Anywhere

By Jade Tara (sadly not written by Eeshie)

Age 12, Grade 7 (sadly not Eeshie's age)

Gold Medal

2011

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Once there was an ordinary boy living in a town so ordinary it dried out his soul and forced him to live in a dream. The boy’s dreams numbered a thousand, and in these dreams he did a thousand heroic things. Sometimes he was a fantastic explorer, or sometimes a scientist who made an amazing discovery so great that he was given a shiny medal straight from D.C., along with permission to leave the town and work for the government. Once he was a mathematician who was so brilliant he left the town to teach at a school for people as brilliant as he, and once he was an artist who painted the ordinary landscape of his hometown a thousand times in twisted and beautiful ways, until finally a rich man gave him money to go to France and paint the beautiful, twisted landscapes there.

When he was 10 or 11, the boy’s dreams changed. Like always, they ended with the boy leaving the town. But now, when the boy left, he was not a rich politician, or a skilled musician: no, these dreams were too far off for the boy to draw comfort from. What comfort can be drawn by a 10 yr old boy from the idea that in 20 years his dreams may (or may not) come true?


For years the boy spent half of his time in an ordinary school that he hated with an extraordinary passion, and the other half of his time in a home he hated even more. So the boy began to dream of brave, boyish deeds, like finding treasure in an abandoned cave, or, more frequently, saving the pretty blond girl name Anywhere who lived down the street, from a terrible fire, and getting a metal from the city. Anywhere would kiss him, and her parents would thank him. His parents would stop worrying over bills for just a little while and be proud of him. He and Anywhere would leave for a big city somewhere far away, where there were no fires’ to hurt her and he could finally stop dreaming.


But that never happened. Summer ended, and his time for dreaming dissolved into time for studying. Autumn came, the air got drier. His mother got sick. Anywhere smiled cautiously at him when he passed, but never said a word. His father kept worrying over bills. The boy stayed in the town. So did Anywhere. Winter came. Winter past. Spring came. The boy’s mother got sicker and soon passed away. The boy never cried, no matter how much drier his soul got or how much more dreadful his life became. He continued to dream.


As the boy grew older, his dreams dried up like his soul and became bothersome. There were no caves in his town, anyway, the boy told himself, and began to be angry that he’d spent so much of his life dreaming.


The boy still dreamed of leaving the town, of course, but no longer were his dreams accompanied by unlikely and heroic deeds. Now the boy had grown resigned to the fact of what he was: Just an ordinary boy. I am just an ordinary boy, he said to himself, but that doesn’t mean I can’t leave this town. Just a week, just a month, just one more year… Then I’ll leave. Soon, he entered High School. He didn’t even bother dreaming of college. Instead, he began to date Anywhere. One day, he asked her to leave with him, to go to a city far away and never come back. Anywhere shook her head and smiled, and her blue eyes told him she knew a secret he did not. Anywhere did not want to leave. She was still a child as much as he was, and she dreamed too, but her dreams were of simplicity, of a family and happiness, and that was all.


They grew up. They got married. They had three children, two boys and a little girl named Any. The boy still dreamed. But soon, he realized, dejectedly, that that his dreams were only dreams. The boy was no longer an ordinary boy, but an ordinary man, and he recognized that the time for this sort of dreaming was past.


One day, the man came into the kitchen and sat down at the table. He watched his wife as she was making dinner, shredding carrots, placing them into a pot, repeating the process. “I have to go,” he said, “I have to leave.”

Anywhere turned to him. “Okay,” She said, “It’s okay. I know.” She said good-bye and turned back to the carrots. Her eyes still said there was a secret he did not yet know.


The man who was once a boy walked and walked and walked until he reached the edge of the town. There, he saw a wall, all around, straight around the town like a rubber band closing it in on itself: clear and made of a plastic-like material he’d never seen before. It took a long time for the man to realize what that meant—the wall meant he couldn’t leave. When he realized this, the boy ran, and kept running and running until he’d gone a full circle around the edge of town, and he knew for sure that there was no way out. Then he sat down and cried and cried and cried. When he was done crying, he stared out the wall at the blurred visions of trucks going by. He did not dream.


Once there was an ordinary girl living in a town so ordinary she could feel it beginning to dry out her soul, and forcing her to force her dreams into reality. Like any healthy young girl, she dreamed. However, she dreamt different dreams than her father, as her mother was quick to assure her every now and then. She was a clever girl, and she had smart dreams. She dreamt of getting a scholarship to an out of state college, and of leaving the town.


When she told her mother these dreams, her mother whispered, “You know, Any, I’d like to leave here too, someday.” But then she smiled with her blue eyes, and they said that she knew a secret that the girl did not. The girl didn’t like it.


Nevertheless, the girl worked hard, and before long she’d won a scholarship to a college out of state. She said good-bye to her mother and her older brothers who looked at her doubtfully but wished her luck. The girl said good-bye to the town, and packed her bags, and then she began the long walk to the edge of town. There sat a homeless man, old and slightly insane, smiling with his eyes and telling her he knew a secret that she did not yet know. If he recognized his daughter, he didn’t say a word. For a while the girl stood there. She watched the man, who sat, staring at the wall without dreaming. She stared at the wall too; but the girl never stopped dreaming, even for a second. Then she stepped towards the wall.


The man began to laugh. He laughed and laughed and laughed, and refused to stop. The girl looked at him. She shook her head and smiled. Her eyes said she knew a secret he still did not know. The man-who-was-once-a-boy watched his daughter as she stepped through the wall and walked onto the other side.


A terrible realization came to the man. He stared at the wall, dreaming, wondering what the girl might find. He reached out his hand. It went straight through.