The Fence at the Edge of the World
This short story was written for my writing group, JLA writers. The first two lines were provided for us, and we had to take it from there.
The Fence at the Edge of the World
There was always that one kid by the fence. How could the rest of us feel okay if he wasn't? He didn't do nothing special, just stood there all alone by the fence, looking at the wood intently as if he could see clear through to the other side. He became a familiar sight on our walks to and from school, or up the hill towards the cemetery, this strange kid; after awhile we stopped noticing him. It wasn't very remarkable anymore. It was right for him to be there, must be. Reverend Mathers raised a stink about it at first, of course, and a lot of folks had agreed with him it was downright unnatural, but eventually even he said it must be the will of God. Around here, everybody has their place, and once we all realized that this boy's was by the fence, well, it became kind of reassuring to see him there, you know? Not that any of us would have changed places with him, not for all the world. But this kid, he sorta belonged there and that was all right with us.
Of course, it wasn't always that way. Before he came along, we all avoided the fence and tried not to think of it at all. The fence bordered the west side of our town and rand as for north and south as anybody had ever cared to go. Far as we knew it ran on forever, around the whole earth. People used to think the earth was flat, and that you could fall off the edge of it into nothing where you'd keep on falling and falling and falling forever, but people used to be ignorant. Not like now. The earth is round, like a big ball, and the way we thought of it this fence just sort of went round the whole of it. Nobody exactly knew how it came to be there, but nobody exactly cared to find out. Reverend Mathers said it was a manifestation of the will of God. Old Farmer Craig said our ancestor's ancestors put it up, and it took them a hundred years to do it. Stew Philips, the constable's son, said it was just a lousy fence. The rest of us didn't care to think of it at all. We had chores to do and families to raise, and what had the fence to do with us? The whole town had this kind of unspoken agreement just to pretend that the thing didn't even exist.
Until that kid came along. None of us rightly remember, now, what his name was or what family he came from. He was a short, kind of chubby kid who couldn't run too well or throw very far, which wouldn't be so bad since lots of kids ain't exactly gifted that way, but this kid, he didn't really get good marks in school or play an instrument or join a club or anything. Everybody has their place, round here, and he just couldn't find his, at first. Well all that sort of made it hard, you see, for any of the other children to make friends with him. A lot of us felt sorry for him, though. He was a strange kid, always said the strangest things you couldn't make head or tail of and then he'd get all upset when you didn't catch on to his meaning. Odd kidd, one of the kind who'd sit all by himself during recess and stare at a blade of grass like it was a hundred dollar bill. The whole time, he'd just sit there and stare and he wouldn't play ball or climb the bars or nothing. And all the time he just never found where he fit in, and it made a lot of people pretty uncomfortable.
Until the day we found him by the fence. At first he stood about ten feet off, looking at it like it was some kind of priceless painting and not moving an inch. As days went by he moved closer and closer until he stood right up against it, with his nose all but butting against the wood, still staring so hard you could hardly see him blink. Well, it made a lot of us might upset, that. A bunch of mothers in town thought it was bad behavior fora boy his age, and a poor example for the other children, so they raised a stink about it and petitioned our mayor. But the mayor couldn't see no harm in it, and said there wasn't any laws or ordinances against it in the town's constitution, and though he didn't approve of it himself he didn't see what he could do in the circumstances. A number of others tried to talk to the kid, kind of show him his error and get him to act like everybody else. They'd walk up to him by the fence and try to shoot the breeze like they was his best friends and ask him what he was doing all friendly like. And he'd say, I'm looking at this fence. He was a riot that kid. We all could see he was looking at the fence but what we wanted to know was why? I'm thinking, he'd say, I'm thinking about what its like on the other side. That kid said the strangest things.
Well, eventually Reverend Mathers took an interest in the whole thing. He said he saw it all as part of his obligation to the people as the leader of the flock to help the boy, to, as he put it, fetch the lost sheep and bring him back to the ninety and nine. We weren't clear on which ninety nine of us he meant, but we were sure that he'd fix it all just just the same. Well, the Reverend walked right up to that boy and asked him waht he was doing, and the kid he answered just the same as usual, except then the Revered asked him all sorts of complicated religious questions about the nature of the fence, and its purpose, and God, and the like. But the boy didn't say much about that, only that he reckoned it was just a fence. The Reverend asked him what he thought was on the other side, and the boy said, honestly this is what he said, he said: the edge of the world. Well the Reverend laughed at that, and we all did too, when we heard of it, because that was ignorant talk. The Reverend told the boy that he ought to try harder in school, especially in geography class. He told the town after that, that he didn't see no harm in the kid standing by the fence, that maybe it was part of God's plan, who, he reminded us, moves in those mysterious ways.
Anyway, the next part could have been avoided, most likely, but nobody could have predicted what that kid would do. See, word of the kid's talk with our reverand got around, and some of the other boys stared teasing him a little, as boys do. They were giving him a time about it, one day, and that kid, he decided he'd find out for sure what was on the other side of that fence, and before we knew it he'd gotten a hold of tools or something and he made himself a tiny little hole in the fence that he could look through. When the other boys saw that, they scattered fast enough, because that kid was acting like a crazy man, poking a hole in the fence and looking through. They ran and told their parents and word got around fast enough. But by the time the constable had come and pulled the boy away, he'd already had a good long look through the fence, and he had quite a story to tell.
The boy said, when we asked him, that he saw people on the other side of that fence. Well, that caused quite a commontion for a while, let me tell you. Everyone was all aflutter with the news and the mayor even called a town council to decide what we ought to do about it and to calm everyone's nerves. He stood that boy up right in front of the whole town and asked him to tell us all what he had seen. He was nervous, that odd kid, and just kind of stared at his feet and mumbled that he had been looking through the fence and he saw people moving around over there. What kind of people, we asked, and he said just people. Well what were they doing, oh just moving around. Nothing special. City Hall was in an uproar, people shouting this and taht, and all the while the mayor waving his arms and shouting and trying to keep everything calm. But then Reverand Mathers stood up and we all fell silent and respectful like we do when the reverend speaks. He told us he'd been praying and studying the scripture since he heard the news and he said we were the children of God and these folk on the other side of the fence, well, they weren't people really. They were children of the devil and that's why God put up the fence in the first place, he said, that way we'd have no trouble with them. Well that settled the matter for us, though we were pretty worked up about it for a while. There was a big row over the kid, whether he ought to be kept away from the fence for his own good, but in the end we had just gotten used to hime there... that was his place, you see. Everybody has their place here. So we let him go back to the fence, when he wasn't at school and all, but the mayor ordered him to plug up that hole to keep peace in the town.
He was something of a celebrity for a few days there, as some of the more curious among us set to asking him a few questions about what he saw. Were there really people over there, they'd ask, and he'd just nod. Anything else? And that kid would say, the edge of the world. And that's all he'd say except once he said, if you want to know go look for yourself. That scared off any more folks with questions. Its one thing to wonder what the inside of the asylum looks like, and its quite another to want to try the funny jacket on yourself.
Eventually things quieted down again, and everybody knew about the people on the other side of the fence, even though we didn't talk about them, and when Reverend Mathers referred to the children of the devil in his Sunday sermons, we all knew who he meant. It was frightening, actually, though we all tried to hide it. The fence was always a little unsettling, but now it was downright intimidating. It didn't bother the kid none, though, and he just kept staring at it as usual. But that became a normal sight, and soon we got used to the idea of the fence, and the people on the other siade, and the kid, and everything went back to normal, or as close to normal as it could. Children were born, some of the old folks died and were buried up in the cemetery, and the rest of the people ate, and slept, and talked and just generally went about their business of living and filling their place. We had just about forgotten about the kid again by the time he climbed the fence.
It was a sunny spring day, and the children were on their way home from school when they saw that kid carrying a ladder towards the fence. Well it didn't take them too long to put two and two together, even though they couldn't hardly believe it. They went and told everybody, and just about the whole town showed up at the kid's spot by the fence to see if it was true. Sure enough, that kid had the ladder set up against the fence, and he was standing by it very seriously, like he was the mayor at a town council or something. He was waiting, like he wanted a big crowd to gather before he did it. We all just sort of stood there in shock, thinking he couldn't be in his right mind, and watched while he stepped up on the ladder and climbed, one rung at a time, higher and higher. Soon he was higher than even the tallest of us, but he didn't look down or slow his pace any. He just climbed slowly, steadily, and our eyes followed him, and our mouths hung open, and now and then somebody would gasp or cover their eyes as if they couldn't bear to watch. It made us scared, sure, but it made us sad too. We couldn't explain it, why we stood there and watched and didn't do nothing. Finally, finally, the boy was within a hand's reach of the top of the fence when Reverend Mathers came running up, huffing and puffing like a madman and shouting for us to stop him, to brimg him down and to take away the ladder. A couple of the men dashed forward and yanked the ladder out from under the kid but he was too fast. With a little leap he grabbed on the top of the fence and dangled there. Well there wasn't much we could do then. He was too high up for any of us to reach him, though we shouted for him to let go and we'd catch him. He didn't pay us any attention though, just struggled to pull himself up and over the edge. We just watched.
He wasn't the strongest kid, and not the lightest either, so he was having a bit of trouble pulling his own weight up. His face looked all red and puffy and horrible from what we could see, and his arms were shaking like a leaf in the wind. But that kid, he just didn't give up. He pulled and pulled and squinched his eyes all tight until finally he got one leg over the fence and kind of hoisted his body up so he was lying there on top of the fence. And then he did something crazy. He stood up. He brought his legs underneath him and just stood up on the top of the fence and looked all around him frantically like he was drowning. For one moment, the sun seemed to reflect off him just so and he shone brightly, and his face... well his face was all triumph and glory and wonder and freedom, like we'd never seen it before. It took our breath away to see it, and that's a fact. He threw his arms out wide and smiled at the other side of the fence and cried like a baby. Then we all shouted in terror, but there was nothing we could do as his balance shifted and he gave us one last, pitiful look before he toppled over the other side and fell and fell and fell and fell.
The Fence at the Edge of the World
There was always that one kid by the fence. How could the rest of us feel okay if he wasn't? He didn't do nothing special, just stood there all alone by the fence, looking at the wood intently as if he could see clear through to the other side. He became a familiar sight on our walks to and from school, or up the hill towards the cemetery, this strange kid; after awhile we stopped noticing him. It wasn't very remarkable anymore. It was right for him to be there, must be. Reverend Mathers raised a stink about it at first, of course, and a lot of folks had agreed with him it was downright unnatural, but eventually even he said it must be the will of God. Around here, everybody has their place, and once we all realized that this boy's was by the fence, well, it became kind of reassuring to see him there, you know? Not that any of us would have changed places with him, not for all the world. But this kid, he sorta belonged there and that was all right with us.
Of course, it wasn't always that way. Before he came along, we all avoided the fence and tried not to think of it at all. The fence bordered the west side of our town and rand as for north and south as anybody had ever cared to go. Far as we knew it ran on forever, around the whole earth. People used to think the earth was flat, and that you could fall off the edge of it into nothing where you'd keep on falling and falling and falling forever, but people used to be ignorant. Not like now. The earth is round, like a big ball, and the way we thought of it this fence just sort of went round the whole of it. Nobody exactly knew how it came to be there, but nobody exactly cared to find out. Reverend Mathers said it was a manifestation of the will of God. Old Farmer Craig said our ancestor's ancestors put it up, and it took them a hundred years to do it. Stew Philips, the constable's son, said it was just a lousy fence. The rest of us didn't care to think of it at all. We had chores to do and families to raise, and what had the fence to do with us? The whole town had this kind of unspoken agreement just to pretend that the thing didn't even exist.
Until that kid came along. None of us rightly remember, now, what his name was or what family he came from. He was a short, kind of chubby kid who couldn't run too well or throw very far, which wouldn't be so bad since lots of kids ain't exactly gifted that way, but this kid, he didn't really get good marks in school or play an instrument or join a club or anything. Everybody has their place, round here, and he just couldn't find his, at first. Well all that sort of made it hard, you see, for any of the other children to make friends with him. A lot of us felt sorry for him, though. He was a strange kid, always said the strangest things you couldn't make head or tail of and then he'd get all upset when you didn't catch on to his meaning. Odd kidd, one of the kind who'd sit all by himself during recess and stare at a blade of grass like it was a hundred dollar bill. The whole time, he'd just sit there and stare and he wouldn't play ball or climb the bars or nothing. And all the time he just never found where he fit in, and it made a lot of people pretty uncomfortable.
Until the day we found him by the fence. At first he stood about ten feet off, looking at it like it was some kind of priceless painting and not moving an inch. As days went by he moved closer and closer until he stood right up against it, with his nose all but butting against the wood, still staring so hard you could hardly see him blink. Well, it made a lot of us might upset, that. A bunch of mothers in town thought it was bad behavior fora boy his age, and a poor example for the other children, so they raised a stink about it and petitioned our mayor. But the mayor couldn't see no harm in it, and said there wasn't any laws or ordinances against it in the town's constitution, and though he didn't approve of it himself he didn't see what he could do in the circumstances. A number of others tried to talk to the kid, kind of show him his error and get him to act like everybody else. They'd walk up to him by the fence and try to shoot the breeze like they was his best friends and ask him what he was doing all friendly like. And he'd say, I'm looking at this fence. He was a riot that kid. We all could see he was looking at the fence but what we wanted to know was why? I'm thinking, he'd say, I'm thinking about what its like on the other side. That kid said the strangest things.
Well, eventually Reverend Mathers took an interest in the whole thing. He said he saw it all as part of his obligation to the people as the leader of the flock to help the boy, to, as he put it, fetch the lost sheep and bring him back to the ninety and nine. We weren't clear on which ninety nine of us he meant, but we were sure that he'd fix it all just just the same. Well, the Reverend walked right up to that boy and asked him waht he was doing, and the kid he answered just the same as usual, except then the Revered asked him all sorts of complicated religious questions about the nature of the fence, and its purpose, and God, and the like. But the boy didn't say much about that, only that he reckoned it was just a fence. The Reverend asked him what he thought was on the other side, and the boy said, honestly this is what he said, he said: the edge of the world. Well the Reverend laughed at that, and we all did too, when we heard of it, because that was ignorant talk. The Reverend told the boy that he ought to try harder in school, especially in geography class. He told the town after that, that he didn't see no harm in the kid standing by the fence, that maybe it was part of God's plan, who, he reminded us, moves in those mysterious ways.
Anyway, the next part could have been avoided, most likely, but nobody could have predicted what that kid would do. See, word of the kid's talk with our reverand got around, and some of the other boys stared teasing him a little, as boys do. They were giving him a time about it, one day, and that kid, he decided he'd find out for sure what was on the other side of that fence, and before we knew it he'd gotten a hold of tools or something and he made himself a tiny little hole in the fence that he could look through. When the other boys saw that, they scattered fast enough, because that kid was acting like a crazy man, poking a hole in the fence and looking through. They ran and told their parents and word got around fast enough. But by the time the constable had come and pulled the boy away, he'd already had a good long look through the fence, and he had quite a story to tell.
The boy said, when we asked him, that he saw people on the other side of that fence. Well, that caused quite a commontion for a while, let me tell you. Everyone was all aflutter with the news and the mayor even called a town council to decide what we ought to do about it and to calm everyone's nerves. He stood that boy up right in front of the whole town and asked him to tell us all what he had seen. He was nervous, that odd kid, and just kind of stared at his feet and mumbled that he had been looking through the fence and he saw people moving around over there. What kind of people, we asked, and he said just people. Well what were they doing, oh just moving around. Nothing special. City Hall was in an uproar, people shouting this and taht, and all the while the mayor waving his arms and shouting and trying to keep everything calm. But then Reverand Mathers stood up and we all fell silent and respectful like we do when the reverend speaks. He told us he'd been praying and studying the scripture since he heard the news and he said we were the children of God and these folk on the other side of the fence, well, they weren't people really. They were children of the devil and that's why God put up the fence in the first place, he said, that way we'd have no trouble with them. Well that settled the matter for us, though we were pretty worked up about it for a while. There was a big row over the kid, whether he ought to be kept away from the fence for his own good, but in the end we had just gotten used to hime there... that was his place, you see. Everybody has their place here. So we let him go back to the fence, when he wasn't at school and all, but the mayor ordered him to plug up that hole to keep peace in the town.
He was something of a celebrity for a few days there, as some of the more curious among us set to asking him a few questions about what he saw. Were there really people over there, they'd ask, and he'd just nod. Anything else? And that kid would say, the edge of the world. And that's all he'd say except once he said, if you want to know go look for yourself. That scared off any more folks with questions. Its one thing to wonder what the inside of the asylum looks like, and its quite another to want to try the funny jacket on yourself.
Eventually things quieted down again, and everybody knew about the people on the other side of the fence, even though we didn't talk about them, and when Reverend Mathers referred to the children of the devil in his Sunday sermons, we all knew who he meant. It was frightening, actually, though we all tried to hide it. The fence was always a little unsettling, but now it was downright intimidating. It didn't bother the kid none, though, and he just kept staring at it as usual. But that became a normal sight, and soon we got used to the idea of the fence, and the people on the other siade, and the kid, and everything went back to normal, or as close to normal as it could. Children were born, some of the old folks died and were buried up in the cemetery, and the rest of the people ate, and slept, and talked and just generally went about their business of living and filling their place. We had just about forgotten about the kid again by the time he climbed the fence.
It was a sunny spring day, and the children were on their way home from school when they saw that kid carrying a ladder towards the fence. Well it didn't take them too long to put two and two together, even though they couldn't hardly believe it. They went and told everybody, and just about the whole town showed up at the kid's spot by the fence to see if it was true. Sure enough, that kid had the ladder set up against the fence, and he was standing by it very seriously, like he was the mayor at a town council or something. He was waiting, like he wanted a big crowd to gather before he did it. We all just sort of stood there in shock, thinking he couldn't be in his right mind, and watched while he stepped up on the ladder and climbed, one rung at a time, higher and higher. Soon he was higher than even the tallest of us, but he didn't look down or slow his pace any. He just climbed slowly, steadily, and our eyes followed him, and our mouths hung open, and now and then somebody would gasp or cover their eyes as if they couldn't bear to watch. It made us scared, sure, but it made us sad too. We couldn't explain it, why we stood there and watched and didn't do nothing. Finally, finally, the boy was within a hand's reach of the top of the fence when Reverend Mathers came running up, huffing and puffing like a madman and shouting for us to stop him, to brimg him down and to take away the ladder. A couple of the men dashed forward and yanked the ladder out from under the kid but he was too fast. With a little leap he grabbed on the top of the fence and dangled there. Well there wasn't much we could do then. He was too high up for any of us to reach him, though we shouted for him to let go and we'd catch him. He didn't pay us any attention though, just struggled to pull himself up and over the edge. We just watched.
He wasn't the strongest kid, and not the lightest either, so he was having a bit of trouble pulling his own weight up. His face looked all red and puffy and horrible from what we could see, and his arms were shaking like a leaf in the wind. But that kid, he just didn't give up. He pulled and pulled and squinched his eyes all tight until finally he got one leg over the fence and kind of hoisted his body up so he was lying there on top of the fence. And then he did something crazy. He stood up. He brought his legs underneath him and just stood up on the top of the fence and looked all around him frantically like he was drowning. For one moment, the sun seemed to reflect off him just so and he shone brightly, and his face... well his face was all triumph and glory and wonder and freedom, like we'd never seen it before. It took our breath away to see it, and that's a fact. He threw his arms out wide and smiled at the other side of the fence and cried like a baby. Then we all shouted in terror, but there was nothing we could do as his balance shifted and he gave us one last, pitiful look before he toppled over the other side and fell and fell and fell and fell.
posted by Matt Haws | 3:31 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home