Sarah Goldstein

Creative Writing

November 24, 2003

Story Story Story

A Tragedy of Height

            Tall had lost track of exactly how many days they had been in the Box, but Short tried to keep a running tally when he remembered. 

            “That’s another tally in the Box,” Short sighed as he looked down at his tally marks, which he aptly kept under the long rectangular window that layed out at the top of one wall.  He figured that since the Window was the one defining feature in the box, he wouldn’t be able to lose track of where he put his tally.  Tall stood, as everyday, with his face gazing out the window.

            “Mmmhmm,” Tall was a man of few words.  He spent most of his time there at the Window, unaware of the Box that existed behind him, or at least doing his best to ignore it.  Sometimes Tall would laugh hysterically at his view out the Window.  Other times he would cry like a big, fat baby.  Today, Tall was seeing something other than the vast, empty sea that stretched outward into the sky, and it made him pensive and concerned.  His voice shook a little as he continued, “Guess we’ll have to keep track, for posterity, I mean.”

            “Yeah right,” Short laughed because he thought Tall had just told an excellent joke.  They were few and far between, especially coming from Tall.  “Wonderful, wonderful!  Keep track for posterity!  Just Wonderful!”

            Short got up off his knees and walked to the opposing side of the Box, opposite of Tall, just so he could get a view.  He pretended Tall was the gallant figure in some painting, which was a practice he engaged in whenever it occurred to him.  In the painting, the gallant figure always stood by the Window, which held predominant grey undertones, offset only by moody reds, blues, and yellows – whatever the day occasioned.  At night when Short managed his “paintings,” the grey molded down into a faintly lit black.  Tall always looked especially noble at night, staring out the Window.

            “Say Tall, I’m wondering if you would budge over to the middle for me.  I really liked that effect when you did it a while ago.  I’d like to play with the mood of the piece a little.”

            Tall took note of the silent explosion he witnessed on the horizon before moving for Short.  Short could be a little too bossy and interrupting, but Tall was also a little too obliging considering the gravity of what he had just seen out the Window.  He moved to stand in the middle of the rectangular window, so his head and shoulders were silhouetted with beautiful symmetry.  Without a word, Tall continued to stare at the distance between himself and his view, his back to Short.  Tall didn’t mind this game of Short’s, he supposed.  He knew he was a little negligent of his companion Short, so he tried to accommodate Short if he was in the mood.  Yet to Tall, all else in the Box seemed petty and boring.

            In the back of the Box, Short was curating his work with pride.  Today, Tall was offset in the window by a lovely grey-violet, which filled the Box with wonderful ambience.  Since the entire Box was nondescript in design, perfectly composed in angle, and a blank mesh of soft grey and brown, the light was all the more striking.

            “Wonderful.  Just wonderful,” Short marveled under his breath, truly astounded at the violet disenchantment that read all the way to the back of the Box.  “Tall, you should really step back and see this.  It is truly magnificent, one of my best to date.  Oh, the colors and tones.  It moves.  Really something.”

            “You know what would happen if I came back there,” Tall replied, his back still turned to Short, his eyes now seeing a mass of birds flying south to salvation, “the entire effect would be ruined.  Something of the way the figure just divides the space so well.  All that gone.  You told me so yourself, you know.”

            “Did I?” Short asked, a bit disappointed with his former wisdom.

            “Yes, Short, you did.”

            “Well,” Short, who could never be kept down for long, “I guess it’s what comes of making you the subject of the matter.  Heh, heh!  You’d think I’d learn, eh, Tall?”

            No answer.

            “Tall?”

            No answer.

            “I said, you’d think I’d learn, eh, TALL!?!”

            No answer, as Tall found tears at the corner of one eye – something lively had just happened, a sparkle in the sky, and he had missed it.  Short remained unaware of Tall’s wistful change of character, but to his credit, noticed the lengthy, defeated slouch that cut the Window in half. 

            Short merrily ignored his observation.  “Alright then…So…” Short wondered if there was a way to claim Tall’s attention, and then resorted to his tried and true method, “Who’s hungry?”  In fact, Short was really hungry himself, had a slightly substantial gut to add to, and directed the comment as much to himself as to Tall.  “I’ll just heat the griddle then.  Ha Ha!  What Griddle, right Tall?  You’re not the only one who has got a few funnies up their sleeve.  Heat the griddle! Oh, to have pancakes, right Tall?  With syrup and eggs…Oh,” Short chuckled as he remembered, “for the sake of posterity!  Woohoo!  You really had me going on that one Tall.”

            Short mumbled and giggled next to the Box of Importance, which he kept next to the Right Wall of the rectangular window.  Short considered this the most proper spot.  Something about being right, and being Right.  The Box of Importance was so named because it held the most important things in it, including crackers, and peanut butter and jelly for eating, a jug of wine for ceremonial occasions, some water, and pen and paper.  Short and Tall lived off these items quite healthily, occasionally dallying in poetry and story telling, though the range of their experiences were limited to the Box.  Their meals were always hearty, and every night, they had occasion for ceremony, nodding off into warm, wine sadnesses.

            “Tall, I’m making your favorite.  Peanut Butter and Jelly Cracker Sandwiches!”  This was very enticing for Tall, who with only a little reluctance, left the Window and joined Short by the Box of Importance.  Sitting down was an elongated gesture for Tall, since his limbs were so spindly and skinny compared to Short’s squat plop to the floor.  For a while they quietly munched on the crackers, smacking and blowing crumbs about their laps, but then Tall said surprisingly,

            “You know Short, I think it’s time we opened up.”

            “Oh God, Tall.  You know I’ve been waiting for this moment.  I wanted to tell you about some of the things I’ve been thinking of.  First of all, the Box.  I…”

            “No Short.  I mean now.  What do you think?  Do you think we are going to die here?”

            The question startled Short.  He had been prepared to open up to Tall for a while now, to speak of life in the Box, to speak of progress, and history.  To theorize the galaxy of the Box, and to engage in Platonic arguments.  But not to talk about death.

            “Tt…Tall…I…What do you mean?  What are you saying?  You know I don’t think about those things.”  Which was a lie to say that Short never did, but only when he lay down to sleep at night.  In the darkness, Short felt his thoughts would not be read in any grey light, and his face would not be discovered shrinking into sorrow.  Dreams kept him in the Box too, and it was only in first waking that Short wondered where he was, and hoped that maybe, he was out of the Box.

            “It just that,” Tall began, “It just so dull in here.  Everyday.  And out the Window, Tall gazed over at the Window longingly, remembering the clapping hands and taking his mental bow, right before that meal.  “Out the window is so alive.

            “What do you mean, Tall?  What’s out the Window?”  Short, being so short, had never seen.

            “Oh, Short,” Tall’s eyes glistened with tears, and for the first time either could remember, they looked deeply into each other with a new wonderment, “It is unexplainable.  The sort of…activity.  I…really can’t tell you what it looks like.”

            Short glanced at the Window, with a little guardedness, feeling the conversation was becoming very one-heighted.  “Well, you know Tall, I can see the color of the day, and that’s quite wonderful too, from the back of the Box,”  Short was a bit ruffled, and did not want to be left out of the argument.  He had ideas of his own, “so, if out the window is anything like the colors, I’m sure it’s just fabulous.  Would you like another sandwich, Tall?”

            “No, Short.”

            “Ok then,” Short made himself one, as he rambled, “Anyways, this is a more cheerful topic than death, at any rate.  Plus,” Short remarked pointedly, “you know how it is, Tall.  I can’t see out the Window, what with the whole height thing.  But I’m sure it must be nice for you, Tall.”

            “Short, you know its not my fault that I’m tall enough to see out the Window…and you’re…well…not.”

            “Oh, I know, I know.  And I don’t blame you for your achievements in height.  You have the obvious advantages it we are thinking out of the Box.  But what about what’s in the Box?”  Short thought of his beautifully composed works, where Tall’s moody essences brought such life and grace and longing to the Box.  Sometimes, Short wanted to cry for the beauty of his view, and in this thought, Short found his advantage, “Really, Tall.  You are missing an amazing thing to be able to see what I see.  My paintings.  That’s my advantage, not yours.”

            “Yes, yes.  But Short, do you ever want to be part of you work?  I mean, don’t you ever wish you knew what made your work so…I don’t know…fascinating to you?”

            “Well, no.  What I see is you in the Window, and that is what makes it.  I am here to see it; you are there to be it.  Why?  Do you want to be part of what you’re seeing?”

            “Yes.  YES!” Tall replied fervently, “Yes, I want to be there!  Out of the Box!  It is so…You don’t even know, Short.”

            “Out of the Box?”  Short asked incredulously, and placing his cracker sandwich down, responded soothingly to Tall obvious agitation, “Oh, Tall.  You know that we are probably safer in here than out there anyways.  Besides, don’t you remember why we are here in the first place?”

            Tall’s long body hunched over his knees as he remembered sadly, “Because we’ve always been here?”

            “That’s right, Tall.  We’ve always been here.”

            “Then why do you keep tally marks on the damn floor, Short?”

            “Because I want to see how much time has gone by since the first time I realized that time was going by!  I’ve told you this before, Tall.  Were you even listening?”

            “NO!”  Tall had rarely if ever raised his voice before and the sound was alarming.  With his height, Tall’s voice leapt just as deeply into his chest, and Short decided it was perhaps best not to say another word.

            Except, “You…weren’t …listening…Tall?”  Short burst into tears because he felt all of his babbling had been for naught.  All of the choice phrases he had coined and forgotten, trusting on the intelligence of Tall to recall them wittily in conversation.  All.  Gone.

            Tall sighed.  He simply did not talk enough to have the words he needed.  He could not explain to Short what it was he felt when he looked out the Window, and since it appeared to be a very sensitive topic, he wanted to speak carefully. “Short, it’s not that I wasn’t listening,” Short wept loudly at the mention, and then quieted to allow for Tall’s apology.  “It is just that I was studying out the Window, and sometimes what you say sounds the same as what you’ve said over and over again.  And…out the Window, things change.”

            “Things change in here too, Tall,” Short whimpered.

            “No, Short.  They don’t.”

            “What about the colors?” Short prompted.

            “I don’t know, Short.  I don’t know what you see.  In the colors, in me in the colors.”

            Short looked at Tall gently.  The reason the colors were so beautiful and changeable to Short, was because Tall always stood, a part of them, addressing their emotion with his own countenance, and making them alive.  This was Short’s longing – to remember each mood, every color, the reactions, the postures of every Tall at the Window.  He could not explain to Tall what it was he felt when he looked at these things, but he was sure they were just as deep and insatiably beautiful as Tall’s views out the Window.

            “No, Tall, I guess you really don’t know what I see, and,” Short drew a long sigh, and began eating his cracker sandwich, “and I guess I really don’t know what you see.”

            “Short,” Tall did not know exactly how to continue, but he did anyways, almost without thinking, “Do you want to see what’s out the window?  I could show you.  I think I could lift you.”

            Short stared straight ahead of him and stopped mid-munch.  No cracker flakes blew out of his mouth as he paused his breathing.  It had never officially occurred to him to look out the Window, with Tall’s help.  Yes, he had dreamed of it, and always woke with the thought egging on his mind, but he always thought it best to leave Tall alone on the subject.  After all, he did not want to invade upon Tall’s space.

            Tall, looked at Short, who seemed to be in a trance, pondering Tall’s question.  It had never officially occurred to Tall to lift Short up so he could see out the Window, though he had thought about it at some length.  Tall usually dismissed this idea because he did not want Short to become morose and disillusioned with the life in the Box that Short seemed to derive some pleasure from.  To ruin Short’s commonplace contentment, would be to ruin Tall’s quietude and detachment, or so Tall figured.  He was surprised that the suggestion had come off his tongue so easily in the conversation, and he wondered if it was a good idea.

            “Well, Tall.  I think it’s a great idea,” Short finally spoke, with some resistance.

            “You do?”

            “Sure, why not?  I mean, it can only serve to make us closer, don’t you think?”

            Again, Tall wondered it he’d made the most proper suggestion, and if his relationship with Short would change to their detriment.  He decided not to say anything and instead stood up in a very long and towering way.

            Short gazed up and up as Tall stood.  With the gesture, Short brushed the crumbs from his lap, and plump-ly ambled to his feet.  Tall looked wonderingly down at Short and held out his hand, which Short took.  Together, they walked to the middle of the Box and looked at the Window.  Tall could see out, and at the moment, feasted his view on a pack of animals that ran across the horizon, wildly, with manes flying and tails whipping.  He felt the wind that ran with them, and it refreshed his mind.

            Short gazed at Tall and intercepted his thoughts out the window.  The grey-violet light seemed to have brightened during conversation and cast a more fired red-grey on to Tall’s face.  Judging from his long-gaze, the fierceness of his view, Short knew what he was about to see would be no less exciting.  Short’s palm sweat as he regrasped Tall’s graceful fingers and squeezed them.

            They walked slowly. Tall taking one step, Short taking two.  Very solemn steps.

            As they reached the Window, Tall placed his free hand on the bottom edge of the Window, and contemplated his decision to share the view with Short.  Short stood with his nose against the cold wall below the Window and didn’t breathe.  Both of them were frozen in thought as small droplets of sweat started at their temples.  Short could feel Tall’s fingers throbbing, each heart beat accounted for in Short’s stubby palms.

            It was time.

            “Ok, Short.  Why don’t you step here in my hand and I’ll squat like this,” Tall lowered himself.

            “Ok, ok then,” Short was nervous, as he raised one of his feet to rest in Tall’s hands.  Short placed his hands flat against the wall for balance and shifted his weight onto the one foot.  With a grunt, he raised his body up along the wall.

            Tall exhaled sharply as he assumed Short’s weight into his hands.  His knees wobbled and knocked together, skinny and unaccustomed to such condensed mass.  As he slowly lifted, he heard his back crack dangerously, and felt the veins in his neck popping up to the surface.  Each inch ached with effort, and Tall was soon panting and sweating profusely.

            Short felt the pressure and heat of Tall at his back as he slowly walked up the wall with his hands.  Looking up, he saw the bottom of the Window coming closer and closer, taunting him still with mystery and anticipation.  His knee scraped along the cold, grey wall, and his belly cushioned the distance between his feet and hands.  As he felt his fingers bend along the edge of the Window, Short’s heart raced, and he breathlessly cried,

            “Tall, I’m almost there!  I’m almost there!”

            For a moment, Short’s mind drew a blank as his eyes peeped over the lowest horizon of the window.  His vision went black, as he worked to support his ascension.  Tall locked his boney legs into place, and for a second, tried to rest as he wondered vaguely between heavy breaths, what Short was finally seeing.

            Short came to and his eyes widened.  The color of the day was extravagant, the vision extreme and vibrant.  As Tall teetered precariously behind him, balancing Short’s foot by a narrow inch of calibration, Short saw.  Short saw.

            “Wha…What…do you…see?”  Tall gasped and struggled to keep Short lifted.

            Short did not answer as he felt Tall’s weight shift away and knew the toppling that would follow.  He tried to grasp the edge of the window for a moment longer, but inevitably, he and Tall buckled and lay dazed on the floor of the Box. 

            Moments passed as the two lay breathless and struggling for each gulp of air, Tall from exertion, and Short from amazement.  Finally after much gasping and quiet emoting, Short rolled over onto his knees, his face in his hands.  From where he still lay, Tall noticed this intimation of sadness and wondered again if he had done the right thing.

            “Short?  Are you ok?”

            Short nodded underneath his hands, but did not answer.

            “Short?  Do you want to talk?  What did you see?”

            Short remained immobile, his face in his hands, a posture that alarmed and concerned Tall.  Tall groaned softly as he rose up on his feet and looked around the Box, not knowing what to do, or how to speak with Short.  He found himself facing the Window and looking out.  For once in a long while, Tall saw nothing.  He turned his attention back to Short who was small and thoughtful in his self-made ball of body.

            Tall paced a few steps, helpless in action, before it occurred to him to offer Short a distraction from whatever troubling thoughts now flew in Short’s mind. “Say, Short.  Maybe you’d like some wine to calm down a bit?  I’d say this is a ceremonial occasion, wouldn’t you?  Or maybe you’d like a Peanut Butter and Jelly Cracker Sandwich?”

            At the mention of food, Short budged, and lifted his eyes, new painful eyes, to meet Tall’s offer.  “Sure,” Short said softly, “that would be just fine, Tall.”