Chapter Text
An Old Man begins as a Small Boy living in a House on the Edge of a mountain. Every morning and evening, the Small Boy is carried out by his Mother and held at the very edge, where he looks up and sees the Sun rising, and at night he sees the Stars flicker into view. He is carried out by the Mother every morning and every evening until he can walk, and even then he goes, with the Mother at his side. He marvels at the light that spreads across the sky with the sun, and at the infinity of space that blankets overhead when the sun goes down. He is full of wonder at the Morning and hope for the Night and he doesn’t think of what lies below the Edge.
One day, when the Small Boy is a Grown Boy, the Mother does not walk with him to the Edge. He walks alone, his shoulders slumped and his face sad, and the Grown Boy does not understand. He stands alone on the Edge, and he looks up into the Sun, but the warmth is not as warm as it had been when the Mother was there. The Grown Boy looks down over the Edge, away from the Sun.
“Why do you look down?” the Sun asks.
“The Mother is gone. I have lost Happiness,” the Grown Boy answers.
“Past the Edge it is cold. Look up, Grown Boy. I give Happiness to the Morning.”
The Grown Boy cannot bring himself to look up at the Sun, and as he stares down over the Edge, the coldness begins to grow, until he is numb and shaking. The Boy begins to cry.
The Grown Boy goes through the Day like always, but the Grown Boy is still cold, and it has become hard to breathe. At Night, the Grown Boy walks to the Edge. Instead of looking up, however, the Grown Boy looks down over the Edge. The Stars dim in their pity.
“Why do you look down?” they ask the Grown Boy.
The Grown Boy replies, “The Mother is gone. I have lost Hope.”
“Past the Edge it is bitter. Look up, Grown Boy. We give Hope to the Night.”
But the Grown Boy cannot bring himself to look up at the Stars. As he stares down over the Edge, the emptiness begins to grow, and suddenly he is falling, plummeting through air as he watches the Edge grow ever higher and higher above him.
He hits the bottom and feels Pain for the first time.
The Grown Boy becomes the Man.
Every Morning, the Man looks down at the dirt below his feet, and he curses the Sun. He no longer feels its warmth, and his coldness has grown. He leaves his cave, breathing in dust and dryness as he toils with the dirt, scavenging for food. All the while, the Sun is calling to him:
“Look up, Man. I give Happiness. I provide your warmth. Look up at me. Be warm.”
But the man is too cold to hear the Sun. Instead he blames it for the dryness of the land and the hardness of the rocks that cut his feet. He does not look up.
At Night, the Stars beg for him.
“Look up, Man,” they say. “We are here. We have always been here, haven’t we? We have never left you. Find Hope again, Man. Hope is not gone forever, all you have to do is look up.”
But the Man has forgotten the Stars, and how wide and deep they go. He has forgotten how they made him feel, how they made him dream. He does not hear them, and he does not look up.
Ages pass like this for the Man, until he is an Old Man.
The Old Man lives in Darkness.
Until Love arrives.
The Old Man does not expect Love, but Love arrives regardless. She comes to him in the form of a Grown Boy, one who is like the Old Man. The Grown Boy is numb and alone. But the Grown Boy is search for Love. The Grown Boy tells the Old Man that he lived on an Edge once, high above the dirt and rocks. He said that he had a Mother, and that every morning and every night, the Mother would carry him to their Edge, and they would look up, and the Grown Boy would feel Happiness and Hope when he did. The Grown Boy tells the Old Man that he dreamt of the Stars surrounding him, of floating among them in a world of Hope and Dreams, where he could be and do anything if he only wished it hard enough. He tells the old man about falling over the Edge. He tells the Old Man how much he had Loved the Mother.
“What is Love?” the Old Man asks the Grown Boy. The Old Man does not know Love. The Grown Boy looks up at the Old Man, and the Old Man looks down at the Grown Boy.
“Love is what teaches,” the Grown Boy answers. “Love is what gives the Sun its Warmth, and Love is what gives the Stars their dreams.”
“I do not know Love,” the Old Man tells the Grown Boy, and he looks away.
The Grown Boy does not.
Instead, the Grown Boy continues:
“You do not remember Love. But Love also causes Pain. When you Love someone, and they leave, Pain follows. Love can take away Happiness and Hope, too. Love can make you cold and empty, Old Man. Love is the only Why that we have.”
“I do not understand,” replies the Old Man.
The Grown Boy holds out his hand. The Old Man can see scars like silver streams that run over the Grown Boy’s skin. That is the Grown Boy’s Pain. It is the Old Man's also.
“I will show you Love,” the Grown Boy tells the Old Man, and the Old Man takes his hand. Together they stand, and the Grown Boy leads the Old Man away from his cave.
This is the first act.
They walk together until they reach a high wall, and the Old Man pulls away from the Grown Boy.
“What is this?” he asks.
The Grown Boy replies, “We must climb.”
“I am too old and weak to climb,” the Old Man tells the Grown Boy. The Grown Boy smiles.
“I am strong. I will help you.”
The Grown Boy helps the Old Man onto his back, and begins to climb.
This is the second act.
They are only a little ways up the Wall when the Old Man slips. He begins to fall, the dirt and rocks rising up to meet him. The Grown Boy is lighter without me, the Old Man thinks. He can make it up the Wall. He will leave me behind. But before Pain comes, the Grown Boy is rushing down the rocky Wall to grab the Old Man, wrapping around him as they fall onto the rocks at the bottom. The Pain does not hurt as badly.
“What do we do now?” the Old Man asks.
“We try again,” the Grown Boy answers.
Once again, the Grown Boy helps the Old Man onto his back and the Grown Boy begin to climb. This time, it is the Grown Boy who slips. The Old Man reaches out, clinging to the Wall to steady the Grown Boy. They carry on.
They climb for days. Rocks fall out from beneath their hands, and they are thirsty, but they continue to climb. They reach a large, flat Ledge, and on the Ledge they find a Pool. They rush to it, but when they reach the bank of it they find that there is only enough water for only one of them to receive a swallow. The Old Man looks at the Grown Boy, and the Grown Boy looks back. They are both covered in dust and their mouths are dry and cracked. If they do not drink, they will die. They realize that one of them must die. The Old Man grabs hold of the Grown Boy and begins to cry, and the Grown Boy follows soon after, clinging to the Old Man.
Their tears fall one by one into the puddle into the middle of the pool, and with each tear, the puddle grows. By the time they have stopped crying, dried out and tired, there is enough water for them both to drink and to refresh themselves with. They drink until they cannot drink anymore, and then the boy helps the Old Man onto his back, and they climb on.
This is the third act.
The wall seems to never end.
They continue to climb.
Morning after Morning.
Night after Night.
The Sun rises and sets.
The Stars come into being, and fade out.
One night, the Grown Boy looks up at the stars for the first time.
“We can make it,” he tells the Old Man.
The Old Man looks down, and says that they are barely off the Ground.
The Grown Boy says, “We can make it.” The Grown Boy believes it.
The Old Man does not.
“We are halfway there,” the Grown Boy tells the Old Man one Morning.
The Old Man replies, “We are still half a ways away.”
The Grown Boy sets the Old Man down on the next Ledge.
He tells the Old Man, “I am tired. I need to rest.”
The Old Man watches over the Grown Boy while he sleeps.
This is the fourth act.
“I cannot carry you anymore,” the Grown Boy says.
“I will walk,” the Old Man answers.
One Morning, the Grown Boy tells the Old Man that they are getting close. The Old Man looks up at the Grown Boy. He looks up for the first time. The Grown Boy is scrawny, no longer the strong Boy that he had been at the beginning. He is weak now. His bones jut out, and his eyes are tired. He is covered in filth, and through the filth on his face run small rivers of tears. The Grown Boy is tired. The Old Man weeps for him as they struggle upwards.
The Grown Boy collapses one Night. His legs fall from under him and he cuts himself on a stone in the process. The Old Man wipes away the blood, and tears away part of his shirt to wrap the wound. He sits over the Grown Boy, and he looks up at the Stars.
“Hello again, Old Man,” they say.
“Save him,” the Old Man replies.
The Stars say nothing.
The Sun does not rise in the Morning.
The Stars stay.
The Old Man looks up, and the Old Man begs.
“Save him.” Silence.
“Save him.” Silence.
“Please, save him.”
He falls asleep with pleas on his lips.
This is the fifth act.
The Sun rises while the Old Man is sleeping. He opens his eyes to Light. The Grown Boy is laying next to him, dirty and cracked, but his eyes are open, and he smiles weakly when he sees the Old Man. The Old Man weeps, but he is laughing, and he holds the Grown Boy close to him.
This is the sixth act.
“I cannot go any further,” the Grown Boy tells him later. They have not moved, and the cut on the Grown Boy’s leg is infected. “I cannot walk on it. I am sorry, Old Man.”
The Old Man is silent. The Grown Boy, he realizes, is now a Small Boy who cannot walk.
They fall asleep.
“Come.”
The Small Boy looks up at the Old Man. He is confused.
“I cannot walk,” the Small Boy says.
“Come.”
“I cannot walk.”
“Come.”
“I cannot walk, Old Man!”
“I will walk for you.”
This time, the Old Man helps the Small Boy onto his back. The Small Boy is heavy, but the Old Man does not complain. He climbs shakily, eyes fixed upwards at the Sun. His arms begin to ache, but he continues to pull himself upwards. His legs are weak, but he continues to push. Which each reach, the Small Boy becomes heavier.
“Rest, Old Man,” the Small Boy tells him.
“We are almost there,” the Old Man replies.
This is the seventh act.
They reach the Edge at the Time Between the Sun and the Stars. The Light is still out, but the Stars dance at the corners of it. The Old Man pulls himself the last of the way, and sets the Grown Boy gently on the ground beside him. The Small Boy is so weak, but the Old Man stands and gathers the Small Boy into his arms. Together, they look up.
This is the eighth act.
“Hello.”
It is not the Sun or the Stars that speak this time. The Old Man turns towards the voice. A Woman stands behind him, smiling softly. In his arms, the Small Boy begins to cry. The Woman walks to them, and runs her fingers through the Small Boy’s hair. He quiets, looking up at the Woman with awe. The Old Man watches her, feeling a familiarity bloom in his chest.
“Who are you?” he asks.
The Woman smiles. “You know me.”
“Who are you?” the Old Man asks again.
The Small Boy looks up at him with a smile and tears in his eyes. The Old Man notices for the first time that the Small Boy's marks from Pain are gone. He realizes that they have been gone for a while.
“Old Man, this is Love,” the Small Boy tells him.
The Old Man looks from the Small Boy to the Woman, who is still smiling.
“Old Man?”
The Old Man looks down at the Small Boy.
“Do you remember the Sun, Old Man?” the Small Boy asks. “Do you remember the Stars?”
“I remember,” the Old Man tells him. The Small Boy smiles. Love reaches out and touches him. “I once dreamt I could touch them.”
Love gently takes the Small Boy from his arms. She cradles him like a Mother, and the Old Man can see that the Small Boy is has become new again. Love pulls the Old Man close, and kisses his forehead. “Why?” she asks. “Why did you dream you could touch them?”
“I wanted to feel all their warmth.”
Love smiles. “And have you?”
The Old Man looks at the Small Boy, then at Love. He looks over the Edge at the Wall, at the miles and miles that stretch downwards, miles and miles that he and the Small Boy had climbed.
“I have fallen to the Rocks below,” he tells Love. “I have climbed back up. I have been Loved by the Grown Boy, and I have loved the Small Boy. I have found Happiness and Hope. We are warm again, the Small Boy and I.”
Love smiles.
The Old Man watches Love turn and carry the Small Boy back towards the House on the Edge of the mountain.
This is the final act.