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Warning: Triggering content mentioned, skip the "Take courage. Take courage." paragraph to avoid :)
The stained, hospital-room curtains floated softly away from the open window, the near spring air filtering into the musty room. The rotten looking armchairs with the floral print sat in a state of constant unevenness, which bothered the room's inhabitant greatly, near the bathroom in the right of the room, closest to the door out. The hospital bed which moved when you did and made so many creaks and noises that it was a surprise that the thing didn't just fall apart. The bathroom with its stained tile that made a wet, mucky noise when you stepped on it and the mirror which showed no reflection. The light which crackled before it turned on and was very close to just burning out and leaving him in complete darkness, not that he would notice. The wallpaper which was peeling up in the corners and was a complete throwback to the 90's. The tree which scraped the outside of his window whenever it got just a little bit windy. The low hum of the air conditioning as it whirred to life, a very thunky and clangy life.
Everything in this place was known to him. Everything was in its place. Nothing ever changed here. Sure, a new patient might be wheeled in or a new nurse or some doctor becoming employed there, but that was all normal. All the nurses, except Jihyo, transferred out at the end of a six month period. The doctors would get caught with something that they shouldn't have and they would be replaced. Patients came in and out all day long. It was all normal, regular, nothing out of the ordinary.
The boy that refused to leave the door, that, that was not normal. He was out of place. He was not meant to be here. The normals weren't supposed to be there, outside his door, unless they were a doctor or a nurse. No normals that ever came to see him had stuck.
He thought that blocking the boy out, not acknowledging him, would make him go away. Even the uneven balance that was building. He would be just like the others. They would get more and more frustrated each time they came and he wasn't there. They'd get so frustrated that they'd storm off to the front desk and demand to be switched. Jihyo would slide them the papers and everything would become balanced. Like taking the third person off of one end of a seesaw. Everything would be as it should. Him, alone with only the visits of his friends, as he was supposed to call them, though they knew little about him, and nurses with his dinner.
