Jeff Jones, Week 9

“You walk into the room

With your pencil in your hand

You see somebody naked

And you say ‘Who is that man?’

You try so hard

But you don’t understand

Do you?

Mister Jones…”

Bob Dylan. “Ballad of a Thin Man”. Horrendously apropos. My monitor is constantly afflicted with these quotes, but nothing about them seems to suggest some greater meaning. It appears to be further taunting.

Only one thing of note happened this week, but it was a substantial thing. Once again keeping to myself for the bulk of the week and venturing out only for groceries, I did some work – poor work, but work – and slept. But the trip for groceries ended up being much more.

As I was paying for my things, I glanced out the store window and saw the creature across the street – just like I had before. But rather than run from it, I just stared at it this time. It made a motion with its head – as if to say, “this way”. My eyes widened, and the store clerk seemed perturbed by my sudden fixation with the window. I paid him no attention and ran out the store across the street, nearly being hit by two cars, but not caring. Something was about to happen, and I dared to hope that it may lead to the end of this all.

The creature had vanished, but I saw him down a nearby alley, and walked that way. He sort of glided out of sight around a corner. I rounded that corner and saw him again in the distance. He was leading me. Eventually we came to an ostensibly abandoned office building. He led me up the stairs to the third floor – the top floor, I think – and to a hallway. Large windows covered the right side of the hallway, and a white wall the other side. It was rather imposing, as the creature sat in a room at the end of the hallway, unmoving this time. I walked slowly toward him, hoping he wouldn’t glide away. As I did, I became aware that the white wall to my left was populating with a familiar red scrawl – the quotes that have been appearing on my monitor. The scrawl was far more frantic and unnerving here, hastily written in a messy fashion – no neat line structure or order existed on this wall. Everything was written haphazardly, crossing over other words and taking line breaks at will. It was chaotic. The creature didn’t move, but it did tilt its head. I finally reached the end of the hallway, and in a clap of thunder – tacky, I thought – the creature vanished. In his place was an ornate box. I don’t want to call it a chest, because that sounds tackier than the clap of thunder, but that wouldn’t be an entirely inaccurate term. I opened it, and saw that it was filled with large stacks of paper – manuscripts, it appeared. The papers were of varying ages, and I didn’t have time to sort through them all right there. I closed the box, and picked it up – it was surprisingly hefty – and brought it back to my home.

That was twenty minutes ago. It is now night, and the creature is not outside. The answer to all of this hopefully lies within these manuscripts. I am going to begin reading them right away.