Slender Man

We had a free period after lunch, and I got a little bit of work done on the story I’ve been writing. It’s still not working quite how I want it to, and I’m still not totally sure how to fix it, but I wrote a few paragraphs that I’m pretty pleased with, and I think I can make them better tomorrow if I get time. I would work on them tonight, but I’m about an hour’s grind from levelling up my new Warlock and I think that’s about all I’ve got the energy for right now.

I’m really tired. Not the kind of tired where you’re going to feel great if you give yourself an extra hour’s sleep: that kind of deep tiredness that makes it feel like your bones are made of lead, like someone has turned all your dials down to zero and locked them.

This is what Dr. Casemiro is supposed to be helping me with. She’s clearly doing an awesome job, although I’ll admit that actually going to sleep before one in the morning would probably not be the worst idea in the world.

But fuck it.

I know I’m my own worst enemy :)

— — — —

From the desk of

DR. JENNIFER CASEMIRO, M.D.

596 WEST 72ND STREET, NY 10021

March 15, 2018

Dear Paul and Kimberley,

Further to our call yesterday, please find below my assessment of my first month working with Matthew. Please be assured that I understand your concerns about what you perceive to be a lack of visible progress – I can only attempt to reassure you that such progress rarely occurs at the speed you are (understandably) hoping for and, in my experience, its absence does not signify anything more significant than the issues of trust-building and boundary-testing that are common to the early stages of a professional relationship of this type.

Matthew possesses high levels of intelligence and awareness, and has made it clear that he is unwilling to work with me on the issues for which he was referred. Despite that, I believe significant progress has in fact been made.

His initial statements were that he did not want to talk to me, and that he considered my attempts to induce him to do so to be a violation of his human rights. This grand language is not unusual, especially in teenagers of Matthew’s intelligence. It is a common form of diversion, in which he avoids the issue of why he doesn’t want to talk to me by expanding our conversation to a point of general absurdity, in this case the issue of human rights.

In the last week or so, Matthew’s objections to working with me have changed. He no longer states that he does not want to – he has now repeatedly stated that he does not see any point in doing so. This marks a significant shift, in my experience. He has moved past a dogmatic refusal to talk to me, and has moved onto a more personal objection, i.e. that he does not believe I can help him with what he perceives to be a medical issue. This, although it may not seem so to you, is progress. It suggests a willingness to engage with our process, provided that I can convince him of its potential usefulness. This is what I have focused on during our last two sessions.

As you know, I have asked him to keep a diary. He has apparently done so – he has shown me the pages he has written, although I (obviously) cannot guarantee that he is taking it seriously – although it is clear that he resents it. We have discussed it, however, and those conversations have been illuminating.

Persistent refusal to engage requires a level of self-control that few teenagers possess, and even Matthew, who is both intelligent and unquestionably composed, is not able to neuter his speech entirely. Our conversations have revealed the frustrations and doubts that are entirely common to this period of late adolescence, the period in which most teenagers find themselves caught between the desire to be in charge of themselves and the unavoidable reality of the rules and restrictions that come with living at home.

He makes several references to his belief that you will be disappointed in him if he chooses any career other than the law, so much so that he believes you would actually prevent it by refusing to pay for college tuition in any other field. I do not know whether this is something that you have ever made explicitly clear to him, but it has become a deeply-held belief. I suggest that you discuss this with each other, and then with him.

I am also convinced that his frustration and worry are at least partly responsible for the issue for which you referred him to my practice, i.e. recurrent nightmares and sleeplessness. This is the central issue that I will continue to focus our sessions on.

I hope this sets your mind at rest. There are no reliable timetables for the work that I do, and while I know from long experience that this can be frustrating, I would ask you to allow the process to continue. I can assure you that we are making progress, even if you are currently struggling to see it.

Yours sincerely,

Jennifer Casemiro, M.D.

TRANSCRIPTS OF AUDIO RECORDED ON MATTHEW BARKER’S CELLPHONE

Recording begins: March 16, 03:24

Jesus

That was

Hold on

Let me just

OK

OK

It’s 3.24 in the morning, and I know that exactly because I’ve been staring at my phone screen for the last ten minutes waiting for my heart to slow down. It was on the pillow when I woke up. I must have fallen asleep still with it and right now I’m really grateful for that because if it was on the bedside table where it usually is I would have been fucked. I tried to turn on my lamp a few minutes ago and I reached out and my hand disappeared and I couldn’t see it anymore and I started wondering what I would do, what I would really actually really do, if fingers closed around my wrist and I pulled my hand back and put it under the covers and I could feel my whole body shaking like I was freezing.

So

Jesus

I need to

Recording ends: March 16, 03:26

Recording begins: March 16, 03:30

OK.

It’s 3.30 now and it feels like my head is sort of starting to clear. I just … Jesus. Seriously. I don’t know if that was the worst nightmare I’ve had since they started but if it wasn’t then I’m just really glad I can’t remember the ones that were worse.

I can still feel it. Does that make sense? Like it was an actual thing, like a physical thing that attached itself to my skin and it feels like I can’t scrape it off. Like if I close my eyes I’ll be back inside it.

I managed to turn the lamp on. It took literally every ounce of bravery I’ve got, but I feel a little bit better now.

I never used to be able to remember dreams, not the good ones or the bad ones. I sometimes had that vague feeling when I woke up that I had been dreaming, because it felt like I wasn’t really as rested as I should have been for the amount of time I’d been asleep, and sometimes there were images I didn’t recognize in my head, like photographs I know I didn’t take, but the dreams themselves, the details, were always gone by the time my eyes opened.

For the last couple of months it hasn’t been like that. At all. And this one was no different. I can remember every single bit of it.

I already know it’s going to sound stupid but right now I don’t give a shit. Like, at all. Because dreams always sound stupid. They don’t translate properly to other people, because they come out of some place deep inside yourself and what’s absolutely fucking terrifying to me probably means absolutely nothing to you, or to anyone else. But I have to get this out. I think it will be less, afterwards. Like it’s diminished or something. I don’t know.

There were trees everywhere. Everywhere. That’s the main thing I remember. I don’t know what they were, or where. Because Central Park is two blocks away I guess it would make sense to assume that was where I was, but I don’t think that’s right. I didn’t see any paths or gardens or anything familiar. And the trees seemed older. Like they were wild, like they had just grown wherever they wanted. I was totally surrounded by them and I remember looking up and seeing the sky, and it was black. Not dark purple or dark grey or dark blue or the pale glowing yellow that always hangs over Manhattan. Proper black.

Pitch black.

I was walking. I don’t think I knew where I was going, or if I did then I’ve forgotten. There’s no logic to dreams, no narrative of A to B to C that makes sense. Or, at least, not that I’ve ever known. Maybe it’s different for some people.

I was walking, and there were trees and the black sky and I sort of knew that I was cold, like I was just sort of aware of it, but it didn’t worry me. I just walked and shivered and walked and I can’t remember actually thinking about anything, or doing anything else. I just walked.

And then

I think

Jesus. Come on, for fuck’s sake. Get your shit together.

Come on

Come on

Recording ends: March 16, 03:33

Recording begins: March 16, 03:35

OK

So

There was something behind me.

I just knew there was, as surely as I know my name and where I live and that if I swing my legs out of bed there’s going be a floor there. It was just a fact. It was behind me, and it was getting closer.

I didn’t look round, because I think I knew that it would catch me if I did. Like that was the rule, like I was fucking Odysseus or something. If I looked round, I would see it right behind me, and I didn’t want to see it. I didn’t want to know what it was.

But I knew I couldn’t run either. If I ran, then it would definitely catch me. I knew that too, without any doubt at all, the way some things just are. It’s like someone installs the rules of the dream into your head before it starts.

So I kept walking. I was sort of trying to go quicker, like I was going to push the no-running rule as far as I could, but nothing really happened. That’s the worst thing about dreams: that there’s nothing you can do. You’re basically helpless.

I know people talk about realising they’re in a dream while they’re still having it and being able to change things and do whatever they want, but I don’t buy that. I think maybe that’s how they remember them, and maybe that supposed realisation was actually just part of it, like it feels like they were making choices and exercising free will afterwards, once they’re awake, but I don’t think that’s ever actually what happens. I don’t think your consciousness is engaged in dreams. I think they’re like movies with you in them, where you can’t actually change what’s happening. You’re just a passenger along for the ride.

Anyway.

I was walking and it was dark and the thing that was behind me, whatever it was, was getting closer. It didn’t make any sound, it’s not like I heard its footsteps speeding up or anything like that. I just knew it was getting closer. And I knew it was going to catch me. I didn’t know how long it was going to take, or whether there was any way for me to stop it, like I might reach the end of the trees and be safe. It was following me and I was walking and it was getting closer and closer and I was trying to hurry and I didn’t dare look around because I knew what would happen and then I decided to run because I didn’t care anymore I just needed to run because I couldn’t just walk through the trees and wait for it to catch me but my legs wouldn’t do what they were told and I think I screamed then but I’m not really sure and then I knew – I just absolutely knew without any doubt whatsoever – that it was right behind me and that if I reached my hand out behind my head I would touch its skin and then I definitely screamed and I felt something on the back of my neck like its breath or maybe it reached out and touched me with the tips of its fingers and

Recording ends: March 16, 03:37

Recording begins: March 16, 03:42

I’ve been awake for exactly twenty-eight minutes. I went to get a glass of water but my hands were shaking so much that I spilt most of it on my way back from the bathroom.

So. Yeah. I think

I think

I don’t know if I screamed out loud. Probably not, because I guess someone would have woken up. The apartment is all dark and on my way back from the bathroom I stopped outside my parents room and I could hear my dad snoring.

So I guess I only screamed inside my head. It was enough to wake me up, though. My heart was racing in my chest and for the first couple of seconds I couldn’t breathe, just couldn’t breathe at all. It was like someone had tied a belt around my chest and pulled it tight. It was dark and the scream was ringing in my head and I couldn’t see anything and I honestly thought I was dying. I thought my heart had stopped and I thought I was dying and there was a thought in my head, just one thought, going over and over and over.

It got me. I was too slow, and it got me.

Jesus

I’m pretty sure that’s it for sleep for me tonight. Dad’s alarm will go off in about three hours and I’m not moving from this spot until then. The lights are staying on and I’m staying right where I am and I’m not moving until the sun comes up.

I’m done

Recording ends: March 16, 03:44

LAUREN

So I read it. It’s good.

MATT

You thought so?

LAUREN

I mean, I’m not exactly a literary critic. But yeah. I really liked it. The first bit, the dream, was really scary.

MATT

Awesome. I know you don’t scare easily :)

LAUREN

Damn right ;)

MATT

You really liked it?

LAUREN

You know I wouldn’t say so if I didn’t. You should show it to someone.

MATT

I did. I showed it to you :)

LAUREN

Smartass.

LAUREN

Seriously, though. Maybe Professor

Trevayne?

MATT

Why?

LAUREN

He might like it too?

MATT

He might. Or he might tell me it’s a piece of shit. Either way, what does it matter?

LAUREN

What are you talking about?

MATT

You’ve met my dad, right?

LAUREN

Once or twice :)

MATT

Do you know how much writers make?

LAUREN

I would guess it depends on the writer.

MATT

Now who’s being a smartass?

LAUREN

You started it.

LAUREN

Why does it matter how much writers earn?

MATT

Because me telling my dad that I don’t want to be a lawyer, that I actually want to be a writer so would he mind financially supporting me for the rest of his life, is not a conversation that’s likely to go well.

LAUREN

That’s bullshit.

MATT

What is?

LAUREN

Even if you’re right. You enjoy writing.

MATT

Was that a question?

LAUREN

Nope. I know you enjoy it. So you should want this story to be as good as it can be.

MATT

OK.

LAUREN

So show it to someone who knows what they’re talking about. Like Professor Trevayne. He gives you advice, you finish the story, then the next one you write is better. I don’t see the problem.

MATT

I wish I hadn’t sent it to you.

LAUREN

Well that’s just tough shit I’m afraid.

LAUREN

I’m going to bed. Two questions first.

MATT

OK.

LAUREN

One. When are you going to send me part two?

MATT

When it’s ready.

LAUREN

Spoken like a true writer :)

LAUREN

Two. What’s the title going to be?

THE DAWN ALWAYS BREAKS

by Matt Barker

He had no idea how much time had passed when he saw it.

Time seemed malleable inside the forest, to the point where it had ceased to have any meaning. The rain had stopped briefly, then started again more heavily than ever. In the brief moments when water wasn’t falling from the sky, the air had cleared and felt fresh, before thickening again as the rain returned. It had felt like the first storm had passed, only for a second, stronger one to arrive within minutes. Which was impossible, of course. The storms that battered the valley were huge, vast sheets of dark clouds that blanketed the entire sky. They took hours to move across the sky, and it was unheard of for one to follow another directly.

But that was what had happened. Stephen was sure of it.

The trail was still there, rougher and more overgrown than ever, now boggy with mud and with streams running either side of it, but it was still there. Stephen had considered what he would do if – when – it ended, if he found himself faced with the impenetrable wall of undergrowth and tree trunks that ran along both sides of the trail, but had pushed the thought away. He would deal with that if and when it became necessary to do so, and there was no sense worrying about it until then.

Thunder rolled overhead, a ceaseless drumbeat that shook great quantities of water down from the trees and trembled the trail beneath his feet. He paused, feeling the crackle in the air in his teeth and the bones of his jaw, then flinched as lightning burst across the sky, lighting the entire forest blinding white. A smell of burning filled his nose, the electricity in the air lifted the hairs on his arms and the back of his neck. The thunder rolled again, and this time he braced himself, ready for the flash when it came.

The lightning struck with a noise like the end of the world. It sounded like it was close – too close – and the blaze of light was long and hurt his eyes. In the blue-white seconds before it faded, leaving dancing spots of red and yellow in front of his eyes, he saw the scale of the place he now found himself, saw the trees stretching away in every direction, tall and old and endless. And away to his left, where the trail made a gentle turn to the left, he saw something else.

For a millisecond, he thought it was a tree. It was tall, and spindly, composed of straight lines and edges.

Then it moved …

Stephen allowed reality to come slowly, to wash over him like warm water. For long, stretched-out moments the divide between sleeping and waking was a blur of dark grey, the familiar surroundings of his bedroom bleeding into the equally familiar horror of his nightmares.

They were always the same, and he had accepted that they would never leave him. Not entirely, at least: there were nights, sometimes as many as three or four in a row, when he slept as he had before the war, and he was never less than grateful for such respite. Because he always knew it was only a matter of time before the things he had done invaded his unconscious mind again, and soaked his dreams with blood.

He swung his legs out of bed, pulled on his boots, and stood up. He felt the aches in his back, the pull of his shoulders, and grimaced. He had seen his own father stretch and wince in a similar way in the mornings, but that had been because he had been an old man. Stephen was barely thirty, although he could no longer claim with a straight face that he felt his age. He felt tired, and worn out.

He felt used up.

The physical hardships of the war had been severe, but he understood instinctively that this was something deeper. He had no learning of medicines and ailments, but he felt that a malaise had settled into his bones during his time in the west. Perhaps the old men and women of the village had been right when they proclaimed that there was a price to be paid for taking a life. If so, Stephen owed the kind of debt that would give even a king pause for thought.

He slid the bolt on his door – there had been much scoffing when he had hammered the metal plates into place, but then the farmers and blacksmiths and tailors who called the village home had never hacked a foreign king’s nephew’s head from his neck while his limbs still twitched and his body was still warm – and stepped out of his house.

Spread out ahead of him to the east were the fields that he had worked as a boy, first for his father and then under the unfailingly critical eye of his mother. The small stone church, abandoned since the dawn of the Age of Reason, stood at the north-west corner of the largest field. For three winters now the villagers had waited for its roof to fall in, but still it held.

To the north, the valley sloped down to the river and the rich lands beyond. It would never cease to feel strange to Stephen that when he looked in these two directions, everything he could see now belonged to him. He had protested the King’s decision to make him the Lord of these lands, but only once: the King appreciated humility but did not appreciate argument, especially if the topic under discussion was a gift that was – by anyone’s standards – extremely generous.

Perhaps gift was the wrong word. The lands that had always been known as Wrong Side were a reward, earned a thousand times over on the battlefield in the protection of the Realm. And had they been any other parcel of lands of equal size and value, Stephen would not have protested even once. He knew what he had done, and what it was worth. It was only the men and women who lived on and worked these lands that had given him reason to be uneasy. He had grown up amongst them, a boy no better than any other, and now he was their Lord, by order of the King.

It was fair to say that there had been varied reactions to the news.

The small village square was busy, as it almost always was.

A small queue had formed in front of the well; the hard women who worked the land with a stubborn determination that was at least the equal of their husbands, waited patiently with wooden buckets in their hands. He could not hear their voices across the distance between them and him, but Stephen was extremely confident that gossip would be flowing between them as rapidly as the water being drawn from the cool rocks below.

Down by the river, he could see clothes being washed and children playing happily along the water’s edge. Arthur Allen, who would turn fifteen in a month’s time and was making the most of his last summer as a boy before the duties and responsibilities of adulthood made themselves known to him, was leading a group of smaller boys and girls in a circle along the riverbanks, orchestrating a game the rules of which Stephen could not even begin to fathom. There were sticks involved, and the covering of one eye with a hand, and an intricate series of loops and whirls had been scratched into the dust. It was beyond his understanding, but the children appeared to have no such problem.