The Journal of Bloody Mary Jane: My Florida Idyll, Episode 1

by Chuck Miller

  ***

  Those who have read the first volume of the memoirs of the Black Centipede, the rather grandiosely-titled Creeping Dawn: The Rise of the Black Centipede, may think you know quite a bit about me. You do not. Nobody knows the secrets entombed in the yellowing pages of my journals-- not even my darling William, whom I have known in every conceivable sense of the word for almost 90 years now.

  There was a time when I thought I wanted to be like you. I knew so little of myself at the beginning of my journey in 1892. I killed Lizzie's father and stepmother, just as she wanted me to. I couldn't be blamed for that. I was only doing what I was created to do.

  Once that was accomplished, I took it into my head that I wanted to be human. I cannot imagine now why that seemed such an attractive prospect. We are foolish when we are young.

  My father had gone by the time I completed my mission. I did not know that I would ever see him again, and I sensed that Lizzie would have no further truck with me. I was alone and thought myself free.

  I thought I wanted what I thought everyone else had. I didn't know why I wanted this, any more than you do. And, like you, I didn't question it. Not for a very long time. It took years and years for the flesh of the illusory world to rot and drop away and reveal the bare bones of the lies that are the foundations of this world.

  But back then, in 1892, I was not wise. I believed all manner of foolishness. I knew nothing of the portentous events taking place all over the globe, events in which I was already deeply involved. It would be many years before I met the one who would give my life shape and purpose and help me to learn the truth about myself. He would not be born for another 18 years, and it would be 17 more before we would come together for the first time.

  I was alone and I feared that I would always be so.

  But, really, in the end-- aren't we all?