Inside The Devil | M.yg × P.jm✓

II

Late at night, after he got out of work, Dr. Park immediately went to the bathroom. Turned up his collar and jumped in the shower. With her mother's voice coming after his back and pestiferous questions spilling nonstop from her mouth that he still had to shout to shut her up. Dr. Park was frustrated, he was tired and the event that occurred on that day still left him miserable. He could still not delineate what it was.

He spent nights researching the creature that he saw. He had reached the last website but neither did it give an answer to his question. When he heard noises or even just a drop of the can, he would come running to the door, panicking and checking what it was. He's slowly turning crazy and that is something he doesn't notice nor does he have the ability to think of it for now.

At weekends, when he has the time — he would sneak to the library, picking every one and each book consisting of Urban Legends, Supernaturals, and Tales of Satan, expecting to see the name of the creature that had shown itself to him. He was certain only books could give him an answer to that. When he dropped the heap of books on the counter, the librarian would give him a look, raising her eyebrow whilst she chewed with her gum like an old dappled cow chewing its cud — but Dr. Park could be careless. Whenever he walked down through his neighbors, they always gave the same look the cat would look at the pig. Dr. Park was irked by their inquisitive eyes that followed him in the butt—he could scarcely retrain himself to snap at them and turn their heads away or bug their eyes out.

At night, he would stay in the Cellar, sitting on the cold dusty mucky floor with the book open on his left and a dying kerosene lamp. The small yellow flare that is nearly gutter serves the eye from the shadow, and there, he would read until dawn. His mother thought that he was asleep—but Dr. Park is pouring tears on the clean pages.

He can't sleep. Whenever he closed his eyes, the creature would always appear in his dream.

In his dream, he would wake up at 2:57 am with a freezing breeze covering his entire body, as if someone was rubbing their hand on him and he was paralyzed. He just lies there, staring at the ceiling immovable and still. After some minutes of just listening around his surroundings—abruptly, the gaunt face of the woman would leap at his vision, and her terrible laughter ringing in his ears. She towered over him and choked him, laughing maniacally until he had a black substance leaking from his mouth. For this reason, Dr. Park was afraid to sleep or even when he just closed his eyes.

The figure that stood within the corner of his room seems to watch him when he lies on his bed. Those glowing eyes were piercing through him, and just as he was drifting off to sleep — he could hear a strange whispering sound just close in his head and hot breath as if someone was blowing air to his ear. Those reasons kept him sleepless at night, and to form a pair of black circles under his eyes when the first spark of the sun showed. Then he staggers down the street to his work like a walking dead, looking like Erik in the movie 'The Phantom of the Opera'. The effects of termination are fairly shown in his face. 

Those people that he happens to meet in the street tell him he could nearly become Erik's twin and that he looks like a person that just had his blood all squeezed out—to which Dr. Park would just laugh at them, not in amusement, but a sarcastic one.

His colleagues noticed the strange behavior of the psychologist. One would try to ask him what the matter was but Dr. Park refused to answer. Mrs. Park also began to worry about her son, but Dr. Park just won't respond whenever his mother tries to ask if something is bothering him— he insists that he's fine and not to worry. Though she's a mother, and even if Dr. Park claims everything's alright, she knew that something is not right.

He seeks explanations but the logic just seems to lay around. Playing with his mind—but overall, Dr. Park is still smart. Those phobias, images, voices, they clustered in one frame, protruding through a golden border like a tuft of hair, and he stood there, scrutinizing each strand. He won't stop unless he gets the answer and he's satisfied with it, even if he had to walk through the smoldering coal of hell.