INVISIBLE || E. Dockery

4

" Graham Session "
Recording #1
August 21,2012

Welcome to my world. You can call me Graham, and I'll be your host.

You don't know me. My anonymity is a testament to my success. As I'm sitting here talking to you, I'm not famous. But I will be when these recordings are released, whenever it is that I decide to release them. Then I'll be on the front page of every newspaper and magazine around the world. They will write books about me. They will study me at Quantico. Websites will be devoted to me. Movies made.

You will never know my real identity —“Graham” may or may not be my real name— so whatever you know about me will come from these audio files, my oral diary. You will know what I let you know. I may tell you everything and I may leave some things out. I may tell you the truth and I may lie to you.

A bit about me to start: I was sufficiently athletic to play high school sports but not enough to go beyond. I got good grades in school but not enough for the Ivy League, so it was a state university for me. I absolutely detest onion's of any variety, cooked or raw, a vile weed no matter it's iteration. I can speak three languages, though my French borders on the embarrassing at this point. But I can say no onions please, or the functional equivalent of that phrase, in no less that eleven languages, having recently added Greek and Albanian to my tally. I prefer your basic pop music to classical or adult alternative or heavy metal, but I don't admit that to my friends. I once ran a half marathon in one hour and thirty-seven minutes. I don't exercise regularly now. And I never drink light beer.

Two of the things I just told you aren't true.
But this one is: I've killed a lot of people. More than you'd believe.

And you? I don't even know who you are, the person to whom I'm addressing this narrative: a sentient being, perhaps the spirit of one of my victims? A tiny demon perched on my shoulder, whispering dark thoughts in my ear? An FBI profiler. An enterprising reporter. Or just an ordinary citizen listening to these audio files on the internet someday, hovering over the computer with lascivious fascination, hungry for an morsel, any kernel or information, an insight whatsoever in to The. Mind. Of. A. Madman!

Because, of course, that's what you'll do— you'll try to understand me, diagnose me. It makes you feel comfortable and safe to do that, to assign me to some nice, neat category. You'll ascribe my behavior to a mother who didn't show me love, a traumatic even that redefined me, a mental illness in the DSM-IV.

But here is what you'll find instead: I could be chatting you up in a neighborhood bar, or trimming the hedge's next door, or sitting next to you on a jet from New York to Los Angeles, and you would never even notice me. Oh, in hindsight, sure, you might pick out something about me that seemed off. But in real time, when I'm standing right in front of you or sharing an armrest or seated across from you, I would make no impression on you. I would seem, in a word, normal. And do you know why?

No, you don't know why. But I do. It's why I'm so good at what I do. And nobody will ever catch me.

[ End ]