He is lost in the far North of America, seeking to escape his past rather than start anew. He breaks into an abandoned cabin. The nights are long and torturous. He is haunted by his own demons and the demons of the cabin’s previous occupant. Surrounded by the belongings of this malevolent former inhabitant, wracked by guilt and thoughts of what might have been, he loses himself and takes on their personality. 

He ponders why everything in the cabin has been almost perfectly preserved for over thirty years. There are unfinished bottles of Pepsi, bowling competition programs and clothes still hanging up to dry. He wonders why no relatives ever come to the property, if only to scavenge what few possessions he had accrued. He finds a notebook with a few names and addresses and decides to see where they lead. His journey takes him across a very different America, one entirely lacking in romance or mysticism, one of unhappy families and unrequited desire.

A year after first setting foot in the cabin he finds himself sitting outside a bar, drunk, high, minding his own business. He has left winter behind,  travelling South through summer to another summer. Loud music gets closer as a procession of perfectly happy people snake their way down the street. A tap on his shoulder, “What are you writing?” she asks. He thinks about whether two negatives can cancel each other out, if two sinners can join in harmony and make the world a better place. Faulty goods are temporarily fixed with cheap drugs on a timeless and seemingly endless night.

An entirely different story or maybe part of the same story, but in an alternate reality where unhappiness has turned to despair and the only thing left to do is celebrate your prophecy about the end of the world coming true.