Blinded By The Lights | Sungjoy

Act 2 - Chapter 38: Sanctuary

Joy sat with the man until security came to escort him out of the building. She watched as they lifted him slowly from the ground, his crying slowly turning to dry sniffles as he left the building. Before he exited the doors, he turned around once and bowed towards Joy, who awkwardly bowed back as she watched the man leave the building.

"Thanks, Joy."

She turned around to see Eunwoo approaching her, bruises and scratches marring his face. When the man had been distracted, a group of staff had pulled him away from Joy and the man to protect and treat his injuries.

"You would've done the same for me," Joy shrugged as she scanned her friend from head to toe. "You should probably get those wounds treated.

"Come on," she told him as the crowd began to slowly disperse.

--

They didn't talk as they cut through the hospital, taking routes less traveled by patients and often used by staff when they wanted to quickly get around some of the traffic in the main passages. Occasionally, Joy would glance behind her to check if Eunwoo was still following her. Eunwoo didn't notice this, his face expressionless as his mind tried to make sense of what had just happened.

Joy peeked through the window of the lounge and saw that only Irene and Yeri were inside, their lunches scattered on the table. Joy pressed her ID card against the reader and pushed the door open, causing the two women inside to look up at the newcomers.

"Joy," Irene greeted her, as Yeri took another mouthful of her lunch. "And... what happened to you, Doctor Cha?" she asked as she got a look at Eunwoo's face.

"There was an incident," Joy answered shortly as she directed Eunwoo over towards a chair as she looked around the room for the first-aid kit.

"It's over there by the sink," Yeri answered, gesturing with her hand.

"Thanks."

Joy returned to the table and dragged a chair in front of Eunwoo before she set the first-aid kit beside her and opened it.

"What kind of incident was it?" Irene asked her as she stood up and walked over to them, peering over Joy with a professional eye.

Joy looked at Eunwoo, who still seemed to be struggling to figure out how to put the incident into words.

"A former patient's guardian just assaulted me in the atrium," Eunwoo said quietly. From the other side of the table, Yeri looked up, her attention piqued.

"A former patient?" Irene was confused. "Why would a former patient's guardian attack you?"

Eunwoo swallowed hard, his mouth grimacing. "You know about the recent surgery that I did, right? The pediatric VIP."

"The whole hospital knows about it," Irene replied dryly. "Your father couldn't stop praising you for it the morning after the surgery was over. You weren't there, but he spent a few minutes extolling your praises during our morning briefing."

Joy nodded as she shuffled through the first-aid kit, looking for anti-septic wipes and bandages. As part of the team that had assisted Eunwoo, she had also been a part of Director Cha's overzealous praise. He had called out each member of the team that was in the room, asking them to stand up so that they could be recognized.

Eunwoo's face turned red. "The former patient was an elderly woman that I had been seeing for three months. We had just planned everything for her, from surgery to recovery. We were fairly confident that we could do it. It was going to be a difficult surgery, but I thought that we had good chance of success. It took some time for me to convince the patient's son, especially since he had done a bit of his own investigating into the method that I wanted to use, but eventually, we won him over.