Aloneness, Alienation

I'm not sure quite why I had my hopes held up so high, it's embarrasing really. Why would they have wanted me?

I don't even know why I am typing this, he must have driven me neurotic, all those hours spent listening to the Professor, frequently the only witnesses were he and I to his ramblings, and as insane as he might have seemed, in those moments outside his normally lucid self, there was always a note of truth to his nonsensical babbling. There was something about his voice that made even the completely ludicrous something I could never quite perfectly dismiss...

It wasn't a shock though, I always knew when an attack was coming, we might be in a tutorial, or even laughing over dinner, and suddenly, he would get that look in his eye. I can only describe it as abdject horror.

It was like a different man was seated across from me, all the usual kindliness left his face, sweat beaded upon his brow and frequently his whithered, clammy hand clutched mine. He spoke, desperately, as a lunatic, but through all his nonsense, one theme stayed clear, the key to his madness, the "key to everything", lay to the east, in the Indian Ocean, I suppose that's why, when I spotted the job advert, it was auto-pilot, I couldn't resist.

The professor, God rest his soul, never remembered these episodes afterwards, repressing them perhaps, or maybe they were an outpouring of emotion from an event in his distant past, I don't suppose anyone will ever really know.

Damn it, I apologise, perhaps it's the weather, the rain hasn't stopped all day, the slack ropes on the flag pole in the courtyard have been rattling noisily through the windows since I got here, I guess the Janitor forgot to raise the flags today, or was put off by the weather.

Damn New England in the Fall. Especially being so alone, there must be some joy somewhere in the world.