The Notebook: Donovan

(audio transcript)

Is… is this thing on? H-hello? Is.. is it on? It’s on. Okay.
Uhh… where do you want me to start? Yes, yes I know. The beginning. But…  But… which beginning?
Any beginning? You are very helpful. You are very very very helpful. Okay… Okay… Okay…
Can I have another drink first? This’d be easier with the dr—Really? You’re holding the drink hostage? You are not as much fun now when you’re serious as you normally are. Muh… Okay.
I guess… I guess it all started. Uhh… A year and a half ago.
I’m… I’m a married man. Technically. I mean I haven’t seen her in… in… since… since… since Caleb died. Can I please get a d--- Fine. [pause] I haven’t seen her since Caleb died.
Who’s Caleb? Caleb’s my son. You know this. The recorder, the recorder doesn’t know this. The recorder doesn’t know any--- [sigh, pause]. Caleb is my son. Samantha is my wife.
So Samantha and I got married a long time ago. And, we shouldn’t have. We did it for the wrong reasons and…  [pause].
Caleb started talking about a man with no face.
He was five. He’d just turned five. And he started talking about a man with no face. And… and… it’s fucking stupid. You think it’s just a kid’s story. Just another one of his little imaginary stories and and it’s fucking not. You find that it’s fucking fucking real and it’s going to hunt you down and make you bleed and… just… just…
[pause]
We didn’t think it was real. And one day… One day… Samantha went out and… so I was watching… watching Caleb and I went outside for a smoke. And he was… [sigh] He was he was being annoying. God, that sounds so awful… It… he was just being a kid. And I let that get on my nerves…
So I went outside for a smoke and… the next thing I hear is this loud crack and I run back in… and Caleb’s on the floor. And his neck is bent all wrong. And there’s a mark under his chin from where he jumped… From where he jumped off one chair and… and aimed so his chin would hit the back of another and his neck just snapped.
My son snapped his own neck to get away from this thing.
[long pause]
And… and I… I still didn’t believe it at the time, ya know? I just thought it was a weird accident or something. Samantha got home and she… she started blaming me. And I guess I deserve it but… I don’t know.
And and… A little bit after I saw it for the first time. I actually saw that goddamn thing outside.
So then I started running. My family, not my wife, my parents  support me. Every… every first of the month… Every first they put money in my bank account. And I don’t deserve it. I don’t deserve this… this money.
So that’s why I do what I do. I just travel. I keep running. I keep moving forward. I keep trying to help others so someday… someday maybe my karma evens out.