Deceptive Deeds

I tried going to a hospital. Well, no, I went to a hospital. They wouldn't treat me though.

Because I'm not sick.

It was all in my fucking head this whole time. The monster probably put it there just to, I dunno, fuck with me or delay me or try and keep me here and I don't fucking know I'm just

I can't concentrate I'm so angry with myself for falling for it I

Update soon.

Back to the Street

Turns out that homeless shelter enforces their one week rule very strictly. They made me leave yesterday, even though my chest infection not only hasn't improved but has worsened. Those antibiotics did nothing for me and now I'm barely mobile with weakness and lethargy, can do little more than breath without my whole body being racked with coughs and wheezes and can't sleep due to feeling like someone is driving screws into my temples.

It's not really fair but there's little I can do about it. I no longer have the physical strength, let alone the money, to get out of this city. It's only because there are so many cafés that don't require me to purchase things to use their Internet that I'm even still posting on this.

I think I might die here.

I Hung My Head

Today, as I was lumbering around the city, trying to find something to do, I started to feel doubts gnawing at my mind, the same doubts that have been gnawing at me since I pushed Royal off that balcony. Was the voice that told me to kill him the voice of God, the voice of the monster or...was it all me? Did I kill him because it was God's work or because I wanted revenge and then rationalised it to myself?

Just as I was about to break down, I looked up and saw I was outside a church. It was named after St. Edward the Confessor. Divine providence or contrived coincidence? It's hard to say but I went in anyway, found a confessional and told the priest everything. I told him about killing Royal, the monster and the voice I heard in my dreams. He seemed very perplexed about the whole thing and suggested that I seek medical help but eventually agreed to lead me in the Rite. It made me feel a bit better, but I don't know if it helped me reach any kind of clarity.

Valentine's Day

Yesterday, I tracked down one of those free clinics and I was given a load of bog-standard antibiotics that the doctor himself admitted might be out of date. Better than nothing I suppose. I've also found a homeless shelter that will take me in, no questions asked, for one week, so that's helpful. Hopefully that'll be enough time to get a bit better so I can forge on to my intended destination.

Today, I thought that getting out and about a bit might do me some good, so I went to this big botanical garden just north of the city named after some Confederate tobacco tycoon. Seems almost tragic for such a beautiful place, awash with roses, to bear the name of a man who hastened the deaths of thousands, but that's America, I guess.

At any rate, I passed some hours there, just trying to relax. I almost managed to forget about the monster, even, but, of course, there were times when I looked up and he was standing among the roses like some diseased tree. Something is rotten in the state of the world.

Chest of Wonders

I'm going to follow Elaine's advice and try and find one of these free clinics. Apart from the fact that I'm sick as a dog, I got mugged on the way back to the warehouse I was planning on staying in tonight. Sufficed to say, I had the shit kicked out of me and all my money was taken.

I'll update soon.

Rattle and Wheeze

I think I've come down with a chest infection from sleeping in all those cold, dank warehouses, which means I'm basically fucked. I'm too weak to try and continue on to my destination and I'm too poor to afford any proper shelter. I don't know what I'm supposed to do. I can barely talk without coughing so hard my temples start pounding and every time I inhale, my lungs make a sound like an out of tune harmonica.

Oh God, now I'm starting to cry. This isn't going to look weird to the people running the café at all. Fuck, I gotta go before I embarrass myself more.

Solomon Grundy

I was just walking around the city today and saw a shop that looked almost identical to a shop in Waterford. Suddenly it hit me how fast this all happened. How can a life be so fragile that it can fall apart in such a short time? Just two months ago, I was posting about how great life was since I'd escaped Ballybeg. Now, I'm on the run from a hideous monster that NEVER LEAVES ME ALONE and, quite possibly, the law.

I tried so hard to start building a life for myself and now I'm slumming it in this shithole, the Ballybeg of the Eastern Seaboard of the United States. It makes me feel like this was inevitable, as if God gave us no free will. Is man so tightly bound? Can anyone ever escape his inheritance? Does any kind of independence exist in this world?

This is all my life has become. I walk the city for exercise but all my mind can think about are these great cosmic questions, the monster that follows in the shadows of my footsteps and, once in a while, Shannon.

I'm so sorry.