She watches her colleagues getting excited about their vacation, which was due in 3 weeks. Her vacation got canceled, and she is definitely sad about it, but their happy faces didn't make her jealous. How can she get jealous when she got the best early Christmas gift ever? To be precise, it's more like a bribe than a gift, but whatever.
A bright smile appears on her face when she remembers the scenes from the CEO's office as she travels back in her memories.
"He is a VIP client. Even though he left South Korea and the K-pop industry, he is still a celebrity and has an influence."
Her CEO, Mrs. Amanda, tries to make her understand the depth of this problem. Just 10 minutes has passed since she started persuading her, but she got no luck in her hands. No surprise there, Vanika is really stubborn.
"That doesn't mean that you will cancel my vacation."
She has no problem with treating that tornado man, whose name she later came to know, is Ivaan Lee. It is her duty to help the patient no matter what it takes. This profession isn't just a profession for her, it's something which she loves to do. The only problem here is the cancellation of her vacation.
"He is a celebrity and-"
'And here it comes.' She thought in her mind.
So what if he is a celebrity? That doesn't mean she has to start treating him like a god. No matter what a patient's profession is, a patient is a patient and no patient should be treated differently. According to her, it should be on the basis of what problem they have, instead of this segregation based on money.
"No discrimination in treatment, Mrs. Amanda."
Amanda sighed helplessly. If she wants to, she can threaten her with her job, but no, that was against her work ethics. Even though Amanda is at a very high position, she never lets other workers feel inferior to her. She always strives to create a positive and peaceful workplace for the workers working here. And to her satisfaction, all the workers respect her.
"See Vanika, I know you don't care about what profession he has, and I don't want to change your opinion in that case. But I want you to treat him." She paused for a second to see Vanika's expressions before speaking again.
"I obviously can't force you to do that if you don't want to because. As the Head of Psychiatry Department, I have to respect your decision, but also to respect that same title, I have to do everything possible for the betterment of this place too...."
As the head, she is doing a very good job of handling this department and if a celebrity comes here for whatever reason it is, obviously the media will catch a whiff of it, benefiting the hospital in many ways.
Grace Hospitals and Medical College, one of the top hospital chains, research center and medical college in the entire country, as well as in the world. There are various different hospitals of the same franchisee for different healthcare problems, like, Grace Psychiatrist Hospital, Grace Cardiology Hospital, etc. Employees working in these hospitals get free health check-up and free consultancy on health related issues, with few exceptions, obviously.
In short, it has the best facilities for the public and also for the employees. But for a few years, Norris Health Care Group has been taking over popularity with the help of social media marketing, because what is seen is sold.
Due to this, their hospital is going through major funding problems as many of their trustees and donors are losing faith in them.
"Okay let's keep the enhancement of the hospital aside as it's Ivaan's personal choice to make. Mr and Mrs. Lee do not want the best psychiatrist to help their kid, but someone who knows how to deal with emotional scars. They want someone who can help him to open up about his feelings because everyone he is close with has tried to help him, but no luck.
So, when they asked me to suggest a psychiatrist's name, your name was the first one to invade my mind. I agree that Sharon is currently the best psychiatrist we have in the hospital, but she is a practical person. Moreover, his parents told me about his psychiatrist back in South Korea, and that she had the same personality as Sharon. It's no rocket science that it didn't work out with her.
Trust me when I say this, you are the most compatible with him. So that's why I want you to treat him."
Vanika understands why Amanda wants her to do this job, but she is also sure that Anvish and Lee couple were also behind this. She quickly goes into her thoughtland.
'As Amanda said before that it is not rocket science. Sudden dinner without prior notifying. Yesterday, me and Anvish had a conversation about the very same thing. Tarika quietly listening to them but saying nothing in my defense when she usually scolds Anvish when he is making decisions for me. These are all the indicators of them working behind the scenes.'
".... So can we talk about why you aren't willing to treat him or if you are willing too, what's stopping you...?"
Vanika, at this point is tried.
"Mrs. Amanda, I am willing to treat torna — I mean Mr. Lee. I am ready to treat him but-"
"But what?"
She lets Mrs. Amanda cut her words as she takes a deep breath to calm her nerves down. She has never ever been this nervous while talking to Mrs. Amanda. She always been the sweetest woman, but today is a completely different story.
She was confident earlier as she didn't want to lose her one-and-only yearly long vacation, but now her facial expressions had a different story to tell.
"But the problem is the cancellation of my only vacatio-"
"Oh my goodness!! Vanikaa!!"
Vanika looks at her as the nervousness fills her eyes at the thought of how she embarrassed herself in front of such a high-positioned person, but soon she sighs in relief when she hears her next sentence.
"How come I forgot that and didn't consider that a problem when I started thinking about why were you denying it? Christmas vacations are very important, especially for you, who only gets to visit her home country at this time."
From the time Vanika joined, she always considered herself lucky to have such an understanding boss, but today, she felt as if she was the happiest person ever alive on this planet. Her happiness today was on the next level.
"I have heard that you are a Pluviophile, is it true...?"
Amanda moves a little closer to her with her hands firmly resting on the desk for support purposes. Subconsciously, Vanika also moves ahead, reciprocating her actions. After she nods and answers with a 'Yes', she low-key knows what Amanda is going to say next.
"You can call it a bribe or whatever you want to, but I have a superb deal for you. What if I give you a one-month paid holiday on the dates you want?"
The way her eyes twinkled when Amanda said that, people might have mistaken the sparkle as the brightest star of the solar system if it was dark.
"That sounds unbelievable."
Amanda got her. Even though Vanika hadn't verbally said yes, her face has made her answer very clear. Who can say no to a paid holiday?
Vanika smiled widely while nodding and accepting her CEO's bribe before going towards her office as it was almost lunchtime now. As today is Saturday, which means her shift will end after lunch. Usually, on Saturdays, when lunchtime starts, she goes directly to the house to eat lunch, but today she stopped at the cafeteria to get herself a coffee before leaving.
'Not all bribes are bad', she concluded, at the end of her half-day in the hospital before smiling at her overjoyed colleagues and driving away.
She was very happy, but she didn't know that, apart from happiness, today she would be getting a great surprise as well.
......…
'If your future dreams don't scare you away, then they aren't big enough to make you feel satisfied.'
Whenever he and his parents used to visit his grandparents' house, this quote, which used to be beautifully imprinted on a wooden scrap, always got his attention, the moment they entered the house.
Perfectly hanging in the middle of the wall while the words always gave him the enthusiasm.
That's what his grandpa's goal was. He was the one who made that beautiful hanging wooden scrap, all by himself. That was his teaching for his grandchild. His grandpa always told him to chase his dreams fearlessly, whereas the little Ivaan used to always nod and promise him that no matter what happens in the future, he would never give up on his dreams.
But what little Ivaan and his grandpa didn't know was that, in the future, those big dreams will turn into a monster and eat up his happiness.
Because of him chasing his dreams, the boy lost his childhood and teenage years. When he should have carelessly and recklessly spent his teenage years making impulsive decisions, he left his home country and traveled to the other side of the world with no one on his side, for his dreams to come true. When he should have been playing on the ground with his friends, he was holding a mic and performing in front of thousands of fans. When he should have written an exam without even studying for it, he was trying to hold the expectations of thousands and millions of people who were always ready to plunge into him if he made the slightest mistake.
Even though he didn't regret chasing his dreams, that doesn't mean he did not miss those memories, which passed away quickly as a breeze.
Ivaan looks angrily at his parents, which soon turns into frustration when they are not even one percent affected by his angry eyes.
He wants to stomp away and throw tantrums, but he can't. He is an adult now, he can't act like a child. He has to man-up and act like a mature person.
But when the silence prevails and none of the party has talked for the last one hour, he stomps away instead of talking to his parents like a 25-year-old man does.
He is not angry because he does not agree with them. Yes, he agrees with them that he is mentally ill because of his instability in the emotional department, which needs to quickly receive treatment before he completely turns to a mad person. But him agreeing with them, doesn't give them the right to rule life in whichever way they want.
His professional life as well as his personal life are going deep down the drain, and he is happy that his parents are supportive.
"But without my consent, how can they literally order Mrs. Amanda to cancel the only long vacation Anvish's sister has?"
Okay, his father didn't contact Mrs. Amanda directly to make her cancel her vacation, but he overheard his father talking to one of his old friends, who is also one of the board directors of Grace Hospitals and Medical College. He was telling him about Ivaan's condition and immediately after that, he causally mentioned how coincidental it was that his neighbor's sister was working as a psychiatrist in Grace. No one is stupid enough to believe from his tone that he causally happened to remember her.
And then the rest is history.
He is embarrassed to death because of his father's antics. But as a good child he was taught to be from his childhood, he kept quiet even when he wasn't a big fan of being an obedient child anymore. He couldn't take a stand for himself and that made him hate his own self even more than he already was.
His breath hitches when he sees the reason for the anger towards his parents walking towards him. Actually towards her apartment if he has to be precise. His anger soon vaporizes when their eyes meet and when she sweetly smiles at him.
For a second, his brain stops processing what was happening at that moment. Cynical thoughts starts rushing into his mind. Why isn't she angry with him when she missed her only long vacation because of him? And God knows what—what negative thoughts invaded the poor man's mind, but they all vanished when, instead of directly walking inside her apartment, she spoke to him.
"Hey," she merrily said with happiness dancing all over her face. It is pure happiness. He knows because every day he tries to capture but in the end, he always returns with sadness in his hands.
Without even thinking twice, he asks her something. Something which he had been thinking about for a very long time. It just suddenly slipped from his mind and ran towards his tongue, making the words overflow itself.
His words and his emotions were heavy. He didn't know what made him spill this question. But now that it is already happened, he is expecting a brilliant answer from the psychiatrist, who is soon going to treat him.
"Hey. Can a monster achieve happiness in his life...?"
The happy smile on her face, fell down as she was stunned for a moment. She didn't expect this unexpected question coming from him. But without complaining or asking him why he is thinking like that, she quickly processed his question and gave him a sweet smile once again.
No matter how much he wanted to ignore his feelings and concentrate on what she was going to say, he couldn't help but get amazed over the fact that her smile was doing some magical wonders in his heart.
"The answer to your question will differ from person to person. You will never get a perfect answer to it."
The expectant eyes quickly fill up with confusion. But after a while, he agrees to her statement. Whenever he asks this question to anyone, all of them had their own different answers, but she is the first one to answer his question in such a way.
"A person who sees negatively, will always say that monsters or villains don't deserve a happy ending as they always see the bad qualities in people. Whereas a person who sees positively, that person instead of blaming a person's bad qualities, will appreciate their good qualities, and will say that they really do deserve a happy ending. But Ivaan..."
She takes one step ahead and looks deep in his eyes. Her intention is to put more stress on her upcoming words. She also, wants him to know that no matter what kind of person you are, whether you are an angel or a monster, you don't deserve the problems you are having. Through her movements, she wants to show him that whatever she is going to say right now, she is serious about it, and he should also start taking it seriously if he really wants to improve.
Little did she know that her small step towards him which she took today, in the future, such steps would turn into a beautiful story for which the lovely stars had already started conspiring.
"... I think no human on this planet deserves cruelty and talking about monsters, they definitely deserve happiness, even if it's just for a little while. That happiness makes them open to seeing other possibilities the world has to offer."