“Can you still hear those voices right now?” The sudden transition between her past and her present was intentional; it forces her to be more aware of what she is feeling in the moment, so she will tell the truth. "Strangely... no. I don't." “When you told me about your university, was it a happy memory or a sad one?” "Happy. I was thinking about my friend who helped me survive through it, so it was happy." “Are you still friends with her?” “Yes.” “Did she ever notice anything different about you?” "No. I kept telling her there was something wrong with me, but she just said it was all in my head." “Did you feel disheartened after hearing that?” "Slightly, when she first told me. But later, I just kept thinking that maybe she was right—maybe it actually was just in my head." “Do you still think that?” "All the time. But the feeling that something is wrong with me surpasses it." "What about your daily routine? How are you coping with that?" "Honestly, it was going fine, but then I just started forgetting things. Sometimes I'll get up to clean my desk, but then I realize my bookshelf needs cleaning too. While I'm cleaning that, I notice my bedsheet is crumpled. In the end, I finish cleaning the whole house, but the desk I initially started on remains dirty." She laughed at herself. “What are your sleep hours?” I asked. "Seriously? You're asking about my sleep hours? I feel like you're worse than the others. Did they joke with me when they recommended you?" I just sat there, blankly. She was showing a sudden outburst of emotion—a clear sign of anxiety. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said that," she muttered. "About five hours, hardly. I haven't been accustomed to sleeping since I started university." I didn't ask anything. Her face showed she was ready to tell her whole story; she was beginning to realize where the issue originated. Any question from me could taint that, so I stayed silent. Ten minutes died between us. She was as still as a void, no sound escaping. She was just stuck there, sitting in front of me. "Actually, Doctor... the problem isn't those voices. It's me." I sat perfectly still. "I am the one who let those voices take control of me. I haven't been normal for a long time. I wake up with a drowsiness, not wanting to do anything, and I spend my whole day just thinking, and thinking, and thinking. Sometimes I thought so much that I just wanted to end my life then and there_but then I became conscious of the aftereffects. How would people find my body? How would they be broken, disheartened, and blame themselves for what I did? I didn't want that. But once it became too much to bear. Now, I feel like that was a bad choice, too." I sat there as if I weren't even in the room.
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