[FOR YOU]

[Jesse Fforde]

FOR YOU
07/11/16
_____________________

You know who you are. I read your journal how often? Whenever it moves. Whenever I see that journal shaped square in dust, I know you’ve taken it. You’ve moved it. Whether to read it or write in it, I never know – until I pick it up and flick to the last page.

You gave me permission. You’ll have to revoke it if you want me to stop.

But I don’t want to stop, so here’s how I will repay you. Here is my offering. My leather-bound heart, for you to open and read whenever you feel the need. I will write as if you can’t see. I will write as if this is a private tome, under lock and key for no one’s eyes but my own.

Okay, maybe that’s a lie. But I can try.

I keep burning bridges. I don’t know how I’m doing it, this time. I have no intention to. I approach people with genuine goodwill, and they laugh at it, throw it back in my face. I am stubborn, and I act without thinking. I make mistakes, but haven’t I done good, too? I compare myself too much to people I hate, and I need to stop. It’s not healthy, and it would only give them satisfaction.

See, I’m lying already. I know I’ve been a twit, I know I lean toward pessimism more than optimism, but it’s hard to have faith in anything these days. But I have faith in you. I have faith in Marisol, in Aine and Tara. I have faith in Kenlie. I have to practice what I preach, and I have to see the GOOD, rather than focusing on the bad. I am going to try. This much I can promise, and you have full permission to slap me – or stab me or shoot me – if I should slip.

But allow me just this once to focus on the bad, to lay out, here, the regrets and frustrations and sadness that I have.

You love Raven, you care about her, but I think you need to let her go. She craves death like an addict craves crack. Maybe she needs to sire. Maybe what’s wrong with her is what was wrong with me. Maybe there’s nothing wrong with her and I’ve got it all wrong. Whatever the case, I only want you happy and she seems to make you happy. If she disappears, if she drops you, betrays you, treats you like ****, fails to acknowledge any and all of the good you have done for her, you can come to me. And I will rage with you. Okay?

And just like you have a Raven, I have a Rhett. It’s stupid to think that I was so happy. He’s… well he was one of my oldest friends, and I hoped that it would remain. I hoped that if he had issues, he would talk to me. I should have opened the line of communication. That’s what you’ll tell me, right? I should be the bigger man, I should be the leader, and I should have done that. But I’m sick of it. I’m sick of always being the one to open that line, to reach out, to say ‘hey, what’s going on?’ I wanted to know what his answer was, but he evaded. ‘Technically’, he said, but what the **** does that mean? Technically, yeah. Sure.

I’ll admit that I’m jealous. When we’re fighting, when you need to cool off, you’ve got someone to go to. You go to Athena, and you go to Kenlie. You’ve got friends, confidants. I envy your ability to trust. I envy the strong friendships that you have formed that I don’t seem to be able to maintain. I thought, in Rhett, that I had regained a friend from the past, a strong pillar, but we’re too different. I sound like a priss, like a sensitive dickhead. And you’ll tell me I should try harder, then. It’s crossed my mind, but why? I was dead and he handed back his tome, no interest in using the lair. He’d basically walked from the ‘family’. But I still reached out. I still showed an interest. I try to keep informed, to keep in touch. It’s not up to me to do it again. Not this time.

Yes, I’m stubborn. You know this already. But I can’t apologise for failing to care about people who give so little **** about me. I’m not a selfless person. I’m not magnanimous. I hold grudges. Loyalty, to me, is not a liquid term. You’re loyal or you’re not. There’s no in between.

You’ve never been in between. Sometimes I wonder why you chose me. Why you keep me. Why you married me. But you’ve been my only constant. You are my constant.

Jesse

[Jesse Fforde]

Such a Mess
18/11/16
____________________

I was kidnapped.

Although most know about it, no one really seems all that concerned, and nor do I want them to be. It is a matter of security, however. Where one threat was boisterous and loud-mouthed with their intended violence, there’s another threat that I don’t think one dock fire will have eliminated.

The fact is, they knew who I was and where to find me. They had the technology and the numbers to take me. Freedom was hard-won. Who were they? They were not hunters. They did not want me dead. You asked that question, whether I (or anyone) would prefer to be a well-fed test subject or a starving hostage. I wasn’t quite sure how to answer that one. Why? Because I’d been the starving test subject.

They plied the canines from my gums. They waited for them to grow back. They figured out the effect blood had on me – I’m afraid I wasn’t exactly a prime example for vampire-kind. They had me bite into rubber attached to glass jars, like to they do with snakes. I felt like a snake in a glass cage, trapped under lights too bright.

Whether they had a vampire working for them, or a sorcerer, or a blood thief capable of vampiric ability, I don’t know. But someone, something there was keeping me from using my powers. I couldn’t get out. They had me chained, arms stretched out and legs pinned. Naked as the day I was born. They cut open my chest, broke the ribs, rolled the skin up and kept it from healing. For hours I lay there with a cavity in my chest.

I made no sound. None. I didn’t give them the satisfaction of knowing how much pain I was in, and it was not pain that I enjoyed. I should have died on that table ten times over, and yet they never went that far. If they thought I was going to die, they would patch me back up again. They would take notes while I healed. How many secrets did I give away? What, now, can they do to me? To us?

You ask me how I can work so hard, so much. You ask me how I can keep up. I haven’t been working. Not the whole time. I’ve been trying to figure it out. What danger have I put us in? I need to figure it out. I need to go after that danger before it comes back for us. I need to eradicate the threat. I could ask for help. I should ask for help, but this is my mess, and I need to clean it up.

Even if I did ask for help, would it do any good? I’ve made mistakes before. I’ve caused messes and though you did support me, my love, I still believe that you did it only out of obligation and not because you believed in the cause. I do not want help to be given grudgingly, and you are working so hard on the traps for the lair. You are helping without knowing it. You are helping in ways that are sorely required.

If I am distracted, that is my reason. I have to find out what happened. I have to go back to the dock and find the clues. I will do my best not to be kidnapped again. But should I suddenly not come home, you will know where the trail starts.

But I can assure you that I will always come home.

Jesse

[Jesse Fforde]

JEALOUSY
27/11/16
____________________

I’m not sure what to think.

I’m less sure what to do. Or whether I even need to do anything.

Although I doubt the intimacy we share is one of a kind—I doubt we’re the only twisted minds to ever have existed—it remains something special. Something peculiar, something that we share. Delight accompanies pain, the giving and receiving of it. And yet, even in this we have fallen into our roles. Where she likes to give, I like to take. She likes to draw it out, to prolong the pleasure of it. I sometimes join her, I indulge in the slow slaughter of our victims even if I myself prefer a swift gluttony. Our styles differ.

It shouldn’t surprise me that she goes out without me. I go out without her; I feed without her. She has a serial-killer-esque system by which she abides and I cannot fault her for it. I like to watch her from afar. I’m proud of her. It was the mutual discovery of our disregard for human cattle and our enjoyment in relieving them of their life blood that began our chaotic relationship. She encouraged freedom and helped me to indulge in it and –

Well, it’s kind of amusing, writing these things down. Remembering. I used to resist my nature because I thought to indulge would put the family in danger. To encourage the animalistic behaviours that vampirism unlocks could only bring unwanted attention to our door. And yet Clover succeeded in convincing me to let it go. To let go. And I did let go. And yet given recent events, it seems her mind has been changed. No, I can’t do what I like.

I derailed. It’s different. I know it’s different, but still. I can’t let it go. To get back on point—

I read Clover’s journal. This isn’t a secret. And one of her most recent entries… it rubs me the wrong way. It’s jealousy. I know it’s jealousy. I can name it for what it is. I can recognise it. But how ridiculous is it that I’m jealous of the way she plans to torture someone else? Torture. It’s not generally perceived as intimate. And yet. Here we are. She’s going to go torture some woman called April. It doesn’t sound like she’ll get away with her life. So why am I bothered? Why do I want to inject myself into the situation and demand that she cease and desist, or in the very least that I can go with her?

I can’t, though. Can I? There are a limited number of things that bring Clover joy in this world and I can’t systematically take them away from her because I disagree with them. She loves Raven. I hate Raven. I’ve cut Raven out of my thoughts. She no longer exists, as far as I’m concerned. But I haven’t told Clover that. I haven’t admitted it to her—though if she reads this, she’ll soon find out. I don’t expect Clover to do the same. I don’t want her to do the same. She should spend her time with Raven, because Raven makes her happy.

I can’t ask Clover to give up anything because she will. She’d do it for me. It’s a fine line that I walk and if I say anything out of place she’ll take it to heart. She’ll change. She’ll make sacrifices. And I’m not going to ask her to give up anything else.

I’m happy. I am. I’m content. I have no complaints. Well, close to none. Nothing important or urgent. True and complete happiness, unflawed and untainted is a myth, but I hold my demons close to my chest. It’s better to keep them on a loving leash than to let them run free, right?

Jesse