The Renegade Cycle

01/05/88

I’ve finally done it. I walked away. The pone calls haven’t started yet, but they will. I must be strong. If previous accounts are to be believed I’m going to start forgetting the details soon, but this journal should remind me that no matter how foggy the details are nothing is worth going back there. Nothing.

Thirty-one days is all I need. On February third it will be like nothing had ever happened.

God help me.

01/08/88

The calls started this morning. I knew it would happen, hell I’ve made a few of them myself. Somehow I was hoping I would really get away without a reckoning.

As a side note, the cute girl working the register at Woolworth’s gave me her number today. Maybe this move won’t be so bad after all.

01/09/88

Peggy called this morning. Can’t deny it, that one stung. It’s one thing to know I screwed my own life up with that nonsense, but Peggy never deserved any of this. I wish I’d never found that thing.

I’m conflicted about the Woolworth’s girl. Jennifer, I think her name is. Handwriting is terrible, but there was something there, a spark. I keep staring at the back of this receipt like a nervous schoolboy

I don’t know. It’s a weird time for me to be worrying about romance, but in some ways this is the first time I’ve been awake in, what, ten years?

01/12/88

They don’t even leave messages anymore. Probably realized I was just erasing the tapes. You would think weird spooky cults would find other things to do with their time, but the calls just keep coming. I tried changing my number, but I knew it would be useless. Doesn’t even slow them down.

Started the new job as a custodian at the local school, kindergarten through eighth grade. Not enough kids here to justify separating the schools after the old elementary burned down. 

The staff seem nice enough. Admin were pretty happy to have someone with my mechanical engineering skills. I’ll keep the place running for a fraction of what it would cost to bring in repairmen, a solid pitch to any underfunded rural school. Solid enough that they didn’t look too closely at my work history, anyway.  

I’m starting to think maybe I’m going to pull this thing off. Three weeks to go.

01/15/88

Something isn’t right. I swear I’m sleeping through the night, but I wake up exhausted. Bought a new mattress, maybe that will help.

My memory of before is starting to get hazy. I read this journal and the others I wrote over the last few years, and they feel like fiction. I know they aren’t, but for how long? 

God, please let me hold out for a few more weeks.

Talked to Peggy today. No idea when I plugged the phone back in, but I answered it without thinking when it rang. She asked me when I was coming home, said Mom was asking for me. I know Mom died years ago, but I swear for a few minutes I believed her. Even started looking through the phone book for bus stations.

I threw the phone in the trash. I’ll call Jenny from the pay phone at the school tonight, tell her the wiring in my apartment is messed up or something. 

1/17/88

This just doesn’t make any sense. I’m flipping through all the old journals and none of them mention any kind of escalation. My memories of the group are hazy, but I’m almost positive they never get physical, not even just to talk. They call and call and wear you down, but they don’t chase you.

It has to be them though. Who else would leave a dead cat in my apartment? And how in hell did they do it without waking me up? All the doors and windows were locked, but it’s not exactly fort knox here. I’m sure I could break in myself if I was determined enough. I cleared it with the super, going to grab a door chain from the hardware store tonight and install it myself. 

At least all this snow is keeping me busy at the school. Work helps keep my mind off things.

1/21/88

Finally got Jenny over for dinner tonight. It’s been a week since our first date but it feels like I’ve known her for a lifetime. 

My parents had this crazy soul-deep connection, it was something obvious even to my sister and I. The idea that I might be that lucky in love never occurred to me until that kiss under the stars. Maybe it’s just my brain going into overdrive for the first real romantic relationship post high school, but I don’t think it’s that simple. Electrical doesn’t do justice for describing the atmosphere when we’re together.

Shit. Thinking about my parents reminds me, how long has it been since I talked to Peggy? I should call her. It’ll be a good test of this fancy new cordless phone Jenny bought me with her employee discount.

1/26/88

Well that was unexpected. The head custodian for the county schools went missing, and the superintendent tapped me for the job. Seems old McDougle had been prone to drunken benders from time to time, and this was one too many for the leadership. They saw my degrees and said they were impressed with my work (after less than a month?) so I get the gig. 

I know Jenny’s father is influential around here, maybe she pulled a few strings? Man, how do I even ask?

No answer from Peggy still. Hope she and the boys are okay.

1/31/88

Well, almost there! I can’t really remember why the third of February was so significant, but it was the whole reason for this journal so it must have been important to me at the time. I can’t seem to find the older journals mentioned in this one, but Jenny says they were mostly just about that weird cult I was into for a while.

She asked me to move in with her tonight. Her dad gave her one of his old properties when she started medical school, and it’s more than big enough for the two of us. Hell, it’s big enough for us and a whole gaggle of kids down the line. 

One thing I can’t figure out after learning how rich her family is. Why in the world would a medical student that doesn’t need money be working as a cashier at Woolworth’s? I asked her and she just gave me that mysterious little smirk I get from time to time when she isn’t going to answer my questions. Quite an enigma, my girl - but I wouldn’t change a thing.

2/03/88

It’s finally over. Decades trapped in that damned little town with that damned little shrine around that damned little statue. 

What was I thinking, bringing that thing into our home? Having my soul shackled for so long is infuriating.

Jenny says it was all fate, that it led me to her and this place in the middle of nowhere. I think I owe her far more than I realize just yet, but she’ll tell me in time. It’s not like either of us can walk away now, no matter what dark secrets come out. With her access to hospitals and mine to the schools, I suspect we’ll be making many much darker ones soon.

I’ll save this journal as a warning for others. I don’t know where that artifact came from, but we’ll need to be vigilant against them.