Fiction Packet #2

The second fiction packet that we had to read for class was much different than the first one. These pages contained three longer stories. The passage that really caught my attention was part one of the Internal. We are introduced to the young intern who is working in a mental hospital for a man named Rauch. When he first takes the job many people warn him about this man and tell him that something just isn't right. Due to the fact that the interne's job is to give medicine, and more legalistic duties he finds himself avoiding Rauch as much as possible. Rauch right away is treating his new intern differently and almost favoring him. He gives him a special job of observing his own brother and gives the intern an apartment right next to that of his brother's. It is explained how the brother is the nervous type, the depression type, and the suicidal type, and that he needs extra attention so that he doesn't try and hurt himself. Right around this time in the text we also see how the intern is starting to explain everything like a psychiatrist would. He is putting percentages to many things, and examining all situations from a perspective of someone like we would think to be Rauch's. When the intern gets to his apartment the author makes it seem like he is trapped. He gets into this weird cycle of doing the same thing everyday and counting steps, and repeating certain numbers. When he goes exploring down into the basement he finds a drill. He uses the drill to make holes into the walls to the apartments next to him to spy on this so called brother. He finds out that there is no one living here and there hasn't been anyone there for a long time. This part kind of started to creep me out a bit. It makes it seem like the intern is going crazy when clearly Rauch is not clear on who is brother is and that there is no one next to the intern's apartment. The intern at the end of part one makes up the percentages of the brother of all 0%. This is just the first instance where we see the craziness of Rauch really start to affect the intern,

Literally this reading was very good, yet I found a little difficult to follow. Just the way it was written kind of made it hard for someone who knows nothing about psych houses to follow along. The imagery was great though and I really got a look at what was going inside of the intern's head, even when he did start going a little crazy.