After avoiding the head nurse Austin, Sean and Moonlight came to the lounge. As dinner time approached, there were many people in the lounge, so they found a corner to sit down.
As soon as he sat down, Sean's eyes unconsciously fell on the big fish tank not far away.
There were only a few goldfish in the tub, belying its size, but Sean loved the tank. Its bottom is paved with gravel, and in addition to corals, there are also trendy and weird decorations - several buildings, and next to the buildings are people wearing heavy diving suits...
He murmured a word with a smile on his face. The divers at the bottom of the pool started to move before his eyes, so he blinked and withdrew his attention.
"Man, how was your day today - did you meet Phillips this morning?" Moonlight leaned back lazily.
Sean nodded: "Yes. He told me to stop writing for the time being, otherwise it would be detrimental to my recovery."
Yueguang sat up all of a sudden: "You are a slow writer, and you only wrote one chapter in two days! You can't just listen to that old guy and stop writing. I'm still waiting to see!"
Sean shrugged: "I haven't decided yet." He held the brown cover tightly. He always carries a notebook so he can jot down inspiration at any time. Life in the psychiatric hospital was not easy, and he was reluctant to give up writing.
Moonlight breathed a sigh of relief and leaned back again.
Sean turned his head and looked around. The nurses were far away. Then he turned back and lowered his voice and said to Moonlight: "Man, I have a strong feeling today."
Moonlight leaned over and narrowed her eyes: "What?"
Sean pointed at the brown book with his finger - he knew it was full of indigo writing, but it was far more than just some ink: "I feel like everything written on it really happened."
Moonlight blinked and frowned: "Have you taken your medicine today?"
It is definitely a great irony to be asked by a mental patient in a mental hospital whether he takes medicine.
Sean took a breath, and Moonlight quickly held his arm: "I'm joking, Sean. I believe in your feelings, please explain carefully."
A nurse passed by in a hurry. Sean cleared his throat and waited until she was far away before continuing: "Didn't I tell you that many of the things I wrote came from the dreams I had? Although I don't remember the dreams very much after I wake up. The specific content is given, but I will complete it based on my own imagination and guesswork..."
Sean waved to the moonlight, and the heads of two patients in Arkham Psychiatric Asylum came closer. Sean said: "Literally, I think everything that happened in the dream was probably real."
Moonlight narrowed her eyes. Sean read his look. Maybe in this world, if he had just told those words to anyone, the other person would look suspicious, but Yueguang did not. He listened very seriously.
"Why do you think so?"
"That's it, Moonlight..." There were no nurses or other patients around him, but Sean just wanted to lower his voice and say this, as if he was afraid of being overheard by something invisible, "We have all had dreams, and dreams are Constantly changing: You clearly dreamed that you walked into a house, but in the blink of an eye you arrived at a river. Is this the case?
"But those dreams are not. Those dreams are always regular and logical - I'm not saying that the existence of evil gods and masked people is logical. I mean, uh..." Sean scratched his forehead, " I mean it's always coherent! It has its own rules, it doesn't jump around, it keeps changing like a real dream...
"And those things are obviously beyond my imagination..." Sean lowered his head and glanced at the brown notebook, "I don't think they were made up by my mind. I just saw them and then wrote these stories based on my dreams. …”
"But you said..." Moonlight pointed to the fish tank in the distance, "A lot of the content in the story is based on your imagination based on the things around you. For example, the inspiration for Ocean City came from this fish tank - so how can you talk about those dreams? Isn’t it your fiction?”
Sean frowned: "This is the strangest thing. It's hard for me to explain. I can't tell whether the things I wrote affected the dream, or whether the things in the dream appeared here, and then I adapted the story based on them." Complete the details..."
Moonlight was silent for a while, staring into Sean's eyes: "Are you sure you really feel this way?"
Sean nodded affirmatively.
Moonlight exhaled and said: "You mean, you think your dream is a window through which you see the world, and you think that world...is real?"
Sean nodded excitedly—if anyone in the world could understand him, it was probably this crazy pianist.
In the distance, a pair of patients who had no vision and liked to chat with them came over with a smile. Yueguang obviously wanted to continue this topic and lowered his voice and said: "Come on, let's go 'over there' and continue talking."
The two quickly stood up and walked out of the lounge.
Avoiding the nurse, she walked to a closed door on the fifth floor. Moonlight gently took out a copper key from the window sill and opened the door to the rooftop. It was left there by the hospital electrician. One time he opened the door and was seen by the moonlight. From then on, the rooftop became their secret place.
Gently closing the rooftop door behind you, Moonlight took a deep breath facing the vast sky.
"Hello, Olivia." He turned to say hello to a weather-faded clothing mannequin placed on the rooftop. She has rare short white hair.
Like all previous symbols, Sean is not sure whether it was this model that gave him the inspiration for the character "Olivia Windchime", or whether Olivia's existence is reflected in this poor model in this world...
There is a green barbed wire fence on the edge of the rooftop to prevent patients from jumping off the building. This inexplicably reminds Sean of his time in the college. The two of them stood by the barbed wire fence, looking at the city going through dusk.
The spire of the Empire State Building points straight into the sky, like a landmark pointing into infinity. Shining blood flows through Manhattan's well-organized veins. There is the hustle and bustle of cars on the Brooklyn Bridge, and the wind blows across Long Island... The city seems more lively and charming at night than during the day. However, in the eyes of Sean and Sean, everything in this world is crawling on the ground - there is no let-down here. The spiritual hook that makes people fly into the sky does not exist in Undercurrent Street, let alone the Explorer Center located in Silent Street...
There are only Valium-eating stockbrokers, yawning dentists, and tens of thousands of divorce lawsuits.
This world... Sean blinked... Mystery is dangerous, but without it, this world seems to be missing salt.
Looking at the faded city in front of him and thinking about the strange things in his dream, Sean felt like he had been severely deceived. He grasped the barbed wire tightly and looked at everything in front of him in confusion.
Moonlight suddenly sighed beside him: "Sean, if what you wrote is true..." He turned his face, although with a smile, there was melancholy in his eyes, "I really want to see that world. .”
The evening breeze blew, and the two people standing on the rooftop seemed abandoned by the city in the distance.
At this moment, the green moon rises in the sky as usual.
