FAST

Gunrock beach. I pitch my tent -- light of the moon reflecting off the water; smell of the ocean and low tide; sound of waves crashing; feel of warm-dry-powder sand beneath my bare feet and the warmth of the nighttime summer air. The tent went up quickly; uneventful.

Yesterday, I spent the night on Russ's couch, after moving all my possessions I couldn't carry into Russ's basement. Staying at his house permanently would've been taxing -- the grate of his mother's drunken stupors, day after day, would've been too much for either of us to handle. No, it's better this way; better for me; better for Russ; better for that welfare-queen-drunken-crazy-bitch mother of his.

With my tent completed -- set my iPhone's alarm to 20 minutes before sunrise; do a set of 100 pushups; sit-ups; leg lifts; isometrics. Light my battery powered lantern; pull out my journal -- (my personal grimoire,) -- and PRION -- the grimoire of Mr. Mitchell, I purchased from his soulmate Susan.

Haven't eaten today; plan on food fasting for the next three days. Additionally, I'm going to quit smoking and drinking caffeine; should be delightfully painful. Three simultaneous fasts. Suffering. Sublime suffering.

"Suffering unleashes spiritual power." I remember that old witch Susan telling me before someone shot her -- wearing my body as a disguise.

My water jug's full; in the next few days, I'll remain fully hydrated; my fat cells will unleash the energy required to power my body; my fat cells will implode, releasing their stored fats back into my bloodstream, along with all the toxins they contain. All the toxins from my body will be purged -- I've never fasted before.

Fat cells are storage devices; they're greedy. Whenever there's an overage of calories, beyond what the body can burn in a day, fat cells acquire and then store excess calories for future emergency use. In primitive man, this fat storage system was a survival mechanism. Men of the past, would often go for a time without food; loaded fat cells would enable men to survive many days without new food intake. Now a days, in this civilized world of plenty, men rarely go without food. This evolutionary survival trait -- fat storage -- seems to have outlived its usefulness. Fat cells hold onto memories as well, by fasting and imploding these cells, old memories, stored within the fat cells, will come rushing back to consciousness. People, places, events I haven't considered, in many years, will now come to the fore. These are my thoughts as I begin my three-day purification fast.

What went wrong in unguided meditation? Why did my spirit get captured by Antwon? Did Mitchell not know this was a possibility? I'm more than a-bit disappointed. Who murdered Susan? Was it really my body controlled by some other force?

Susan must have sensed the danger. She was such a beautiful woman, inside and out. Who would want to kill her? Did he kill her over this book? Did he kill her because of this book of magick she sold me?

I put Susan's murder out of my mind; there is nothing I can do about her murder now, but someday, hopefully, I'd have the resources to investigate and avenge her murder.

Now for the task at hand, survival. I need to find income and a place to live. Rents are expensive here; jobs are hard to come by. Could I learn how to survive from reading PRION? Can I conjure the things I need?

These thoughts intrigue me. I begin to read in my lantern's dim light. I turn back to the pages I skipped the other night; none of PRION'S pages are numbered; I turn to page nine marked with a junk-mail envelope. I'm tired. I'll try and push through it. Don't want to fall asleep with my lantern on, that would surely attract police officer Mahoney.