Jeff Jones, Week 7

“As I lay dying, the man in the black suit would not close my eyes as I descended into Hell.”

Interesting. The first one that isn’t a direct quote. The source appears to be a quote from The Odyssey, but this certainly isn’t the exact quote. Nice to see there’s a direct connection between this and everything else that is happening; if the quotes were something else entirely I think I’d just end it now.

Speaking of ends – Roland’s dead.

I went in to the store this week to pick up my typical groceries, and Roland wasn’t at the desk as he usually is. There was another guy I’d never seen before, but he seemed to recognize me, and asked me as he rang up my purchases if I was the guy Roland had a drink with the other week. I told him I was, and he asked me to wait there for a minute. He came back a few minutes later with a police officer in tow, and I was asked to come into the station and answer a few questions.

They didn’t seem to think I had done it, but that may well be part of their interrogation technique. They asked fairly basic questions: where I was at the time, could anyone back me up on that, what was my relation to the victim, etc. etc. The whole time they were talking I was growing more and more fearful of what had actually happened. When they said they had no further questions and that I could go, I asked them if they had any crime scene photos. They showed me one of the body. It looked completely unharmed – he was lying face down. But the photo was still one of the most horrifying things I’ve ever seen. Cast over Roland’s dead body was a shadow.

I asked the officer what the shadow was, and he said they didn’t know. It appeared to be somehow permanently embedded within the floor, but they couldn’t determine the material and had sent it to a lab for examination. I thanked him and asked my final question: who found him?

“His daughter.”

I left the police station in a daze. He had a daughter and I never even knew that. He was the only person in this town who appeared to give a damn what happened to me, and I never even cared enough to ask about him. Maybe I deserve all of this. But he didn’t. And it’s my fault he’s dead. Whatever that thing is, it’s sending a message. Well, message received.

I didn’t even try to work.