Seventh Hospital

【Diagnostic record】

Name: Levi Ackerman

Age: 25

Hospital No.: NO.0723984

Pathological description: Perceptual disturbance/suicide syndrome

【0】

That's what happened to me when I was a teenager.

At that time, my mother was admitted to the hospital due to a serious illness, and as the only family member, she had to go to the hospital to accompany her in bed every day after school or on holidays and weekends.My mother's condition fluctuated, which was a great torture for her and me. At that time, my mother asked me to apply for euthanasia for her more than once.

At that time, I was not young enough to bear this kind of intense pain, and I was at a loss for a while.

Then I accidentally learned that there was a special patient living next door to my mother's ward.In this hospital, some wards can communicate with each other. In the mother's ward, there is a window that communicates with the next door.

I just opened that window out of curiosity.

【1】

In the next ward lived a young man.

My reaction when I first found out about this was to be angry, because after all my mother was a woman and a man lived in the other ward that I could share with her, which is really bad.However, the doctors and nurses were very indifferent, and even taught me in turn, don't open that window if you have nothing to do, because doing so will disturb the patients in the next ward.

I was short of breath, young and energetic, but I just felt that this was not good, so I decided to go to the next ward to find the patient to discuss whether I could let him change the room.

So I was too young and ignorant at that time, and I didn't know the particularity of this hospital and the patients it admitted, so that it was easy to cause some irreparable troubles.I don't know much about some of the diseases in the world, so I have no idea what it's like to be afflicted.

Then that day I quietly left the ward after my mother fell asleep, walked to the door of the next room and knocked on the door.

"I'm sorry to disturb you."

"Come in." A very gentle-sounding man's voice answered me.

At that time, I thought that a man with such a voice would be easy to talk to, so I said "excuse me" and pushed the door open.

When I first entered the door, I was taken aback by his room design.

How should I describe it... This room is very... safe and soft.

There are no unnecessary furnishings in the room, all objects are firmly nailed to their positions, all furniture has no edges, corners or sharp places, and there is nothing that seems to hide danger, even the walls and floors look It looks soft and elastic.

The man who I preconceived to be very gentle was sitting on the hospital bed. He had a handsome and melancholy face, pale complexion, deep eyes, and exuded a melancholy and deep charming temperament all over his body, making it impossible to imagine him. A sick person, more like a star who is using this room for work.

Then I was horrified at his limbs locked tightly to the bed.Soft and tough chains fixed his wrists and ankles. The chains were so short that his limbs could only swing slightly, and he couldn't do anything else at all.

I was suddenly a little uneasy, and my keen sixth sense made me think that this man should not be a normal patient, because everything in this room was too obvious.

But when the man asked me gently: "Have you encountered any problems?", I couldn't help but let my guard down again.

So children are so naive, adults can fool you casually.

"It's like this. I'm a family member in the ward next to yours. I didn't know that the two wards are interconnected, but my mother lives in the ward... I think you can understand me, sir."

"Oh, so that's the case." He nodded understandingly. "You want me to change wards, don't you?"

"Yes."

"How long have you been living there?" he asked again.

"...a month."

he laughed. "But I've been living here for half a year, boy."

I blushed in embarrassment.No one ever told me he came first, so I always thought he just moved in and tried to drive him out...but it was me who should go.

"I'm sorry..." I said sheepishly, resisting the urge to run for the door immediately and apologize to him. "I didn't notice this..."

"It's okay, I forgive you." The man smiled kindly, then looked at my bewildered look, and suddenly said: "The pen in your pocket is very nice."

I said "Huh?" before realizing that he was talking about the pen I pinned in my shirt pocket. "Oh, that's an award from the school."

"It seems that you are an excellent student." He said with a smile.

I scratched my head embarrassingly. "not bad……"

"Speaking of which, I just don't have a pen here. I want to write something. Can I borrow your pen first? I'll ask the doctor to return it to you in the evening." He paused and said to me with a smile .

I didn't doubt him, nodded and took out a pen from my pocket. "Okay." But when I was about to hand it over to him, I suddenly realized that his limbs were all bound.

"It's okay, just put it in my hand." He didn't care and raised his hand with limited movement slightly at me, and opened his palm.

"Ah... oh." I put the pen in his palm carefully and quickly. Even though I was very careful, my fingertips still touched his palm. The temperature also made me shiver abruptly.

"Then I'll go back first..." After I gave him the pen, I didn't know what to say, and he didn't say anything, so I could only leave.

He looked up and smiled at me, and nodded his goodbyes.

I walked out the door, covering my empty pockets with some anxiety.I don't know why, but his smile just now made me feel...

scary.

【2】

After I returned to the ward, I didn't go out again. It wasn't until the nurses came to make rounds in the evening that I heard them say that the surveillance alarm sounded once in the afternoon.Then until they came, they were still discussing this matter, and the expressions on their faces were not very happy.

"It's 'him' again! It's been so long since he's been silent, whoever forgets the precautions and gave him such a dangerous thing!"

I was at a loss when I heard it, and cut in curiously: "Sister, what are you talking about?"

"23984 next door." The sister nurse replied with an unhappy expression, "I have already warned everyone in this building, but there are still people who knowingly commit crimes, they are people who are only looking for death! It really makes us worry! "

When they talked about the next door, my heart skipped a beat and I suddenly became extremely disturbed.

After the nurse left, I saw the doctor walk into the mother's ward with a gloomy face, but he didn't come to see her, but came to see me.

"This pen is yours, Alan." A pen was in the doctor's hand.

I nod in bewilderment. "yes……"

The doctor sighed. "We were negligent and forgot to remind you. Let me make it clear to you this time. Alan, remember, never go to the next ward in the future."

My hands suddenly gripped the hem of the clothes. "Did I...do something?"

"Although it's not your fault, it's only this time. You must never do it again." The doctor looked at me seriously. "Alan, you must not take anything that has not been checked by us to the next ward in the future, not even a piece of paper, you understand?"

"I see...but..." I still don't know why.

The doctor stared at my pen for a while, then put the pen on the table. "Alan, the patient in the ward next to yours is a patient with 'suicide syndrome', he is very dangerous, understand?"

I didn't understand what the doctor said "suicide syndrome" right away, but I understood what he said "dangerous", so I immediately became uneasy: "He is very dangerous?! Then these two wards are still connected... I Can you apply to change the ward for my mother?!"

The doctor took one look at me and said in a strange tone, "No, Alan, I don't mean he's dangerous to other people, but other people are very dangerous to him, understand?"

I finally came back to my senses and looked at him blankly. "What... do you mean?"

The doctor's face was serious. "Alan, there are many special diseases in this world, which appear for various reasons, such as suicide syndrome. It is a very serious cognitive impairment, a terrible mental disease. I say so much that you may not understand , but as long as you know what the disease is—”

"What disease is that?"

"Simply put, it is a disease that wants to seek death."

"Looking for... death?" I was startled, and then suddenly thought of what the sister nurse said in the afternoon.

"He's all about looking for death"... So does that mean that that person has been trying to commit suicide?

That's why that room is horrifyingly well-protected, leaving no trace of danger to anyone. Is it because he is afraid that he will use something to seek death?

So he asked for my pen...

I slowly turned my head to look at the pen on the table, and shivered fiercely.

I can no longer imagine the circumstances under which the doctor took it out and cleaned it up and handed it to me.

very scary!

Seeing the extremely ugly expression on my face after reacting, the doctor sighed. "So, don't go to the next ward again, and don't open that window again."

"I... I know..." I said with trembling lips.

Then in those few days, I really didn't dare to look at the movement in the next room, and even trotted past when I passed by.

Then two days later, when a mother was taking a nap in the afternoon, I went out to fetch water with a kettle, and I happened to run into a man in the next ward who was taken out by the nurse to bask in the sun.

He was wearing a hospital gown, with shackles on his wrists and ankles, and a pair of mittens on his hands. He kept his head down when he went out, as if my appearance had alarmed him, he raised his head, revealing The gloomy and deep eyes under the gray-black hair, I was taken aback by him, because he had a mask on his face. Self-mutilating and specially crafted things.

Our eyes met, I was at a loss, the arc of his brows and eyes was flat and quiet, and then the next second, his eyes suddenly bent, as if giving me a smile, and then walked away with the nurse.

Until his figure disappeared at the stairs, I was still standing there blankly, and my mind was full of the way he bent his eyebrows and smiled at that moment.

very nice.

But also... scary.

【3】

After feeding my mother the medicine, I left the room. The oppressive atmosphere in the hospital made me breathless. I walked out of the hospital and came to the garden. Some patients were sunbathing, and children from the Children’s Hospital were playing in the open space. The atmosphere here is lively and lively. It was lively, except that those people were all wearing hospital gowns and looked sick, they seemed to be no different from ordinary people.

In a corner I saw the man.

The nurse stood beside him, watching his every move closely. He sat in front of a drawing board without paying attention, and daubed the soft canvas with paint with his fingers.

with fingers.no pen.

When I thought of the pen, I couldn't help but fight again. I put that pen away, and I didn't dare to use it. I always felt that it was covered with blood, which made people feel cold when they saw it.

Ordinary people can't understand the world of these mentally ill people. I did something wrong without authorization and caused serious consequences. Maybe for that man, I was helping him, but for the doctor, I was hindering their treatment .

I should keep my distance from that man, because he can always make people defenseless against him, but the consequences of being defenseless are too terrible.

After all, I am a child, being played around by him.

The footsteps that were about to step over turned away abruptly, but before I could walk away, I heard the sound of him being covered in a mask, which was a bit dull but still very nice.

"Why are you leaving here? You hate me?"

I put my feet down in embarrassment and turned around. He looked up at me. The canvas beside him was a mess of abstract patterns. The colors were very oozing, like a twisted monster dripping with blood.

"No...I'm afraid of disturbing you." I explained weakly.

"It's okay." He said, "I'm glad you can come with me." After he finished speaking, he frowned at me again.

I stood there at a loss, and the nurse was looking at me very carefully, as if studying whether there was anything dangerous on my body.

"That... is there any problem?" I was nervous when the nurse looked at me.

"It's nothing, you can come here." The nurse said.

"Okay... okay..." I walked over slowly under the gaze of the two people.

He immediately stepped aside and pulled the drawing board. "Sit next to me," he said.

The nurse was close to him, but now I'm between two people, and they're all looking at me, which makes me very nervous.

"That... I will disturb you..."

"It's okay, you can give me some advice." He said with a smile. "How do I draw?"

not so good.I pursed my lips.Don't know what to say.

I don't know what he is painting at all, the patterns on the canvas are very messy, there are no rules at all, it is more incomprehensible than a child's graffiti.And his colors are very scary, all colors like blood red and evil green, it looks disgusting.

"What... are you painting?" I thought for a long time, and could only ask him cautiously.

"This yard," he said. "There are others."

"Oh..." My mind was in a mess, and I could only follow what he wanted. "The painting is pretty good."

He seemed quite happy. "It's not close." He raised his hand, the gloves were taken off, and he dipped his fingers in the paint to smear the canvas in a disorderly manner. "If you like it, I can give it to you after I finish the painting."

I almost jumped up in fright.I don't want something so scary!

But I can't just refuse him like that, so I have to be a little more tactful... "That... no need... I'm too good at keeping these things... I will destroy the painting..."

"Never mind, it's worthless," he said indifferently. "Throw it away if it breaks."

"This... this is not good..." I was sweating profusely, not knowing how to persuade him.

As if seeing my difficulty, the nurse said, "You can't take it back right now." He glanced at the man, "Levi, you can keep it first, and give it to them as a gift when they are discharged from the hospital. "

"Good idea." He was very happy after hearing that, and looked at the nurse with a smile. "Well then, I'll give it to you as a gift when your mother is discharged from the hospital."

I smiled dryly. "Okay...okay..."

In the afternoon, the nurse took him back to his room. My mother hadn't woken up yet, and it wasn't time to eat. I didn't know what to do, so I simply sat in the corridor in a daze.

The nurse came out of the ward, saw me sitting there, and came over.

"Hi."

"...Hi." I looked up at him and forced a smile.

"Scared you in the morning," he said, standing next to me. "But never mind, he didn't mean to."

"He doesn't look like he can draw..." I whispered.

"No, you're wrong." The nurse shook her head.

"Ugh?"

"Before he got sick, he was a famous illustrator." The nurse tilted her head and looked at me and said.

I opened my mouth wide in surprise. "But today..." Is the thing on that canvas really the work of an illustrator?

"That's because he's sick," said the nurse. "He suffers from perceptual impairment, which is very serious. The whole world is distorted in his eyes, everything, people and things are." The nurse is obviously used to his paintings. "He's really just showing what he sees."

what did he seeThat bloody mess twisted irregularly?

I couldn't keep my mouth shut in horror.

"The doctor said..." It took me a long time to find my voice, and he became dry. "He has suicidal syndrome..."

"It's a complication of perceptual impairment," said the nurse. "He's afraid of the world, so he wants to escape. The world he sees, including himself, is so distorted. He's afraid of the world and himself. This world makes him feel very Disgusting, and so is he."

I do not know what to say.

"This kind of obstacle generally leads to two results." The nurse went on to say, "Anti-social tendencies, because they think the world is ugly and want to destroy it; or anti-self tendencies, thinking that neither themselves nor the world should exist, so they want to die. .”

I can't say a single word.

I always thought he was a horrible person because he seemed so gentle and nice, but his behavior was so twisted.But now the nurse's words let me understand that what is distorted to him is not his own behavior, but the world.

All he did was save himself.

It is not I who should be afraid, but him.

"Is this disease...can't be cured..." I could only ask this question after deliberation.

The nurse looked at me sadly. "The treatment of perceptual impairment is very difficult, and some people spend their entire lives without necessarily improving. He has been sick for a long time, so long that he has been able to live as before in his twisted world, without even fear and loathing. It showed."

I stared blankly at the front, the sunlight outside the window was very bright, even in the shadows I felt dazzling.

We were all silent, the world suddenly quieted down, only the swaying of the wind blowing through the treetops continued restlessly.

The nurse sighed and walked away, I continued to sit alone in the corridor, my mind was blank.

【4】

Maybe it was the nurse's words that affected me, and I couldn't help paying attention to the man in the next ward.

My mother's condition is getting worse day by day, and now all I and this hospital can do is wait, so during this difficult time, I found something to do for myself by observing that man.

I think he must be very lonely too, the world is so terrible to him, but because he is a patient, it is impossible for the doctor to satisfy his sick wish, and he is suffering the torment of living to stay here, despite this twisted A rotting world enveloped him.

In his eyes, I am so ugly, but in my eyes, he is the most beautiful person I have ever seen in my ten years of immature life.

"You're here again." He sat on the bed and flipped through a book, ignoring my arrival. "You shouldn't have come, the doctors and nurses should have told you that I'm a dangerous person."

"What are you going to do to me?" I sat on the chair, not approaching him.I just want to talk to him, I feel lonely and so does he.

"Well, I can't do anything to you." He turned a page, glanced at it twice, and turned another page. "If I could do something to you, I'd rather do something to myself."

"What does death look like to you?" The question popped into my head and I asked it.

His fingers paused, then he raised his head.

Calm and deep eyes looked ahead, it was a blank wall.

"If I've been like this since I was born," he didn't answer me directly, but said slowly, "then maybe I don't feel so much. After all, my world has been like that from the beginning, and I can't blame others. "

"But I know I've seen the normal side of the world. I can't recall it at all, but I know I've seen it."

"Just that one thought is enough to make me intolerable in the face of all this change."

"Perhaps for me, the death you fear is the beauty of the world that I can't ask for. That's why I can't wait so much."

"I can understand you." I lowered my head and whispered.I can really understand him, because like his mother, he is already full of despair about this world, and only death can save them.

But their own will is based on pathology. As doctors and ordinary people whose mission is to eliminate all pathogens, they cannot accept such a will.

In fact, we are all cruel people, imposing our will on these poor people, forcing them to face the world that makes them feel pain, and saying "it's for your own good" in all seriousness.

Although it is so.But, in the end it is reluctant.

Such a precious person will never come back once he leaves, who can bear the pain of separation.

"Do you have family?" I asked him.

"Yes, or no." His answer was confusingly ambiguous. "I live alone and do not communicate with my family, but I was admitted to the hospital for medical treatment due to illness, which is the request of my family, and they hope that I can recover."

Two wills of such divergence are established, and he suffers in the middle of being unable to move.

"Have they visited you?"

"Maybe they don't want to see me make a complicated expression." He smiled. "Or they were afraid."

"What are they afraid of?" I asked puzzled.

"After I was sick, I drew portraits of them." He grinned like a child who had succeeded in a prank, and then seemed to think that this was a bit too much, and put up the book to cover his mouth.

For some reason, I couldn't laugh.

I can imagine such a scene, obviously out of cherishing the family, but the reality is so cruel.

No one can accept that my appearance in the eyes of others has become that terrible appearance.

They can't, can he?

At that moment, I finally understood him completely.

"Your greatest wish..." "Death." He interrupted my question and gave the answer directly.At that time, his expression was dignified and serene.

"I have had many, many important wishes to fulfill in my lifetime, but now my only wish is to sleep peacefully," he said quietly to me. "There are many better things in this world than death, but they cannot tempt me."

"Would you say no to someone who means so much to you?" I asked.

"What kind of person do you want to talk about, friend, relative, or lover?" He smiled, "If it's that kind of person, I probably want to die more."

"Because I love him so much, how can I bear his ugly and terrible appearance in my eyes?"

"For him, the me he loves is the best in the world, so why don't I think so. The person I love must be the best in the world in my opinion, the most inviolable, but I first , is a blasphemer."

"I can't stand being so filthy myself."

His plain words made my chest throb, my heart constricted, and I almost burst into tears.

Later, I recalled it countless times, and I thought about it countless times, maybe he was the first and maybe the last most beautiful person I met in my immature life, even if he was sick, he was better than me. All are well.

According to what he said, am I also in love with him?

That's what happened to me when I was a teenager.

I fell in love with a man who was ten years older than me.

And he fell in love with Death.

【-twenty four】

When some people mention him, they always say: "Although he is a bit clumsy, he is very simple and sincere."

You'd ask who Alan was, and they'd point to the man in the town's small but brightly colored courtyard and say with a smile:

"Alan is the one."

Alan is a young man in his early twenties. He came to this town alone two years ago and became the only primary school teacher in the town.

Although there is a ten-year gap between him and those children who are less than ten years old, he still acts like a child who has not grown up, playing hide-and-seek with the children, climbing up and down and rolling in the sand .

Allen taught them Chinese and art.Allen can write beautiful blackboard writing, and the cursive calligraphy is also very beautiful. Some old people in the town can't help but admire it after reading it.Allen can also draw beautiful illustrations, with warm colors and soft lines, each painting is like a fairy tale being told, even the ugly monsters are clumsy and cute.

People in the town spoke highly of Alan, saying he was an excellent young man.

But as to why he came here, no one knows.

Allen didn't tell anyone.

【5】

The mother has completely fallen into a coma.Using the medicines and instruments in the hospital to continue the thin life.I know she is not happy, because it is too painful for her, she needs a quick relief, but her son selfishly rejected her.

Because I was guarding my mother, I rarely went to the next ward, but the window was always opened.The man moved his hospital bed to the window, and we leaned against the wall when we had nothing to do, talking about some unnutritive topics, or talking about the taste of today's lunch, or talking about the nursery rhymes sung by the children in the children's hospital in the yard outside the window. .

We rarely ask questions about the shape of something, beautiful or ugly, big or small.I didn't mention it because I didn't want to embarrass the man, and he didn't mention it because he didn't know.

Sometimes I couldn't bear it anymore, so I asked him: "If everything in your eyes is so distorted, how can you distinguish them?"

He gave me a strange look.

"Although my vision is impaired, my perceptual state is still sound." He shook the chain on his ankle, "Just like you ordinary people, when you see something, your brain will think: oh, this thing is this Shaped, it looks like this... It's a fixed concept, just like you can't mistake people and dogs. Me too. Although what I see seems a bit irregular to you, but to me Saying that they have their own concepts, I know what is a pen, what is a book, what is a person, what is a table, bowls, cups and saucers... This does not affect my judgment of things." He smiled after finishing speaking. "You think I'm seeing random things, but the message my vision sends me through my brain is: this is how it is. You can't understand it but I can, and that's it."

"Ah, yes." I was a little embarrassed. "There is actually no difference between you and us, it's my preconceived idea..."

"That's funny," he said, leaning his head against the wall. "You would say something like 'I am no different from you'... In the eyes of everyone, I am different from you."

"How could it be?!" I said in amazement, "Although your perception is blocked, it's just that you are observing the world in another form. How can you say that you are different from us!"

He listened to me quietly, bowed his head and smiled.Then he said a word softly, and that sentence was kept in the deepest part of my heart, and every time I recalled it, I couldn't help but burst into tears.

He said, "I'd love to see you, Ellen."

【6】

The hospital has strict requirements. Because there are some special patients, not only are the family members visiting relatives strict, but it is also difficult for patients to leave the hospital.Some special patients are absolutely impossible to be allowed to leave the hospital until they are cured.

I was given an exception because my mother was seriously ill, but my mother's time was short, and if she stopped breathing, I would lose my eligibility to re-enter this hospital.But that man didn't know how long he had to stay there before he could wait for relief.

I quietly asked the sister nurses about him, and they seemed to gossip about him a lot, because of his gentle and handsome appearance and the terrible symptoms that were completely opposite to his appearance.From their mouths, I heard a lot of things I never knew, about the madness of that person, and about his infinite thirst for death.

Since he was found to be suicidal, his family had closely monitored him, but that didn't stop him from using everything to seek death.Whatever it was, even a piece of paper could be his weapon of self-mutilation.Unbearable, his family sent him to the hospital, but unless he was tied up 24 hours a day, even if he had only one minute to spare, he might do things that others could not imagine.The nurses who took care of him changed batch after batch, but they were all scared away by him.

"You can't imagine what it was like." The nurse sister said with lingering fear. "I saw it with my own eyes. We were all in the room at that time. No one thought that he would suddenly pull out the needle in his hand and slash his artery. If it weren't for the thin and soft needle, probably the current on his neck There should be another scar left. He is too crazy, no matter whether the thing will achieve its purpose, he will try it. Rather than saying that he committed suicide, it is more like self-torture." The nurse sister sighed after finishing speaking Shaking his head anxiously, he sighed with regret: "It's so pitiful that such an excellent person has become like this..."

I inquired about his past deeds on the Internet. He is a genius. He had extraordinary talents when he was a child. He had won many awards when he was a teenager.But all of this came to an abrupt end later, he fell gorgeously from the sky like fireworks, turned into dust and fell to the ground, and was trampled into the darkness.

I can't imagine how he was hit, just like I still can't see how many wounds on his body from the neck down.

All I can do is sit with him, talk some gossip that has nothing to do with these, and see a little smile on his calm and stable face.

What a precious thing that was, and I will be saying goodbye to him very soon.

Mother stopped breathing completely one rainy afternoon.Maybe it was because the sky was crying, but I didn't cry.The doctor announced the death of my mother and then covered her face with a white cloth. I turned my head in a trance, and saw that he was quietly looking at my sleeping mother on the other side of the window. His expression was neither sad nor happy. An envy I can understand.

Mother's body was left in the hospital morgue while I prepared everything for the crematorium.That afternoon when I was tidying up the things in the room, he stood by the window and looked at me without saying a word.

Before leaving, he gave me the book he had been reading, and I gave him a paintbrush as a gift in return.

Holding the book, I walked out of the gate of the hospital. The night spread from the woods to the sky, dimming the outline of the hospital.I looked back at that place, a gust of cold wind blew on my face, dust fell in my eyes, I blinked, tears fell down.

【-twenty four】

The children said that Mr. Allen has a very precious book, which he takes with him wherever he goes.

Teacher Alan likes to take them to sketch, and he will draw them very seriously no matter what kind of scenery or things are in every place in the town.The adults said that Mr. Alan is a modest and responsible teacher with a delicate heart, and we feel relieved to entrust the children to him.

Then one day, when I was going to sketch again, Teacher Alan asked the children: "Is there any place in this town that we haven't been to?"

The children said: "Yes! There is a beautiful big house on the outskirts of the town."

"Then let's go and draw that beautiful big house," said Allen.Then they set off towards the outskirts of the town.

On the way, the children chirped to popularize the history of the house to the teacher. The house was built by a couple from the city. Later, they gave birth to a daughter here. The daughter married a boy in the town and gave birth to a son. .The boy only grew up here until he was three years old. The family left the town and returned to the city. No one came back here. According to the adults in the town, the boy died later because they once saw others wearing black clothes. The parents of the boy in the black veil came back, took all their belongings, and sold the house.

The house has been abandoned for a long time