Time

So, having had a weekend, a Monday, and most of a Tuesday to think about it, I've come to a conclusion about that last post.

This whole thing is batshit insane.

Melanie refuses to say a damned thing about it. I only got anything by pretty much playing 20 questions over a couple of days. ("Are you thinking of an eldritch abomination? Yes. Is it outside the window right now? Also yes.") In the end, survey says that this is what's been bothering her all along. At first she didn't say exactly when it started, but led with "It's been going on since before dad's crash". That raised its own horde of questions that I've miserably failed to do my best to not think about. The other big thing is that the other has something to do with trees. For a minute I was hoping this was all an elaborate prank, because they lived in Kansas, where the state tree is a bush and the usual limit on how far you can see is the curvature of the earth.

But it started in Arkansas. They were visiting some of her mother's family when it first started. Apparently one of the friends of the kids in the family had told her some old urban legend. All I got out of it was it was a guy-in-a-mask/monster who starts fires and preys on kids, lives in the forest. It's about as coherent as you'd expect stories swapped between pre-teens to be, or urban legends in general. The fact it was second hand and told by a little girl who's been tortured by it for months probably didn't help.

Then the other actually showed up. I couldn't really get anything clearer than that; for at least a few days at the end of the trip, the thing appeared outside her window, just like it was doing here. Then they went back to Kansas and everything was fine. For a while.

Apparently it would show up some nights, with no pattern, never consecutively, and usually weeks apart. A couple of months later her parents had gone back to Arkansas, leaving her to stay with a friend while they looked into a house to move into.

That was in February. Her parents - my dad - never made it back to Kansas. The other was outside her window for what she claimed to be the entire night.

Then she came to Texas. For a couple of weeks, everything was, while not OK, free of our gruesome friend. Then she saw it where she'd never seen it before. In broad daylight. In the park. I apparently saw it too but I didn't see it then. But I can see it now - his stance, the way he held his arms - I thought it was some sort of injury or disability, but my mind's eye says that's how that veteran was standing.

I'm glad I cataloged this kind of thing.

That still doesn't really say what to do going forward. It didn't show up over the weekend, and it didn't show up yesterday even though I wasn't in the room that night. Mel and I discussed switching rooms - I don't have a window - but I don't know how well that would work. One thing's for sure - this isn't Kansas, and this isn't Texas as we like to portray ourselves. I can look out my front door and see trees, look out my backdoor and see a sea of trees, the drive into town is a largely-uninterrupted string of light forest. My school is surrounded on two sides by trees. Mel's school borders a small neighborhood covered in, yes, trees.

We can't run, and I Mel refuses to ask for help. "That's how he gets you," she said. I'm not sure what she meant by that. Maybe I'll do some research.