Let me start by saying , thanks for reading . You guys have been amazing to me . I started this blog when I wasn 't even sure what blogs were , or what I wanted to do with mine . I never dreamed that in just five short years , I 'd have such a large , and loyal , group of readers . Even the trolls , I thank you as well , because every time I get a comment , my hit count goes up and that adds to the revenue I collect from my sponsors . Each and every one of you who have read , liked , disliked , commented or flamed has helped me go from just another college kid to a person who can make a living doing what he loves ; writing . Anyway , I 'm saying all this because I wanted to announce that I 'll be moving to a new URL starting in two weeks . I 've decided that today will be my last post on this blog because there 's going to be a ton of work involved in my next venture . I 'll be joining the ever - expanding ranks of the professional bloggers on nuviews . org . I cannot say enough how thrilled I am to be working with these amazing people . Blogging never felt like a real job before , even with the ad revenue I was generating , but now , now I feel like I 've found my calling . I 'll be writing the same stuff I 've always written , but now it 's actually my job . My old content will still be at this url , but new content will be available at http : / / caffeinehead . nuviews . org starting in two weeks . I 'll still be blogging about as often , but it will be there , not here . I wanted to move my entire back catalog with me , but apparently there 's some potential legal snarls there , and it might work out as too expensive . So , loyal readers , please bookmark the above link and be sure to share it with people you know who read my page on a perhaps more sporadic level than you and might miss this message . Some of you might think that because I 've moved , I 'm gonna start holding back a bit with my viewpoints as to what 's happening , but really , guys . The fantastic folks at newviews . org would not have wanted me if they didn 't want my opinions . So , if you thought I was gonna start pulling my punches or changing my opinions , think again . Sorry , trolls . Then again , no , I 'm not sorry , and really , you aren 't either . You come here to be entertained by me , anyway . I know you do , no need to lie about it . Last week , as I 'm sure many of you have heard , the lie - spreading time waster known as Wikipedia got hit with a massive hack and was offline for over 48 hours . I want to stress that I was not involved , though I have nothing but love for the hackers that accomplished it . Hopefully soon the web 's most infamous deceit factory will be completely unable to spew its filth . I am not in contact with the hackers but I hope their next target is snopes . com . As I 'm sure my readers know , I cannot believe how easy it is to mislead so many people at once . Make a website , get some views , suddenly you 're an authority . Wikipedia allows its readers to generate content . How do they know the content being generated isn 't a lie ? Sure , they have to provide citations , but a citation can just be a link to another lying website , like snopes . How do I know snopes is a group of lying scumbags ? Simple . Just go check their page on Impetus Sand . They say Impetus Sand is a myth . A fraud , conducted by conspiracy theorists . Folks , you know that 's ridiculous . I have seen Impetus Sand in action with my own eyes , and I 'm certain you all have , as well . In fact , just the other day I was speaking with a man while riding the bus , and it hit me halfway through the conversation that I was speaking with a man who did not exist . He might have existed once , but no longer . He was a construct ; a being formed from Impetus Sand . What tipped me off was that at one point he stopped , mid - sentence , blinked his eyes , and started his entire sentence over again , same inflection and everything . He had to reset himself . I see it all the time , but you don 't have to believe me . Just check out this link at http : / / optimumscience . net / archives / 10 / 06 / 05 / the _ impossible _ polymer and have a look at what Dr . Magnus Ellison has to say about it . He 's looked at Impetus Sand under a microscope . Wonder how long it will be before the government disappears him . Anyway , my point is that sites like Wikipedia , Snopes , Drudge . com and others exist mainly to keep us coddled , with the wool over our eyes , never questioning the official story . Even google gives you the hits they want you most to see first . They have created a generation of people who will only believe something if one of these " reputable " websites tell them it 's true . What is true anymore ? It 's certainly not " verifiable fact " because there 's nothing verifiable in anything either site gives us , while stuff like Impetus Sand is proven and verifiable , but you won 't catch these sites talking to you about it . This was not a great Christmas season for me , and I don 't have any fear of telling you why . Most of you know I 've gotten death threats before , and to be honest , I 'm proud of them , because being threatened just tells me that they consider me a threat . But over the Christmas season , the threats started being launched at my new employers at nuviews . org , including a virus that got sent to my bosses ' computers . The link I provided last week at optimumscience . net is down now , and in fact , when I google " Magnus Ellison " I get zero hits . They 've done it ; they 've unpersoned him . I have little doubt that in a few months , he or someone suspiciously similar will return to his job as though nothing happened , and will deny that such a thing as Impetus Sand exists . But it won 't be him , not really . His wife will call him the same man , his kids will call him Daddy , but he 'll just be a construct . Of course , pains are being taken to ensure that they can 't find where I am . There are umpteen different proxies and redirects surrounding my IP address , which changes every day . That 's one of the reasons I wanted to work with nuviews . org , but , it appears that they 've managed to infiltrate their offices somehow . I 'm going to be speaking with the CEO at nuviews . org to ensure that this sort of thing can be prevented in the future . I 'm also going to refrain from posting links in my blogs from now on . If I have something to share , I 'm now only going to do it through private messages . This way I will also be able to ensure that people who are clicking on my links are actually interested and reading what 's there . I had an interesting conversation with my brother - in - law today . He likes a good conspiracy theory himself , or at least , he used to . Today he seemed different . More withdrawn . I brought up my old post on the Orpheus Device , which , as some of you may remember , casts a field over you so that literally you are a walking radio to them . You don 't have to use a cell phone or speak in a place where there 's technology around . All you have to do is just speak . Of course , I have screens up around my house which filter sound and add white noise to anything they here , so we were safe to talk , but he still acted like he didn 't want to talk about it . In fact , he is far from the first person that 's started reacting strangely when I talk about my latest online discoveries . Yesterday my neighbor gave me the strangest look when I mentioned Wikipedia , as if she 'd never heard of it . Hmm . It is becoming increasingly clear to me that my friends and family have been gotten to . I don 't think all of them have been replaced with constructs , though I know a few have . This is a mild concern , because it makes me feel like they 're closing in on my location . My wife started acting abnormally when she switched to a new moisturizer . I don 't know how many times I warned her to never do that , in fact to pretty much only use what hygiene products you have to , and even then to make sure you buy them from places like the Dollar Store or other places that it 's unfashionable to shop in . Nanoseeds are in everything , these days . The more you use it , the more you likely have in you , altering the way you think , getting you to suppress the desire to think too much about what you hear , what you read . I 'm sure I have some Nanoseeds in me ; it 's unavoidable . I tried for a few months boiling and refrigerating jugs of tap water and only drinking that , but I kept running out of the boiled stuff and needing to drink something , so I 'd break down and have a glass of water straight from the tap . I do my best to counter - act whatever Nanoseeds I might have by relentlessly fighting against any urge I might have to just forget about this stuff for a while and enjoy life . In fact , even today I find myself just plain tired of having to worry about everything like this . I find myself wanting to just say " screw it " , take down my screens , cancel my blog and just live like the other sheep live . After all , would it be so bad ? I know it would improve my marriage , would improve my relations with others in my neighborhood . In fact , I think those Nanoseeds are starting to convince people that the things I blog about , even the stuff that other websites acknowledge as true , don 't actually exist . My wife blew up on me the other day during an argument , telling me that there is no such thing as newsmax . com . She honestly believes that no such website exists . I offered to fire up my laptop and show her , and she just yelled " There you go with that laptop bullshit again ! " She didn 't even want to look . My brother - in - law won 't even speak to me anymore . He might actually be a construct now , but if he were , wouldn 't he be trying to influence me away from my so - called delusions instead of breaking off contact ? No , I don 't think they 've gotten to him . I think he 's just becoming more afraid of what they can do . Lately , though , I 'm not so sure but what nuviews . org hasn 't been bought . I was recently warned about my content . My content hasn 't changed in five years , so I don 't know why they 'd hire me if they think they can make me say different things from what I believe . I 'm not going to back down . It 's important for people to know this stuff . There are so few of us who have discovered the truth , so many who would rather just swallow whatever pablum they 're given and go along to get along . I thought nuviews . org would help me to spread the word . Now I 'm starting to wonder if they 're not part of the problem . This will be my last post on nuviews . org . A representative of theirs called me today . He didn 't even have to tell me ; I could hear it in his voice . He was a construct . Tell me something , people . You can see my posts , right ? You have computers , right ? You surf the net , right ? I ask because today my wife told me today that she was through with my delusions , that she was taking me to see someone , that she would prove to me once and for all that this silly thing called the " internet " was not real and that in fact , " computers " are giant machines that only the government and prestigious universities can use , so the idea of a laptop was absurd . She told me that my laptop is only a briefcase . It 's happening . They 're unpersoning me . First they got me questioning myself on the bigger stuff , wondering if Nanoseeds , Impetus Sand or Orpheus Devices even exist , and now making me question even if I have readers , a blog , or so much as a computer . I refuse to allow myself to question it . My wife is the delusional one , not me . She 's the one who let more Nanoseeds get inside her thanks to that new moisturizer brand . It 's not going to work . They 're not going to unperson me . - CaffeineHead Out of nowhere I got an email from my brother - in - law . He wants to meet with me . He wants to discuss a few things he 's learned and make sure I can defend myself . He apologized for disappearing , but explained that he realized he was being followed around on a daily basis by men who were doing their best to look innocuous but were always there , every time he examined his surroundings . I hope this isn 't a trick . I 'm going to meet with him today but I am truly afraid that this isn 't what it seems . If all goes well , I 'll blog about it later . " It 's so strange , Dr . Winthrop . My husband was a normal man until five and a half years ago , and then he started talking about strange things like laptops , and blogs and this Internet or Interweb thingy . He would spend hours at a time just staring at an open briefcase , as though there were people in there talking to him . " " Not talking to him , Mrs . Lyman . Reading what he supposedly wrote and replying . We 've seen this delusion in others , a sort of mass psychosis which affects only about one out of a hundred people , but the delusion they share is so real to them that when they discuss it with each other , you could almost believe they 're talking about something real . Of course , in most cases , it 's harmless . They just think they 're getting the latest updates on their favorite singers , or actors . They think they 're sharing photos or brief statements with each other . But in other cases , such as your husband 's , the delusion turns paranoid . But rest assured , your husband will get the treatment he needs . " Orton managed to work around Lyman 's efforts to alert Linda , Orton 's sister and Lyman 's wife , of our existence . Her Nanoseeds have convinced her that she has delivered her husband into psychiatric care , and that the internet , even laptops , do not exist . It may be necessary to program all Nanoseeds to believe this within the next five years , as more and more websites like nuviews . org are springing up . I recommend once again cutting off the source of such sites rather than simply taking over each site as we discover them . Linda Lyman is the 1 , 395 , 983th individual we have had to reprogram to believe that the Internet does not exist . Eventually one of them will say the wrong thing and alert more people to our presence . Posted by But I had tried doing the companionship thing , and it never seemed to be for me . I had a girlfriend for two years , but she left me because I rarely wanted to go out with her friends , preferring to stay home , just the two of us . The feeling that was most prominent after she left was relief . I also tried hanging out with a group of people I met online . As in , hanging out with them in the real world . I did this because my ex - girlfriend told me I needed to get out more , to meet people , to come out of my shell . I realized after hanging out with them that I liked my shell better . Again , it 's not that I didn 't like them . I 'm just not a hang - out kind of person . I 'm not an Asperger 's patient or anything . I can have conversations , I can be friendly . I 've stopped to help strangers on the side of the road who were having car trouble . I 've helped people move who I barely knew . I 've donated blood just because I could . I 've volunteered at a homeless shelter . It 's just a matter of preferring to stay in on a Friday night with a good book , when having a group of friends would mean I 'd feel obligated to go out instead . I woke up , and the first thing I noticed was that the power was out . I live in an older building just south of downtown . The kind of place where the carpet in the halls is stained all over with god - knows - what , the paint on the walls is chipped and peeling , in many places the ceiling is just a collection of exposed pipes , the elevators make odd noises like they 're straining on even the lightest load , and the whole place carries the heady bouquet of booze , cigarettes and weed . The power 's gone out before . The last time it happened , it didn 't come back on for two days . I had just gone grocery shopping the day before . Sucks having to throw out stuff you just bought . So , when I woke , my first feeling was irritation . " They had better not take forever getting it back on this time , " I muttered . Now , where you live , the power probably mostly goes out only after a storm , fire or heavy snowfall . In my building , with wiring that was probably installed during the Ford administration and hadn 't really been upgraded since , the power could go out at any time of the year , and needed no outside catalyst to do so . So it never crossed my mind to wonder why , on a wet - but - not - stormy day in April , the power would go out like this . My alarm clock was dead , of course , so I checked the time on my phone . I swore and leaped into the shower , not caring that the water was ice cold , and that I couldn 't see my hand in front of my face . Even if I walked out the door this very minute , I was going to be an hour late for work . I hate being late . I usually try to be at least fifteen minutes early . It 's a weird side - effect of introverts that we 're usually pretty anal retentive about being on time . Now , this is probably when I first felt it ; that sense of unease . I did my best to ignore it , because I wasn 't a child anymore , and feelings like that are just your mind running away on you . But it was hard to ignore , and not just because of the total darkness of the stairwell . It was because I realized at that point that I had not seen another human being that entire morning . This , by itself , was not an alarming thing . I had often made it to the elevator before without seeing another person . However , while descending into the dark , holding my phone before me , LED light shining , I realized a couple of things that seemed out of place . First , I heard no noise coming from behind any of the other apartments ' doors , which I should have considering the air was off . Second , I was late . I usually left for work before the rush , but today I was leaving at the same time that a lot of other people should be . On an ordinary day , maybe some of them took the elevator and few took the stairs , but today , they all should be on the stairs with me . When I got to the ground floor , things got even stranger . When I had first opened my windows , I had failed to notice just how still the morning was . But I noticed now . The only cars on the street were parked . Not another soul was in sight . The businesses at street level didn 't appear open or closed ; they were just dark and empty . I swallowed the lump of fear that was rising in my throat and told myself that there had to be a good reason for this . But my mind was refusing to accept that . It was 8 : 30 AM on a Tuesday . The streets should be deluged with cars , the sidewalks filled up with people . There should be noise , there should be life . But the only sound was the light wind that wailed between buildings . One ring . Two . Three . Several more . Then voice mail . My boss 's bored voice saying " please leave a message " was the first voice other than my own that I had heard all morning . I opened up a browser and started checking local news . But there wasn 't anything new since yesterday . In fact , my connection was sluggish and eventually dropped out completely . I tried calling a co - worker , the only co - worker whose number I had . He had been the one to offer it to me . Others were always trying to reach out . That wasn 't something I did . He didn 't answer either . I began to wonder if the power outage was affecting the cell towers in the area . Could the power really be out for that wide an area ? I went back to the stairs , phone LED light on again , and began climbing . My apartment was on the eighth floor . I 'm not in the best of shape , and my legs were starting to ache by the third flight . It was the fourth flight , though , when the light on my phone began to fade and then went out completely . " No , no , no ! " I whispered . I thumbed the home button . I then remembered that the phone had not charged during the night as it normally would have . There would have been just enough power left for the one phone call and momentary surfing , plus these trips with the light on . I must have ignored the low power warning , and now it was too late . The phone was a paperweight . " Piece of shit , " I muttered . Somehow I already knew to keep my voice to a whisper . I put the phone back in its clip and stood on the stairs for a moment , calming down . You 'd think I would be glad to know that another person was still around . You 'd think that after noticing how empty my world was all of a sudden , that I 'd be relieved to know that I was not alone . And for a moment , I tried to tell myself that I was . The footsteps were slow , inexorable . They echoed through the darkness like the slow drumbeat before a death march . They were somewhat soft , at first , though I could tell the feet that made their tread was heavy . But they were getting nearer . From their sound , they were less than two flights below me . I didn 't think . I bolted up the stairs . I paused at the top of every flight to listen . They kept coming . I thought of calling out , but every instinct said that would be foolish . I tried telling myself it was just my misanthropy rearing its ugly head again , but this feeling wasn 't a mere wish to be by myself for a while . Every sense I had told me that in this unnatural stillness , this unthinkable emptiness , that nothing should be moving . I had not heard so much as the bark of a dog from within this building . But something else was here besides me . I knew , at the core of my being , that it wasn 't supposed to be there . I reached my floor and headed out into the hallway . I paused at the door after pulling it closed and listened . Those footsteps continued , not even having increased their pace . They sounded much closer . The hallway was empty , as I knew it would be . I pulled myself away from the door and listened . My own heartbeat , hammering in my ears , and my heavy breathing were the only sounds I heard . There was a window at the end of the hallway , letting in dim grey light , but it was still hard to see . I began walking left . The hallway had an intersection up ahead . I turned right , the direction of my apartment , and kept walking . Behind me , I heard the door to the stairwell open . The footsteps , still slow but unrelenting , started down the hallway . I waited . Maybe they had turned in the other direction . But no , they were getting louder . Coming toward me . I turned and walked quickly in the direction of my apartment . I didn 't run . If I ran , I would make more noise . I tried to keep my breathing quiet as well . I reached my apartment , but still heard those footsteps behind me . At any moment their owner would turn the corner . I reached for my keys , but a new thought struck me . The footsteps sounded close enough that this . . . person . . . could turn the corner just as I was closing the door . Then my one safe hiding place would be exposed . Thinking quickly , I turned and ran as quietly as I could in the same direction as before , heading for the other stairwell on this floor . And then I began to feel a little silly . After all , why was I so convinced that this person was pursuing me ? I was the only person I had seen today , but that was the unnatural thing , not the sudden appearance of another person . Somehow , some incident , a disaster or abduction or rapture , or whatever , had emptied my neighborhood , but left me behind , and if I was still here , why would I assume that no one else was ? This person could just be someone else who lived on the eighth floor , likely just as confused and terrified as I was . I shook my head and laughed at myself , but I stuck with my plan . I circled around the building , headed for the other stairwell . Reaching it , I began to climb up . . . I instantly flew back down the stairs and back into the hallway , running full tilt for the very stairs I had just come down , bolting back up them . I cautiously opened the door back on my floor , listening . No steps as of yet . All thoughts of the footsteps belonging to another confused , frightened person had left my mind . Those heavy treads did not belong to a person who was in the same situation as me . They did not sound frightened , or confused . They were purposeful . A purpose that I knew could not be good . This time , I reached my apartment and managed to get inside . I locked the door , the deadbolt , and secured the chain on the door . I stood there for a second , feeling like that wasn 't enough , and finally put a chair under the knob . Then I went into the living room and huddled against the large window . For a very long time , nothing happened . And then I heard them again . There was no doubt in my mind now that the footsteps were coming for me . They trod , persistently , inescapably closer , starting to slow further as they reached my apartment door . They stopped . Just on the other side of my door , something waited , possibly listening for me , but knowing beyond a doubt that I was inside . I thought I could smell something from the hall . Something that smelled . . . hot . That 's the only way I can describe it . It smelled hot . I waited . It waited . The silence was palpable . I felt that the air between us had solidified , waiting , as the world did , for the inevitable . My doorknob rattled . First a little , then vigorously . I sat there , numb , my breath coming in short gasps , my heart beating so fast it felt like a continuous pressure in my chest . Finally the rattling stopped . I slowly pulled myself away from the window and fired up my laptop . Unlike my phone , it had not been on all night and the battery was still fully charged . I don 't know if anyone is still out there to read this . I don 't even know how long the internet will continue to work . I never needed people before today , but I sure need them now . Being a misanthrope has its oddities , but no situation I 've been in has been more odd than this . He lived far from where his three children had settled . Grandma died when I was a small child , and he ended up remarrying another woman a few years later who demanded that he move out west so that she could be nearer to her sons . She was a piece of work , was Grandma Hester . We all wondered how Grandpa could stand her . It turns out that perhaps he could not . We 're not precisely sure when he developed dementia , but it was probably years before we noticed it . He 'd tell us about people he was speaking to , or visiting with , or a trip he took . Years later , after we learned he was suffering from dementia , we 'd learn that conversation , that visit or that trip never actually happened . For all we really know , any story he told us from the last decade and a half leading up to his coming back east could be a false memory . We would have no way of knowing . Hester rarely communicated with us herself . Probably our first clue that Grandpa wasn 't himself anymore happened a few weeks after he came back east to live with my parents . Most of the family had settled in one area ; my wife and I lived in the south end of our city , as did one set of cousins , but my father and his two sisters all lived in the north , within driving distance of each other . A few of my aunts ' children had moved out of town , and my brother had as well , but there were still enough of us around that Grandpa could visit with . We would often have gatherings at my parents ' house where Grandpa would either hold court with some story or would go to sleep . Later that same month , he told my aunts and uncles the story of how he came out east after living with Hester got to be too much . " I prayed to the Lord , " said Grandpa . " And the next thing I knew , Martin was there . " Martin was my father . I remembered him driving out to the tiny , cold house on a hill in Colorado to get Grandpa . He had not come due to any divine intervention . He had come because Grandpa called him in the night and pleaded with him to come get him . We all loved Grandpa , but caring for him was not easy . For one thing , Grandpa had gotten it into his head that he was a young , single man with many years ahead of him , and the only thing missing was a young woman at his side . If he spoke for any length of time with a younger woman , he became convinced that she was in love with him , and that perhaps she should be his new bride . Hester was even still alive at this point . He had forgotten her utterly . Dad and Mom didn 't let him go on walks by himself , but that didn 't mean he didn 't sneak away sometimes when Dad was away and Mom was in the basement . He had to use a walker to get around , and simply couldn 't do stairs , but refused to admit this to anyone , including himself , leading to a lot of falls . He would also get confused as to where he was , or where he lived . At times , during his walks , he would attempt to find the old family home that he raised my father and aunts in , despite it having been long gone since before I was born . Dad picked him up from a police station , where he had been taken after some patrol officers saw him wandering around , clearly lost . The time he tried to drive Dad 's car was after that . He decided that the reason he got lost is because he had to walk . He managed to get the E - break off and rolled right down the fairly steep incline outside my parents ' house , crashing into a fence . The damage was minimal , but after that incident , my parents realized he needed to be in a full time care facility . My father visited him three times a week . I have no idea how often my aunts went , or if they even did . I tended to only go when there was a family gathering , and increasingly I began to realize that he had no clue who I was . He 'd smile and greet me as though I was someone he had just met . He 'd tell me about his children , describing them as " little kids " , and even going as far as to invent a friend who was looking after them while he was in this home with " all these old people . " Grandpa was 93 at the time . He was much older than many of the others who lived there . But somehow , they were the " old people " , while he was not . But he had never been violent before . That changed one night when Dad was called to come to the facility quickly . Grandpa had wandered into the wrong room , and had come out screaming , raising his walker up in the air and slamming it into the ground , taking a few swings at people who tried to calm him down . He began accusing the staff of stealing his things . He was bellowing as loud as he could : " Give them back ! Give them back ! " When Dad got there , they had gotten him into his room , and he was somewhat appeased . Somewhat . He had a can of Ensure in a tube sock , and almost hit my father in the head with it when he came in . He apologized ( Dad was one of the few people he always recognized ) , and said he had been waiting for " the thief " to come back . " A man who 'd steal from me 'd just as soon kill me , " he explained . The Ensure - in - a - sock was his weapon to fend off the thief . He told Dad about the men who had come to give him all his things back . " They put it all back , just like it was , " he said . " Didn 't take ' em long . " Later that night , he told Dad about how much it had scared Florence . He hated that she 'd had to go through that . Florence was my grandmother ; the one who died when I was six . He finished by saying that Florence had gone somewhere , and when he went looking for her : " They told me she was dead . One day , they 're gonna come looking for me , and they 're gonna find me dead . " That was a jolt to my father . Grandpa had never , at any point before that , acknowledged his mortality , his advanced age , or the fact that he had probably no more than a handful of years left at best . Aging , and death , was something that happened to other people . But here he was , accepting that death was near . That wasn 't the last night he mentioned the thief . He even gave the thief a name ; Charlie Rosen . It was strange that he would invent a whole person , name included . He didn 't even name the friend who was looking after his kids . In fact , that person ceased to exist ; Charlie Rosen had stolen his kids . Had killed Florence . Had come to his home in Colorado and routinely taunted him , beat him , and he even declared that Hester had been sleeping with him . He remembered her now , and was certain that she and Charlie were ganging up on him to make his life a living hell . In the last six months of his life , he would become increasingly agitated . Dad could not have a single visit wherein Grandpa would not mention Charlie . And then the violence started up again . In one visit , Grandpa accused Dad of being Charlie , and attacked him . After that , Dad 's visits dropped to once a week , and he didn 't stay long . Once , I went with him . It was the last time I saw my grandfather alive , and I will never forget it . " Charlie was here again today , " Grandpa told us as soon as we arrived . " He told me I couldn 't leave this room anymore . He 's trapped me here . " " Dad , this is where you live , " my father tried to explain . " See , here 's a picture of Mother . Why would Charlie let you keep that ? " " Mother had an aneurysm , " said Dad . " You and I decided together to unplug the machine . She died in her sleep , but no one killed her . " " No , no , it was Charlie . " Grandpa 's voice was not agitated . It was solid , like he knew for a fact what he was saying . " He poisoned her . Made something go wrong in her head . I didn 't know it then , but I realized it later , after he introduced me to Hester . Conned me into marrying her . He 's my personal demon , that Charlie . " Dad finally had had enough . " There is no Charlie ! " he said , nearly shouting . You aren 't supposed to correct people who have dementia ; it just confuses them more and makes them upset . But my father forgot this in that moment . " Charlie is someone you made up ! Mother died naturally , you met Hester at a coffee shop years after Mother died , and while she was not a nice woman , she was not unfaithful to you ! Please , stop talking about Charlie ! " " Dear Lord in Heaven , " said Grandpa . " He got to you . He told you to say these things . You 're part of it too ! " " I don 't want to play any fucking checkers ! " screamed Grandpa . I couldn 't have been more surprised if he 'd hit me . Grandpa had never used profanity in his life . " By - words " , as he called them , were only used by bad men , as far as he was concerned . " Not with you ! Not with him ! Charlie Rosen 's pet demons ! He comes to me every day . He talks to me about Florence . He taunts me . He reads my mind and he takes thoughts away and puts in new ones , worse ones . He tells me about how he rapes my little ones . How he and Hester keep them half - starved and chained in their basement . I can 't stop him ! He can go inside my mind ! He 's controlling me ! " We left after that , without saying goodbye . Driving home , I almost wanted to cry . This kind , loving man was ending his days as a raving , violent lunatic . It wasn 't right . It wasn 't fair . What kind of monster was this Charlie ? That thought stopped me cold . For an instant , I had accepted that Charlie was real . Giving my head a shake , I resolved to think about something else . But an image of Charlie had been forming in my mind , beginning a few months back , when Grandpa had first started talking about him . I only now realized that when Grandpa spoke of this demonic man , I was picturing him in my mind , and I could see him as clearly as I could memories of real people . I thought of the last time I had visited Grandpa in that tiny house in the mountains of Colorado , when I was a teenager , sitting at that little round table while Hester served us some of her inedible glop , and I would see a man standing in the corner of the kitchen , watching us eat . A tall , gangly man with leathery skin stretched over sharp - looking bone and corded muscle . Shaggy grey hair hanging down , obscuring the upper part of his face , his smile stretching like a knife - slash across his jaw . I thought of the wedding . I was twelve years old . I met Hester for the first time . And standing a ways behind her was that same man . I remember a family gathering at the facility Grandpa was concurrently staying at . Didn 't we pass that man in the hall once ? No , of course not . These were just images my mind had cooked up the more Grandpa talked about this shady character that never existed . The brain can do that ; insert false people in your memory just because you decide , subconsciously , to remember them . It doesn 't mean you 're insane ; it 's just another way for your brain to play tricks on you . Grandpa had invented a person who he talked about with such conviction , as though Charlie was real . So my mind had conjured up a Charlie Rosen . But there was no Charlie Rosen . Everything was normal at the start . My parents , my aunts and uncles , my wife and I , and our children , my brother and his wife , and their son , my cousins , their spouses and their children , we all gathered under the same roof for the first time in years . No one was missing . No one was out of town and couldn 't make it . Two of my cousins I hadn 't seen since they were children . It was nice to catch up with them . The service was nice , as well . The pastor who served the spiritual needs at Grandpa 's facility was the officiator . Grandpa looked calm and peaceful , whole , so unlike what he had been in the last few months of life . I started to feel calm myself ; Grandpa was where he belonged now , where the devils of his own fevered , decaying brain couldn 't get to him anymore . And then we drove to the cemetery . The coffin was lowered . We all sprinkled a handful of dirt on the coffin and began our walk back to the cars . And then the gravedigger came out of the shadows to start shoveling the rest of the dirt . I could barely read the embroidered name tag on his coveralls . It looked like " C . Rose " or " C . Risen " . Or . . . no . It couldn 't be . He was tall , gangly , with leathery skin , sharp - looking bones , corded muscle , long grey hair . And that smile . That smile that haunts my nightmares to this day . Today , I felt like I had to write all this down . To make sure I remember it all , before things get worse . Because today , my father called me to complain that Charlie was driving past his house and staring in his windows . I 'm very worried about my son . More than worried , at this point . Terrified . His behavior these past few weeks is not normal , not healthy . It makes me think there 's something wrong . At first , he would just come and stand at the door way . He did this at night , just before I 'd be ready to fall asleep . I 'd roll over to turn off the lamp , and he 'd be standing there , in the doorway . I used to try to speak to him . I don 't do that anymore . He never has answered me . He just stares . A couple of days ago , he graduated from standing in the doorway to coming in and sitting on the bed . He still doesn 't speak . I have asked him what he wants . I 've asked him if anything is bothering him . It 's not like him to be so quiet . He usually waits until my wife is asleep . That 's the part that gets me . She always falls asleep before me , and he has never come in when she 's awake . But then , she didn 't have a hand in this . If something doesn 't change soon , I don 't know what I 'm gonna do . I 'm starting to feel like he knows that I 'm the one who killed him .