Stories
—
The Slag of The Wordsmith
All
he wanted
was a foothold,
a branch, a rock,
anything to not drown.
But there was nothing.
He was engulfed,
tumbling in a
turbulent
liquid
tomb.
He opened his eyes.
His head
was still spinning,
but he felt the support
of his mattress,
and the weight
of his duvet.
He was safe.
He closed his eyes.
Loose dust fell into his face. He tried not to lose his grip on the chalky rock of the cliff’s edge. While his muscles screamed in pain and betrayed him, the cliff was silent and still, a calm and impassive adversary. Every fiber of his being knew he was about to die, and no amount of effort could prevent his inevitable fall into the abyss. But he curled his fingers and dug in, refusing to give death a moment more than necessary.
He opened his eyes.
He was flat on his back,
lying on his bed,
coated in
thick
dreamy
darkness.
He closed his eyes.
A child stepped on his foot, leaving a dusty tread mark on the toe of his sneaker. Crowds flowed past him as he pressed on. Someone crashed into his shoulder, dropping their bag and cursing him. A soft felt coat caressed his arm as it sped past, traveling too fast for him to catch the color of the fabric, or the face of the wearer. Voices flowed around him, rising, falling, drifting. Some frenetic and grating. Others soft and gentle. Each sound coming from a stranger. A maybe-friend. A possibility. Their eyes formed a distant mosaic of dots, a star field. The nearest emerged from this background, however briefly, to reveal a unique and singular window into a soul, only to then disappear the moment they were closest, fading into the background, the Doppler-shift of yet another almost human connection signaling his continuing failure. “What is wrong with me?” he wondered.
He opened his eyes.
The low swoosh of traffic
half a mile away
drifted in
his open window.
A streetlight buzzed
in the early pre-dawn mist.
He closed his eyes.
The preacher’s practiced cadence filled the hall with words of hope. He spoke of love and mercy and the warm embrace of a father. He told his story of hitting rock bottom, of loneliness, of despair. Except he wasn’t lonely. He had Jesus. “You’ll never know how much you need Jesus, until Jesus is all you have.” He spoke the words as if shaping them on an anvil. Applause erupted from the crowd, sparks of emotion released by the careful hammer blows of a practiced wordsmith.
But there was one who didn’t applaud; the slag of the smith’s work. Desperate and longing to feel the hope that those around him so easily found, our man felt alone in the crowd. His face wore a practiced calm, while inside his internal monologue raged. “Why are their prayers answered, while mine go unheard? How can everyone else feel this peaceful and hopeful presence, while I remain alone, abandoned at the bottom of the pit? Why can’t I be free of this pain? Why can’t I force myself to believe? It would be so much easier. What is wrong with me?”
He opened his eyes.
He was in bed,
alone.
His thoughts
his only company.
He closed his eyes.
He was at the bottom of the pit. Its smooth walls offered no foothold for escape. The shaft was narrow enough to evoke a horrifying solitude, yet he couldn’t press against the walls to shimmy his way up. He was trapped.
This is when he should pray, right? This is when he should cast his needs at the feet of the father and ask for strength? He tried to form words to express his need, his loneliness, his longing. But he couldn’t. His mind rebelled. The only words he could muster were a curse of rage.
For the first time in his life, he realized he wasn’t free. Not because he was confined to the pit. But because, try as hard as he might, he had no ability to force a belief. He knew he wouldn’t pray because he knew no one listening. And no amount of effort could manufacture that belief.
However, this didn’t scare him. Instead, scales fell from his eyes and he saw the world for what it was. He wasn’t pretending anymore. At the bottom of the pit he found true freedom. Freedom of mind.
He opened his eyes.
He stretched his
muscles,
as if
to prove
there were no walls
to suppress his movement.
He closed his eyes.
He was standing in a vast expanse. Turning, he studied what was around him. At his feet was a smooth black floor. It was cool to the touch. Textureless. Grippy. Easy to walk on. It was a perfect floor in an expanse of nothingness. He tried to speak but his words fell flat and disappeared right in front of him, barely able to make it to his own ears. He walked a few steps, then ran. Other than the movement of his muscles and the sensation of fabric on his skin, he could detect no progress. The featureless floor offered no evidence of movement. The environment stretched into the void, appearing to go everywhere, and nowhere. He was alone in a vast expanse of . . . nothing . . . and everything. Exhilaration consumed him.
He opened his eyes.
Still alone in his bed.
It was early and the sun hadn’t even begun to breach the horizon. He could smell the crisp pre-dawn dew, a sign that the morning chill would persist a few more hours.
Gently lifting his bed covers, he carefully drew them back, stepping out of bed with deliberate and unhurried movements. His feet found the plush carpet floor, the familiar texture sending a feeling of safety and security up through his body.
He walked downstairs and began the ritual of making coffee. In his mind he formed a vague image of someone else, somewhere in the world, perhaps even nearby, going through the same ritual. She was making the same motions of waking. Of making coffee. Of mentally expanding to take in the day. Of gripping onto the very few things of which she was certain. He wondered, will I meet this person today? Or ever? Would she want to meet me? How many times might we have passed each other before? Will we perhaps encounter each other again? Maybe at a store, separated by the shelves of an aisle? Or in traffic, parked next to each other for a brief moment? Close enough to whisper “hi”, yet so distant nothing can span the divide. Or will happenstance bring us face-to-face, suddenly seeing into each other’s eyes and shattering the bonds of loneliness, even if for a moment?
The sudden
pure realization
of the random chance of it all
brought him a peace
he hadn’t known.
It was
no longer
his fault.
It just . . . was.