Entry Fifteen
Black Pen (Under the Gun)

So I decided to go back to black, mainly because it's easier on my eyes. I can see the ink way better now.
    Anyway, I just wanted to let you know that I have no clue what I was going on yesterday about. That's the thing sometimes--I'll say a whole lot of crap that I don't mean. It's tactless of me, really, and I hate it, but it's sad and true so I'm not gonna try to change that. Sarah says she doesn't seem to notice so I guess it's OK. Right? I dunno. Sometimes I think she's just trying to be nice to me because she has to. I mean, I've had to pretend to like people before. All the time, in fact. It was the only way I could get by with my old jobs.
    See, Blue Book, in order to make a living the way I used to, I had to pretend a lot. I had to pretend to like people. Kavar made me do that sometimes. I hated it, but what can you do?
    I was able to go out today. I like the rooftop of the building. I'll go there and feel like I'm flying. Do you like flying, Blue Book? You've flown better than I ever could when I've thrown you. No hard feelings or anything.
    No one sees the urban world from above the way I do. To me, they're giants, as I'm a flea beneath them. Late at night, I'm in bed but I'll be far, far away, in this place in my head. It's there because I have it embedded into my brain so I can go there whenever I want. Neat, huh? I'll stand upon these giant's broad shoulders, with a view of the starlit village in which I have read early romanticists wrote so poetically about. Cities that rise so beautiful and bright, so tall and potent. The toxic stench of this place defies all of that petty romantic bullshit. In the city, there's no need to look up. You don't see the sky, you see. You can't distinguish the stars from that black, lonely blanket bearing down on you. All places, all hours. You can't take your hand up and curve your fingers over the moon, to catch it.
    Have you ever tried to catch a star, Book?
    I have. Once. But I fell.
    The Delial Park Facility--my lonely penitentiary.... The city is but my small cell, a box toppling over a pile of living corpses, piling to the heaven no one will ever reach. I'll grab it, though. One of these days.... I'll take a star, and I'll kill it for burning so goddamn bright.
    I can see me--a mound of splattered blood and gore across their city streets. For now, I'm a marionette, just like what my dearest brother wanted. I stand on the edge of a concrete divider, between me and freedom and an enclosed prison. At least Sarah is watching. This is my mind and she's always there watching me. If I was in my right mind, I ought to jump. What'd you think, Blue Book?
    The rest of the staff lets me out now. This way, they can taunt me as I stand over the building and only imagine killing myself these days. I don't care anymore.
    It may not even hurt. Ever thought of that? It may feel like it at first, but how long does it take for a person to fall?
    What an unreasonable question.
    Broke more bones than I thought I had back then. In addition to my fractured wounds--about four to five months since I came here and my body is still healing. How long will it take, do you think?
    I am not a criminal I'm just psychotic. That is what I am told, anyway. They call me Alexander, yet I call me Ravencrow most of the time. I've lost my mind and my memories. I think I'm starting to come to terms with that now. That's why I am here. That's why I sit here in these ugly, itchy white clothes, these small shoes, while taking daily medications for a sickness. I'm sick. I'm sick. No matter how many times I think it, it sounds so surreal and untrue. I'm sick. You're sick. You're sick, Alexander. You're not gonna get any better soon. These things they shove down your throat will only make things worse.
    There's something in my head!
    Being sick must explain the bad dreams I am having. I see the golden eyes of a woman who spoke in riddles. Her forked tongue slithering between her teeth like a knife; she hissed and taunted. Her hands crush me. I hear the words of a taunting man inside my head. At times I'll hear voices. I wonder if this has anything to do with my sickness.
    Everything was a bad dream. It was all a dream.
    Sometimes it's difficult to say that I'm a man. It can't be true. I'm a parasite, a leech. Each morning they give me something to take, something to make the sickness go away. All I'm doing is taking, taking, taking away. Beneath this towering mortuary, on the lowest level, they'll force me to speak to blathering saviors who talk of messiahs and flames and ruptured earths, of rebirth. It will come soon--I wish. They turn to me with their deceiving sneer, holding out their book to me and claim there is still time for me to repent. I could be saved. I will get better.
    And this is my holiday. This is my break from the world. My leisure time from reality is being convinced of a child's dream of a god and savior. My Mind of moderate sanity.
    Bullshit. That's all it is.
    Earlier today, I sat in a circle of other men that claimed they were just like me. Sarah had told me it was for the best but I disagree. These men reached out to me, wanted to hold my hand. Pricks. They disgust me. They open their hearts and souls to these doctors, and what'd they get? What did I get? They shared their problems with each other, their addictions, and their sickening little secrets. The list goes on. Men, who claimed they saw things that weren't there, heard voices, taken advantage of women children and were trying to make amends for their sins. Many of them were criminals, rapists--fucking lunatics.
    Then they tried to convince me that they shared my pain. More bullshit.
    I just killed a few people. That's all.
    What sickened me more was that there was also a time when I almost believed them. Almost. I was so close to becoming a slave to the notion that salvation and perfect harmony would somehow be my escape. But there isn't escape. There's nothing.
    What happened to me the previous months before I came in here? That would leave me in doubt. These are memories filling up the empty fragments of pain. All the strange events and the people I met, including all who abandoned me--are there, right in front of me.
    They say I have problems. Yeah, we all have problems. We all are dying. We're all failures. We all hurt. But I knew people who have known only a world of hurt.
    I've been running for a long time when I was out there. How do I know this? Even now my legs are sore and my throat have been burning as though I swallowed a tank full of acidic fluids rather than water. Wouldn't be surprised. Burns my skull; burns my eyes. Natural light hurts me. These white walls hurt. These colorless, itchy clothes they put me in burn. Cheap sneakers and slippers that are too small for my own feet. I don't have big feet. If you were stuck here, I am sure you'd hate it too. You have it easy, Blue Book.
    God, I hate it here. God, it reeks. God....
    God is bullshit, too, all of it. God doesn't belong here. He exists only in soft, uttering words from the tongues of men who have deceived as well. Yet there they sit, preaching about it all to me. Go to Hell, Alexander.
    If there is a god, then he must not like me very much. He must hate me.
    No, I haven't lost my faith. That faith just never existed. Faith is obsolete. Faith, you see, is a leash. Faith is weary and wishes to take a vacation from pathetic wretches like us. These babbling men of their faith refuse to see it, but when I look at them; to me they look like insects cowering into a corner, their hands raised into the air. Their faith is their shield, but it is old and dented now. Ha! I haven't done it yet, but I have thought of it a thousand times. How I wanted to tear apart those books. Burn them to ashes and sprinkle it over their salads, shove it down their throats with a torch in one hand and a dagger in the other. Simmer them in the quantum soup of my own sacrilege and sins. They're the slaves of religion, the unwanted broods of God. The jailbirds of creed. Uncle Satan wants us, and we are all his recruits. We are their Nazis and lotus-eaters. And once again, I am Ulysses, a pawn of the gods, abandoned by Minerva.
    But maybe that was thinking too broad, perhaps too vain. I've been reading too much poetry. That's all.
    So close to the error....
    Sarah's calling me out of my room. No more daydreaming for Alex. I should go. I haven't eaten anything since morning and it's getting close to dinner. Don't want her to tell Wendel anything, and then tell Marcus, and then it all goes downhill from there.
    You know, Blue Book, I think I rather like this pen.

--Alexander

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