“Graham Session”
Recording # 3
August 23, 2012
The Day After. Not unlike a hangover, the comedown after an overly indulgent night. I’m lying in bed, talking to you with this handheld digital voice recorder, staring at the photograph of Joelle Swanson I took last night after we ended things, and which I printed out on my color printer. She was a fighter, I’ll give her that. All that blood, all that pain, and yet she still fought for her life at the end. Sometimes, I just don’t understand people.
I know, I know, I told you I don’t take photographs—but I do take one of each victim at the end of the encounter. Can’t a fellow keep a souvenir?
Anyway—good morning! I try to start each day with the sunrise roundup at five in the morning. No better source for car crashes, murders, other incidents of ill tidings. Especially on a day like today, the quote, unquote Day After, the news is required viewing. Here, I’m pulling up the video clip on the website right now…here it is:
“A house fire claimed the life of a woman in suburban Lisle overnight. Twenty-three-year-old Joelle Swanson, a recent graduate of Benedictine University, was killed when a fire erupted in her townhouse bedroom in the early hours of Wednesday morning. Authorities say the cause of the blaze was a lit candle that tipped over by her bedside. They do not suspect foul play.
“Well, coming up next in sports, the NFL season is just around the corner, but a labor dispute will keep the referees—”
Enough. Click that right off. I wish you could have seen the footage of the ink-black smoke billowing out of the rooftop of Joelle’s townhouse. I love that word, billowing, one of those words that really only applies in one context. Does anything else besides smoke ever billow? They also had a sanitized photograph of Joelle that must have come from her recent graduation yearbook, posed and air-brushed. I prefer my photo of her; it has more character, more scars, more life.
By the way, I’m aware that it’s strategically indefensible to retain photographs of my victims. Yes, I know, if I were caught, this would be a blow-by-blow tour of what I’ve done, better than a signed confession. What can I say? I need these photographs. I’m willing to be reckless on this one point. If it makes you feel better, I stash my collage between pages 232 and 233 of my mother’s old Betty Crocker Cookbook, right next to the recipe for ground-beef lasagna. (Yes, it was a deliberate, if gory, choice.)
Ooooh, you’re thinking. His mother. The first mention of his mother occurs during the third session, at three minutes and seventeen seconds. Is there some significance to the time? Is 317 their street address growing up? Was her birthday March 17? Did she sexually abuse him 3 + 17 times?
Okay, I might as well tell you: my mother made me dress up like Little Bo Peep when I was a child, and it’s haunted me ever since. After I killed her with a machete, I vowed to mutilate all beautiful young blond women with whom I came into contact to rid myself of that horror. But it DOESN’T MAKE THE NIGHTMARES GO AWAY!
Just kidding. I know, I didn’t sell that very well. Didn’t have my heart in it. Maybe I’ll tell you about my mother sometime. Maybe I won’t.
I need to get ready for work now. Big day planned. I have one more adventure planned, at least, before Labor Day.
[END]