Hi @Ms. Hazeltine ! I was wondering if I could apply for the summer caretaker program, since my status at this school is dubious. I was going to start next year since the flesh prison seems to be high school age and education seems very important, but currently I don't attend classes. I do live and travel in the walls though, if that counts for anything. And I am in possession of a Child Groove CD. I found it on an empty grocery store shelf where I thought the butter potatoes were supposed to be. The songs make your brain feel compressed. I think it's supposed to be a bootleg Kidz Bop, but the voice singing sounds deeply haunting and personal, like it's screaming the words to Momma's House right to you. Anyway, I do think I would be a good caregiver, especially since I now have experience nursing! And, of course, the Child Groove CD.

Thanks!

Annie

Before I begin with how Gave is trying to ruin my party, I should probably talk about my guests. They're very private people, and I don't want to put anything in this journal that could expose them, so I'll be brief.

When I begrudgingly went back to the greeting card store a couple weeks ago to get a card for the patient I visited, it looked completely different inside. And by that I mean there was a giant hole in the floor. Not even a hole. There was simply no floor. When I looked down, it seemed as if the floor had come apart down the middle and split in two. And, of course, I slipped and fell into the hole. What did you expect?

I fell for a moment or two until I hit solid ground. That's when I met the people who will be in attendance of my party. What they were doing in the floor of a gift card shop, I won't say for now. Again, none of your business.

Anyway, after I was on the phone with Gave and after I posted my last journal I stopped procrastinating and went to drop off Nettie's casserole. It went pretty routine. I mentally prepared myself on the walk to drop it on their stoop and run away as fast as possible, and I did. But when I was walking home, I passed Gave's house.

Now, normally, you can't see in the windows because of how full the house is of pans. But this time, I had a very clear view of... nothing. The house seemed to be empty! Now, if you know Gave, you know that absolutely nothing could cause them to abandon their precious pans, short of death. So I was immediately concerned. They had either died or moved away, and I wanted to know which IMMEDIATELY so I'd know whether I had to be careful not to run into them at grocery stores or whether I was finally free.

I knocked on the door. Someone around my age answered. "Hi, I'm Annie-from-next-door and I was wondering if something was up with Gave?"
The teen answered, "I'm Oak, their nephew. Me and my brothers are staying here for a while."
Brothers? I thought. I was beginning to understand. Just then, eight other guys (I say so in a relative way, since I live in a city of vegetable babies) peeked over Oak's shoulder. They were all wearing those shirts that covered the front and back but were completely empty on the sides. Some wore crocs, some wore slides, most wore baseball caps. This couldn't be happening.

I thanked Oak and left as quickly as I could. Maybe nothing would happen? Nope. That night, all I could hear was loud music with lots of beat drops. When I looked out the window, the street was painted shades of purple and green from the violent strobe lights coming from next door. They were having a party. And not just any party, a frat party. Gave had called his frat bro nephews to try to manipulate me into not hosting my own low-key dinner party. The NERVE.

It's been a few days since then, and I don't know what to do. Any suggestions would be helpful. I'm feeling more on-edge than usual. Earlier today, a baby cried on the bus and I cried too. I should probably ask to borrow Cornelia's noise-cancelling headphones.

I know I just posted a few minutes ago but something happened and this browser tab was still open and Cornelia is doing a shift and anyway they told me to stop instigating things because I have to "be a grown-up" and "act responsible".

So, what just happened is I got a phone call. I had just hit Post on my last entry and was ready for a celebratory cookie. That's when my phone started vibrating. I have it on silent to be better able to ignore calls. But the ID said it was from Gave, so I had to pick up.

Gave lives next door. Gave is also horrible. And Gave is utterly obsessed with pans. Not even antique pans. Just any random pan. They don't even know much about pans. The one time I went over there, their home was completely full of pans. It was like a maze. Don't even get me started on the kitchen. If you leave any room in a conversation Gave will start talking about pans, which is especially annoying since they organize all the neighborhood activities.

All dinner parties, barbeques, bonfires, and other organized events go through them first. This especially bugs me because I love neighborhood activities, especially hosting them, and I have to talk to Gave to do anything. It's awful. You have to speak really quickly to them or they'll start talking about pans. Once I tried to bypass them and host a secret party, but the whole time they banged their pans on the walls and screamed so everyone was super uncomfortable.

So, when I got a call from them, I sighed and steadied myself but picked up. "Hello, it's Gave, your neighbor."
"Yes, I saw. What's up?" I said quickly.
"Well, nothing much," long pause as they presumably adjusted their pointy hat with the word dunce on it, "but I heard you wanted to host a gathering?"
I racked my mind, but came up empty. I wasn't hosting any neighbors soon. Then I realized what they meant.
"That's private. Nobody on this street is coming, Gave, and I bet you know it, so it's really none of your business," I spat out.
"Any parties that happen here are my business, remember? I'm the official neighborhood planner, elected at the yearly banquet for nine terms and counting." I knew this was a lie, since when we compared notes, everyone on the street was told after the party that our invitations had been "lost in the mail".
"No you're not, and everyone knows it. Now stay away from my party or I might just organize a committee to uncover corruption in the election. Have a fine day." And I hung up.

Gave really has some nerve, sticking their nose in my business. One day they might just wake up with one of their precious pans coming towards their head in a very fast nature. Hopefully they'll stay away, though, since my guests are the types who don't like being bothered.

I didn't post last week. Lately it feels like I have to force myself to sit and write these, typically when I'm procrastinating something. Today it's visiting Nettie, Cornelia's second cousin who won't stop asking me if I like jazz. News flash, I understood the reference the first time, it just hasn't been funny for years. I have to give them a casserole. Another annoying thing about Nettie is that we're in a casserole war.

From what I can tell, I was raised with good manners. Of course I don't remember the raising part, but I still oddly take pride in it. So when Nettie made Cornelia and I an apple crisp to thank us for taking care of their opposite-Venus-flytrap (it has a better name, but I can never remember it, and my description is astute anyway) I took it upon myself to send the empty dish back with something in it. This is where everything went wrong.

So, I sat down and made a casserole. I found a recipe in a random book above the fridge. I can't remember what it was, but that's besides the point. I took the casserole to Nettie's house, and thought that was that. A few days later, I see a casserole on the kitchen counter. Cornelia says Nettie dropped it off. It's in the same dish. We ate the casserole. I sent the dish back with lasagna. It pops back up a few days later like a stray cat you fed once.

We've been sending this dish back and forth for a while now. I can't stop the madness. It's turned into a hobby of mine. I've started growing fresh herbs to spice up this competition. The only reason Cornelia doesn't interfere is that Nettie's cookbook where they evidently get all the recipes from is an old family one, and it has the best casseroles we've ever had. They can be sweet, spicy, umami, sour: I never cease to be amazed of the flavors they can pack into that oven-safe dish. I have to ask for the ingredients so I can try to replicate them. Not the amounts, I want to figure it out myself.

I guess I should talk about how visiting the patient who was rude to me, but that story turns into a whole big thing and I'd have to sit down and write another whole entry. Maybe later. I also don't think it's nearly as important to my life as the casserole war. I'm trying to write here things I think are important, maybe not so interesting. I liked this journal though. I think I'll try updating more often.

Last week, I discovered Long Furby and was immediately obsessed. I had to get back to work eventually, but I couldn't really concentrate on the patients. All I could think of was constructing a horrible creature of the flesh. Self care.

Anyway, Cornelia was very worried about me, I assume. Or maybe they were just tired of me spending all of my waking hours not at work hiding in our living room under a pile of blankets looking at Furby content. The fact that I hadn't taken a shower since April probably also had a big factor in their decision to get me out of the house. To quote them directly: "Get out and don't come back till you're ready to stop being a crusty-musty goblin and stop stinking up my whole house, I haven't had company over because if I did all my friends would say their grandmothers suddenly fell ill and politely leave and never return. Go to therapy or some mental equivalent, you apple-headed crustacean, and don't come back till you smell like flowers and not farms in spring." Now, that hurt my feelings. I kinda knew it was true though. So I set off.

I didn't really know where to go, however. I'm still fairly new here. I've been to work, the library, and travelled the walls, but that's pretty much it. As I was thinking about where to go, I saw a sign. Literally. For a greeting card store. I don't know how they stay in business, but I think it was what I needed.

As I went inside, I was met by an employee giving me a dirty look. "Can I," insert pause where the employee slowly pushed their hair (which looked suspiciously like grass), out of their eyes to get a better look at me, "heeelp you?"

"Yeah, could I get a get-well-soon card?" I asked, approaching the counter behind which they were standing.

"Yeah... sure, they're over there." They looked at me like my question confused them, even though this was a greeting card store and that is probably one of their bestsellers. They shook their head, pushing the grass hair back into their eyes again and ending this conversation.

I approached the aisle. From the front, this store looked pretty small, but the aisle seemed to go down forever. I couldn't see the end. There was a plaque on the wall next to the first shelf with a guide, and one of those horizontal escalators you see in airports going down in middle. I tried to find the card I wanted on the plaque, and noticed that this whole aisle was just get-well-soon cards for different situations. I decided on "Sorry I (an emergency responder) inadvertently annoyed you when you called me for help, but I'm not that sorry since you were quite annoying on the phone and you seem like the kind of person to send food back if it has capers on it even though the menu said the dish had capers and you'd probably also yell at the waitstaff for putting capers on your food even though they're just trying to get through school and are very underpaid." It didn't fit perfectly, but it was fine.

The plaque said the card would be found at the third green sign with a square on it, so I got on the conveyor thing to go find it. But when I got on the conveyor, I was pushed backwards. It was a one-way conveyor, going towards me. I didn't want to walk all the way there, so I went back to the employee.

"Hi, the escalator seems to be going towards the door, is there any way to reverse it so I can go grab a card?"
"No."
"Why not?"
"Doesn't do that. Not supposed to."
"Then how am I supposed to get a card?"
They shrugged. "Nobody's ever wanted a card before."
I was kind of annoyed at this point. "But this is a greeting card store. How can you never have sold a card before?!?" I may have said that a tad louder than I intended to. Sorry to the employee, I know you probably don't want to be there either.
"Well, we're not a very good store, are we? You can get a card or you can leave." They tossed their hair so it nearly grazed my nose. I stepped back and left the store.

So, I didn't end up go visiting the person I found a couple weeks ago, but I did forget about Long Furby for long enough to have an interaction, so that's something. I think tomorrow I'll go visit the patient, but for now I'm just going to take a shower so I can go back inside. Toodles.

This time I actually forgot to post. But for good reason.

Last Tuesday I was getting antsy. I had stupidly promised to make a list of things that made me happy this week for my next journal entry, but of course I had procrastinated until the last minute. By then I could barely remember what I had for breakfast the day before, much less little moments a week ago. So, what do you do when you have an assignment due the next day you haven't done anything on? Cram.

I was frantically looking on the Internet for good things to write about, when I stumbled on something that distracted me. Long Furby. Now, for those who don't know, long Furby is a creation people on the Internet make sometimes that has the face of the beloved children's toy Furby and an extended, snakelike body, sometimes with other custom embellishments. As soon as I saw it I needed to know more.

As I did my research, I came across the Oddbody Furby community. There are more than just longified Furbies. There are loafs, octopi, I even saw a plush ear of corn. The only rule seems to be to have a Furby face somewhere on the abomination. I think I'm in love. It just makes me absurdly happy to see the weird creations.

So, in conclusion, I did not post yesterday, nor did I post what I said I would, because I am hopelessly infatuated with a cursed toy. I will possibly post updates on how my obsession goes. It might have to stop, though: Cornelia is concerned about the fact I haven't left my bed in days.

I'm starting to remember more. It's scary. Sometimes when I think of something, I already have an opinion on it, or I remember what it is, although I don't remember why or how. It's like there's a bowl on a high shelf that I can clearly see, and I know that it's a bowl, and I know that I like the bowl and want it right now. But I can't reach it, I don't know where it came from, or what's inside.

The thing I have in mind right now is a song I heard a couple days ago. Ever since I heard it I can't stop thinking about it. Not because it was any good, but because I knew the words. When it started playing I had the most vivid former-thought (not quite a memory, more like my internal monologue from long ago) yet.

It was one of those songs that makes you happy, but reminds you of yourself too much, or of bittersweet times. Except I don't remember the person who related to it. We must be similar, I know, because these former-thoughts are coming from somewhere, and I mostly like them. But it can't truly be who I am right now, since so much happened back then that I don't know and so much has happened since I forgot.

I cried when I heard that song. I was at a store, looking for a good pickling jar. I still don't know who played it. I got a lot of weird looks for crying in the middle of the jar aisle of a homegoods store. When I got home I laid down on my bed and stared at the ceiling for a good few minutes, concentrating on the psychic chatter. It's calming to concentrate on one sense. When I finally got up, I felt better.

I came to the conclusion that I'm not ready for a self-discovery journey. It feels cliché. I am who I am, weird pseudo-memories and all. It's part of me now, no matter what was. I am in the present. Someone else was in the past. Someone new will be in the future. And I'm alright with that. I don't need to know what happened. It'll hurt whenever I think of what I forgot, whenever I hear an old song, get deja vu for another life. But that's fine.

Now, I'm going to try to stop posting things like this. Sad things. My life is primarily happy, anyway. So tune in some other time (to be decided) for a list of good things that happen.

I have to get better about updating this. Problem is, whenever I set an alarm for anything on my phone, it doesn't go off. I think that's because I have my phone muted to avoid things like calls and alarms. If someone calls me without texting first, I don't want to talk to them. And alarms get annoying after a few minutes of procrastinating. I set myself up for failure constantly in my personal life. I'm also trying to get better at not doing that.

So, last time I updated I was stuck in a bed of grass that behaved like a waterbed or beanbag chair. I ended up getting out thanks to Cornelia. They wouldn't let me hear the end of it. Action movies every night this week. I could write an essay on how problematic those movies are, especially the old ones. But if I did I would probably die from boredom halfway through.

Anyway, as you may recall, the whole reason I was stuck there was because one of my patients contacted me by screaming into my brain via a psychic message, which was rude on so many levels. So when I got back into the vent (Cornelia threw a rope down which I tied around my waist and they pulled me up. I would've climbed but I can't support my own weight.) I was even more ticked off. The vents had even changed while I was down there. So now it would take longer to get to the patient. Cornelia offered to come with me, but I said no. I wouldn't wish meeting whoever had the gall to psychically scream at a medical professional onto my worst enemy, Gave.

It took 13 minutes to climb through the walls to the screaming patient. I was ready to cry when I got there. Maybe a bit before too. Maybe I did cry in the vents. I was having a bad day, okay? Anywho, I got there in one physical piece, but my resolve was shattered. I dropped down the vent next to the classroom door. It smelled damp. Like damp wood, or The Outdoors after it rained. As I knocked on the door, I heard a loud sigh from inside. "Hello? This is the Plant People Fighting Diseases representative you called for." I said warily.

I heard a cough. "Yes, yes, come in. Took you long enough." I jiggled the knob, but the door was locked.

"Excuse me, the door is locked. Would you unlock it for me, please?"

The voice sounded exasperated, like they were talking to a baby who couldn't understand. "No, of course not. Why would I unlock the door? Just come in through the window." Then, under their breath, "Entitled brat... come in through the door..." then something about me not being the queen.

Now, I was REALLY ticked off. If they didn't want to bother opening the door, fine. Maybe where they grew up that was normal. But they berated me for even asking? So I may have jiggled the window pane a bit harder than I should've. It didn't break or anything, but it made a lot of noise. Sure enough it came loose, and I took it out and dropped it on the ground next to the door.

"I'm coming in." I said as I reached my leg over the door to hop in through the window. When I got in, I couldn't see the patient at first. The whole room looked like a terrarium. I think it was a lecture hall, but I could barely see the chairs under a thick layer of moss and dirt. The floor was covered in mushrooms. Hanging from the ceiling was some kind of purple vine, seemingly extending from the large light in the center. Don't even get me started on the humidity. My hair will probably never be the same again.

"You waiting for an invitation? Get over here!" Yelled the voice. I ran over to the back of the room, where the whiteboard should have been. Sitting there at a desk was a humanoid figure with little white hairs poking out here and there. Upon further examination, the hairs were actually fungus. Their skin was a nice brown color, and seemed to have a pattern like tree bark. Where on a human there would be hair, there were sheets of moss running down into a sort of pageboy "hair"do. Some sticky white stuff that looked like cobwebs were scattered along their skin.

"How can I help you?" I asked in my best customer service voice.

"Fix me." They said back grumpily.

"Uhh," I stammered, "what do you want me to fix?"

"Isn't it OBVIOUS?" They hollered.

"I'm new at this job." That's not exactly a lie. Not exactly a truth either.

I heard them grumbling under their breath. Then, to me, "Well, I don't want a newbie fixing me up. Bring me to someone better."

I decided not to argue. I didn't particularly want to fix them up either. So I said alright, and I called a replacement. In a few minutes a team arrived and carried the grumbling figure away. But something didn't sit right. The scream I heard was so... powerful. I have elected to ignore this discrepancy. I was really tired at the time. Maybe some other day I'll investigate, but for now, I'm really busy.

That's all this week folks. Tune in next week to... uh... see what I get up to? Yeah that's manageable. Bon voyage.

More tomfoolery today.

I've been working very hard all week, treating vegetable babies. I do home visits now, too. The longer I work the more things I see, the better I get at treating all sorts of things.

For example, yesterday I tried to make a home visit. Now, when I get a call to visit, they usually leave a message with what's wrong and their location. Scratch that, not usually, always. You have to. The machine that answers asks for it, then it sends me a notification on my pager thing so I can gather any supplies I might need.

But yesterday, when my pager buzzed, the only thing under the "Reason for call" column was screaming. And when I say screaming, I don't mean like a like of letter A's, like "AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA". I mean somebody psychically charged the message so that the screams reverberated in my head. But it wasn't just a loud scream either. The scream was charged with so much sad-pain. Emotional. I cried for a few minutes after. It was trippy.

I'm usually patient with my... patients. That was unintended. Anyway, I'm usually patient, because they are probably in a lot of pain and/or distress. They can't help screaming in my face. But this was crossing a line, in my opinion. You can't just mess around in my brain without my permission. Privacy, people.

The location the screamer put down was Room 6̶̧̢͖̮̈́̅̓͛͋̆̿̉̚̕̕7̴̨̺̣̱͈̜̮̬̖̈́̑̂̇̃͝͠ͅ5̸̢̛͙̘̅̕͝8̵̨̨̛͓̞̣̭̯̳͚̝̰͇̯͑̆̇͗̽̈͆̋̓̌̅́9̴̛͇̝̣͓̀̊͆̍̄̂͠͠7̵̢̪͍̰̫̮̲͈͈̍̿̆̔̀͌̈́͐̿̐͗̏̈́͝6̵̧̘̝̫̰̗̰̫̺͖̹͖͉̈̒̀̏́͑̌̓̈̍́̇ͅ5̶̡̘̤̃͂͗ͅ4̵͎̺̓3̸̯̤̆́͗̊̿́ across campus. That in itself was weird, since most of my patients are from the city in the walls by the cafeteria. I've had a few outside calls, though, so I just grabbed my wall adventure bag I made last Friday and got moving.

I entered the walls. I won't say how, because then anyone could try it, and that would mean more traffic. It's not just for my benefit; the walls are very dangerous if you don't know what you're doing. So there I am, travelling the walls, when all of a sudden, a grate falls from beneath me, and I land in a bed of grass.

I try to get up. The grass moves around me. It's like a huge beanbag chair that flows around me as I try to move. So. TL;DR: I'm stuck here and can't get up. I called Cornelia but they're busy at work. They'll come get me after their shift, which ends in about an hour. My phone is going to die soon. I just hope my patient will be alright.

I've been researching a bit but haven't found anything helpful about why someone would psychic scream at me from across campus. But that's the end of anything interesting. Bye.

Not much has happened since my last post. Only the lecture, which was fun, so I'll talk about what happened here.

So, Cornelia and I went through the walls and arrived in a very green room. It was obviously a classroom; we could plainly see the replica Greek statues labeled with psychic energy. I think it was an exercise in identifying body parts in Ancient Greek through sheer willpower, but I wouldn't know. I'm probably a dropout. Now that I think about it, though, nobody said those were replicas.

Anyway, the class turned out to be on mixing spice blends for all occasions. These included banishing unwanted sentient radiation, first day of middle school (which would probably have been helpful if this wasn't a high school course, but I shouldn't assume. Merlin goes to school too I guess.), and tricking your companions into watching the movie you want instead of whatever brainless action movie they somehow enjoy.

The class was really fun. I think I learned a lot. Cornelia doesn't want to keep going, something about being bored, but I think I'll stay for the semester.

In related news, guess who got to watch Legally Blonde again instead of dumb James Bourne or whatever. Cornelia is wonderful, but there's more to life than wrecking civilians' cars and somehow knowing how to fly any plane you get your hands on. Don't tell them I said that. They are very serious about their action movies.