Then I was sat on my bed with a razor against my wrist.
A scene I remember clearly.
I pushed the metal against the flesh in silent desire, searching my brain for a reason to the flow that burnt like fire.
I found none.
I pushed harder and clipped through the first thin layer of skin, in no time at all a slow crimson cascade calmly erupted out of the small crack. I was surprised at how little the pain bothered me. I had decided to end my life, but a small part of me was still scared of the process of actually bringing this about. Now that I had tested the waters though, I realised that there was nothing to fear in the depths.
As I pressed the razor in deeper the door to my room was kicked down. My father burst in, his face more red than any I had ever seen. He wrestled with me, and as it always had been he won the fight and it dropped to the floor.
The same scenes happening again.
He sobbed and held me tighter than I had ever been held, crushing both my arms into my sides. Amidst his cries the word ‘why’ kept parting his lips.
“Dad, I don’t want to live anymore.” I said in a toneless voice that conveyed I was serious and confident in my decision.
We sat in that position for a long time. Not once did his grip soften. We talked about why I wanted to do this. My reasons seemed hollow and lifeless, something I felt only contributed to showing that my decision was the right one. He didn’t agree and tried to tell me of all the things I had to live for. Love, obtainable happiness and opportunity all made an appearance.
Then he said something that I don’t remember him saying. No, that’s not it. It’s as if I remember him saying it but I don’t understand what he means by it. I feel like I once knew the meaning behind these words, but it has somehow escaped me.
“Someone saved your life once before Lucas, don’t you ever forget that. For as long as you live don’t you forget that for one second.”
I looked up at him.
“That person didn’t get to choose, but you are alive because of them. Don’t make that for nothing.”
Then I was back in the room, sat in front of the mirror again, the small lamp still humming a faint glow.
Why don’t I know what he meant? I know in my heart of hearts that he spoke those words, that is definitely part of my past. What is this hole in my memory?
And then, the most peculiar and absurd recollection entered my mind.
I remember not wanting to take off my t-shirt at a swimming pool. I anticipated stares and laughter.
Suddenly, before I could dedicate any more time to trying to piece together this obscure puzzle, a noise louder than anything I can recall reverberated around the room. It sounded like something between a piercing scream and shattering glass.
I jumped to my feet and realised the mirror was gone. Instead, behind where it had been, the wall had developed an opening.
It was a small hole. I scurried over to it, pressed my body against the wall and looked through it. It was like peering through a misshapen letterbox.
Through it I could see a young man in a room not unlike the one mine had been before this all started.
I moved my mouth up to the hole and screamed, shouted until my throat was raw. Not once did he even flinch. He just sat on the edge of his bed staring at the floor.
The he picked up a small black book and began reading.
I don’t know how, as me even writing these words on this paper discredits what my eyes are telling me, but the book he is still sitting there reading is my journal.
Welcome to The Echo Room, the home of budding weird fiction
Saturday, 4 September 2010
Thursday, 5 August 2010
THE JOURNAL OF LUCAS BROWN. PART 7
On my second venture I was even younger
A new memory. I am sure it is something that truly happened but it is a sequence of events that until now I could not recall.
Nothing was clear this time, there was no blatant reality to the situation, just an air of what was happened that hung in the air slightly, I occasionally felt its breeze and began to make sense of the situation, but these moments were fleeting and never lasted long enough to be truly graspable.
I was lying motionless, face up towards a whitewashed ceiling. I couldn’t move, I don’t know if there was a reason for this other than that I might have been too young to do so properly but I got a definite feeling of being impeded. As if there was a cause and my immobility was the effect.
Beep.Beep.Beep.
My little eyes could not see clearly, colors and shapes blurred together to form imperceptible masses with no finite boundaries. In the distance I could dimly see two of these masses, they were large and appeared to be standing behind some kind of screen. Although I could not make out their contours enough to say what they were, I felt a tremendous source of comfort in knowing that they were near.
Beep.Beep.Beep. Consistent and getting stronger.
Then I realized that I felt as if I had been asleep for a long time. No, it wasn’t that. It was as if I was alive again, as if somehow I hadn’t been and was now back.
The two masses stayed there, unmoving for as long as I was conscious, they emitted something, not a noise or a warmth, they were too far away, but they generated some kind of sentiment in me. I wasn’t afraid.
My little eyelids began to shut, weary and struggling to cope with their surroundings.
Beep. Beep. Beep. Strong and repetitive.
This visit has left me mentally exhausted. My body feels nothing close to what I could label tiredness, but my mind finds it increasingly difficult to remain active, to process the complications of what I am experiencing. Unfamiliar and unrequested thoughts fly around within its confines at an ever increasing rate.
As I sit in front of the mirror I realize I have less and less control over what I am thinking. This journal acts as a filter so I can put down what I know is mine. I cannot look away from the thick black, it draws me in with its vague promise of escape.
Is that really what it is offering me?
The next visit was a time I vaguely remember, another scene from a childhood almost long forgotten. It was now presented to me with all the clarity of a crisply projected movie on a gleaming silver screen.
The day progressed as it always had. My father and I set out to take one of our customary after dinner walks. We were never particularly close, and looking back I always thought my mother may have suggested, and then forced, him to take me on these outings in an attempt to hasten the process so vaguely called bonding.
The house we lived in at the time was surrounded by a great deal of nothingness, barren land once farmed and since forgotten.
We would walk up over a small hill and down onto a more aesthetically pleasing plot, grass sprouted sporadically at this time of year and looked an unusually vivid green against the otherwise dry backdrop.
We would walk through this plot and on to the only tree for as far as the eye could see. We would sit beneath it every time, we did not talk about whether or not to do this, it had become ritual, as soon as we got it to it we simply sat down as if it were a mandatory portion of our excursion. My father would then take it upon himself to do his fatherly duty of asking me how everything was. The conversation was always bland and stunted.
On this day though there was an uncommon event in our otherwise usual routine. As we arrived at our tree, we noticed that something was already lying beneath its sparse foliage.
It was a wild dog with a shabby coat.
I stood still, scared at my unfamiliarity with the beast. My father put his palm against my chest, letting me know he was there to protect me. We drew closer with baby steps.
I noticed a flurry of movement at the dog’s side, near its stomach.
4 pups sucked at its teats hungrily.
Then I noticed at the side of the tree was another pup, alone and not joining its siblings as they consumed vital life force. It was considerably smaller than the others, thing and weak looking, its eyes barely open as it gazed over at the flurry of activity it was incapable of joining.
We stood there watching. After a few minutes the pups had had their fill and began to run around the perimeter of the tree, playing with one another.
The mother still laid there, half motionless. The runt eventually picked up what little strength it had and struggled over to her. It collapsed at her side and begun to half heartedly sup milk. It could barely hold its own mouth open.
“Why doesn’t she just let it die?” I asked my father.
An older friend of mine had bred a family of hamsters. One of the litter was also a runt. The mother had rejected it due to its weakness and sure enough it had died.
This had upset me but my older friend assured me that it was for the best, and that this was simply the way that nature worked.
I gazed over and up at my father. His eyes were clouding with tears and his mouth wrinkled into a frown. It was a painful look I had never seen on his face before. He spoke without turning to face me, his voice quiet and cracked with something that told me my words had angered him,.
“Because, when you love something you don’t just let it die.”
A new memory. I am sure it is something that truly happened but it is a sequence of events that until now I could not recall.
Nothing was clear this time, there was no blatant reality to the situation, just an air of what was happened that hung in the air slightly, I occasionally felt its breeze and began to make sense of the situation, but these moments were fleeting and never lasted long enough to be truly graspable.
I was lying motionless, face up towards a whitewashed ceiling. I couldn’t move, I don’t know if there was a reason for this other than that I might have been too young to do so properly but I got a definite feeling of being impeded. As if there was a cause and my immobility was the effect.
Beep.Beep.Beep.
My little eyes could not see clearly, colors and shapes blurred together to form imperceptible masses with no finite boundaries. In the distance I could dimly see two of these masses, they were large and appeared to be standing behind some kind of screen. Although I could not make out their contours enough to say what they were, I felt a tremendous source of comfort in knowing that they were near.
Beep.Beep.Beep. Consistent and getting stronger.
Then I realized that I felt as if I had been asleep for a long time. No, it wasn’t that. It was as if I was alive again, as if somehow I hadn’t been and was now back.
The two masses stayed there, unmoving for as long as I was conscious, they emitted something, not a noise or a warmth, they were too far away, but they generated some kind of sentiment in me. I wasn’t afraid.
My little eyelids began to shut, weary and struggling to cope with their surroundings.
Beep. Beep. Beep. Strong and repetitive.
This visit has left me mentally exhausted. My body feels nothing close to what I could label tiredness, but my mind finds it increasingly difficult to remain active, to process the complications of what I am experiencing. Unfamiliar and unrequested thoughts fly around within its confines at an ever increasing rate.
As I sit in front of the mirror I realize I have less and less control over what I am thinking. This journal acts as a filter so I can put down what I know is mine. I cannot look away from the thick black, it draws me in with its vague promise of escape.
Is that really what it is offering me?
The next visit was a time I vaguely remember, another scene from a childhood almost long forgotten. It was now presented to me with all the clarity of a crisply projected movie on a gleaming silver screen.
The day progressed as it always had. My father and I set out to take one of our customary after dinner walks. We were never particularly close, and looking back I always thought my mother may have suggested, and then forced, him to take me on these outings in an attempt to hasten the process so vaguely called bonding.
The house we lived in at the time was surrounded by a great deal of nothingness, barren land once farmed and since forgotten.
We would walk up over a small hill and down onto a more aesthetically pleasing plot, grass sprouted sporadically at this time of year and looked an unusually vivid green against the otherwise dry backdrop.
We would walk through this plot and on to the only tree for as far as the eye could see. We would sit beneath it every time, we did not talk about whether or not to do this, it had become ritual, as soon as we got it to it we simply sat down as if it were a mandatory portion of our excursion. My father would then take it upon himself to do his fatherly duty of asking me how everything was. The conversation was always bland and stunted.
On this day though there was an uncommon event in our otherwise usual routine. As we arrived at our tree, we noticed that something was already lying beneath its sparse foliage.
It was a wild dog with a shabby coat.
I stood still, scared at my unfamiliarity with the beast. My father put his palm against my chest, letting me know he was there to protect me. We drew closer with baby steps.
I noticed a flurry of movement at the dog’s side, near its stomach.
4 pups sucked at its teats hungrily.
Then I noticed at the side of the tree was another pup, alone and not joining its siblings as they consumed vital life force. It was considerably smaller than the others, thing and weak looking, its eyes barely open as it gazed over at the flurry of activity it was incapable of joining.
We stood there watching. After a few minutes the pups had had their fill and began to run around the perimeter of the tree, playing with one another.
The mother still laid there, half motionless. The runt eventually picked up what little strength it had and struggled over to her. It collapsed at her side and begun to half heartedly sup milk. It could barely hold its own mouth open.
“Why doesn’t she just let it die?” I asked my father.
An older friend of mine had bred a family of hamsters. One of the litter was also a runt. The mother had rejected it due to its weakness and sure enough it had died.
This had upset me but my older friend assured me that it was for the best, and that this was simply the way that nature worked.
I gazed over and up at my father. His eyes were clouding with tears and his mouth wrinkled into a frown. It was a painful look I had never seen on his face before. He spoke without turning to face me, his voice quiet and cracked with something that told me my words had angered him,.
“Because, when you love something you don’t just let it die.”
Monday, 19 July 2010
THE JOURNAL OF LUCAS BROWN. PART 6
And then I was a little boy again.
I stood in front of a large table littered with colour. Boxes wrapped with silky ribbons, small cups and paper hats. My chin barely came up above the cake before me.
All around me people were saying “Blow” along with “Make a wish”
So I did, I blew as hard as my little lungs would allow. All seven red candles went out and a cheer sounded in the room, then clapping, a hand on my shoulder warmly congratulated me.
I stared down at what I had done. Seven dead candles, evenly spaced on a brown chocolate circular treat.
Suddenly I was overwhelmed with the sense that there should be more candles, 14 in fact. Or maybe not, I either thought that or that there should be two cakes.
One for me and one for someone else.
“Happy birthday Lucas” was the motto of the event, it resounded constantly around me as people gathered around my mother who was serving slices of the delicious sweet.
I kept thinking they should be singing it to someone else.
The day progressed as it always had done. I ate cake, I played several party games with my young friends. Then, tired and weary, my parents put me to bed.
As I lay in my bed, eyes slowly closing, I felt the black creeping back in from the horizons of my vision. I tried to remain awake, willing my little body to fight the onset of sleep but it simply wasn't strong enough. The black leaked in more quickly, blotting out all around me until there was nothing at all.
It was just black, nothing more.
Then everything shook and the black began to part, shifting sideways and revealing a dim light.
I was back in the room, sat directly in front of the mirror. It still did not reflect, it was still just the pool of viscous unknown I had traversed.
The journal was still in my hand, so I chronicle the events that transpired on my voyage.
The room still has no door or window, the lamp is still the only source of light, the mirror still the only other object.
The only sense I get at this point is that there is someone, or something I need to find on the other side of it.
There is no question in my mind about going back in.
I stood in front of a large table littered with colour. Boxes wrapped with silky ribbons, small cups and paper hats. My chin barely came up above the cake before me.
All around me people were saying “Blow” along with “Make a wish”
So I did, I blew as hard as my little lungs would allow. All seven red candles went out and a cheer sounded in the room, then clapping, a hand on my shoulder warmly congratulated me.
I stared down at what I had done. Seven dead candles, evenly spaced on a brown chocolate circular treat.
Suddenly I was overwhelmed with the sense that there should be more candles, 14 in fact. Or maybe not, I either thought that or that there should be two cakes.
One for me and one for someone else.
“Happy birthday Lucas” was the motto of the event, it resounded constantly around me as people gathered around my mother who was serving slices of the delicious sweet.
I kept thinking they should be singing it to someone else.
The day progressed as it always had done. I ate cake, I played several party games with my young friends. Then, tired and weary, my parents put me to bed.
As I lay in my bed, eyes slowly closing, I felt the black creeping back in from the horizons of my vision. I tried to remain awake, willing my little body to fight the onset of sleep but it simply wasn't strong enough. The black leaked in more quickly, blotting out all around me until there was nothing at all.
It was just black, nothing more.
Then everything shook and the black began to part, shifting sideways and revealing a dim light.
I was back in the room, sat directly in front of the mirror. It still did not reflect, it was still just the pool of viscous unknown I had traversed.
The journal was still in my hand, so I chronicle the events that transpired on my voyage.
The room still has no door or window, the lamp is still the only source of light, the mirror still the only other object.
The only sense I get at this point is that there is someone, or something I need to find on the other side of it.
There is no question in my mind about going back in.
Wednesday, 14 July 2010
THE JOURNAL OF LUCAS BROWN. PART 5
??????????????
I must have fallen asleep
I have lost track of the date and time. Before, when sleep was eluding me, I used the brightening and dimming of the room to gage when one day ended and the next began. When I fell asleep under the bed it was becoming light, now it is a pitch black that seems almost unnatural.
How long was I asleep?
I can just about see that I am holding the journal, hopefully these markings are legible and my hand is actually scrawling what I ask it to. I hope that it too has not succumbed to the engulfing otherness that seems hell bent on….well, I don’t know how to finish that sentence.
I realize now that this is the quietest and most still the room has been since this all started. Everything feel stale and inanimate, even the air, even me.
I edged my way out from my makeshift fortress slowly, none of my movements causing the record to start up again and the faithful dancers to answer the call. I got up to my feet, startled by the reversal of the maddening rhythm into a deathly quiet.
Cautiously, for fear on awakening the now sleeping giant, I tiptoed over to where I figured the light switch should be. I groped at the wall with my fingers, searching for the familiar square plastic signifier but to no avail. I ran the length of the wall with both hands, my search now frantic as my perplexity mounted. I realized that not only was the switch nowhere to be found, but my desk which normally sits against the same wall seemed to have gone.
For a moment I considered the possibility of complete disorientation, trying to assure myself I was actually not where I thought I was.
Then I tripped over something.
I recoiled in anticipation as my body thumped the floor in an unbroken crash, but nothing happened. No one came to dance, no one even sounded the music.
I gathered myself after realizing nothing was coming and searched for what had caused me to fall. Near my left foot I found something small, a base with an elongated plastic beck coming off from it. I shaped it in my hands, trying to
decipher it. Then I found a switch.
As soon as I pushed it a dim yellow glow penetrated the black around me. It wasn’t much, but it bathed everything enough for a pale visibility. It was a small black table lamp.
I have never seen this lamp before. It is not mine, I am more sure of this than I have been of anything since this ordeal began.
I gazed around at what I can only call my new surroundings, for so much has changed that I don’t appear to be in the same place anymore. The contours of the room are the same, but that is all that I can call familiar.
Apart from the bed under which I awoke, all of my furniture has gone. The only thing that is here is the package, which now appears to be roughly six feet tall and three feet wide. I was right.
It leans against a bare wall to my right.
Now that the dancing has stopped, now is the time to open it.
The paper covering whatever was inside was thin, tearing easily with the slightest tug of my hand.
Then, as more paper fell to the floor, I began to notice light bouncing back.
I tore at it more quickly, needing to know if what I had seen was correct. Finally, when the last piece which covered the part directly in front of my face had been shed I stood back to see what I had uncovered.
It was me, standing there, looking back at myself. The dim source of the lamp revealed it clearly enough. I was standing in front of a full length mirror, its dirty glass reflecting the scene of my existence.
But not quite.
It is me and is not me.
As I drew closer towards it I realized it was emitting a low grade hum, barely noticeable, yet definitely a constant drone.
Then, with my face almost touching the glass, the reflection died.
The mirror turned black, no light bounced back, I wasn’t there anymore, just black, a cruel almost viscous black like oil was all that looked back at me.
I reached out my hand and tentatively placed my fingers to it. My entire hand went straight through, passing past the dark into the unknown, feeling only cold and space. I pushed my arm in further seeing if there was anything to feel.
I found nothing.
Petrified by the unreality of these events, I turned and ran to the door, or rather where the door should have been, but nothing was there, only more blank wall. I circled the room realizing now that the window had also disappeared.
This place is a tomb.
I walked back over to what was the mirror, weighing up the decision that seemed to have already been made for me.
So, I clutch this journal to my chest in the hope that it can go through with me.
With no other option, I step into the mirror black.
I must have fallen asleep
I have lost track of the date and time. Before, when sleep was eluding me, I used the brightening and dimming of the room to gage when one day ended and the next began. When I fell asleep under the bed it was becoming light, now it is a pitch black that seems almost unnatural.
How long was I asleep?
I can just about see that I am holding the journal, hopefully these markings are legible and my hand is actually scrawling what I ask it to. I hope that it too has not succumbed to the engulfing otherness that seems hell bent on….well, I don’t know how to finish that sentence.
I realize now that this is the quietest and most still the room has been since this all started. Everything feel stale and inanimate, even the air, even me.
I edged my way out from my makeshift fortress slowly, none of my movements causing the record to start up again and the faithful dancers to answer the call. I got up to my feet, startled by the reversal of the maddening rhythm into a deathly quiet.
Cautiously, for fear on awakening the now sleeping giant, I tiptoed over to where I figured the light switch should be. I groped at the wall with my fingers, searching for the familiar square plastic signifier but to no avail. I ran the length of the wall with both hands, my search now frantic as my perplexity mounted. I realized that not only was the switch nowhere to be found, but my desk which normally sits against the same wall seemed to have gone.
For a moment I considered the possibility of complete disorientation, trying to assure myself I was actually not where I thought I was.
Then I tripped over something.
I recoiled in anticipation as my body thumped the floor in an unbroken crash, but nothing happened. No one came to dance, no one even sounded the music.
I gathered myself after realizing nothing was coming and searched for what had caused me to fall. Near my left foot I found something small, a base with an elongated plastic beck coming off from it. I shaped it in my hands, trying to
decipher it. Then I found a switch.
As soon as I pushed it a dim yellow glow penetrated the black around me. It wasn’t much, but it bathed everything enough for a pale visibility. It was a small black table lamp.
I have never seen this lamp before. It is not mine, I am more sure of this than I have been of anything since this ordeal began.
I gazed around at what I can only call my new surroundings, for so much has changed that I don’t appear to be in the same place anymore. The contours of the room are the same, but that is all that I can call familiar.
Apart from the bed under which I awoke, all of my furniture has gone. The only thing that is here is the package, which now appears to be roughly six feet tall and three feet wide. I was right.
It leans against a bare wall to my right.
Now that the dancing has stopped, now is the time to open it.
The paper covering whatever was inside was thin, tearing easily with the slightest tug of my hand.
Then, as more paper fell to the floor, I began to notice light bouncing back.
I tore at it more quickly, needing to know if what I had seen was correct. Finally, when the last piece which covered the part directly in front of my face had been shed I stood back to see what I had uncovered.
It was me, standing there, looking back at myself. The dim source of the lamp revealed it clearly enough. I was standing in front of a full length mirror, its dirty glass reflecting the scene of my existence.
But not quite.
It is me and is not me.
As I drew closer towards it I realized it was emitting a low grade hum, barely noticeable, yet definitely a constant drone.
Then, with my face almost touching the glass, the reflection died.
The mirror turned black, no light bounced back, I wasn’t there anymore, just black, a cruel almost viscous black like oil was all that looked back at me.
I reached out my hand and tentatively placed my fingers to it. My entire hand went straight through, passing past the dark into the unknown, feeling only cold and space. I pushed my arm in further seeing if there was anything to feel.
I found nothing.
Petrified by the unreality of these events, I turned and ran to the door, or rather where the door should have been, but nothing was there, only more blank wall. I circled the room realizing now that the window had also disappeared.
This place is a tomb.
I walked back over to what was the mirror, weighing up the decision that seemed to have already been made for me.
So, I clutch this journal to my chest in the hope that it can go through with me.
With no other option, I step into the mirror black.
Tuesday, 13 July 2010
THE JOURNAL OF LUCAS BROWN. PART 4
March 30th, 2001
However bizarre my circumstances appeared before, they now feel like a pleasant precursor to my current situation.
This, quite frankly, is a nightmare.
The dancing has reached a speed so intimidating that to feel it swirl around me is to feel the very presence of death, or nothingness.
Nothingness sounds worse than death.
I pulled the blankets over my head in an attempt to conceal myself and make believe I am part of a different reality altogether but the rustling noise of the material against my skin made me sob uncontrollably which only pleased the dancing and caused it to accelerate even faster and wildly mock my despair.
I grit my teeth and rolled off the bed, hitting the floor with a thud that sent the dancing and my mind into true turmoil, a swarm of restless bees filling my head and rampaging within its confines, smacking against the walls in quick succession.
Each one the same yet not the same.
I moved my hands and feet and squirmed under the bed, trying to find solace from the humming assailants. I lay there in the dark, stiff as a board. I did this for a while, trying to collect myself until the point where everything reached a level I dare say is manageable.
Then I remembered my experiment.
I wanted to check the package. I wanted to see whether I was right about its shifting, but I could not face the long walk to the cupboard. Instead, I shifted myself sideways as quietly as possible so that my head peered out from beneath the frame of the bed. The dancing stirred slightly but died down back to its usual steady murmur.
From my position, and there is no doubt in my mind about this, the drawer is now protruding outward, the package must be forcing it forward as it expands. I can see a bit of its packaging poking out through a slit between the drawer and the wooden unit holding it in place.
I don’t know how it happened, but I found my journal under the bed with me along with the pen I have been using to chronicle these happenings.
What does this mean?
I must get the courage to go over there, to open the package.
However bizarre my circumstances appeared before, they now feel like a pleasant precursor to my current situation.
This, quite frankly, is a nightmare.
The dancing has reached a speed so intimidating that to feel it swirl around me is to feel the very presence of death, or nothingness.
Nothingness sounds worse than death.
I pulled the blankets over my head in an attempt to conceal myself and make believe I am part of a different reality altogether but the rustling noise of the material against my skin made me sob uncontrollably which only pleased the dancing and caused it to accelerate even faster and wildly mock my despair.
I grit my teeth and rolled off the bed, hitting the floor with a thud that sent the dancing and my mind into true turmoil, a swarm of restless bees filling my head and rampaging within its confines, smacking against the walls in quick succession.
Each one the same yet not the same.
I moved my hands and feet and squirmed under the bed, trying to find solace from the humming assailants. I lay there in the dark, stiff as a board. I did this for a while, trying to collect myself until the point where everything reached a level I dare say is manageable.
Then I remembered my experiment.
I wanted to check the package. I wanted to see whether I was right about its shifting, but I could not face the long walk to the cupboard. Instead, I shifted myself sideways as quietly as possible so that my head peered out from beneath the frame of the bed. The dancing stirred slightly but died down back to its usual steady murmur.
From my position, and there is no doubt in my mind about this, the drawer is now protruding outward, the package must be forcing it forward as it expands. I can see a bit of its packaging poking out through a slit between the drawer and the wooden unit holding it in place.
I don’t know how it happened, but I found my journal under the bed with me along with the pen I have been using to chronicle these happenings.
What does this mean?
I must get the courage to go over there, to open the package.
Monday, 28 June 2010
THE JOURNAL OF LUCAS BROWN. PART 3
March 27th, 2001
The dancing stops so infrequently.
It waits quietly for a moment for any slight movement for it to pounce on or bounce off of. I try to stay still, lying flat on my back with my arms at my sides and regulating my intake of air until my breath is as shallow as possible.
Still, it doesn’t work. So I have to get up, try to walk through the dizzying cacophony it spills as it surrounds me with what feels like malicious intent, it wants to corrode my senses, to make my mind collapse in on itself.
I can’t help but think there is a connection between this phenomenon and the latest development that has occurred within the confines of this room.
It sounds impossible, but I am quite sure that the package I was delivered has grown.
On the desk where I placed it right after signing my name and inheriting its existence it waited for me to glance upon it again. It looks bigger, not by much, but it definitely is larger.
There is no return address on the package and the characters that make up what is supposed to be my name are barely legible, faint as if the pen was running low on ink and scrawled as if the hand that parted with them was unable to guide it steadily.
I will keep an eye on it.
March 28th, 2001
My experiment begins now.
I have to answer the call of certain necessities, namely going to the bathroom. I tiptoe as silently as possible, making sure the door is left open after every visit as to not awaken the groaning call of the rusted hinges. The toilet itself is becoming full with my waste, I refuse to deal with what I know will come with the noise of using the flush. My standards of living have been violated by this faceless intruder. No, that doesn’t make sense. I can’t rightly say it is faceless, or bodyless or that is does indeed have a face or a body or even a shape. I can’t fathom a word at this moment for what it feels like, I just know that it is there.
After my last visit to the bathroom I glanced over at the package again. This time, its shift in size was undeniable, it had expanded at least 3 inches since I lay quietly observing its behavior from my bed.
Back to my experiment.
I have chosen to prove to myself that the package is in fact growing, that my eyes are not to blame for this inexplicable metamorphosis. I have placed it in one of the drawers in my wardrobe. The ordeal this caused was awful but necessary if I am to prove this point. I closed my eyes and forced myself to follow through with it. I am sure I nearly lost consciousness, but I managed to open my eyes and do what I intended to. When I entered it, the package took up approximately half of the drawer. I will check in intervals of 2 hours for changes.
The clock next to my bed tells me it is 4 am. Sleep is out of the question, there must be a purpose or discoverable reason to this.
I need to know what it is.
The dancing stops so infrequently.
It waits quietly for a moment for any slight movement for it to pounce on or bounce off of. I try to stay still, lying flat on my back with my arms at my sides and regulating my intake of air until my breath is as shallow as possible.
Still, it doesn’t work. So I have to get up, try to walk through the dizzying cacophony it spills as it surrounds me with what feels like malicious intent, it wants to corrode my senses, to make my mind collapse in on itself.
I can’t help but think there is a connection between this phenomenon and the latest development that has occurred within the confines of this room.
It sounds impossible, but I am quite sure that the package I was delivered has grown.
On the desk where I placed it right after signing my name and inheriting its existence it waited for me to glance upon it again. It looks bigger, not by much, but it definitely is larger.
There is no return address on the package and the characters that make up what is supposed to be my name are barely legible, faint as if the pen was running low on ink and scrawled as if the hand that parted with them was unable to guide it steadily.
I will keep an eye on it.
March 28th, 2001
My experiment begins now.
I have to answer the call of certain necessities, namely going to the bathroom. I tiptoe as silently as possible, making sure the door is left open after every visit as to not awaken the groaning call of the rusted hinges. The toilet itself is becoming full with my waste, I refuse to deal with what I know will come with the noise of using the flush. My standards of living have been violated by this faceless intruder. No, that doesn’t make sense. I can’t rightly say it is faceless, or bodyless or that is does indeed have a face or a body or even a shape. I can’t fathom a word at this moment for what it feels like, I just know that it is there.
After my last visit to the bathroom I glanced over at the package again. This time, its shift in size was undeniable, it had expanded at least 3 inches since I lay quietly observing its behavior from my bed.
Back to my experiment.
I have chosen to prove to myself that the package is in fact growing, that my eyes are not to blame for this inexplicable metamorphosis. I have placed it in one of the drawers in my wardrobe. The ordeal this caused was awful but necessary if I am to prove this point. I closed my eyes and forced myself to follow through with it. I am sure I nearly lost consciousness, but I managed to open my eyes and do what I intended to. When I entered it, the package took up approximately half of the drawer. I will check in intervals of 2 hours for changes.
The clock next to my bed tells me it is 4 am. Sleep is out of the question, there must be a purpose or discoverable reason to this.
I need to know what it is.
Thursday, 24 June 2010
THE JOURNAL OF LUCAS BROWN. PART 2
March 24th, 2001
Ever since the incident in the car park I have not been myself.
Something about those vibrations shook a part of my insides so that I am never comfortable, I feel uneasy and unable to concentrate.
Everything looks a little different. I can’t say why or in what way, but everything is definitely different.
The remnants of that period fear seem determined to not slip away, they still appear to be coursing through my veins and instilling in me a continuous dread of its return.
The rudimentary task of acquiring a pen with which to write these words was imbued with this foreboding.
I leant over my desk towards the shelf, hand outstretched towards the object. My fingers folded all too softly to pluck it with success and it tumbled down from the elevated wooden compartment. As it did so time seemed to slow down. I watched helplessly as it crashed to the floor, the fact it had done so reverberating around me in quick succession, one after another mimicking the sound that came before it but at the same time not being quite identical.
Why does that matter?
I know I need to keep using the pen, as much as it may scare me.
March 25th, 2001
I’m not myself again today.
But then I think I may never be myself as there is no way of me knowing what that is. This morning, as I lay upon my bed with the world spinning around me, bouncing back off of itself to torment me a knock at the door slowed things momentarily. I eagerly got up, rushing to the door in the hope that it would be some news, something that would set things back to the way they used to be, some kind of eraser that could blank out whatever caused me to fall into this seemingly reasonless yet somehow familiar spiral. Let me explain. I am completely in the dark as to the nature of my plague, yet I feel a deep seated understanding and this only makes me fear it more.
Back to the knock at the door.
There stood a uniformed man in light blue. He looked down at a clipboard in front of him and then straight into my face.
“Are you Lucas Brown?” he asked me
I almost collapsed at the utterance of my own name. I held myself up by putting my hand on the wall for support. He looked confused. I managed to force a nod in his direction so he handed me a piece of paper and asked me to sign it. My hand shook as I placed the ‘L’ on the page. I slowly followed with the pattern of letters I had been designated at birth yet they felt so alien. What do they mean? They mean nothing? They are at once nothing to do with me, mere scratching, and yet somehow indicative of my existence. I have been given symbols with which to state my being and it sickens and terrifies me. I dropped the pen, my hands unable to maintain a grasp, it crashed and caused the storm again, I was feeling intensely ill by this point. He picked it up and thrust the package into my hands, eager to get away from me.
I closed the door as quietly as I possibly could, but the slight click it generated still made me shudder.
I put the package aside, completely disinterested with what might be in it (I still have not opened it).
I could not get the sound of the uniformed man saying my name out of my head. I made the impulsive decision to shout out my own name.
It shot out of my mouth, so comforting at first, so beautifully familiar, but as it danced around the room it quickly became something else all together. It became someone else.
It is me and is not me at the same time.
I think I will lie down again, I can feel it watching me, the thing that is both me and not me. Maybe if I close my eyes for a while it will stop dancing.
I need it to go away.
Ever since the incident in the car park I have not been myself.
Something about those vibrations shook a part of my insides so that I am never comfortable, I feel uneasy and unable to concentrate.
Everything looks a little different. I can’t say why or in what way, but everything is definitely different.
The remnants of that period fear seem determined to not slip away, they still appear to be coursing through my veins and instilling in me a continuous dread of its return.
The rudimentary task of acquiring a pen with which to write these words was imbued with this foreboding.
I leant over my desk towards the shelf, hand outstretched towards the object. My fingers folded all too softly to pluck it with success and it tumbled down from the elevated wooden compartment. As it did so time seemed to slow down. I watched helplessly as it crashed to the floor, the fact it had done so reverberating around me in quick succession, one after another mimicking the sound that came before it but at the same time not being quite identical.
Why does that matter?
I know I need to keep using the pen, as much as it may scare me.
March 25th, 2001
I’m not myself again today.
But then I think I may never be myself as there is no way of me knowing what that is. This morning, as I lay upon my bed with the world spinning around me, bouncing back off of itself to torment me a knock at the door slowed things momentarily. I eagerly got up, rushing to the door in the hope that it would be some news, something that would set things back to the way they used to be, some kind of eraser that could blank out whatever caused me to fall into this seemingly reasonless yet somehow familiar spiral. Let me explain. I am completely in the dark as to the nature of my plague, yet I feel a deep seated understanding and this only makes me fear it more.
Back to the knock at the door.
There stood a uniformed man in light blue. He looked down at a clipboard in front of him and then straight into my face.
“Are you Lucas Brown?” he asked me
I almost collapsed at the utterance of my own name. I held myself up by putting my hand on the wall for support. He looked confused. I managed to force a nod in his direction so he handed me a piece of paper and asked me to sign it. My hand shook as I placed the ‘L’ on the page. I slowly followed with the pattern of letters I had been designated at birth yet they felt so alien. What do they mean? They mean nothing? They are at once nothing to do with me, mere scratching, and yet somehow indicative of my existence. I have been given symbols with which to state my being and it sickens and terrifies me. I dropped the pen, my hands unable to maintain a grasp, it crashed and caused the storm again, I was feeling intensely ill by this point. He picked it up and thrust the package into my hands, eager to get away from me.
I closed the door as quietly as I possibly could, but the slight click it generated still made me shudder.
I put the package aside, completely disinterested with what might be in it (I still have not opened it).
I could not get the sound of the uniformed man saying my name out of my head. I made the impulsive decision to shout out my own name.
It shot out of my mouth, so comforting at first, so beautifully familiar, but as it danced around the room it quickly became something else all together. It became someone else.
It is me and is not me at the same time.
I think I will lie down again, I can feel it watching me, the thing that is both me and not me. Maybe if I close my eyes for a while it will stop dancing.
I need it to go away.
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