Once upon a time there was a girl who was neither princess nor pauper. She spent her days at her chores or reading tales of times and places more grand than the one she was a child of. In her world and era life was dull and consistently average. There were no hiccups. There were no upheavals. There were no great celebrations of deeds even greater. There was only then and what needed to be done and planning for the day after and what needed to be done that day to make it to the next day and what needed to be done. She felt the monotony of this medocre life would someday smother her entirely. She was not unhappy, nor was she happy.
One day she decided, after much contemplation, that she would flee this land in search of the places with joy and rage, terror and awe, generosity and greed, to experience a world with passion. She would travel north.
Her journey had only just begun to toddle when she came to a crossroads. There she happened across a young man traveling towards that she had deserted. He bore packs and sword, food and poison, a smile and wariness in his eye. She looked into the face of this man and was quite taken with him.
"You do not wish your quest (surely great) to tread this road at my back. There is nothing behind me but a life of dull regularity. No excitement shall find you, brave traveler."
The man looked at her, clearly surprised and replied, "But, m'lady, that is precisely what I seek, for the land at my back, of which I once was king, is full of great treachery and peril all hours of every day, all the days of my life thusfar. The joys I experience are always shadowed by the coming of the next event and the uncertainty of what it shall hold; I travel south to a land more peaceful. A lady so fair as yourself surely would wish a life more safe and a world more certain than that at my back."
Each traveler looked past the other, contemplating what they had just learned and basking in the thought that what they each desired most was so close within their grasp. Neither knew what to say to the other and both wanted this exchange not to end second only to the desire to continue forward and discover that for which each had been longing.
Hesitant to abandon their crossroads but unwilling to change heart, they agreed that they would come back to the crossroads in one year's time to meet again and share tales of the life they had acquired. The young travelers looked once more into the face of the other and continued on their way.
A year passed and the crossroads had its visitors again. The man in burlap and cotton, though the twinkle had faded from his eye. The young woman was in linen and pearls, though her face was harder than before. They sat down on a blanket in a field near the crossroads to share what they had brought to eat.
"So," said the once-king, "is my former kingdom everything you had hoped for?"
After a brief silence, the girl spoke:
"I was jubilant when first I arrived and the things that passed were all grand and full of life and happening and wonder. As the days flew by, bustling with energy, I realized there was much dark behind them and did my best to avoid it. I fell in love, but the man that I thought was mine proved to be unsavory as I discovered I was not his only 'love.' I lived long in deep sorrow and decided not to be fooled again and have since spent my days in suspicion and defense."
The girl drank her wine in weary silence and looked into the west between the two worlds that she knew.
"And what of you?" She said when she broke her silence, "How does the land of bread and water suit you?"
The former king leaned back on his elbows and looked at the sky.
"My days are filled with the days before them, and the days to come, as I know each day will be just as the day before it, and the day after it."
The young travelers were stubborn and refused to return to the lives they had abandoned, but unhappy with the ones they had acquired, and came back each turning of the season to meet at the crossroads and share some good with one another.
One lovely spring, the girl reached the crossroads, uplifted and excited to see her love, only he wasn't to be found. She waited for a time and then began to walk through the fields beside her to relieve some of the anxiousness her love's tardiness had brought her, when she saw a little house. It occurred to her she was quite thirsty and decided to go to the house to ask for some water.
When she knocked on the door, it opened and there was her love, beaming at her. She threw herself into his arms, and asked him what he was doing in this little cottage at the crossroads.
"I have built us this house between the places neither of us belong. We shall belong here, we belong with one another and we will live how we wish!"
And they spent the rest of their days living with each other, with as much joy as anyone could wish, and each day different and more fulfilling than the one it followed, happily ever after.
~The End~
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