Duality is not Good and Evil

November 13th

My name is Edward Hyde, and I don't know who I am.

Not completely anyway, I know a few things. One, I am a doctor. I was taught when my name was Henry Jekyll but I still know everything that he learned. My mother taught me medicines, and I learned how to use them from professors. I intend to find a way to return to my job as a doctor, though it may involve forging documents with the help of new and less than legal friends.

Two, I have real friends in Hastie Jacob Lanyon, Violet Poole, and Lilly; they know my secrets and trust me, more or less. They know I am human, they know who I am and who I was, and they know what happened to Henry Jekyll should've been impossible. And, they saved my life from Jekyll, who so desperately wished to die.

As for Utterson, well, he never came looking the night of the, well, you know. When Lanyon spoke with him, he simply wanted to move on, deal with the will and cut ties. I understand it, doesn't make it hurt any less.

Three, I am a murderer. I murdered Sir Danvers Carew in vengeance for his acts against Henry Jekyll, or rather myself, when I was younger. The wrongful institutionalization feels like a lifetime ago, another life completely, as does the murder. In hindsight I see it was all Jekyll's choice, it was what finally drove us apart, and made me my own man. Regardless of who's choice it was, Sir Danvers is still dead because of my choices, therefore I am guilty.

Four, I am likely not permanent. My transformations were originally brought own by my own will to experiment on myself, following that I assume it some form of withdrawal from the serum itself but I literally have no way of knowing. It has been barely forty eight hours from what Jekyll predicted was the final transformation, but at the time my, his judgement was flawed.

I know not how long I will last, or even if my mind will be susceptible to the same anxieties and oscillations of mood that besieged Jekyll. Perhaps some day I will wake up as Jekyll again and be dead before anyone has a chance to save my life. If he, I, we make the same idiotic decision as this most recent evening. Perhaps I will wake up as Hyde, but shrouded in the shadows of melancholy and misery and find myself in the same downward spiral as before.

I still have a large amount of the strange mineral salt that Jekyll used to create the serum, but not enough that I can go about testing random serums and mixes in attempt to save myself. So! I will live each day as if it is my last and treat it as such!

Five, I am in love and I am a lover of life. There is so much to see and all of it is so beautiful, I want to live. I have the impulse control of a child and I want to see everything, I enjoy picking fights with people, spend an absurd amount time with women because it's fun, and I get distracted by every small little thing. I cannot concentrate well, though I blame this on the fact that I am the concentrated form of Henry Jekyll's mania, but that is still no excuse.

I have no one to blame for my behavior except for myself, but it's far too easy to all brush it off on Jekyll. I'm learning, I guess, to be my own person. Independent, something different and new that Henry was too selfish to see. I say selfish because, in hindsight, I, he never looked beyond himself, his own actions and his desires.

So, I guess I'm trying to learn at this point, to be better than he was.

Which is something one should always strive for, but apparently Jekyll never thought so. This desire to be better, and in the eyes of others to be worse, but in my own eyes to just be me, it's so new. No one else has a chance to start over as I have, to start wholly anew, I will make the most of it.

I'd given up so long ago on being free of the melancholy, and again when the serum created Hyde as opposed to curing Jekyll. Yet, here I am, a new man free of that ever hanging shadow to start fresh.

That night was the last of Doctor Henry Jekyll but the first true night of Edward Hyde's. I think I miss him somehow, but I don't look forward to the day he returns, if he does.

Hyde is here to stay, and I have much to achieve without Jekyll's fears and shadows to hold me back.

Looks like our coin has finally flipped, or something.

Six, Jekyll owned out mother's apothecary, it was how we had income when he wasn't actively working at the hospital or on some experiment. I never thought to include it in the will, so I'm considering giving it to the wonderful woman that's been running it for this many years in our stead. Or, perhaps I'll simply take over operations, I'm not sure yet.

But that's what's so incredible about all this! I'm okay with not knowing! It's a little unsettling yes, but it's also intriguing! I know not what I'm going to do with this new future, but I'm certain it holds promise.

There's another thing I've learned. Seven, I am not as poetic as I thought I was.

~

Hyde smiled and closed the journal, looking at the brand new thing with a sense of pride. New pen, new ink, new pages, new man! A silver EH was decorated on the spine, a little shaky but hand painted with pride. He stood, and looked around the room with a sigh. The room he'd used to call the lab was now his personal room, a small bed added to one corner and some of the more toxic things removed. The door to Jekyll's actual room was respectfully locked now, and it was going to stay that way unless his notes or things were desperately needed.

Edward stood from the desk, stretching as he did. Jekyll had been reported as missing, but the police didn't seem to think it was connected with Hyde at all! They believed Hyde was simply family called to help find the missing doctor, thank God too! They thought the disappearance was connected with the murderer who'd sprung up after the death of Carew, as if Henry had been kidnapped or killed by this copy cat, his body dumped somewhere dark. This doppelganger went around beating rich folk's heads in and cutting them up which was absolutely awful, but it took the spotlight of Hyde.

Poole still received the house and Lanyon the notes, unofficially as they'd yet to read Jekyll's will as he wasn't technically dead yet, but the money was now set to go to Hyde as it was rightfully his. Violet was kind enough to let him stay in the lab until things were sorted, her excuse being she didn't want to deal with Henry's things when she didn't understand them. Edward was just grateful she was letting him stay, and he had a sneaking suspicion she had some ulterior motive.

There was no doubt that she disliked him to some degree, but at the same time, she'd yet to speak rudely to him or outright cross him. Whether she was biding her time or she'd actually changed her mind about Hyde was yet to be seen, but it didn't really matter yet.

He rolled his shoulders and strolled to the small bed, pulling his cape from one of the bed posts and swinging it around his shoulders. He needed to speak to Lanyon, not a word had passed between them since they'd met with Utterson to sort out the will the days after, Jekyll's death. No time like the present, but they had to speak!

Hyde donned his hat, then his glasses, and strode out of his room.

He paused, turning to look at the mirror beside the door, tilting his head curiously at his reflection. He strode up to it and squared his shoulders, tilting his head up and examining himself with a smile. His reflection, once strange and new, but now familiar, grinned back with its new glasses and the fading bruises of the noose on his neck. An ugly green and purple stripe that would easily be missed, that is if Hyde could bring himself to put on a scarf.

His reflection shimmered metaphorically and Henry Jekyll stood there, wearing Hyde's smile and the most dapper outfit he owned. There were the marks of the noose around his neck as well, but they were just as vibrant as the first morning after. Jekyll's smile fell away and he began to speak, though he was silent beyond the mirror and entirely imaginary.

Hyde smiled at the fictional reflection, and tipped his hat to it before turning and leaving the lab.

He slid down the banister and hopped off into the foyer with a lively flourish, calling to Poole- wherever she was- that he was off for the evening. With some pocket change in hand, he walked out onto the street into the sunny afternoon. This gave him a reason to pause, Hyde hadn't ever had a moment to stop and stare at the daylight sky as he had the night.

Gloomy clouds and blotches of blue created a patchwork of ever-shifting mists and winds, Edward found himself unable to look away from the rolling skies as he set off along the road towards Lanyon's home. He was so preoccupied with the sky that he didn't notice Lanyon hurrying towards him until they collided like a most horrible of train wrecks. Edward staggered back and splashed into a puddle, Jacob caught himself on a light post, and they stared at each other.

"I meant to come see you," Edward began, picking himself up off the pavement.

Jacob continued to stare, eyes flickering up and down. He recognized the clothes Hyde wore, the same ones Henry had when he was younger and thinner, his favorite vest that he always left open on the bottom button, here it was the same.

Edward pulled off his top hat and held it to his chest, a respectful gesture that matched with his wide blue eyes, watching Jacob with a small pout. "Lanyon, I've spoken with Poole and we've made amends, yet you will not speak with me. I don't understand why, I have apologized for my foolish actions and thanked you for helping me piece things back together, yet... I feel as if you've begun to pull yourself away from me. Is it, impossible for us to rekindle our friendship?"

Jacob stared, blinking once. Did he want to give Hyde a second chance? He'd ruined everything as Jekyll already, did he even deserve it? He'd lied- but he'd felt awful for it, so awful he had to take his own life! That same sparkle Hyde now held in his eyes, was that not the same light that had enchanted Lanyon so during their schooldays?

Slowly, he let go of the lamp post and stepped towards Hyde, head tilted. Not sure what he was doing, Lanyon took one of Hyde's hands and spread the fingers, examining each spot of scarred skin on the wrist, in the folds of the palm and fingers, things so long hidden by those silken gloves. Like the secrets, like Jekyll's pain, now they wre simply there for all to see.

By simply being, Hyde had proven he held the honesty that Lanyon had used to love.

How much of Jekyll was really gone?

"Jacob?" That tone, the only difference was now it was deeper, a bit more growling, but it was the same.

He looked up, "Henry?"

Edward shook his head, "Not quite, I'm sorry. I can't go back to being him, I don't want to, I want to start over, start new. But, it's only a change of name to you." He smiled, "At least, I hope that's all it must be. Say, would you, like to join me for a drink? A visit to the library perhaps? Merely, the afternoon together, that I might prove I'm still the man you knew."

Yet again, Jacob blinked.

But this time, he smiled, dropping Edward's hand that he could hold it between them. "I think I'd like that, actually. It's been, a stressful week you know."