1544. Keeping a diary

Since he was eight, David had kept a diary. Every day, throughout the school year, he would write “Fine day. Full day’s classes”. Unless, of course, it was raining. Then he would write, “Raining. Full day’s classes.”

Only occasionally, if something really exciting or different happened, would he deviate from the norm. “Fine day. Full day’s classes. My birthday. Got a Swiss army knife.”

Now that he was all grown up, the words had changed but the pattern stayed the same. “Fine day. Full day’s work.” He grew bored with it. He started adding fiction. “Fine day. Full day’s work. Murdered a prostitute on Crown Street.” “Fine day. Full day’s work. Murdered a woman waiting at the corner of Adelaide Street and Beaconsfield Road.”

It was silly, but no one read his diaries of course, so it didn’t matter. His entries become more creative: “Fine day. Full day’s work. Set fire to the shoe factory on Herbert Street. Four people dead.” “Raining. Full day’s work. Left a bomb under the seat of a bus. Eleven dead.”

When a homemade bomb exploded in the back shed and David was killed, his mother found the diaries in his bedroom. She threw them into the incinerator at her work. She never told a soul.