A/N: Characters not mine. Written for the challenge Passion. Written by LSMunch.
"Would you say you have a passion for your job?"
He's acting like a rebellious teenager right now, and he knows it and to be frank, he doesn't give a shit. He doesn't want to be here; Captain ordered it. He doesn't particularly like the man; George Huang grates on his nerves for some inexplicable reason. He doesn't like said psychiatrist's office; contrary to popular belief, the chair he is sitting on is not big or comfy or inviting or any of those things. It is simply a chair, one he wishes very strongly that he was not seated in.
"Yes, I love dealing with rapists and murderers and pedophiles all day long. Dealing with the scum of mankind is the one thing that keeps me going every day." This is all said very sarcastically, which, as mentioned previously, is more typical of a sixteen year old than a man nearing sixty.
"Then why did you become a cop?"
Huang is sitting there very neatly, one leg crossed over the other, looking intently at him, waiting for a straight answer.
John scowls, wondering vaguely what it would feel like to shake some urgency into the little man. It seems as if the man never loses his cool, nor does it appear that he shows any emotion no matter the circumstance. "The benefits."
That should suffice.
"Only the benefits? Why, then, did you join the NYPD when you had already retired in Baltimore?"
Or perhaps not.
"Paying alimony tends to drain the bank."
Huang is quiet for a moment, his head slightly tilted, completely disbelieving of yet another another lie. "During your uncle's case," Damn, he's snagged something now... "you mentioned that your father committed suicide when you were only thirteen. That's an important age for a Jewish boy. How did you cope with the loss of your father?"
I didn't. He shrugs. "I talked with our rabbi at the time, but not long afterwards, my mother couldn't stand the shame of my father having committed suicide and she moved us to New York." He pauses. "Nothing else really. Life went on, so did I." You lying bastard...
"Did your father have dreams for you? Expectations?"
"Doesn't every parent?" Huang doesn't answer. Only stares. And waits. He gives the man what he wants. "Yeah, he wanted me to serve my country."
"Do you think that's why you became a cop?" Softly spoken, John suddenly realizes that despite his attitude, he's been defenseless the whole time.
He can't answer for a moment due to this realization. It's too much. He always thought he could outplay the shrink, and once again, he has been the one outplayed. He gives in. "My father couldn't be in the army or anything because he was legally blind, but he wanted to repay the United States somehow. When he was a baby, his mother and his father and his older brother came through Ellis Island, after World War I. He never forgot the stories my grandfather told him about the trip over here and about the old country and about how lucky they were. Never let us forget either. Bernie's a mortician, so I guess the lesson never stuck. But me... I had this damn idealistic view of what it would be like to be a solider or a cop. After the sixties, I couldn't be a soldier, so I signed up for the police academy."
"Would you say that you have a passion for your job, then?" Huang repeats.
"It's an obligation, I think, more than anything. My father's words always stuck with me, no matter what. I could never shake them. Maybe I have a passion for it, I can't tell. On a certain level, I suppose I do. But most of the time..." His voice trickles off and he stares at a stain on the carpet as Huang stares at him. And waits.
"Most of the time it's just solving the case, living day to day and hoping that one day it all stops and I don't have to wait anymore."