1/1
(does anyone really want a heart)

Two in the morning smells like loneliness. It smells like antiseptic and too much coffee, colourful pills and the taste of blood. Two in the morning is the part of your heart which hurts, the unexplainable dread which fills every part of your bones. Two in the morning smells like hospitals – it is the white washed rooms and the liars who tell you it’s okay when it’s not. Two in the morning is bad tasting food and liquid which just won’t slide down your throat.

2am is everything no one wants to be.

“Morning,” Woohyun says at two. He finds himself saying a lot at two, waking up at midnight just to put on some jeans and a shirt to meet people who can’t seem to see him anytime else. Business people usually, though sometimes he gets students who study throughout the night. He wears jeans to seem like them, or that’s what he’s been told. He wears jeans and shirts so that he’s with them, so he isn’t a thousand miles away. Woohyun drops his heart off at the door, making straight for the shiny C-shaped desk. It’s where the receptionist is.

Howon greets him with a half-smile. He places the phone back on the receiver, caring little for the caller. In a world full of madness, they can afford to be picky. “Good morning Woohyun,” he greets the other with an equal amount of insincerity. “He’s on the left, room 307.”

He catches sight of Woohyun’s rather perplexed expression.

“Monday, Woohyun.” he reminds the other.

Woohyun blinks. Monday. Right. New patient day.

Woohyun gets a new patient approximately every Monday, an aggressive little child who really just wants to be held close (something Woohyun can only pretend to give) and told that everything’s going to be alright. He finds that people in hospitals just want to talk about themselves, just want to be told there’s something wrong and that it can be fixed. He finds that the people he works with want a ghost, not a person.

(His job is to be someone he’s not.)

He grabs the crisp manila folder in Howon’s hands, ignoring the snide comment which falls along the lines of, ‘you really don’t focus, do you’ as he moves away from the desk. Woohyun likes to think he doesn’t read the profiles of his patients to avoid making judgements, but really he’s just not bothered too. Everyone, he finds, is the same. Everyone wants the same things.

He moves to Room 307, trying the knob once. Turning it successfully, he lets himself in, pausing midway.

Well, Woohyun thinks, this is a bit different.

Woohyun’s forgotten how many of his lies are truths, but he’s pretty sure he doesn’t usually get young people chained to beds. His newest patient has chains on his ankles and wrists, all loose enough to allow to him to sit up, but constricted enough to make his movements limited. He couldn’t touch Woohyun even if he tried. Woohyun nods curtly, because now he’s not exactly sure if not reading those files were a good idea, especially since his newest patient looks like the victim of a horrible murderer playing doctor. Woohyun pulls out a chair for himself, looking at the chained boy. He takes a good look at the latter’s face. Sharp eyes, sharp nose, pink lips; he opens the folder and scans the picture. They look similar. This prisoner is his guy.

Woohyun clears his throat, putting on a soft smile for effect.

“I’m Nam Woohyun,” he says a bit too naturally, “And I’m your psychiatrist.”

The boy on the bed nods, as if he knows, but doesn’t do much more. Woohyun adjusts his position, waiting for the boy to speak.

He skims through the boy’s personal details as he waits. Sixteen, Woohyun thinks, the kid’s sixteen. Definitely too young to be attractive. His eyes trail down the page.

Name: Kim Myungsoo.

Condition: convicted of murder; psychotic

Woohyun exhales. His ego tells him he’s right. This is different. Woohyun closes the folder quickly.

“You’re Kim Myungsoo right?” He asks casually, just for confirmation. The other boy inclines his head slowly.

Woohyun nods, putting on his best pitiful face.

“I just want to help you,” he starts, reciting the lines he’s said so many times that they’ve lost meaning. “I just want to help you get through this.”

He receives another nod in return. “I know,” he hears.

It doesn’t sound as soft as he’s used to. It’s not the ‘I know’ of resignation, of giving up and fully lending his soul to Woohyun. It’s arrogant, it sounds as if he knows, but doesn’t believe it. It’s an uncommon reaction, but he’s seen it before. Woohyun can break him, just as he’s broken every other patient who wakes up at two am.

“Just give me a chance,” Woohyun makes his voice softer, just for effect. “I know it’s hard to trust a stranger with all your problems, but just try. Just give me a chance to understand.”

He looks up to dark eyes, eyes which just stare at him.

“You really didn’t read his profile, did you?” is called when Woohyun makes his way towards the break room, eager for his morning coffee. The break room is fairly large, about the size of a classroom. In it, a mini kitchen, large television and a small unused table lie. Sungyeol’s there as he always is at six, laughing because he knows.

“I don’t usually,” Woohyun replies, yawning. He heads straight for the table, pulling out a chair and opening his folder. It’s the same one Howon gave him that morning. Papers scatter over the desk as he works.

Sungyeol raises an eyebrow, slightly amused. “Wow,” he says, “this guy must really have you stumped for you to work during your break.”

Woohyun ignores him, “I can break him.” He takes a sip of his coffee, staring determinedly at the documents in front of him. Sungyeol’s lips quirk into a smile as Woohyun sighs in resignation, looking over to the taller man. “You looked after him, didn’t you?”

He sounds almost pathetic. Sungyeol grins.

“Not really,” He confesses, “I just read his file, something you don’t ever seem to do.” Ignoring Woohyun’s stare, he continues, “Anyway, the kid’s sixteen. He’s a murderer; killed his parents out of cold blood, skinned them almost. Police found him when neighbours reported screams, and to my knowledge, the court ruled it out as self defence. Originally he came here to overcome the event.” Sungyeol shrugs, “That’s around the time they figured he was crazy.”

Sungyeol finishes, waiting for Woohyun’s reaction. He’s meant with a nonchalant sip of coffee.

“I always wanted a psychotic patient,” the other murmurs. It’s half true.

They share a ten second silence.

“This is when I question your sanity,” Sungyeol finally says. He takes Woohyun’s coffee out of his hands, an indignant ‘hey!’ escaping from the elder’s mouth.

“There’s a price for information,” is the last thing he hears, so Woohyun gathers his things and goes to his next patient.

9am has a much more pleasant smell. It smells like work, like days spent slaving away, like a feeling of normality. The public school fairly close to Woohyun’s facility lets out a muffled ring, and at 9am all sorts of people start coming in. People from the normal side of the hospital – the side where problems can actually be seen – come in at 9am. They greet Woohyun kindly, a little tinkle of laughter drifting into the block. Woohyun likes 9am a lot more than two in the morning.

“Morning Woohyun!” Dongwoo, the morning receptionist says. Unlike the bittersweet nocturnal Howon, Dongwoo’s a bundle full of happiness, answering phone calls with a grin and laughing at every smiling face. “Beautiful morning, isn’t it?”

Woohyun bites back at snide remark, because in honesty the one thing he prefers about 2am is Howon’s clear, straightforward tone of voice. He doesn’t care much for Dongwoo and butterflies.

“Morning.” He mutters, promptly ignoring Sungyeol as he passes Dongwoo and whispers rather loudly, “It’s not his fault he’s an every morning.”

Dongwoo laughs at this, because Dongwoo laughs at everything and Woohyun doesn’t think it’s a very beautiful morning if he has to see Dongwoo.

Woohyun makes his way through patient after patient, some permanent guests while others simply visitors. He meets a young school girl who blushes every time he talks (he finds it half amusing, half annoying) and an old man whose memory is getting worse. Woohyun finds himself talking to the wife of a schizophrenic and a boy who’s forgotten his way home. And among all these things he talks to Sungyeol and still manages to keep his heart far away from his head.

“I would like to see you again,” he lies, just for good measures. Pops chocolate into his mouth as the girl looks back with what looks akin to fear, but is really just happiness. He thinks people are easy. “Do you mind coming back next week?”

Her eyes say yes when says maybe, and Woohyun’s just managed to secure another hundred dollars from an unsuspecting family. He nods and leads the young girl out, her shorts too short and her hair made to impress. Woohyun watches passively. He feels nothing.

Woohyun works on and off hours. After leaving at midday and coming back at seven, he finds that already Dongwoo’s packing up, Howon’s near, and cheery 9am has left. It’s only grief from now on.

“Why don’t you go check on your new patient?” Dongwoo suggests lightly, reshuffling sheets of patient files. Woohyun starts to remember all the reasons he doesn’t like Dongwoo. “I’m sure he could use with some company.”

The hospital is darker now. Artificial lights take the place of the sun. It’s still busy, though for all the wrong reasons. People here are grave. They are dying, or someone they know is. There are no light jokes at seven. Woohyun makes his way towards room 307; shedding the white coat he wears to look professional. It’s jeans and shirts, because he has to be like them. They don’t speak to anyone who isn’t, because no one understands.

(Woohyun doesn’t either.)

The boy’s still there, chained to the bed. Woohyun knows more now. He’s dangerous, or supposedly he is. Woohyun pulls out a chair once again.

There’s a silence between them. He feels childish, for starting a staring contest with his patient. Woohyun detaches himself, watching blankly as Kim Myungsoo stares at him with an almost terrifying amount of coldness. Distance, it seems, is plentiful.

“Can you tell me how it started?” Woohyun starts off kindly, breaking away from the other’s eyes. He’s learned it breaks people, speaking kindly that is, whether it’s now or in a few months. (The more months, the more money he gets.)

The air is stiff around them. The boy just stares. Just stares and stares and stares. Woohyun waits for his answer.

“Take as long as you want.”  He adds in helpfully.

But minutes turn to hours and Woohyun’s ready to give up. He’s learned that people like Myungsoo, people who are silent all over, are actually quite easy to break. They take a long time, but they are. People like Myungsoo are easy to break because they’re already half-fixed. They usually know what’s wrong, and all Woohyun has to do is wait for an answer. So he does – so he waits – and at nine-thirty seven he receives a short;

“My parents were soaked in blood.”

Woohyun nods, shaking his head a little to rid away the fatigue. The other’s voice has a sense of innocence to them, something light under his heavy voice. Woohyun takes it a step further, his voice softened for effect.

“And do you know why that was?”

The boy blinks. “I killed them, obviously.”

Obviously, Woohyun thinks, obviously. He’s amused, he believes. Half amused, half curious. He profiles the boy in his head, because that’s what he does. He judges people and tells them what’s wrong. He thinks the boy’s pretending to be strong when he’s not, that Kim Myungsoo is nothing but a child playing in his father’s tie. He’s sixteen – children are silly and stupid at sixteen. They think they know things when they don’t.

“Killed them,” Woohyun repeats for good measures. He puts on a thoughtful face. “May I ask why?”

“Because I’m a murderer,” is the answer he receives.

“Hm,” his mind responds to the boy’s answers like a quiz in a magazine. It’s where he asks questions and the responses his patients give become the options, leading to even more questions until Woohyun can diagnose him. His mind is similar to a personality quiz in a teenage magazine. “That’s quite confusing. You killed them because you are a murderer? It doesn’t make sense, if you see it this way. You don’t kill someone because you’re a ‘murderer’. You kill someone, and then you become a ‘murderer’.”

He’s learned the rules. Always victimise the patient.

Myungsoo nods. He seems to understand. “Okay.”

“So,” Woohyun repeats his previous questions, “why do you think you killed them?”

He thinks the boy’s eyes crinkle. Perhaps it’s a smile – Woohyun’s not really sure he can see the other’s face clearly. Sharp eyes form a half-smirk (arrogance is amusing) and the boy – Kim Myungsoo – replies with:

“I like the fear which passes their eyes.”

He’s psychotic. It’s not very helpful, since another person – psychiatrist, counsellor, who knows – has already concluded this, but Woohyun figures it’s a start. It’s what he tells Howon, at least, and it kind of brightens his day. Woohyun doesn’t often get many psychotic people with macabre obsessions, and psychotic people mean that all his other patients get put on hold. His schedule becomes more relaxed. Woohyun forgets to pick his heart back up as he exits the hospital, and when he continues breathing, he realises how much this job has done.

How much it’s lost him his heart.

Woohyun passes through the streets silently, a faceless business man who makes money off everyone else’s fears. He is the devil of modern-day society, the ghost of a person corrupted by life. He dines at expensive restaurants because he has too much money (he goes in alone because he has too little love), he wears expensive clothing because money is not a question anymore. It’s too late, he’s realised long ago, it’s too late to find himself. His heart is already gone; he no longer needs anything anymore. He plays a puppeteer, a faceless man who hides behind his work. He pulls strings without knowing why, he plays with patients like they’re dolls and acts like a big spoiled child who wants shiny, new, interesting toys. As he realises this his heart is replaced by ice and suddenly the sky looks grey and the pretty little children are nothing but dolls.
 

They are works in progress.  (Works he breaks then pulls back together again.)

“I’ve lost my heart,” he breathes inappropriately, to Howon and to his new patient who lies in Room 307, his soon-to-be new home.

Kim Myungsoo’s eyes look at him almost kindly, with a strange sense of comprehension. The words dissolve into the air, dissolve into Myungsoo’s (breathing) heart. “I already knew,” he says.

They maintain another suspenseful silence.

“Hm,” Woohyun murmurs. He feels quite strange, revealing himself to a patient. This isn’t like him at all. He’s not meant to have traces of himself. This isn’t about him. It’s never about him. He doesn’t want it to be. He shakes his head quickly.

“No, I’m sorry,” Woohyun says, “that was my problem. I shouldn’t have said that. Just forget it – this is about you.”

The boy just stares. (You can’t simply forget things.)

Woohyun grabs his favourite pen from his pocket. He leans towards the boy, clutching the clipboard with his free hand. “Let’s take off from where we started.”

Kim Myungsoo ignores him. “What do you want?” He asks, not unkindly.

It’s not accusing, not distasteful, just straightforward, as if asking about the weather. It sounds so weird out of the younger’s mouth. It sounds like a truthful question, as if Kim Myungsoo is genuinely curious about this matter. As if he cares what Woohyun wants. Kim Myungsoo is asking a vague question, so he gets a vague answer (lie).

“I want to help you,” Woohyun replies, because it’s what he’s paid to say. (That’s what they all are.)

The latter shakes his head. “No, not about me. Just about you. What do you want, Dr Nam? What do you want beyond this hospital?”

Woohyun gives him, for the first time in a long while, the truth. “Nothing.”

Kim Myungsoo pauses, then smiles, so carefully and subtly it’s barely even there. He gives the other a small, “Interesting.” But it’s not, because Woohyun isn’t – interesting, that is.

It feels weird, Woohyun realises, being called interesting by your patient. He tries not to take much notice of it though, because he convinces himself it’s the last time he’ll slip up in front of Kim Myungsoo. It’s all about the insane one this time. (Though they’re all pretty insane, Woohyun’s learned to accept.) Woohyun hides the ghost of himself behind the façade of a mask, wiping away all the (non-existent) traces of himself away.

Kim Myungsoo sits up on the bed now. They’ve gotten rid of the chains (about time, Woohyun thinks) and now he’s allowed to be in a carefully monitored room all alone with Woohyun. Woohyun’s not sure how he feels about being in a room with a sixteen year old killer, but he convinces himself all sixteen year olds are the same – children playing grown-ups with shiny new tools.

“Hello,” Myungsoo says when Woohyun comes back. He looks quite excited, his lips curving to a small smile, but Woohyun thinks he would be too if his only visitor was a self-proclaimed handsome man, so he ignores it. “How are you today, Dr Nam?”

“Good,” Woohyun lies. In truth he feels nothing. He’ll never admit it, but he thinks that in these ways (the general absence of empathy for human life), he and Kim Myungsoo are quite similar. “Are you ready to talk again?”

“About blood?”

“Something of sorts.”

Myungsoo nods. “Yeah.”

So Woohyun pulls up a chair and leans over his clipboard as he always does, waiting patiently for the other. He stares at Myungsoo. “At your own pace,” he tells him.

Myungsoo nods, closing his eyes. He looks a thousand miles away like that. He looks peaceful, tranquil – as if nothing can touch him, not even Woohyun. Woohyun wonders, very briefly, where he is. If he’s counting the stars or staring at clouds or if there’s a place which brings him happiness – a coffee shop, a library, a mall – somewhere where he truly wants to be. Woohyun wonders what goes around in Myungsoo’s head and for a split second he feels as if he’s the patient; as if he’s the crazy one because he simply cannot feel a thing. Because everything he sees is just passing him faintly, a blur of motion. But he stops. He stops thinking like that because thinking is bad and why think when you can follow the marked road.

So he ignores the other’s dazed look, the face of a dreamer, and reminds himself that in front of him isn’t a stargazer or a familiar stranger or someone he’d like to know but rather a psychopath, a murderer, someone who is wrong. And psychopaths and murderers and people who are wrong don’t get to be a million miles off and happy and peaceful and feel better than Woohyun does. They just don’t.

“You’re going to have to ask questions,” Myungsoo murmurs, his eyes still closed. He looks so peaceful (no, Woohyun believes, psychopaths aren’t allowed to look like that). He looks so peaceful to a point where it seems taboo to break his tranquillity. His voice is soft, like chocolate. “My pace is nothing. Ask a question, and you shall receive an answer.”

“A correct answer?”

The younger’s lips quirk into a smile. “If you ask the right question.”

Woohyun doesn’t waste any second after that. “Do you like blood?”

Myungsoo doesn’t flinch. “Yes.”

“Do you regret killing your parents?”

“No.”

“Why did you kill them?”

“I wanted to see fear in their eyes.”

It seems like a repeat of their previous conversation. Woohyun continues, venturing further this time.

“Did they ever hurt you? Your parents, I mean. Have you ever been abused?”

“Of course.”

“How, then?”

Myungsoo opens an eye, watching Woohyun carefully. He pauses, hesitating, before finally going on.

“My father me when I was ten. He made money by giving me over to other men and letting them play with me. The most vivid memory of my childhood is being taken to expensive hotels and being touched repeatedly.”

Woohyun doesn’t flinch. He finds it weird, since he’s supposed too – not out of human instinct, but because of his job. He gives Myungsoo the truth. “Okay then. How did you react to this?”

“I felt disgusting.” His face is contorting now, showing signs of discomfort.

Woohyun reminds him, “We can stop any time you want.”

“No, no I’m fine.” His patient waves him away, the distaste leaving his face. He looks as if he’s trying to put on a brave face. Myungsoo moistens his lips, as if trying to get rid of an ugly taste. They stay in silence for a few moments.

“Where are you,” Woohyun finds himself asking. It escapes his mouth before he can call it back; it comes so abruptly he’s not even sure he knows where it came from. “Where are you, when you close your eyes and look like a peaceful, innocent boy? Where are you, when everything seizes to be relevant and all which is significant is your beating heart? Where are you, where do you go – what, who, why, where is your happy place?”

The question lingers in the air, sinking heavily on the other like suppressed weight. The air feels staler than it once did. Myungsoo opens his eyes for awhile, blinking at Woohyun (he’s sixteen; he’s not allowed to be attractive). It’s as if he’s considering the elder’s question. Myungsoo’s eyes close once again.

“Somewhere you can’t touch,” Myungsoo replies quietly. “Can you open the windows?”

Woohyun warily does so, sliding the white window open to let in some sunlight and fresh air. He starts to notice how stale and artificial the air is in Kim Myungsoo’s room. He notices how bare it looks, with its unused chairs and side tables, with its shiny new television and lifeless shelf with no flowers. He notices how bare Myungsoo looks, with his white clothing and dark eyes and dark hair and suddenly he sees a small boy begging for something to stop and he sees shadows crowding over the boy and big, thick envelopes and greedy little hands and –

“I’m sorry,” Woohyun finds himself saying as his hand reaches for Myungsoo’s thin, bony one. He starts to notice how slim the other is, how pale and sunken his cheeks look and how small his neck seems to be. He stares at the other’s wrist.

“I was anorexic,” Myungsoo says, as if reading his mind. He then shrugs. “I’m nearly recovered, but before this, a few months ago I think, I used to be anorexic. I used to starve myself because I hated my body. I used to want to hurt and destroy the thing so many people had dirtied so many times. I wanted to wreck myself physically because I was a mess mentally.” He laughs, as if it’s nothing. “I stopped when I realised hurting myself would do nothing.”

Woohyun scribbles down ‘used to be anorexic’ in a messy scrawl as Myungsoo’s lips curve into a smile. Woohyun catches a, “But hurting others would make them pay for what they’ve done,” but refrains from writing it. Maybe he wants Myungsoo to be good. Maybe he wants to believe Myungsoo is.

The next question Woohyun asks his patient is ‘would you kill again’.

Surprisingly (or not – Woohyun wasn’t really betting on any particular answer), Myungsoo says, “Maybe.”

He returns with, “Are you planning to kill me?”

And Myungsoo says, “No, not now at least.”

Woohyun nods, because it’s comforting and vaguely reassuring. He twirls the pen in his hand and watches as Myungsoo settles back into the bed. He shifts.

“How are you today?” the younger suddenly asks. It’s the second time he’s asked.

Woohyun finds the answer leaving before he can stop it for the second time that day. “Dead; and you?”

“Likewise.”

Two in the morning is when Myungsoo is awake, Woohyun finds as he enters the hospital once again. He finds this as he tips his hat to Howon, and is reminded, once again, that he’s forgotten to pick up his heart. He finds that it’s been overdue for so long that it’s started to rot. That’s okay, Woohyun thinks, he doesn’t really need it. And if he did, he’s pretty sure his body would produce a new one.

He walks into Myungsoo’s room, the only room he’s been visiting as of late. Myungsoo’s there, as expected, just staring, as if he’s somewhere else once again. His legs are crossed on the bed, his mind so focused that Woohyun’s loud arrival can’t disrupt it. Woohyun half hates it, because Myungsoo has something Woohyun doesn’t. Because it’s ridiculously unfair for a mentally ill person to have something Woohyun, a prestigious (heartless) psychiatrist, will never have. But he can’t bring himself to ruin that (he can’t really feel much to have the strong urge to), so he watches as the other stares into the night sky and looks at the stars.

“Isn’t it beautiful?” Myungsoo murmurs (so he knows Woohyun’s there after all). Woohyun follows his glaze, but all he sees are shining objects in a black sky. It doesn’t look beautiful to Woohyun.

“Not really,” Woohyun finds the truth appearing more and more with Myungsoo (too much, he likes to think). “It’s just stars.”

“Of course it is – what else would you expect?”

Woohyun starts pondering before he realises it. “Something beautiful.”

“Yeah, well maybe this is it.”

Woohyun considers this, nodding slightly. They sit in silence as Myungsoo looks towards him.

“Is there a difference,” the younger boy wonders out-loud, “between finding something beautiful and wanting to find it beautiful?”

Woohyun answers without thinking, “Yes.”

Myungsoo then gets up, walking towards the window. His hands fold in behind his back, and Woohyun feels as if this is an invitation for him to follow. He does, and together they look up at the darkened sky.

“Then I don’t find the stars beautiful,” he says, all too quickly. “I’ve just been staring at them, trying to see what people see in stargazing.”

Woohyun nods.

“Is that why people kept doing it?” Myungsoo suddenly asks, “Is that why it kept happening? Because one person thought I was pretty, and then everyone else did? Is that why it wouldn’t stop? Tell me, you’re a psychiatrist, right? Is that the reason why no one would stop touching me?”

He stares at Woohyun, with so much panic and fear that Woohyun feels one of his ice barriers (the same ones which kicked out his heart) break, and as he looks at Myungsoo he wants to look after the other and stop it from hurting but there’s so much unhappiness in his eyes. But then the emotion and fear and panic disappear once again and Myungsoo becomes passive and Woohyun finds himself at a loss for any real words.

(He realises, all too late, that he can’t give Myungsoo any more fakes.)

Instead they stare at the sky in silence, and Woohyun starts to wonder why he wants to give Kim Myungsoo, of all people, some real words from his (non-existent) heart.

He spends a day with Myungsoo. A day with the other cooped up in the hospital, from 2am on Friday to 2am on Saturday, just talking to the sixteen year old. He places flowers on the side table.

“To brighten your day,” Woohyun says, and he finds that he means it, kind of.

Myungsoo stares at the object as if it’s a foreign thing, as if it’s special. He looks almost speechless, unexplainably happy, like a child on Christmas day. His eyes widen and they look so innocent – he looks so innocent – and the only difference between his usual moments of purity and now is that this time he’s here. This time he’s present, in this lifetime and reality, not a thousand miles away. This time he’s pleased by the present. Something starts to melt another ice barrier in Woohyun’s heart.

“Have you not seen a flower before?” He asks.

Myungsoo continues staring at the flower, his eyes never breaking away. “What a silly question – of course I’ve seen a flower.”

“Then why are you staring so intently at it?”

“Because it’s mine.”

Woohyun thinks he feels an ice barrier, another one, shatter, and it makes him shudder as the ice explodes inside his chest. It’s the second time in a few minutes, the third time with Myungsoo it’s happened. He feels himself looking at Myungsoo, staring into the other’s childlike eyes. He wants to choke out a few words, to hug the other and say that he loves Myungsoo. The thought passes him and makes him pause. Does he? Does he love Kim Myungsoo?

Without a heart, can he still love Myungsoo?

“Heh, only kidding,” Myungsoo’s lips quirk into a smirk and Woohyun thinks about taking everything back when the other’s breath ghosts over his cheek. “It’s from you though.”

Myungsoo crosses his long legs again, holding the flowers in his hand. He looks up at the cloudless sky, murmuring, so softly Woohyun only just manages to catch it, “Sometimes things are special when they’re from the right person.”

And perhaps, just maybe, Woohyun thinks yes, yes they are.

He finds his time being slowly consumed by Myungsoo. Woohyun starts to spend days at a time being with Myungsoo, hours without breaks and morning coffee. He finds himself losing his life to his little psychotic patient, to a point where he’ll sacrifice the smell of nine am to watch the sky with a sixteen year old whose been labelled as crazy. He can’t admit it though (he’s forgotten how to) and suddenly when Myungsoo’s labelled as better, he’s given away to Dr Lee Sungyeol.

“He’s mine now,” Sungyeol teases, and Woohyun’s not sure how he feels. He excuses himself to the city lights and to evening parks, to warm orange walkways and polluted skies with no stars. He excuses himself to crowds and crowds of people, to couples, tourists and students. He loses himself and becomes one with the city once again. He does this and hopes that when he arrives back at the hospital, he doesn’t feel a thing.

He’s wrong though. Because between the bright shiny lights and fried street food, there’s a skinny boy who looks up at the stars and fails to find their beauty, a boy whose broke through Woohyun’s chains. Suddenly the world isn’t grey, the sky isn’t falling and what Woohyun wants to do, among rare things, is share the smell of spicy food with a boy who was under the consent of his parents.

But as Howon transfers Myungsoo’s files over to Sungyeol and asks Woohyun, “Do you have any objections?” Woohyun finds that his mouth can’t say what he really feels.

The next week returns back to normal, to what was previously Woohyun’s life prior to the entrance of Kim Myungsoo. This life starts at two in the morning, just as it always does, and involves dementia, Asperger’s and suicidal thoughts. It involves self-harm and children who want to be helped, people who don’t have enough time to ask about Woohyun’s day or whether the stars really do shine out for people. Thoughts of Myungsoo still linger though. Thoughts of him, annoyingly, do not disappear the way other patients do (Kim Myungsoo wasn’t like them, after all). It smells like winter. Cold, harsh winter with large scarves and no rooms called 307. (No boys named Kim Myungsoo.)

It seems like that for a moment, Woohyun realises that he could’ve said no when Sungyeol told him Myungsoo would now be under his care. He realises he could’ve asked to keep Kim Myungsoo because he thought he could be human around him, because he thought with Kim Myungsoo he could find his heart. Woohyun realises that what he’s been reminiscing over could have been easily fixed, that there was a solution and that this is not one of fate’s little games.

So at one in the morning he visits Kim Myungsoo and finds the dead body of Sungyeol.

This could’ve been prevented, Woohyun thinks, and no one looks more in control than Myungsoo as he stares back up at Woohyun.

“You’re back,” Myungsoo says flatly, and maybe if Woohyun had contained more of a heart, he would have prevented this too.

But Woohyun doesn’t, so he leaves.

He goes back to Room 307 though. It’s not like he didn’t expect it – he’s been Myungsoo’s psychiatrist for the longest, it’s only expected they’d call him back. He gets called back when they discover Sungyeol’s body, when people cling to the walls and avoid direct contact with the murderer, the boy with the body of a model and the heart of the dead. He walks into the room and smells fear, smells blood and distrust and sense that something, very serious and irreplaceable, has been lost. He enters the room while clicking the door shut behind him, while ushering out people til it’s only him and his ex-patient.

They sit in silence for a while.

“How did you kill him?” Woohyun speaks up. He fiddles with the identification hanging loosely off his neck, watching the unchained boy. He doesn’t feel fear anymore (he’s lost the ability to). He waits for the other, but the answer is abrupt.

“It just happened,” Myungsoo shrugs. “I don’t really know.”

“Okay then.”

He takes in the other’s appearance again, noticing this time what the other has hidden for so long. He notices bruising all around his body, slashes and cuts which have (will) take ages to fade away. He catches sight of the paleness of Myungsoo’s skin, the bone which sticks out from his shoulders. He sees the food which has been thrown into the bin, the bones which grate together when he moves.

“You didn’t eat,” Woohyun states. Myungsoo nods. “Why?”

“I had no appetite,” he replies simply.

“You had no appetite, or you wanted to destroy yourself again?”

Myungsoo ignores his question. His next words are cold. “We need a code for what’s inappropriate to ask. That’s why everyone else died, after all.”

“Did you kill Dr Lee because he asked the wrong question?”

“No, I killed Dr Lee because he didn’t know what I meant by no.”

“And what exactly did you mean by no?”

“No means that I don’t want to talk about it, that you shouldn’t go further – that you should stop.”

“Why?”

“Maybe you should be asking yourself your own question, Dr Nam.”

Woohyun sighs. He feels like he isn’t getting anywhere. He catches sight of the other’s cold eyes, the flat response which echo out of Myungsoo’s lifeless mouth. The distance he once felt when he first met Myungsoo has returned and increased. Clicking his pen, he asks, “What did you intend to get out of killing Dr Lee?”

Myungsoo doesn’t reply, and they share a silence before Woohyun finally asks, “What do you want?”

The question lingers there, just as Woohyun’s questions had lingered, days and memories before. The other’s voice is flat, cold, emotionless – as if he’s a robot, speaking what he does and nothing more.

“Maybe this is another question you should ask yourself. What do you want?”

His heart thumps fiercely as Woohyun finds himself losing another part of his ice barrier. And for once he thinks he has an answer, vague and quite mistakable but nevertheless present, and this answer involves Myungsoo and seeing Myungsoo. It involves wanting Myungsoo and hugging Myungsoo and waking up everyday and breathing him. It hurts; it hurts so much because Woohyun knows. Because Woohyun knows what he wants, and for once, he cannot say the truth.

He feels the mental distance – the one he found himself so close to exterminating – suddenly stretch further, and a label seems to have come on top of him. The label of ‘just another psychiatrist’, of being the same as the rest, he feels it being imprinted onto his forehead. And maybe it shouldn’t hurt (it usually doesn’t), but he finds himself wanting it to stop, for the label that Myungsoo’s given him to go away, and at this time, ironically, he finds that he has no voice.

Woohyun, someone paid for talking, has a loss of voice.

He realises it , knowing exactly what you want but having no way of saying it.

Two in the morning smells like Myungsoo. Two in the morning smells like stars which you can’t find pretty and skies which look boring when you stare. Two in the morning is timeless, a kind of inevitable, passing sort of time in which only the clock ticks and everything else is irrelevant. Two in the morning is distance, loneliness, unsaid words and regrets that will never leave. Two in the morning is bitter coffee which won’t ever taste sweet, no matter how many sugar cubes you dump in. Two in the morning, like every morning, starts with Howon.

“Morning Woohyun,” He says, placing the receiver down again. Unlike Dongwoo, Howon doesn’t take fools lightly. His eyes trace down to Woohyun’s right hand, grinning at the sight. “It’s nice to know you’ve finally picked up your heart.”

Woohyun follows his gaze, looking to his hand. He’s pretty sure he can see something purple and battered. Something small thumping against his right palm. He’s almost certain it’s his heart, beating and drumming against his body. And now that he sees it and feels the weight of it, he starts to realise he doesn’t really want a heart.

“Can I give it back?” He asks wryly, and Howon laughs as if it’s a joke. Woohyun bids Howon a good day and moves towards his next patient.

Woohyun’s only patient is the boy in Room 307.

“Morning,” Woohyun says, opening the door with his left hand since his heart occupies his right (it seems like having a heart has so many disadvantages). “How are you today?”

Myungsoo’s lips purse into a thin, fake smile. “Good.” He doesn’t ask about Woohyun’s day.

“That’s nice,” Woohyun replies. He struggles to sit down, his heart screwing with his coordination. He almost falls out of his seat, balancing his clipboard, loose sheets and pen all in one hand. Woohyun thinks that a heart is just troublesome. Not wonderful, just annoying.

“So,” he says, “are you ready to talk?”

The same flat words which repeat everyday escape from Myungsoo’s (perfect) lips. “Not anymore.”

Woohyun sighs, nodding understandingly. He lost Myungsoo the day he couldn’t give an answer. He lost Myungsoo the day he didn’t have a heart. He has a heart now, he wants to say, he has a newly found, battered, bruised heart, just for him. But he’s not sure Myungsoo wants it anymore. He’s not even sure he wants it.

“I see you picked up your heart,” Myungsoo observes coldly, “Can I see it?”

He takes the heart away without much effort, grabbing it as if it was his all along. It is his, Woohyun guesses. It’s been Myungsoo’s for a long time. Woohyun watches as his heart pumps in Myungsoo’s hand, looking over to the side. He’s seen a lot of hearts today, and they all seem to fall perfectly in everyone’s right hand. He stares at Myungsoo’s right palm.

Myungsoo has no heart. (Not anymore, at least.)

A/N:

this is a monster of a one-shot ok goodnight everyone bye