When scanning IRC channels, you meet interesting people. And then you get frustrated, leave, and write an article that you’re not sure is going to cut it, but you’re so tired you don’t give a damn, honestly. Then, because you cannot sleep because it’s only 11:30 PM, you go back to IRC and find an odd person willing to argue with you about fanfiction.
Another letter arrived earlier today, informing me that I needed to be in a park at midday wearing a red shirt and carrying a coffee. These, quite honestly, are putting me off. I’m tired of this game, whoever you are. I sat there for about an hour, writing in a notebook, trying to be observant. Whoever was supposed to be there was either not there, or too good at blending in and looking like the sunbathing masses for me to notice. Speaking of the sunbathing masses, I have not felt heat like this since I left Texas. It might have gotten this hot, but I probably wasn’t outside.
It’s now approaching midnight and the karaoke neighbour can be heard stumbling her way up the steps, probably ready to “serenade” me again. I keep hoping that one of these days the fact that right after she starts singing books start landing against her wall will cause her to wonder if singing at midnight at the top of her lungs is, perhaps, a bad idea.
I haven’t heard from my brother yet, and I’m beginning to get a bit worried. He, for someone who is supposedly an adult, is a bit more than irresponsible. I just hope that whatever he’s gotten us into, he can get himself out of.
I was going to write more, but my email just pinged. Andrew is apparently awake and in an editing mood. Work calls.
It has been the strangest few weeks. I don’t even know where to begin.
When I last was able to update, I was in my flat, with boxes in front of my doors after running back from Tesco in a paranoid fright. Now I’m in my flat with no brother on my couch, no idea what’s going on (still) and a long story to tell.
(later) It feels like I’m never going to get to tell that story. My neighbor (the karaoke one) knocked on my door about thirty minutes ago, crying. She wouldn’t tell me exactly what was going on, only that there was something terribly wrong. I have never agreed with her more, though I have a feeling that different things of ours were wrong. In my clumsy attempts to comfort her (I’m a writer for a reason. It means that I don’t have to interact with a lot of people) I might have let my native accent slip out a little bit. I don’t believe I’ve said “y’all” for a very long time, at least since I left the states.
After the day with the men with guns things calmed down a little bit, if by “calmed down” I’m allowed to mean “I stayed inside and shoved my bookcase in front of my door, forgoing my customary beating on the wall of the flat of the annoying neighbours.” I did that until it was pointed out to me over the phone (and I’ll put more about that up later) that I still had windows and that also, Michael would like it if my brother would stop sleeping on his couch and that surely I was close to being out of milk.
I haven’t been followed since then, and trust me, I’ve kept a look out. In fact, nothing weird, other than pieces of paper showing up, has happened. Though my brother finally did move off my couch. Two days after the phone call he showed up, shoved my car key at me, muttered something about needing his books, left me a piece of A4 with an address, and hasn’t shown up since. If I don’t hear from him soon, I’m going to start getting worried.
I need some kind of sleep. I have a knife to sharpen.
Do normal people have to run away from gun carrying (thank God I watch too many spy/action movies) men who attempt to follow you home from the shops where you’re attempting to buy locks that are hopefully better at keeping the weird things out than your current one? I should think not. I’m pretty sure that I’ve not felt more paranoid since uni, when paranoia was simply everyday. I mean, I was a pretty angsty teenager, and I constantly felt like the whole world was out to get me. This time, I’m pretty sure that it is.
I have never been more thankful for my youth experience with cross country, and my little-used ability to disappear. I was able to lose the creeps, and put enough streets between them and myself that I felt safe sneaking home. Is this what it’s like to live in a Bourne movie? Because honestly, I’d rather not. I’m a writer, not a runner.
All of this was preceded by what happened last night.
Last night, as I was just about to attempt to sleep, I found another note on my table. It was in the exact same place as the previous note, on the same kind of paper, and written with what looked like the same pen. It simply said Be careful. I, having made a habit all my life of being careful, promptly ignored it and went to sleep. Well, I say I went to sleep. Instead I lay in my bed for what felt like hours, listening to all the sounds in the flat.
This morning I woke up early, with all intents of both buying new locks, groceries, and hopefully catching my brother leaving the flat. He apparently wasn’t back at all last night, which is worrying even me. His car is still on the kerb, along with mine, and his bookbag is still in the customary space next to the couch. I’m both hoping that the nasty men with guns are his problem, and not. I mean, why else would they be coming after me? I don’t even write political articles! I mean, unless the history of a particular piece of music is political, these days.
The rest of this evening was spent hearing every sound, cataloguing it, and attempting to dismiss it. Every creak in the wood, every step of the neighbours next door, every car that drives by causes me to stiffen up and think that it’s the gun carrying nutsos again.
If they found me shopping, then they can find my flat. I’ve put my book boxes in front of the door.
Well, at least as much normality as I can expect to have, apparently. All this normality is making me on edge.
I actually finished. Me, finished. I celebrated by compulsively reading over it, saving it, saving it online, then sending it in. And then I ordered the expensive takeaway. And this is after my brother woke me up at 6 AM, when I’d only fallen asleep around 3. I wanted to kill him.
At least I know he’s alive, now. He came in, banged the door, slammed some food around in the kitchen, tripped over a table, and then landed on the couch. He’s lucky I had actually made it to my bed to sleep, because if I’d been where he landed he might have found himself sleeping in his car.
I’m now writing this over some delicious Indian food that got here about 5 minutes ago. I shouldn’t have to start working again for a few weeks, hopefully. Maybe I can actually pull my camera back out and start taking pictures again. That is, if I can find it, and if I didn’t leave it in the States last time I visited.
Nothing new has come of the note or the lockbox. There have been no further notes on the subject.
I may be back later. I’m going to concentrate on delicious food and last week’s Doctor Who.
I’m actually starting this entry before midnight, which in itself is an acheivement. Something today set off one of my nasty migraines and I spent most of the afternoon on the couch with a sleep mask over my eyes. I did get a little done on my actual work, but it’ll require a lot of editing. I’m decent at touch-typing, but sometimes my fingers get mixed up and I start typing in nonsense that looks like Welsh. While that would be interesting if it was actual Welsh, it isn’t, and is therefore annoying.
I did end up with a lockbox though, at the end of the 32 hours specified by the note. Nothing has happened, so I’m honestly hoping that this is someone with stock in a lock-box company and a weird sense of humour. Speaking of the note, it had disappeared when I went to make tea this early evening. I’m just hoping that my absent brother made himself un-absent and took it. If not, then I’m going to have to invest in better locks.
It is now officially midnight, and I am still as awake as ever, if headache-y and a bit cross. I have no idea why I wasted £29 on a box with a lock for me to store nothing in, Andrew will not stop emailing with his ridiculous suggestions, my brother has not been back, that I’ve noticed, since yesterday and I’m running out of both my tea and the Texan chocolate my mother ships me from the States. It’s not entirely fair.
I need to go throw something at my wall. My neighbour is singing again.
It seems that I’m always writing this at an hour that, for anyone else, would be insane. Being originally from a different time zone helps a little bit, but still. I’m living in this zone, not US-central.
Part of it may be because I have some of the most annoying neighbours on this side of the Atlantic ocean. They seem to think every night is a good night to come in blathering drunk, shouting at the top of their voices and singing songs that cause even me to blush.
I have gotten nothing done on any of my various “assignments” today. In fact, I’m finding it hard to even write something for this blog. I actually started typing this at a little before midnight, and now it’s 3-ish in the morning. I can’t believe that I’m still on my university schedule. Then, 3 in the morning would be nothing worth mentioning. Now? I somehow am on my way to being a functioning adult, or I was before this whole mess with my brother started up.
He was gone most of today again, and was about to take my car with him when I managed to, er, relieve him of my keys. I told him that he had his own damn car, thank you v much, and that he could take it if he felt it nessecary to drive. It was raining, so I figured he’d either do that, or grab a cab, but he muttered something petulant about walking. I think he took an umbrella, but I’m not sure.
He hasn’t been back since then, and I’m beginning to be slightly worried. I’ve been working on the couch all day, just so I can see the door. Unless he’s mastered the highly improbable art of becoming invisible, he hasn’t walked in.
The note from yesterday is still on the kitchen table. I know that he looked at it, but no box-lock or not- has appeared in the flat. It was addressed to me, though. I may see about buying one tomorrow.
I really need to get some kind of sleep. That deadline Andrew’s always on about is actually approaching and I have to get something done to show him.
Now, to finish my tea and make that actually happen.
My brother continues to be strange and confusing. He decided that he needed to ransack my books for something that he refuses to tell me. If the very loud cursing at an unholy hour of the morning was any proof, he didn’t find it. He spent most of today either not here, but not with the car, or in the kitchen, reading the newspaper. I really hope that this sudden interest in the classifieds means that he’s finally finding either a job, or another flatmate, or both. I don’t want my own flesh and blood to live in his car, but there comes a point beyond which any sane person loses their patience.
Andrew called today, with his normal questions of whether or not I actually would ever like to see the rest of the money for the writing. I might have responded with some slightly less than cordial language. I know what deadlines are, and I know when they are. I even know that I’m held accountable for them! I don’t know what he hopes to accomplish. I don’t even have to write for him. The only reason I haven’t thrown my hands up in despair is because I am too stubborn to give in.
(Later)
The odd things that have happened this week keep piling up. I set down my computer, meaning to come back and finish this entry, and realized that there was a note sitting on my kitchen table. I hadn’t heard my brother leave, but I can get a little caught up in my work and not actually pay attention to what’s going on. It was a simple folded note, on plain paper, with my name written in script on the top. I had been hoping it was a note from my brother, informing me of his decision to move out, but it was nothing that nice. In fact, if I didn’t know my brother’s handwriting like my own, I would say it was from him, hoping to annoy me.
The note simply said 32 hours. Buy a lockbox. I have no idea why my brother, or an associate of his, would be offering me this advice.
I’ve decided to leave it be. If the message is meant for him, but I’m the name on the rent agreement, then he should see it. That is, if he even comes back.
It’s time for a cup of tea and another late night.
Interesting things never happen to me. Well, that’s not true. They didn’t happen to me until yesterday.
I had just acquired a new car-when I say new, I mean, new to me- and was sitting in my study when my brother (a man of little sense, sometimes) ran out the door. I didn’t pay much attention to that until I realized that the car noise leaving the kerb was not his normal car. In fact, it sounded distinctly like mine. I shrugged it off as his mistake and continued to throw things at the wall under the guise of writing something to show Andrew.
My brother is staying with me until he “gets his feet back under him.” I do not understand why it has taken him almost a year and a half to get the feet that are on the ends of his legs back underneath him, but then again, that’s just him. Unlike him, I invested the inheritance, and therefore can afford the flat I’m renting. He’s sleeping on the couch, and I’m about to kick him off it. I need my couch. I can throw things at a different wall, there.
Back to the car. I had given up and gone to bed when he returned. I got the distinct impression that he was trying to sneak in, despite the fact that I have never fixed the door hinge and it makes quite a ridiculous noise. He’d gone somewhere for 5 hours in my new car and was attempting to hide his return time from me. Sometimes I worry about him.
The biggest deal that came out of this was the fact that there were no obvious reasons for it not to run this morning. I mean, normally I would just shake my head over the rubbishness of buying a used vehicle. This time, something just feels…off. I intend to figure it out. I need something to do. The landlady is threatening a rent increase if I keep denting the wall with pens and such.
