Chapter 20 Chapter 20 Once

I thirsty.It's warm in the office, and I think that's why my mouth is dry.Watching Dr. Peterson take another sip of his expensive soda brought my discomfort to a head.I didn't ask him for a drink.I swallowed, hoping the drool would return to my parched mouth.But that doesn't mean I want to talk. Now is the break time.Not my idea and I have no objection.You could tell by the look on Dr. Peterson's face that he didn't like to rest either.I can only guess that the break was necessary, that after all this time, I had to be given a chance to breathe, or to reflect.But I couldn't leave the room, and he didn't mention refreshments.

Dr. Peterson glanced at the expensive Rolex on his wrist, the hairs on his arms gray with age, and I realized it was time for a break.He continued to look at my record, but didn't look at it seriously.Maybe he was just counting down the time in his head.His gaze fell on the paper, but his eyeballs remained motionless. Finally—but still too soon—he sighed, pushed my file away, looked at me, and gave me a pleasant smile.I couldn't help but wonder if he hated me as much as I hated him, if that smile was forced on him, if what he really wanted to do was blow his beard and stare at me.No - I'm pretty sure he enjoyed our meeting time.I was like a Rubik's cube to him, a puzzle he knew the answer to, but he couldn't stop playing with it.Because the real challenge was how to solve it, how to bend the little color block to his will.

I've never solved a Rubik's Cube.The most I can do is get a row of yellows, or four little red squares to form a neat square, and then I'm stuck, unable to make any progress no matter how hard I turn.I would start getting bored and give up.Unfortunately, Dr. Peterson seems to be more stubborn than I am, at least in this respect. He opened his mouth to speak, and I wonder what we're going to say now. "Are you religious, Heather?" Does it matter?I blinked and blinked without showing the slightest expression, waiting for him to continue asking questions.Dr. Peterson said nothing, just looked at me, obviously waiting for an answer.How long will this go on if I don't say anything?

Probably it will be a long time, and I got this realization after a minute.It's embarrassing to sit here without saying a word.The breathing of the guards is loud in the background.It's actually very annoying.Did he do it on purpose, so that I wouldn't forget his existence?Now, I try to be in tune with his breathing, it's harder to ignore it after all.I wish there was something else over the sound of his breathing.Anything, even if it means I have to talk.Besides, that's just an innocuous question.Even if I answer him, I will have nothing to lose. "I don't believe it." I said softly.

"Do you believe in God?" I don't see any difference between this and his first question, but I answered it anyway. "Do not believe." "Then do you believe in an afterlife?" I narrowed my eyes slightly, still trying to figure out the intention of his question.I think I guessed it... "Everyone wants to believe in an afterlife," I told him. "They want to believe that death is not the end." "how about you?" "I don't know." I made my voice sound curt on purpose.Because I thought I might see what he was trying to say, and I wanted to cut the subject right away.

"Ah," he said, as if he'd never heard me say that.Then, he said, "That's the problem, isn't it? Unknown." I smile.I got it right.However, the smile didn't last long.I don't even want to talk about the theory that Peterson wants me to believe over and over again.It's not that I have a lot of topics I'd like to talk to Dr. Peterson about, the only thing I'd like to talk to him about is to let me go, and I'm pretty sure we won't be talking about that anytime soon. However, the guard was still breathing, slowly, loudly, without interruption.

"No one knows," I said, trying to sound contemptuous as if it should have been obvious. Peterson smiled. "That's why you're so obsessed with it? Death makes you swoon?" "I'm not fascinated by death," I replied.This is the truth. "No, you're right." He agreed.I blinked in surprise that Peterson agreed with me, but he didn't finish. "It's not death, right? Dying is what you're obsessed with. Those precious moments where you can watch life slip by. You wonder where it's going to go." This man is probably crazy.

I pursed my lips tightly, intending to close my ears too.Just to drown out the sound of breathing, I hit my knees loudly with my good hands.Peterson must have thought that meant he had me, and I had to grudgingly accept that. "Heather?" dying, dying.There was nothing fascinating about it, but it was utterly terrifying.Inexplicable.unexplored.Mysterious.No one knows what that final journey was like, unless you walked that road yourself, and at that time, you can never go back and tell others what you encountered along the way. The road went down so deep that that's why we were all so afraid of the dark.Because there is nothing more terrifying than not knowing what's going on there.

But I will not try to explain this to Dr. Peterson.I don't care how long he waits, how loud the bloody guard's breathing is.I bit my tongue with my teeth, biting so hard that my tongue hurt. Maybe Dr. Peterson read my determination in my face, because he quickly moved on to the next question on his little list. "Do you believe in ghosts, Heather? Devils, creatures from another world?" I bit my tongue harder.I must have bitten my tongue and bled, because a metallic taste that was both familiar and unfamiliar suddenly appeared in my mouth. Dr. Peterson brought up the topic whenever he wanted me to respond.If I had been able to think rationally, I would have been amazed that he had waited so long in this interview before he did this to me.But I don't.I can't think at all.I put all my energy into keeping myself here.Stay in this room, stay in this moment.This topic should be very interesting, after all, I never believed in this before, but I didn't laugh.

Because I do believe it.I believe in ghosts, devils, whatever you want to call them.Those creatures shouldn't exist in this world, but they do, and they don't have to obey the rules we do.You can't defeat them, you can't kill them.I do believe they exist. The druids once appease these ghouls with grisly sacrifices, knowing full well what they were doing.They know that if the devil's desire is hard to satisfy, the world will experience catastrophe. I know that too.