The Mansion of Men

Pete starts a journal

It's a daily entry. Short paragraphs that describe how he feels. It's meant to be an exercise to cleanse his mind. Because his mind can't function when everything gets too quiet.

It's nothing. It's filled with disjointed notes that don't make sense, pooling experiences from multiple events that add up to chaos. Because everything feels like chaos.

But he writes anyway.

He can't control much. But he can make his hands stay on the desk, make his wrists move, make his brain sit.

One day, he takes a break and reads through everything he's written, marveling at the utter rubbish that it is. He's so proud of it. It makes no sense and would probably confuse anyone who reads it.

He posts one day's entry on Twitter. He has no followers, so it's okay. He's screaming into a void. It's almost anonymous.

But then he wonders what it would be like to actually be anonymous. To write his thoughts out for people to know without them realizing that it's Pete's voice, his truth, his noise.

He envies the man behind the site, his anonymous voice. His ability to speak without consequence and be heard. To captivate people with his noise that has come to mean so much to people who can't put a face to his words.

Pete wonders if anyone would care about Pete's words. What Pete has to say is rubbish, anyway. No one would care. It's just the inner ramblings of a broken man.

And broken men don't last long in this business.

Not if people start to find out.

So Pete deletes the tweet and goes back to his journal.

Because no one can crucify him, if they don't know what sins he has committed.