The Ghost of Winn Peterson

23. Winn

November 10

After my insensitivity with Evie, I sloped my way through the house in search of something to distract myself with. Alas, the various skeletons and skulls and stuffed creatures did nothing to assist me in the way of entertainment. Pyotr the Bear gazed at me with frozen, pained eyes, as though empathetic with my situation of forced isolation. There was no small amount of embarrassment I felt, looking upon his massive hide, for my own position. Here he was, a great and mighty beast of a foreign land, forced to house nothing but straw and empty thoughts. Who was I to feel poorly in the face of something so pathetic as Pyotr was now?

Feeling more melancholy in the face of my ursine friend, I settled on staying in my own chambers (as I had grown fond of calling them; did the morose and gloomy world I was now in not seem more fitting to be called such?). There was not much to do besides sleep or pine out of the window, so I reduced myself to continuing the penning of my story. I was irked that I was forced to write at a desk purchased by the one responsible for my imprisonment, but I detested writing in bed. The cramps of the neck from looking at such an odd angle had been learned by myself one too many times in my past, and I refused to commit the mistake again.

Something of my plot had become clearer to me, a feat I was rather proud of, as I've only been able to accomplish sections of a story at a time, and all random at that. Alas, good things cannot last! 

As I reread for inkblots and misspellings, I began to see a clear pattern, and that was merely the detail' of my own life. Irked with the repetitive nature of my fictional and narrative writing (indeed, there is no use in keeping a journal if one is to tell the same story elsewhere), I threw this all out of the window and watched with frustration as they fell on the carrots below. Take that, I snorted, hoping Atticus found them when he went to collect dinner. He could do with another chore or two. Always lounging about, picking at those clacking teeth of his, he was conveniently free of a task when I was around, perfect for his favourite hobby of needling me.

Starting anew, completely from the beginning, has its own joys, which were on occasion known to outweigh the pains. What story would I have to tell, now? The options were endless, as was my imagination, but would the notes I took down now be of any worth? I grappled for some time over the use in writing anything at all, before I looked to the window and was struck by the image of the black lace fluttering in the wind of a faulty window. The impression of dark, elegant fabric upon the moody background of an eternally raining sky filled my breast with a wordless inspiration. I turned back to the paper and found myself writing an abbey into existence. The mismatched eyes of a newcomer fell onto the page, his sodden figure nearing the door of the crumbling house of devotion. Continuing for some time, I found myself enraptured by the construction of this new world, a world dominated by fearsome religious fanatics and magic of incomprehensible depths. Having written for some time, I sat back and smiled wearily at the paper. More so a collection of notes, the page was a mess of murder amongst gods, priests, and animals. I considered the situation this nameless character was in and pondered his purpose. 

The point of a person's life was always something that fascinated me - no doubt, the history of my parents' lives fueled this fascination, but it also was an interest that somewhat solved my own doubts about myself and my life. Had I been anything at all like Mrs. Shelley, or her passionately atheistic husband, then I am sure I would have been quite through with living, coupled as I was with my various plagues of health. However, I can say quite firmly that the presence of God in my own beliefs, and this subsequent desire to understand the purposes He gave us, have pushed me through a day or two of misery, and a lifetime of sickness. 

Perhaps my pondering of the purposes of my new characters is to remind me of this in my current state. I was brought along with Evie despite my not being proposed to on any level. I could just have easily been snatched as an unfortunate wife of the suspicious and unsettling doctor, but here I am, a mere companion. There must be a reason for this.