"What I want you to do is very simple. If a doctor or nurse comes to check the ward after I leave, you just need to pretend to be sleeping." Zuo Han didn't have any hope for Chen Ge: "You don't need to do more.
Say anything, no matter what he asks you, just say you don't know."
"It's that simple?"
"Well, when I come back, remember to open the door for me." Zuo Han lay on the hospital bed and stopped talking to Chen Ge.
Ten minutes later, Zuo Han glanced at Chen Ge, then stood up and walked to the door of the ward.
He quietly opened the door a crack, and when he saw that there was no one in the corridor, he slipped out.
"This man is suspicious, and his symptoms are indeed very similar to persecutory delusion." Chen Ge sat up from the bed: "Should I help him?"
Without having to think hard, Chen Ge had already sensed that Zuo Han's departure tonight was not as simple as checking out the hospital. It was also a test for him.
He didn't trust Zuo Han, and Zuo Han didn't completely trust him. In the eyes of patients with persecutory delusion, the entire world is dangerous and potential enemies.
Maintaining his original posture, Chen Ge sat by the bed for more than ten minutes, but Zuo Han still didn't come back.
He looked at the door that was ajar, dragged his plastered leg, and slowly walked to the door of the ward.
Opening the door, Chen Ge looked outside. The corridor of the hospital was not completely dark. There were lights on at the corners of the corridor and at the nurse's station.
"It's completely different from the hospital in my impression. Could it be that that gloomy and dark midnight hospital was really a figment of my imagination?"
Chen Ge can now master a certain degree of control. He will not think deeply about any problem. As long as the memory of the past is not stimulated, the pain as if it is being torn apart will not be felt in his brain.
"When I think about what happened during the day, I don't feel a headache, but when I try to think about what happened before I fell into coma, the pain comes suddenly, which is weird in itself."
"What do these memories mean to me? Why do I feel pain just thinking about them?"
After taking a large dose of medicine, his body was extremely weak and he was still suffering from pain. However, under such circumstances, Chen Ge still maintained his ability to think independently.
"To a certain extent, Zuo Han and I are similar. He feels that everyone in the world is harming him, and I feel that everyone in the world is lying to me. Are we really sick?"
The symptoms are so similar to those of a mental patient, which indirectly indicates that he may also be a mental patient.
"Being able to realize that I may be sick means that I still have a sense of illness, and my self-awareness has not weakened... self-awareness?" The three words that popped up inexplicably in his mind made Chen Ge stunned for a moment: "Self-knowledge"
Why am I so familiar with the three words "intelligence"? This thing seems to be extremely important to me. I need self-awareness and something with self-awareness!"
Pain hit him like a tide, and Chen Ge seemed to be touched by his previous memories again. Countless memory fragments collided together in his mind, and he almost fainted from the pain.
Chen Ge grabbed the bedrail with both hands and gritted his teeth.
Blood was already flowing from his teeth, but he still didn't make any sound.
"Why am I so impressed by the word self-awareness?!"
His consciousness began to blur. If Chen Ge continued to think, he would not only have a headache, he might faint directly.
Taking a deep breath, Chen Ge tried his best to calm down. He followed the breathing method taught by Dr. Gao and tried it several times. The pain in his brain finally eased.
In just a few minutes, Chen Ge's back was already wet with cold sweat, and his body became even weaker.
"If I faint, will another me appear? Will I be able to talk to him?"
When Chen Ge was about to go back to his hospital bed, footsteps suddenly sounded in the corridor.
"Zuo Han made no sound when he walked. It must be the nurse who came over."
Chen Ge still remembered Zuo Han's words. He lay down on the hospital bed and started pretending to sleep. After about ten seconds, the footsteps stopped at the door of the ward.
Narrowing his eyes, Chen Ge stared at the door. He was not nervous, nor did he feel any uneasiness. Only then did he realize that his mental quality was ridiculously good.
"Bang."
Someone knocked lightly on the door, followed by footsteps, and the person outside the door left.
"What do you mean? Come here at three or four in the morning, knock on the door, and then leave? Is this a prank by the nurse?"
No one outside the door came in, and this became the most confusing point for Chen Ge: "Who knocked on the door? The nurse? Zuo Han? The doctor? Or other patients in the hospital?"
After a while, the ward door was pushed open, and Zuo Leng walked in with a stern face.
"went well?"
"This hospital is very big. It is a general hospital. The third ward where we are located is only a very small part of it." Zuo Han walked to Chen Ge's bedside and stretched out his hand to make a gesture: "If you compare the hospital to a pillow, we probably
Right in this corner."
"Are you confident to escape?" Chen Ge was more concerned about this. The inexplicable knock on the door just now gave him a sense of urgency. It seemed that if he stayed here for a long time, something worse would happen.
.
"No." Zuo Han's answer was very straightforward: "There are surveillance cameras installed at the entrance of the corridor. Our building is under 24-hour care by three caregivers and two nurses. The door leaving the hospital is also locked, and I don't know who has the key.
on the body."
"Key?" Mentioning the key, a flash of lightning seemed to flash across Chen Ge's mind. He was like a drowning man suddenly grabbing a straw: "I need a key!"
"Yes, without the key, we can't escape at all." Zuo Han felt that Chen Ge's tone was strange, so he did not continue to communicate with Chen Ge and returned to his hospital bed.
"Aren't you going to sleep?" Chen Ge found that Zuo Han was still wearing clothes and shoes, lying sideways on the bed, with no intention of sleeping at all.
"I don't want to die in my sleep." Zuo Han closed his eyes and hid one hand in his arms, as if something was hidden in his palm.
Knife? It doesn't look like it. It should be some kind of sharp thing. Did he get it from outside?
According to the doctor, Zuo Han was a patient suffering from severe persecutory delusions. It was scary to think about such a dangerous guy holding an unknown object in the same ward as him.
Reason told Chen Ge that he should be afraid, but to be honest, there was no disturbance in his heart.
After changing into a comfortable position, Chen Ge closed his eyes and fell asleep.
…
The door opened, and Chen Ge slowly opened his eyes. The morning light outside the window shone on him, and he stretched out comfortably.
"This kind of life is pretty good. As long as I don't think about those bad memories, I look like a normal person."
Chen Ge turned his head and Zuo Han was still lying on the bed. He didn't seem to fall asleep until dawn.
"It seems that you had a good rest last night." Dr. Gao stood at the door. He did not go to see Zuo Han, but went directly to Chen Ge's bedside: "Did you have any nightmares last night?"
"No." Chen Ge shook his head. The face of Dr. Gao in his mind overlapped with the face of Dr. Gao in reality. Perhaps because he had seen it too much, the two conflicting memories started to merge.
There seemed to be a force in his mind that was slowly changing his understanding, allowing him to see reality clearly, and helping him get rid of the pain.
"This shows that my treatment is still effective." Dr. Gao was very pleased: "I won't let Xu Wan continue to deliver food to you today. You have been in the ward for a long time. It's time to go out and walk around. This is important to you."
Rehabilitation helps a lot.”
"Go out for a walk? Can I go to that paradise?" Chen Ge immediately became energetic.
Dr. Gao laughed dumbly: "Do you want to see the female owner of the haunted house? I'm afraid that won't work. You can only move around in the hospital for the time being."
"All right."
"I'll get you an armpit crutch, wait a moment."
After Dr. Gao went out, Zuo Han, who had been in a coma, suddenly woke up. He made a gesture towards Chen Ge and whispered: "Don't believe his nonsense."
"Why aren't you asleep yet?"
Zuo Han didn't speak anymore and remained motionless, as if he was still asleep.
A few minutes later, Dr. Gao returned to the ward with an armpit crutch. He helped Chen Ge up and the two of them walked out together. During the whole process, Dr. Gao did not say a word to Zuo Han.
I don’t know if Dr. Gao is worried about disturbing Zuo Han’s sleep, or if there are other reasons.
After breakfast, Chen Ge and Dr. Gao went to the garden outside the ward.
Because we missed the flowering season, there weren't many flowers in the garden, but it still felt very comfortable to stay here.
The wind blew through the treetops and blew on my face, like a pair of gentle hands.
The sunlight falls on the ground through the gaps in the leaves, like a swimming goldfish. The grass and trees on both sides of the road are neatly trimmed, like a calm and beautiful green lake.
"Have I not left the ward for a long time?" Chen Ge leaned on his armpit crutches and moved his body little by little.
"Why do you say that?"
"I haven't experienced this feeling of relaxation for a long time." Chen Ge touched the tree next to him and found a quiet place with few people to sit down.
"It's not that you haven't experienced it before. You're just trapped in a light-tight room and have forgotten that feeling." Dr. Gao sat next to Chen Ge. He seemed to enjoy chatting with Chen Ge.
"A light-tight room?"
"This opaque room is your heart. You have locked yourself in your heart with the key. All I can do is find a way to get you out of that room." Dr. Gao looked at the sky, wondering what he was thinking.
something.
"As long as I can come out of this room, my illness will be cured?" Chen Ge asked seriously.
Dr. Gao shook his head: "Mental illness is different from psychological problems. Mental illness cannot correct itself. It requires medication to treat you and get you out of the house in your heart. This is only the first step."
"Then how can I be completely cured of my disease? In fact, I feel that I am no different from a normal person now." Chen Ge leaned against a tree with his eyes slightly blank.
"You didn't realize that you were sick, which means you are still far from recovery. The awareness and insight of the disease are also the basis for us to judge the severity of a patient's condition." Dr. Gao and Chen Ge started chatting.
"Self-knowledge? What is that?" Chen Ge grabbed the edge of the wooden chair with his hand and lowered his head, as if to prevent others from seeing his expression at this time.
"Insight is the patient's ability to understand his own mental state. It depends on whether he can judge whether his mental state is normal. In your current situation, you obviously have no self-awareness at all."
"But I still feel like I'm no different from normal people, I just get headaches occasionally." Chen Ge raised his head again, covering his head as if he had just had another headache.
Dr. Gao did not refute Chen Ge. He pointed at a man talking to himself next to the pavilion in the distance.
The man was in his early thirties, wearing a hospital gown. He stood under the sun, talking to himself in the pavilion where the sun could not be found.
This person Chen Ge also felt familiar, but he couldn't remember his name for a while.
"His name is Zhang Jingjiu. He once lived in the same ward with you, but later we found that his condition continued to worsen after living with you, so we moved him to another ward."
"Zhang toasts?"
"Well, he is the son of the owner of a winery in Xinhai. He is young and had a great future. Unfortunately, he has a mental problem."
"What's wrong with him?" Chen Ge's expression changed when he heard the name Zhang Jingjiu.
"Undifferentiated schizophrenia." Dr. Gao stared at Zhang Jingjiu, watching his every move: "This patient always feels that he can see ghosts."
"ghost?"
"How can there be ghosts in the world? In fact, we tested his senses and found that his five senses are completely different from ordinary people." Dr. Gao said casually: "He can't concentrate and always feels like someone is talking around him, even if
It's the same in a room where he's the only one. And his brain has problems processing sounds. Let me give you a simple example. After a normal person hears a sentence, his brain will think about the expression.
The meaning, and he heard each word, and all the sentences were fragmented in his mind."
While Dr. Gao was talking to Chen Ge, the patient named Zhang Jingjiu turned his head and saw this. His eyes suddenly opened wide and he rushed over quickly.
When neither Dr. Gao nor Chen Ge reacted, Zhang Jingjiu grabbed Chen Ge's hand and tried to pull him up from the seat, but he ignored Chen Ge's injured leg. The end result was that Chen Ge was
He was dragged to the ground.
There was no sign, and Chen Ge didn't react.
"Nurse! Someone come!"
Doctor Gao and a patrolling nurse dragged Zhang Jingjiu aside. As he was being dragged away, he kept shouting at Chen Ge - ghost, ghost, ghost!
"Are you okay?" Doctor Gao helped Chen Ge up.
"It's okay, it's okay." Chen Ge sat on the bench again. He felt a little strange. From Zhang Jingjiu's last tone, he could tell that he was afraid of ghosts. Since he was afraid of ghosts, why would he take the initiative to drag him up?
?
After dragging himself, he yelled at himself: ghost, ghost, ghost...
Chen Ge lowered his head and beat his clothes to get dusty, and his eyes met Doctor Gao's.
"He should be reminding me that there is a ghost around me. He thinks Dr. Gao is a ghost."