04.02.2022

Cass,

I’ve long forgotten when it was exactly that I made you up. Some time ago, I decided to be alone. It didn’t take long to realize how impossible that was to maintain, so I conjured you out of my imagination. At times, I’ll forget you’re a figment. To me, this is all real. At least, profoundly more real than anything else.

I write to you at my worst, not that anyone would know. Work is going well. I’m good at it. I’m much, much younger than everyone “at the office.” Some have kids my age, which is likely why they’re so impressed by my temperament. I suspect a couple of them resent me for it — that is, for being half their age and outperforming them. I do not say it to boast, mostly to demonstrate how utterly stress free my life should be.

I work with an utter lack of focus — I have no desire to perfect anything. Yet, anything I touch is praised. At work, my mind and body exist in entirely separate planes of reality. I’ll often find myself typing, not registering a single thing at all. My hands, with a mind of their own (doing the heavy lifting), while my thoughts wander. I dream of Flowers and Alchemy, among other devilish things.

I’m not proud of it. Mostly, I’m confused by the way I instinctually wind up thinking about Abraxas, wondering if anyone else has met this Daemon and whether they’re willing to instruct me on how to rid myself of it.

I’ve never quite pictured him in any way — it’s more of an acute sense of his presence. I’ll see him in the faces of some of my coworkers and grow fearful of them. I put a great distance between me and anyone that bears the mark. I’ve started to see that darkness in public too. I’ll become aware of him lurking in the shadow of a stranger, try to keep course and calm down, grow overwhelmed by cowardice and divert my route; Subsequently thwarting my scheduled arrival — I am late a lot these days.

It’s pathological. I am going insane. Tell me, have you been seeing him too?