Chapter Ten: Unadorned Gong

So...I Archive Binged A Rainbow Life, which was easy because there were only about twenty posts. She just dropped off, didn't she? Suddenly it's just poof. Gone. Hey, she said gods too...interesting.

Janus was at school today. He was a substitute teacher for some other class that I didn't have. He also was in the library after school and followed me to the cafeteria when the library closed down. I didn't see him follow me home, but he's here now.

Oh my gods. Okay, so I finally got involved in a D&D campaign. It's got like seven people. I think. I'm not sure who's dropping out and who's not. Tiberius Miller, halfling rogue! I have NINETEEN dex. And I ended up with like forty-four skill points to waste. And waste them I did.

Still no camera, but I do have an audio recorder that I used to, well, record some audio. I don't know why. I guess it's better than nothing, right? Well, no, it's not, because the audio file busted my USB drive and was so corrupt it didn't even have an image to double-click on.

Shelby suggested that since I'm younger I may have seen him in my childhood. So I thought about it. I meditated with my focus - which happens to be an old, old motherboard from a computer or something.

September 11, 2001. I'm being taken home from preschool, or maybe kindergarten, by my father, from up in D.C. He's listening to the radio when suddenly Kojo Nnamdi or whoever it was on NPR that day starts going "Oh my God. Oh my God. A plane just crashed into the World Trade Center. No, two planes. Oh my God. The Pentagon. Oh my God. Oh my God. Oh my God."

I was young. I didn't understand. I thought of it as some bad guy dressed all in black, flying an empty plane into one of the buildings down the street, then opening the cockpit and jumping out, a giant among the ants, walking away without anyone harmed. I thought it was a game. I thought it was something that wasn't so serious.

I get home, my dad runs to his computer or whatever, he's trying to figure things out, I guess I'm watching TV, in the very same room I'm in now, and I look outside into the woods, the woods I've been taking creeeepy creepy creepy videos of, and he's there. He's just there. He's this really tall man, just there amongst the trees, not leaning casually like you or I might but standing in between them. He has the longest, longest arms, and the longest, longest legs, and the tallest, tallest body, and the strangest, blankest face, and I can feel, with my Smallfry Sense, a smile. He's associated so much with fire, and what is this if not a huge, murderous fire?

"Dada!" I've seen my dad in suits sometimes. It must be him, wanting a hug. "Dada!" I'm not sure how I unlock the sliding door, but suddenly I'm outside, on the porch, and I run to him. I black out. I'm back in my room. My REAL dad comes up into my room. He reads me a bedtime story, kisses my forehead, tucks me in and leaves. I don't think anyone noticed me leaving the house. The Slender Man must have put me back in my room.

So that's THAT.

*Joce