Item:Ocean House Diary

The Diary is an item used in VTM: Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines as part of the The Ghost Haunts at Midnight quest. It's found in the basement kitchen of the Ocean House Hotel. Picking it up activates the Spiritual Release quest. It was written by Ed's wife.

This is the charred remains of what looks like a diary:

05/30/1958 - Just arrived here, at the Ocean House. We have a week-long holiday here in Santa Monica, and Ed has booked us a room for the hotel's grand opening. It's a wonderful place, almost magical. The children have been swimming all afternoon.

05/31/1958 - The first two days have been almost perfect, except that Ed can't seem to stop asking about the locket I received from my mother. He seems to think it was sent to me by some other admirer. Ed can be sweet, but sometimes his jealousy can get the better of him. Hopefully he'll feel better tomorrow.

06/01/1958 - Sun is out today, not a cloud in the sky. Ed seems a little on edge, keeps guessing as to who my "new boyfriend" is. Silly Ed.

06/03/1958 - There was a picnic for the hotel guests this morning... quite a grand affair. Ed is in a dark mood. I don't know what I can do to reassure him that he is my one and only love. The only time he seemed to brighten up was when he was speaking to the groundskeeper. Boys and their tools....

06/04/1958 - We only have two days left, and thank God we're finally going home. Ed won't speak to me or the children, and I've found him more than once in the bathroom holding the locket and staring at it. I'm afraid he's suffered some sort of breakdown. I've told him we can go home, but he just shakes his head. He won't look at me. I just want to go home.

06/05/1958 - Ed left early this morning, and I haven't seem him since. If I haven't seen him in another hour, I'm going to call the hotel manager. Against my better wishes, Ed Jr. went to look for him downstairs in the basement. I'm going to send Tiffany down to fetch him, if... wait... someone is knocking at the door....

Oh my God, Ed covered in blood... coming to kill me... locked myself in the bathroom... he's gone crazy... he keeps shouting we'll be together forever and he'll never let me go... someone please hel... (The writing trails off the end of the page.)

See this article on the VTM Bloodlines Wiki:

Diary

Background Information

• The in-game item name is simply "Diary," a name it shares with Lily's Diary.
• The original game shared the same model as most other diaries and journals in the game. However, given the description mentions the "charred remains," a charred version of the diary model was created for the Plus version of the Unofficial Patch.
• The overall plot of the events described -- a couple with a child or children arriving at a hotel, a groundskeeper, the father becoming an axe-wielding murderer -- parallels the events of The Shining.
• The final entry falls into the trope of making sure you're writing a record of events even while you're in the process of dying. It was parodied most memorably in the "Castle Aaaargh" sequence of Monty Python and the Holy Grail.
• The author writes that the family is staying in the Ocean House for a week, starting May 30, meaning the final day would have been June 6. Ed killed everyone and burned down the hotel on June 5, one day short.