Paradigm

~true story~

“Where are you going?” I rush up to the side of a hooded, black figure fleeing her homeland, billowing swarms of confused gnats in her wake. I turn to see a determined glare hardened on her face as her steady strides carry her swiftly away from the place she once called home. The gnats have completely swarmed her heartland, consuming the vegetation, making the region uninhabitable, and rendering the tilled fields barren.

The hooded girl does not reply. Trotting briskly beside her, I call out above the inane buzzing of the droves of gnats, “Well, I’m coming with you!” She makes no reply as the dirt path stretches before her and the streams of little black specks flood behind.

 

~ ~ ~

 

Paradigm, wait! Come back! But there was no coming back. Things would never be the same. The fallow field would be better off abandoned. No amount of tears could quench the thirst of the soil that had ached throughout this longest drought. No amount of rock-removal or prettying-up could make it worth anything more than the dirty dust that it was. Heck, it couldn’t even serve as a proper burial ground for Hope. Useless, stupid plot of earth. Better left alone, its doomed destiny.

 

~ ~ ~

 

Suddenly, the buzzing stops. A split moment later, a blinding light from heaven coalesces into a brilliant figure on the road just ahead. I shield my eyes from its brilliance and even the black-hooded figure freezes in her tracks. The shining man majestically approaches, extending a small golden item towards the girl. I squint and inch closer until its form is more clearly seen. “…in exchange for your field,” the man says. I see the golden object now, simply “A key?” questions the girl. “Of what use is that?”

“This key,” declares the man, “unlocks the vault of the royal treasury, where I've stored all of my riches, everything I possess. I offer it now to you, in exchange for your field.”

 

~ ~ ~

 

Preposterous! How could he possibly consider that worthless glop of moistureless mud to be worth all of the priceless treasures of royalty? Surely the King hadn’t authorized such scandalous use of his kingdom’s wealth! But who could refuse such an offer? The field's abandoned deed was dead to her already. With nothing to lose and everything to gain…

 

~ ~ ~

 

I watch as the man trades away his very life for a deserted field. What insane delusion compels him to such a choice? But as he makes his way back to the heartland, the girl and I are drawn by bewildered curiosity to follow. Reaching the field, he stoops to kneel near the center and buries his hands in the dark earth. Spellbound, we watch as he draws out a dirt-clodded stone heart from the dust. “Life!” he breathes into the heart, holding it tenderly as it transforms into flesh within his hands. “My bride!”

 

~ ~ ~

 

Some things just couldn’t be comprehended or explained. In that moment, everything had shifted. Life itself had never been the same, and there truly was no going back. New life had blossomed in the heart of that field, and the work of its cultivation had only just begun. And you know what else? The key actually works.