities.

Today’s afternoon program is conversation. In pairs of two, patients have to paint a portrait of each other, but the pairs aren’t freely chosen. They are randomly assigned by the nurses. Won exchanged awkward greetings with a woman she estimated to be in her 40s and began to paint. The nature of the task forced them to stare at each other’s faces.

“I know you.”

The woman whispered in a low voice.

“You’re not a real patient, are you?”

Won stopped drawing for a moment.

She continued as if nothing had happened, but inside, she was not calm. She realized she told Ju-hee that she was forced to be hospitalized, and this could be a conversation about that.

“You must have infiltrated this place for a special purpose.”

Her optimistic hypothesis was quickly thrown out by what happened next. Won stopped drawing again and looked at the woman. She managed to keep a straight face, but her mind was racing.

‘Where would she have gotten a hint like that?’

If she knew, there was no way the staff, who were watching Won all day and night, hadn’t noticed.

‘Did I make a crucial mistake that I’m not aware of?’

No matter how much she thought about it, she couldn’t find anything. She was always conscious of the CCTVs in the ward…

Won was nervously reviewing her actions.

“Don’t worry, I won’t tell anyone. No one believes me anyway, so who would believe a patient’s word?”

The woman glared at her and Won didn’t know what to say. She didn’t want to admit to anything, but also didn’t want to be unprepared and deny it.

She remembered the story of Dr. Rosenhan.

When he was admitted to the psychiatric facility posing as a patient, no one on the medical staff realized he was a fake, but the patients knew he was normal.

One patient came up to him and said, “You’re not crazy. You must be a journalist or a professor,” and another said, “I know you’re investigating this hospital.”

Dr. Rosenhan was not alone in his experience; fake patients admitted to other psychiatric hospitals that collaborated with his research had similar experiences.

For some reason, the mentally ill were better able to recognize normal people than the doctors.

As if drawn to something, Won asked the woman.

“Who else, in your opinion, is not a real patient?”

“Uhhh… First of all, there’s a young man named Jin who has only been here for a little while and looks like a rich kid. There’s a cranky, but handsome young man named Gyeom. Also….”

Instead of answering, the woman suddenly went blank. After a long pause, Won called out to her.

“Excuse me?”

“You’re a pretty young lady. Are you a celebrity?”

Caught off guard by the question, Won didn’t know what to answer. The woman covered her mouth with her hands and began to whimper.

“Oh my God, oh my God! I’ve never seen a celebrity in real life! I want an autograph, can you do that?”

The nurses heard the commotion and came over to grab her.

“Oh no, she’s doing this again.”

“Ms. Yang, go to your room.”

The woman, called Ms. Yang, was grabbed by both arms by the nurses and dragged out of the room. Unable to comprehend the situation, nearby patients explained to Won.

“Ms. Yang has Alzheimer’s.”

“If she says something strange, don’t pay attention or take it to heart, because she fictionalizes everything.”

“That’s right, last time she said I was an evil spirit!”

“You’re lucky that you got a demon. Apparently, I’m a bug.”

“You people. At least you’re a humanoid, she called me a bald eagle! It’s a shame that I have no hair.”

Won blinked. The more she listened to them, the less credible her conversation with Ms. Yang seemed. An evil spirit, a bug, and a bald eagle. It was quite a lineup.

‘Was what she said earlier just a fluke?’

A nurse approached her as she groaned.

“I’m afraid we don’t have anyone to match with you.”

“Oh, well, I’ll just go back to my room…”

Just as I was about to leave, someone opened the door and walked in. It was Top Dog.

The nurse waved him over like it was a good thing.

“Mr. Rock, please come this way.”

“Why?”

“We’re having you paint each other’s portraits and she doesn’t have a partner.”

Top Dog’s gaze shifted to Won.

‘Just say no and leave. You don’t look like you’re cut out for it.’

Won tried to convey her thoughts through a glare, but Top Dog lifted one corner of his mouth in a pout and approached like a beast on two legs.

“You want her to draw my face and want me to draw hers?”

“That’s right.”

“Okay.”

Top Dog plopped down on the seat where Ms. Yang had been a moment ago. Won wondered what kind of situation this was: Top Dog and her sitting across from each other, drawing their faces in a friendly manner.

“You have to look at me, pretty girl.”

“Don’t call me that.”

It’s not the end of the 18th century, it’s the 21st century. Hearing “pretty girl” as a compliment gave Won the creeps. Of course, there must be people in the world who like it, but she wasn’t one of them.

It’s like the kind of name that prisoners would use for a skinny newcomer to the prison, whistling and giggling as a group, saying, “There’s a pretty girl in here!” Or “Hey, pretty girl, be this guy’s girlfriend!” She didn’t like to be harassed, but he was intrigued by her attitude.

“Why would a pretty girl hate to be called a ‘pretty girl?’ Was my pretty girl born pretty, lived pretty all her life, and told she was pretty so many times that she got tired of being called pretty?”

Won was dazed by what Top Dog had sneeringly poured out.

‘How many times did he just say “pretty?”’

Won hated it so much that she felt like she was breaking out in hives. She hadn’t realized that when you tell someone not to do something, some will do it even more. It was like throwing rice cakes to a bullfrog to eat.

From now on, Won decided to be consistent with her non-reaction. For this type of person, being disliked only motivates them.

“Why aren’t you responding, pretty girl? Have you decided to ignore me now? I come when you say you need me, you say ‘oppa’ to me, and then throw me away when I’m no longer useful?”

“I don’t pick up anything and eat it. If it isn’t to my taste, I don’t put it in my mouth.”

“If you try it, it might be surprisingly delicious.”

Top Dog was neither angry nor concerned by the blunt rebuke. There was confidence in the way he took it in stride.

“Maybe it’s just your kind of thing, sweetheart. Once you try it, you’ll wonder why you didn’t try something so delicious before. You might get addicted and want it every day.”

i’m addicted to you top dog sir and everyone who donated to my Kofi agrees