Chapet One

Thursday June 6th, 1932

Hello, I'm Raymond Williams. One of the characters in a book I'm reading keeps a journal, so I thought I'd try it out. I live in a city called Crooks. It's a big city and some of the wealthiest people in East America live here, though it feels like practically everyone who lives here is rather wealthy. Although I would be considered to be in the upper middle class, it was still hard to get here. I moved into a nice apartment a couple of years ago, it even has a balcony. I don't know what else to write about so I will end it here for now.

Friday June 7th, 1932

Yesterday I forgot to mention, but I'm the assistant manager at the local newspaper. The title sounds impressive, but really I just spend the whole day proofreading papers and managing finances, the boss is the one who actually does all the important work. I noticed that my co-worker, Baron, came to work late today and got chewed out by the boss. He said he overslept because he stayed out late last night,but didn't say what he was doing. I don't know Baren that well, but we talk sometimes. He's from a small town called Echo Creek, which is just south of crooks. My office is by a window, so sometimes I see him walking up the dirt path that leads from Echo Creek to Crooks. Barren is the only employee here who's from Echo Creek. Most companies don't hire people from Echo Creek because of their lower class status, but Baren managed to get a job here after agreeing to accept a lower pay. My break is almost over so I should probably finish up this entry.

Saturday June 8th, 1932

I can't believe my boss personally went to my apartment to get me to work five hours early. Apparently the mayor of Echo Creek sent a letter to our newspaper explaining the recent death of a man named Brandy and a four foot crow. My boss said that this was going to " rake in the money " and wanted us to start printing immediately. After a few hours of editing I approved the headline, " Man in Echo Creek killed by local cryptid ". I thought it was an exciting title, and apparently so did everyone in the city, as it sold out by noon, and we had to keep printing copies all day. I was exhausted by the end of the day, but it was all worth it because my boss was very happy with the results and gave me a pay raise.

Sunday June 9th, 1932

We continued printing copies today, and they were just as popular as yesterday, though that's not exactly what I wanted to write about today. Barren didn't show up for work today. I asked my boss about it and he said that Barren was on a "temporary leave", but I knew he wasn't coming back. HR had been wanting to fire Barren for weeks now, and they finally had an excuse. The truth is, the newspaper hasn't been doing so well lately because nothing big is happening, and if nothing big is happening then newspapers don't sell. They've been needing to let go of someone for financial reasons, but I have a feeling that's not the only reason why they chose to fire Barren.

Tuesday June 11th, 1932

My theory was correct,well, most of it at least. The company has already found a replacement for Baren! I guess the company had more lee-way than I thought. The new employee's name is Vincent, and he is a local, as expected. So far Vincent has been keeping to himself but he seems nice enough...though I wonder what kind of strings he had to pull inorder to get this job. Even though I wasn't hired this quickly and it took me a year and a half to get to the position I'm in, Vincent has only been working here a day and gossip around the office says he's already due for a pay raise.

I'm updating this entry twice today. I usually wouldn't do so, but something odd happened. Vincent dropped by to give me the daily financial report, but before he left he also gave me an unusually large crows feather. I asked him why and he told me that he grew up in Echo Creek and only moved to Crooks twelve years ago. He told me that crows feathers meant good luck in Echo Creek, but his voice winced a little when he said that last part. Before he closed the door behind him, he looked over at me. He was smiling but his eyes didn't match. They looked at me almost as if they were saying " I'm sorry ". He didn't talk to me again after that.

Wednesday June 12th, 1932

Things have been rather tough lately with the recent stock market crash. Although the crisis had started two years ago, back then it was only affecting poorer towns. But now it has started to affect bigger and wealthier cities, including Crooks. People are starting to get laid off left and right and about five tenants in my apartment complex have lost their jobs and are now just barely managing to stay on their feet. I have never been so grateful for my job in my entire life. I had already stated that the newspaper company I work for has been doing poorly, but now things are going from bad to worse. But there is hope. The head manager of some big wig newspaper company in Washington came to see my boss today. Washington has been hit pretty hard by the stock market crash and it turns out that a supposedly really successful newspaper company has been doing even worse than us. They had to let go of too many employees and could barely keep up with deadlines. The head manager offered us a deal; not only would we be printing newspapers for Crooks, but we would now also be printing for Washington, and in exchange for our work, we would get forty percent of the profits our newspapers would make. My boss eagerly agreed, and thus started our partnership with the Phoenix newspaper.

Thursday June 13th, 1932

It's midnight, and I have woken up but I am now unable to fall asleep. I decided to open up my window for some fresh air when something weird was happening. A thick, dense fog covered the streets, flowing through the city like a river. I stared out the window for a few minutes, gazing upon this weird phenomenon. Suddenly, very quickly, a jet black...thing, I didn't quite see what it was, flew just above the fog. Maybe I'm just delirious from lack of sleep, I should probably try to go to bed now.