Not much longer now. The fight comes when the sun is setting, of this I\u2019m certain. I\u2019ve longed for this fight and if I die trying, well, that\u2019s good enough for me.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
I know people think I\u2019m mad. I was actually afraid that I\u2019d see myself committed to the county home before I faced him. Face him.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
I consider him a scourge, a self-deceived creature of man\u2019s manipulation, of his own manipulation. If that sounds almost charitable, I hope so; he is my father.\u00a0 I\u2019ve learned there is no stronger force for evil than self-will. No stronger force for good than… self-will. God help me, please God help me.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
I\u2019m leaving this journal where someone may find it. My only prayer is that if I fail tonight, I die. What does a condemn man do but reflect on his life? The word insidious comes to mind. Don\u2019t think me a mad scientist or a bum who stumbled upon a nest of vipers. Thank God I never married, but Charlotte comes to mind during times of fear. Thank God she thinks me crazy and well shed of me.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
I have no resentments toward my father. He was a man of reason, a reader who shunned fiction as man\u2019s weakness; plays, poetry, novels, all folly. To raise the crucifix against evil was laughable to him, superstition. I can still hear my mother weeping during his funeral. It was his funeral that gave me a clue to his scheme.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
\u201cMichael, I\u2019ve seen him. Your father. He was right, dear, he has returned. I\u2019ve seen him, and I know tomorrow he will come and speak to me.\u201d She was right. He came, and I was waiting. My father was always a hard man, pushing me toward greater things, pushing me to leave my mark on the world.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
\u201cSon, you\u2019ve a great mind. Evolution has culminated in you. You have a great capacity for understanding, use it, damn you!\u201d<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
It\u2019s laughable that he could curse me as a second thought. I doubt he thought of the hypocrisy of it. The night my mother invited him into our home, he walked in dead. \u00a0I could see it in his eyes. Triumph, power, superiority and death all reflected in the green-red glow of his eyes. She saw it right away and fainted dead away. He came for me, but unlike him, I read fiction. Trembling, I raised my rosary toward him.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
He became a whirlwind of destruction, raising my mother\u2019s lifeless body before me and snapping her neck.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
I\u2019ve dogged his every step. Yes, my life has been an insidious chess match. The sun has almost set, I\u2019m sure he will be here. Twenty-three years is a long time to hunt a man that should have meant the world to me.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
The latch on the door to the sarcophagus is moving outward toward the night. Surprise is on my side. God help me.<\/p>\r\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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