Wonderland
Mad Love
My breath was completely taken away when I saw Irene enter my office. I thought Taeyeon was the most non-criminal looking alike ever but I was deadly wrong. Irene was. Probably for the reason she was shorter and younger than Taeyeon was. Her long blond hair gave her the appearance of an uplifting California girl I used to see back in my hometown.
She was wearing a gray uniform and I could tell she was under Regular Penitentiary. The Asylum dresses the inmates according to their units for safety reasons; orange for Intensive Care residents; gray for Regular Penitentiary's. The treatment from officers to those inmates were even different. They were much more inclined to be tougher against Intensive Care inmates than regular ones. Yuri even told me that sometimes some Regular inmates could roam around the garden without any supervision.
As Irene was under Regular Penitentiary, she was supposed to be easier to handle than Taeyeon and I honestly hoped for it. I couldn't have two patients taking me as a fool. So, I was willing to show service this time around and prove that I did not have a ty training. If I could make at least one of my patients be aware of that... it will be worth it.
“Hello, Miss Bae.” I greeted her after reading her name was Bae Ju-Hyun. I didn't bow this time and I honestly felt proud of myself for that.
Other than her basic information such as name, date of birth and hometown there wasn't much info about her on the files. There was no description of her psychosis nor behavior whatsoever. I wasn't really sure why tough. Her crime of choice was, as stated down, drug dealing. Well, at least she wasn't a murderer.
“You're my new doctor?”
“Yes. I'm Stephanie Hwang.”
“Awesome. I was tired of that old in' around.” I blinked a little uncomfortable as she took the sit in front of me.
“Hello, Doctor Hwang. Do you request our presence today?”
I recognized Lee Sungmin from the day before. “Hello, Officer Lee. How you've been today?” I asked showing him a smile.
“It's not very different from the other days, but thanks for asking, Doctor.”
“Sure. And how is your wife?” I asked curiously remembering that Taeyeon said his wife got a role on a musical. I didn't know how he would react but I knew that if it was me asking, he wouldn't be so angry about it. Plus, I genuinely hoped she did okay, so in my mind was a valid question.
He smiled prideful. “She's doing great. Her last performance was highly acclaimed by the critics.”
“That's great.” I smiled back upon hearing his response.
“Yes.”
“Ow, , please, get a room.” The girl snorted with a grimace.
“Do you request our presence today, Doctor Hwang?” He asked ignoring the girl.
“No, I'll be alright, thank you.” I dismissed and he left the room as soon as he could.
I took a moment to breath in. Okay, that was the time I needed to show service! C'mon, Tiffany, you can do it! That girl must not take you as a fool! You gotta be tough!
After feeling I was ready to start the session, I pressed the white button on the voice recorder and the tape did the twirl, starting to record that interview. “Psychotherapist Stephanie Hwang, Interview #2, Resident: Bae Ju-Hyun.”
“Forget that name and call me Irene, Doctor.” She quickly said upon hearing her real name.
“So, Miss Bae...”
“Please, Doctor, Bae are only the intimates.” She said grinning hard. “Just Irene.” She repeated.
I nodded. “Okay... So, Irene, how long you've been under Dr Young's care?” I found a bit strange he didn't write much about the patient. There was no indication of what personality traits she has in the files, nor any indication of the sightliest psychosis. Only thing written was truth to be told her crime choice.
“Not much, thank goodness. The old man was a pain in the .”
“Really? How so?”
“Have you ever met a guy where everything he says or does angers you?”
“Yes.”
“That's Dr Young. Didn't really fancy the . Maybe our blood types weren't very compatible.” I wasn't really worried about that. Most of times, patients tend to not like their doctors simply because our jobs require to be firm. It's like students not liking a teacher because the teacher scolds them for not doing homework. It wasn't very serious.
“Still, you haven't told me how long you stood with him. Can you tell?”
“A couple months or so.” She replied nonchalantly. “Why?”
“His notes about you are a bit vague. Did you have another doctor other than him?”
“No.”
I blinked. “So...is it safe to say you came to the Asylum a couple months ago as well?”
“Yes, that's correct.”
“Where were you before?” If she was in another facility I could try to search for her previous records.
“Free, roaming the streets of Seoul...”
“Dealing drugs...” I added.
Her face held a smug. “It happens. There's hundreds of thousands who would kill for one junk, ya know. They would kill and steal and then come to me, buy my stuff. It was awesome, Doctor. Good life, good money, good .”
“And then you and your got caught...”
Her smug disappeared and I noticed she started to gnaw her teeth. “Someone set me up.”
“And you ended up here? Did you do any medical examina-?”
“I ain't crazy, Doctor.” She said at once, interrupting me. “I ain't one of those lunatics! I was shoved in this place God knows why!”
“Well, if you are here you must have some sort of unusual behavior.”
“My only behavior is loving the smell of cash, Doctor. Is that unusual? Don't we all love money? Don't we all love the smell of cash so we can buy whatever we wanna?”
“Don't you love the smell of your narcotics too?” Narcotics could someone's mind so badly, it could be one of the reasons she came to the Asylum. Not every side effects is extreme though, there are degrees of it. The lightest one could be a bit of anxiety or paranoia. It could be so light, the person couldn't even realize she had developed those.
“Hell, no, Doctor! I'm not stupid.” She quickly dismissed with a grin. “You gotta use your head, Doctor, or you would end up loosing it for .” She pointed her fingers towards her head. “Never used any junk whatsoever but as I told you before, there were loads of people who would come to me.”
“What lead you into it?” How come young girls such as Irene and Taeyeon were into crime was a mystery for me. They were rather young and quite beautiful, they were supposed to go to college, find a good job, get married and have a family, not being criminals.
“Life.” She shrugged her shoulders. “It's easy money, Doctor.”
“Was it worthy? Have that easy money when in the end, it just led you here?”
“It's one of those little infinities life throws at you, Doctor. I had good money and good life doing it. I knew it wouldn't always be like that and I kinda knew someday someone would try to get our turf, but for a while, those moments were pure gold.”
“Our turf?” I repeated when I heard she said that. “Weren't you working alone?”
She giggled. “No one works alone, Doctor. Especially in this field.”
Well I had to agree, it's very hard to be alone when your job is to deal drugs. You gotta have network with others.
“And you were the only one caught?”
“Wendy and Yeri were with me too.”
My heart beat faster than I could expect when I heard that name. Yeri… wasn't she the girl who was killed by Taeyeon? I'm definitely sure that's her name! That girl was Irene's partner? Does Irene know what happened? Does she know her friend's murderer is also my patient?
Probably not. All doctors' patients are kept secret from each other. Besides, with Taeyeon being on Intensive Care, there's little room to Irene know that I'm Taeyeon's doctor as well.
“Wendy and Yeri were your partners?” I asked curiously controlling my voice.
“We were big. Our was big. It was sold as easy as an ice cream cake!”
“What happened to them?”
“We all came here.”
“And can you say that no one in your band has an unusual behavior?”
“Why is that important?” She asked frowning her brows. “It ain't problem of mine.”
“If one of them have a psychosis, the police would think all of you might have as well, hence why you were shoved here with your two partners.”
“But that's not fair.”
“You don't care about what is fair so why should the government?” She got quiet when I said that. She clenched her teeth a bit angry. “Isn't about fair, Irene, it's about safety.”
“What about my safety, Doctor?” Irene raised her voice a tune higher. “What if I get killed by one of those lunatics?”
Once again I was reminded of what happened to Yeri. Irene sure knows what happened to the poor girl so it is normal to be afraid that could happen to her as well.
“You are safe.” I tried to calm her.
“Am I? I feel like I'm walking in eggshells here, Doctor! One wrong move, one wrong word and boom! You head is smashed against the wall like a piece of .” I gulped at that. “But you don't care. No one here does.” She spitted it out.
“Why should we, Irene?” I asked her firmly, lifting my brows.“Why should we care for you?”
“I ain't crazy, Doctor.” She repeated.
“You're a drug dealer. You're still a criminal. And you're what those officers hate the most. So, tell me, why they should care for you? Why they should care for your friend?”
“I try my best to live in peace here. And so does Wendy. And so did Yeri.”
I chuckled at that. “If she really did, she wouldn't have been killed.”
“Yeri always had always been an attention seeker, but how come she was supposed to know that one of her cellmates was a mental ?”
It took me a couple of seconds to realize I gnawed my teeth and my nose dilated when she said those words referring to Taeyeon. It took me by surprise actually. I've got a bit angry because someone called Taeyeon a mental . Why? I didn't even know.
“Were you close to her?” I asked after a couple of seconds. “You seem to care about Yeri.”
“We were partners. We worked together, we lived together. It's normal to care.” I nodded. It was really good to hear that. This basically means she has some sort of sympathy and it's a good sign. Sympathy is what is lacking in psychopaths or sociopaths and I could easily take that out of her diagnosis. “Unlike all of you.” She added later, harshly.
“Look, I know you're angry because your friend was killed but you can't really blame us here. If Yeri was indeed doing the best to live in peace here, she wouldn't have been murdered.”
“She was just trying to make friends.”
“By pissing one of the most dangerous residents off?”
“She didn't know that. No one told us anything about the residents here.”
“Was it necessary? Never crossed your minds that every single one of those inmates are dangerous?” Because honestly, it was my first thought when I got the job. Even hough I was feeling ready for the challenge, I couldn't lie about not being nervous. We are dealing with mental criminals here, a
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