Emit

by Jack Beal

  Cry not, my sweet child

  When it’s dark and you feel alone

  The stars above will be the guide

  To shine your way back home

  Fear not, my darling little man

  The shadows as they fall

  The moon must shed to live again

  Just as we must do, all

  At long last, the pieces fall into place. I have been the poor orphan boy as well as the rich old man. I have been the child in need of attention along with the parent unwilling to spare it. I have feared the consequences of our indifference on this planet, and then gone along to contribute to them. I have loved only to deceive. I have judged and been judged. I have brought life into this world, as I have taken it away. I have peered into abysses in search of monsters, only to find myself. Where I have longed to leave my imprint, I have left a gaping hole. And there where I would have wanted to disappear, I will always be remembered. I have looked outward when I ought to have looked inward. I have misplaced my focus on the rising of the sun instead of where it belongs: on the shedding of the moon.

  Inside the void, it’s a realm of complete opposites that detains me, just as it always has. I am the opposites. I am ever-changing, as I always was and as I always will be. This is not my final state of being, nor was it ever meant to be. As the snake leaves its skin or the moon sheds its shadow, I allow myself to let go of what no longer serves me.

  Fear and bravery. Hate and love. Good and evil. I watch the skin of my past fall around me in paradoxical heaps. Male and female. Pride and humility. Birth and death. In the middle, what remains is life.

  Stepping out from the ancient piles, I am two. I am he who is ready to go forward, and he who will forever remain too afraid. Together, we approach the indescribable light and reach in, each of us drawing out a shovel. One, with a red handle. The other, blue.

  In a realm of complete opposites that detain us, it’s one of perfect balance that lets us go.

  July 4, 2020

  The first thing I’m aware of is the smell of clay and rain rising into my nostrils like two muddy streams. Jerking my face from the heap of soil, I gasp for air. The panic sets in. Where am I?

  A thick haze hangs over the scene, making it difficult to see further than a few feet away. How did I get here?

  My eyes are like two broken arrows, darting blindly out into the mist. Something glimmers arduously in the distance.

  The smoke burns my corneas and pervades my lungs with smoldering lavender swirls. As my body is caught up in a coughing fit, I fall to my belly. Eyelids squeezed tightly, I move forward with slow, meticulous strides.

  The sound of voices ricochet behind me, but I continue forward. Arms extended, I wriggle along until my hand falls upon something smooth and cool. Clutching onto the object, I draw it toward me. The shovel looks as old as the Earth itself. I examine its tarnished metal shaft, dirt-encrusted tip, and T-shaped handle with its flaking blue paint, trying to imagine what it looked like when it was new.

  I’m so engrossed with the strange, old shovel I hardly notice the footsteps approaching.

  “Robert Flynn!” the voice scolds. “How many times has Mom told you that you’re not allowed to dig here?”

  As the girl tweaks my ear and drags me belligerently through the thick haze, I let out a painful groan.

  “And none of your complaining!” she cautions. “As soon as we get in, it’s ‘in the shower!’ And chop-chop if you want to make it in time to see the launch.”

  I open my mouth for a second before closing it. “The launch?” I finally muster.

  “You are a birdbrain, aren’t you? Last week, you couldn’t stop talking about the Atlas V launch, and today, it’s Earth-to-Robbie.”

  I think hard, but I can’t remember yesterday let alone last week. In fact, I can’t remember anything at all. If this ear-pulling brat hadn’t called me by name, I wouldn’t even know that much.

  “I…I was seeing if you hadn’t forgotten,” I try.

  Hook, line and sinker. “How could I forget the launching of the first Rover to Mars? I’m not the one with the birdbrain!”

  As a geometric glass door slides open a different voice calls out. “Sweetie! Stop making fun of your brother! He’s only six, remember?” Then she turns her gaze to me. “And you! You know better than going off by yourself like that. In the shower pronto! We’ll discuss punishments later.” Her eyes narrow with disappointment, blotting out the two spheres of unparalleled blue…

  July 4, 1947

  The first thing I’m aware of is the smell of clay and rain rising into my nostrils like two muddy streams. Jerking my face from the heap of soil, I gasp for air. The panic sets in. Where is it?

  The world is masked in a dense fog. Groping around blindly, my hand falls upon something cold and smooth. Phew. As I wrap my fingers around the red painted handle, a surge of energy reverberates up my arms and into my shoulders. It brings with it the memories of my childhood. Clutching on tighter, another rush of electricity floods through my chest and into my arms. Adolescence and adulthood. It flows down my legs and pours into my feet, swelling into my every toe. I begin to gray. It gushes up into my face, spilling around my brain. Old age. When my entire body has been stirred by the invisible force, it flows back out into the shovel’s handle, which grows gray and dull before my eyes. But I’m not worried. The red, burning knowledge is inside of me, now.

  A distant clatter breaks through the haze like pennies in a well, hitting the water with sharp, tiny pings. As it grows steadily closer, the shrill notes become lower and more drawn out until I can identify full words. “Rob-ert! Robert Flynn!”

  I jump to my feet and peer around, but the smoke is so thick I can’t see a thing. I want to scream ‘I’m here,’ but it’s as if my vocal cords are paralyzed by the clouds of smoke. Suffocating, I drop to my stomach and scramble toward the voice as best as I can.

  Blinded by the haze, I don’t even see the car’s front tire until I’ve bumped into it. As I look up at the brand-new Buick, my mind lurches back to the day of the Independence Day Fair. The day I went out without Dad’s permission. The day this all began. Is it possible?

  There’s only one way to find out. Disregarding the state of my shirt and trousers, I slither breathlessly through the dirt, only stopping when I’ve reached Dad’s Ford Deluxe.

  My mind is filled with memories of UFO’s, of little girls with magic tablets, and with extraordinary journeys that retreat backward in time. Of hidden caves, of choices made, and of lessons learned just a moment too late.

  “Robbie! Can you hear me?”

  I can hardly believe my ears! Filling my lungs with as much oxygen as I can, I poke my head up into the smoke and gaze out.

  As Dad swoops me up in his arms, I can’t believe how young he is. His smooth brow suddenly wrinkles. “What were you thinking going off like that?”

  “I…I…” I stammer.

  “You know better, Chief. I’m just glad you chose to hitch a ride with the right person…”

  I think back, dredging up the man wearing the black fedora.

  “John happens to be a colleague of mine over at the US Engineer Force. After dropping you off, he stopped at the first payphone to call into the office.”

  That’s why he asked so many questions.

  “But what’s Mr. Bristol doing here?” I try piecing the fragments together.

  “Mr. Bristol was the first to receive the call. He came straight away, since I was at the testing site and he was worried I wouldn’t get the message.”

  The smoke is becoming denser by the moment. Dad ushers me into the car and closes the door behind me. I hear his muff
led voice calling out to Mr. Bristol that I’m safe and sound before he takes the seat beside me.

  “And the flying saucer? Did you go inside it? Did you meet the little girl?”

  Dad’s deep frown transfigures into a long, hearty chuckle. “You’ve sure got an active imagination there, Chief. Always with your head in the clouds when you’d be better off focusing on the ground below your feet.”

  I snort, searching for the enormous cake dish. Throwing my hands in the air, I try again. “But all the smoke…”

  “I’m not sure where all this smoke’s coming from. If I didn’t know better, I’d say it’s coming out from the testing site…”

  The testing site. The accident. The star bomb that would be responsible for taking my father’s life.

  But Dad’s not there. He’s here with me.

  My gaze drifts from the mushrooming billow of smoke down to the metal shovel resting at my feet. As the haze dissipates from my mind, I’m filled with an unhampered awareness.

  I did it!

  And I did it all by digging.

  Which leaves me with a final question: What is it you should be digging for?

  “Time stays long enough for anyone who will use it.”

  ~Leonardo Da Vinci

  Epilogue

  Thus, the tale of Robbie Flynn draws to an end. Right at the beginning, as it must. After all, as I’m sure you’ve come to understand, the two are but the same.

  And as I’m not inclined to wait, the moment has arrived for us to part ways. But as we prepare our final goodbyes, let me also say hello. For, at long last, I have come to reveal who I am. And as I do, the rest will become crystal clear. After all, you have known me all along.

  So, without further ado, please allow me to introduce myself. My name is Time. And now you see why I can no longer stay.

  But, as this story draws to an end, do not fret! As you might have already gathered, it is only now that yours might begin. For as much as this myth belongs to me, it also belongs to you. In fact, as I express these final adieus, I am reaching into the cardboard box and pulling out a new tablet. Take it! Etch upon it a legacy all your own. But as you do, please choose wisely. For, as you now know, just as Robbie’s story belongs to all of us, so will yours…as it has always been and shall be forevermore.

  But hurry! I beg of you! After all, I, Time, am fleeting, if I ever existed at all. And if I never did, it may well be too late.

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  Stories are born inside of us, just waiting for the right people to come and draw them out. Thank you to everyone who has taken the time to teach and inspire me; it is you who have brought this story into the world.

  A very special thank you to my parents, Bob and Diane Beal, for inspiring me from day one. You have instilled within me a foundation of respect, honesty, and perseverance, always encouraging me to think broad, dream big and work even harder. Thank you for always having my back, regardless of whether it’s meant letting me spread my wings to fly away, buying me airline tickets to bring me back home, or reading and editing into the wee hours of the morning. Without you, none of this would have been possible.

  Mark Grande, thank you for your sharp insight and all the painstaking attention you’ve offered editing this book. Along with the rest of the Grande family, thank you for reminding me that sometimes family are the people we choose.

  I’d like to thank my husband, Ben, for encouraging me to follow my dreams (even after countless hours of scrawling away in the attic led to a propensity of botched dinners). Thank you for having never stopped believing in me.

  Marie-Pierre Josse, thank you for inspiring me to stretch my mind in new ways. I will be forever grateful for all of your and Gilles’ generosity (including the countless delicious meals that saved us from so many of the aforementioned dinners).

  Thank you for your wisdom: Babcia & DziaDzia, Mommom & Poppop, Joe Truitt, M.A. Rafey Habib, Michael Mills, Connie Titone, Jean-Louis Hippolyte, Holly Blackford, Deborah Schussler, Mary Alice Walsh, Richard Epstein, Carol Singley, and William Sleeth.

  Finally, a very warm thank you to Reagan Rothe and Black Rose Writing for believing in this book and affording it the chance to succeed.

  P.S. Stephanie,

  When they ask me who told me to write this myth, you know I’ll answer, “Snake did.”

  REFERENCES

  Page 17: “What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us.” Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1836.

  Page 39: “Man is born free, and everywhere he is in chains.” Jean Jacques Rousseau, “The Social Contract,” 1762.

  Page 50: “The future enters into us, in order to transform itself in us, long before it happens.” Rainer Maria Rilke, “Letters to a Young Poet,” 1934.

  Page 66-67: “One for Sorrow,” (Nursery Rhyme). Michael Aislabie Denham, “Proverbs and Popular Saying of the Seasons,” 1846.

  Page 68: “All that we see or seem, is but a dream within a dream.” Edgar Allan Poe, “A Dream Within a Dream,” 1849.

  Page 77: “He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you.” Friedrich Nietzsche, “Beyond Good and Evil, Aphorism 146,” 1886.

  Page 87: “What you leave behind is not what is engraved in stone monuments, but what is woven into the lives of others.” Pericles, 5th c. BC.

  Page 97: “The future is no more uncertain than the present.” Walt Whitman, “Leaves of Grass: Song of the Broad-Axe,” 1900.

  Page 105: “Think of tomorrow, the past can’t be mended.” Confucius, “Analects,” 6th c. BC.

  Page 118: “I dreamed a thousand new paths. I woke and walked my old one.” Chinese Proverb.

  Page 123: William Shakespeare, “A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Act i. Sc. 1.” 1595.

  Page 123: “Asato ma sad gamaya, tamaso ma jyotir gamaya, mrtyor ma amrutam gamaya.” Yajnavalkya, “Brihadaranyaka Upanishad,” 9th – 6th c. BC.

  Page 131: “Hope is a waking dream.” Aristotle, 4th c. BC.

  Page 138-139: President Jimmy Carter’s Inaugural Address, Washington DC, 1977.

  Page 142: None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, “Elective Affinities,” 1809.

  Page 152: “As far as the laws of mathematics refer to reality, they are not certain; and as far as they are certain, they do not refer to reality.” Albert Einstein, Address at the Prussian Academy of Sciences (27 January 1921); published by Methuen & Co. Ltd, London, c. 1922.

  Page 165: “Time goes, you say? Ah, no! Alas, Time stays, we go.” Austin Dobson, “The Paradox of Time,” 1886.

  Page 169: No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it’s not the same river and he’s not the same man.” Heraclitus, 6th c. BC.

  Page 171-2, 176, 178: References to public domain film, Duck and Cover. Anthony Rizzo, Archer Productions, 1952.

  Page 178: “The road up and the road down is one and the same.” Heraclitus, 6th c. BC.

  Page 187: “Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself.” Leo Tolstoy, “The Power of Darkness,” 1902.

  Page 194: “When I let go of what I am, I become what I might be.” Lao Tzu, 6th c. BC.

  Page 200: “Three things cannot long be hidden: the sun, the moon and the truth.” Buddha, 5th or 6th c. BC.

  Page 210, 211: “We are all bound up together.” Frances E. W. Harper, Speech given in NY, 1866.

  Page 230: “The past is the beginning of the beginning and all that is and has been is but the twili
ght of the dawn.” H.G. Wells, “The Discovery of the Future,” 1901.

  Page 236: “Time stays long enough for anyone who will use it.” Leonardo Da Vinci, 15th c.

  About the Author

  Teacher, novelist and unwavering dreamer, Jack Beal is always seeking a new way to challenge the limits. After obtaining a BA & MA from Rutgers and Villanova Universities in English, French, European Studies and Education, Jack embarked on a new adventure, traveling from her home in the Philadelphia/South Jersey area to live and teach in France, where she currently resides and is fulfilling her dream of writing novels.

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