the old book

A million faces. Two million beautiful eyes; a sea of souls seeking, struggling, hoping.

The old, withered book lies in the ally between Charlie’s and Chappie’s. It was dropped from the roof-top above by the son of an old lady. She lived in the apartment two floors up from Chappie’s, the bookshop her grandfather started when her family moved to the Great Society.

“Such potential for greatness, but far from great,” the book sighed. Its cover flaps open from a breeze sucked into the ally that swirled narrowly between the brick buildings. The gust flipped the pages with the cover - exposing its trauma.

The old book has seen better days from the weather it endured. It no longer remembers what kind of book it was - or the story it told, the moral it taught, the hope it bestowed. The old book could feel the phantom fingers fiddling the pages; turning them, brushing them. It can still feel the weight of a million stories from the tears stained into the pages.

Chappie’s alley door bursts open sending a current stirring the old book’s pages. A bulk of black flashes and plummets into the opposing alley wall. The bag bursts. The explosion of paper, books, bottles, a handkerchief and candy-bar wrappers tells a story all of its own. The old book cringes, “the waste of the world is a treasure unknown.” The old book pondered the value of its pages, “would a great society like this rediscover its worth; would she ever find the dignity of her once beating heart? She values a selfish thing that withers.”

“What’s that?”, the old book gasped. The sound of a voice reading from the pages of a vampire novel escapes into the alley before the door closes shut. “What if...” the old book thinks to itself. What a fantasy it would be; to be caressed in hand again, a deep melodic voice breathing to life the words of its pages before a grand audience - as it did 72 years ago.

The old book’s author shut the book in disgrace. This great society wasn’t ready for words such as these. The author battered his creation, slamming it to the ground at his feet as the crowd - a wondrous crowd packed to the street - exclaimed the treachery of such words. Chappie, wiping tears into his sleeve the pages did not claim, shelved the book with a prayer, “one day, the people of this society will be ready to hear, and on that day I hope they will listen.”

The old book moaned. The last to turn its pages struggled to accept its perspective. The grandson sought liberation; redemption from the rips and tears of his life. He discovered the old book, the title caught his browse along the dusty shelf. The truth in its pages - of freedom, justice, love, forgiveness - overwhelmed the grandson. He had no value in this world but the old book told him otherwise. He struggled to believe. The grandson snapped the book shut, swung his arm across the table tossing his coffee as he stood. He held the old book to his beating chest - the sweat soaking through his shirt into the cover. He shunned it away dropping it from the roof-top down into the alley between Charlie’s and Chappie’s.

“Such painful memories in hope of change”, the old book moaned.

The streets outside the alley roar in anger, rage, hate, and fear. It’s pages quiver from the rumble.

The voices of a million faces, a million stories bound to the same history. A history bent into competing narratives - many fighting for equality of life, some fighting to protect their privilege, some fighting to be heard at all, some fighting a war on crime, many fighting a war against injustice, others fighting a war on sin. History is twisted to fit into the different narratives. Parts of this shared history forgotten in the hypocrisy of progress and freedom, parts of this history remembered through generations in the pain and trauma of dehumanization.

Days pass. Weeks pass, or could it be months - years? The streets of chaos are endless now. A pandemic sweeps the so-called great society exposing it for what it is. A virus of the human soul. Hate blinding man against another man, holding self-righteously to his way by minimizing and invalidating how others see and experience the world. A virus of hate disguised as morality. The old book warned of this decades ago, it weeps tears of black.

The alley door opens. The sound of dizzying techno beats blares and fades as the door closes back. A young lady leans into the brick beside the door after she closes it. A digital light beams into her eyes from her hands. There is a sadness in her eyes the old book has seen before. It yearns for those eyes to look upon its pages, longs to give hope too-long rejected.

The old book studies the young lady, she is not the distinguished type. She does not resemble the establishment of Chappie’s, but as someone exploited by a world of profit; a world demeaning to inherent human worth.

She puts the phone away, the old book does not know where, as there are few places to put anything with what she is wearing. The young lady breathes in, and then out as though the air in this alley is somehow refreshing. The air inside Charlie’s is poison. It holds you captive, as if it is the only thing left in the world willing to give you air to breathe - and you begin to believe that it is the best life you can possibly have, until you step out into the alley. And the air within this alley is nothing compared to what you will find in the street, or out in the country where the street may take you. “The trick of it is”, the old book ponders, “is the air within the walls of comfort is the same poison inside Charlie’s. The only difference is how the air is filtered into circulation.” The old book could go on, but is drawn the the beauty behind the broken mess.

The young lady pulls a hit from a tiny pocket in her shorts and contemplates it in her fingers. The door beside her rattles as the man inside pounds and calls her in. The young lady stirs in surprise and the hit slips out of her grip into the busted up garbage around her feet. The pounding and yelling continues. She quickly falls to her hands and knees stirring the waste to find what she dropped.

The old book stirs at the touch of her fingers stumbling into it. She discovers it. The words on the cover capture her. The pounding on the door continues, a beck and call to return to her lot in life.

The world suddenly goes dark for the old book. It’s confused, “what happened?” It hears the door open and close and then silence.

Moments later - what could be hours, maybe days - comes a patter of noise and quiet whispers through the alley door. It’s cover opens. A soft melodic voice begins to speak the words on its pages. The young lady reads to an audience packed into the alley from Charlie’s and Chappie’s and to the street. Eager to hear - to listen.

“We are alone in a world full of people,” the old book excitedly shares. “The world is breaking and falling apart because we fail to come together. We cling to narratives that we claim for our fight in a war. A pathetic little war that divides people; that a society fails to become truly great. We fail to value each other, to love and care for our neighbors outside of ourselves - as ourselves. We cling to hold on to a life we have or strive for, for fear of losing it - and yet we are losing it. We are alone in a world full of people, because we have designed narratives to turn people into creatures, into something less than human, into something dangerous; a threat to our narrative. What if we decided to let go? What if we decided to see ourselves in each other; if we decided to create a narrative that is big enough for everyone, that restores the value of who we are? We are more than the labels that our narratives place on each other, more than the scars, the traumas and the sins we carry. What if we changed the war on sin into a journey of redemption, liberation and freedom for all people? We are alone in a world full of people, until we connect with each other.”

The old book can feel the change. It can feel its words take root, grow and spread through unexpected connections between people - crossing barriers, demolishing walls and creating a better society.