A Boy of Glass

In the land of Everdream, there was a boy in a world of glass. There were not four walls to his world, but rather a rippling dome of reflection. It shimmered like a bubble, transparently separating him from the ‘Out There’. Out There was a nasty place, full of nasty things and nasty creatures. Yet within this world of glass, the nastiness stayed away. Here, every color was potent, every sound pleasant, and everyone… Everyone stayed indoors safe with their families. 

The boy wasn’t in charge, there was government and rules and that sort of thing. But within the glass, he could create! Buildings constructed themselves at his very whim. Stars appeared to twinkle above his metropolis. A full moon lit up the night, calm and safe. With everyone indoors, the boy could roam these imagined streets as much as he could want. Stairs shimmered into existence as the boy wandered into the sky. A laugh burst from him in gleeful freedom. For that was what he was; Free. Free to dream, free to wander, free to do anything he wished, and free to do as much of nothing as he wished. 

He wandered and danced and dreamed the night away! Sunrise came with perfect golden rays and the boy knew it was time to leave. The boy leaped off a rooftop to land unharmed on the street. He ran down the cobbled streets, smiling as he went until he approached the glass. Carefully he reached out and the world of glass stretched. It did not break or disappear, instead it pulled with him and molded around him until at last… Pop! The world of glass separated from the bubble world leaving a second skin of transparency around him. He now had his armor of glass to face the Out There. 

He had done this many times, the gleaming glass hid his presence by reflecting back what the creatures of Out There wanted to see. He was invisible to them within his portable world of glass. He may not be able to create cities, stars, and dreams while he walked in the Out There, but the creatures couldn’t hurt him within his skin of glass. And so the boy could duck, dodge, and weave through the crowds of creatures without worry. The creatures loomed over him with their dark and  long limbed bodies, grinning at the reflections they saw in his glass skin.

But today, as he made his way through the creatures he saw someone. Not smiling and terrible like most of the creatures were, this someone had a face that none of the other creatures dared to wear. This man looked sad. It seemed so contrary to the rest of him. This man’s hair fell freely around his head, messy and free. The man wore an elegant grey coat that drifted behind him in an unfelt breeze. His posture was relaxed, and he walked slowly with an almost dancing rhythm to his movements. And yet, his silver eyes drooped sadly.

The boy couldn’t help but stare at this strange man. He felt like this man was almost like him, but the boy did not have the words to describe why. In his staring at the man, the boy forgot he was in the Out There. He didn’t see that one of the nasty creatures was walking straight towards him. In a moment the creature crashed into the boy sending him flying backwards! He hit the ground and his world shattered. A sickening crash of glass echoed in the street. The boy’s glass skin had been destroyed. He was now… out there!

His heart thundered in his chest. His breath leaping away from him. The boy couldn’t think, couldn’t dream, and couldn’t move. He thought the creatures would stop and stare at him. The boy pictured them circling him with twisted faces glaring at him. He imagined their grizzled voices screaming at him, questioning why he couldn’t put on one of their happy faces. He opened his eyes to find the Out There kept moving past him. A dark creature walked towards him and the boy braced himself for the trouble that would be in. But the creature walked right over him without even a glance. 

He breathed a sigh of relief and scrambled to his feet. Shards of his glass skin were scattered across the street. He reached for some of the glass, but reeled back when the glass drew blood. He clutched a shard in his hand unrealizing that it cut deep into his skin. At the sight of blood running down his hand, the boy ran. He ran and ran not caring where he went, he couldn’t dodge through the creatures this time. They crowded the street and the boy was not strong enough to push through the creatures. Creatures began to pile in behind him. 

The boy was stuck!

The Creatures pushed closer and closer squeezing the boy between their ranks. He couldn’t breath, he couldn’t move, and he couldn’t think. His world became a crushing and dark weight of a thousand weights slowly closing in on him. He panicked and thrashed around violently. The creatures shifted slightly at his jarring movements, so he continued. The boy screamed and waved his hands wildly around him. The longer he rebelled against the dark crushing, the less effective his movements were. His arms grew tired and his voice gave out. The dark creatures almost squashed him entirely and for a single terrible moment he stood limp, held up by the dark creatures on all sides of him. 

Then he saw a spark of light, he hadn’t realized that the creatures had been blocking out the light. The boy felt so tired and he barely knew if he could move at all, he didn’t know what the point would be of chasing that small faint light. Yet in his soul, he heard a note to a song that he had somehow forgotten. That single note gave him a burst of courage and so he ran. The boy ran towards that light with all the strength in him. He hobbled and limped and mere inches away he fell to the ground. 

He clawed at the ground trying to escape, but the foot of one of the creatures stepped on his back. Blinding pain ripped through his body. The boy tried to scream, but his voice was silent. He tried to move, but the dark weight was far too great. All he could do was to clutch tight to the shattered glass in his hand and wait. He waited in that uncomfortable, painful place. But the creature did not step off of him. 

The boy dared to open his eyes and before him he saw a shimmering, rippling wall of glass. Hurriedly he grasped at the ground and reached out his hand to touch it. His fingers brushed the liquid glass and it pulled at him, dragging him back into its embrace. But as he slipped out of the foothold of the dark creatures and into the world of glass, the shard of glass he held pierced the glass wall. The boy still slipped into the glass world, but behind was left a jagged crack. He dropped the shard of glass and stared at the line in the wall that showed so clearly the divide between his world and the Out There. 

Some things could not be the same. He tried to wander and he tried to dream. But the stars he imagined felt so far away, and the streets he built were empty. The night was colder than he remembered and the moon shone dimmer than before. The colors were less vibrant and the sounds were silent. And the people…there were no people. The boy sat huddling on a roof as he began to understand that everyone who he thought was inside, weren’t there at all. He was alone in his world of glass.

"This is all my fault," The boy whispered to himself. Then he heard a knock. The boy raised his head and saw the stranger with sad eyes on the other side of the wall of glass. The man was tracing his hand across the crack in the glass. The man knocked on the crack sending a spider web of rips through the shifting glass wall. For a second time this day, the boy’s world of glass broke. The boy should have panicked, but he was too focused on this strange man. 

This stranger still saw the world with wonder despite his sad eyes. The stranger could live in the Out There even if all he did was break things. The boy dropped from the roof, unharmed of course and walked up to the stranger. The man looked down surprised to see the boy on the inside of the glass world. Then the man smiled. Not a nasty smile like the dark creatures gave. This man gave a very sad and genuine smile. It had a spark of joy but did not extinguish the cloudy sadness in his eyes. 

The stranger gestured to the crack as if to say Do you want out? The boy frowned. He didn’t know if he wanted out. Out There was twice as nasty as he could have imagined, why would he ever want to go Out There? But here it was so…lonely. The boy slowly nodded. The stranger smiled and gently placed his hand on the crack. A muffled tune sounded as the stranger began to sing. The song washed over the boy and gave him courage while the song also shook the wall of glass until at last it shattered in a single horrible crash. 

 The boy held his ears and shut his eyes. His ears were still ringing when he felt a weight on his shoulders. His eyes flew open to find that the grey coat of the stranger curled around him. The boy may not have his armor of glass skin, but now he had a new set of armor.

The stranger smiled, nodded, and ambled away in a mirthful pace. The boy’s world changed again, for as his vision cleared and the ringing in his ears stopped, the dark creatures took on different shapes. Each creature was different and they weren’t twisted like they once were. Each one was someone! Amazed, the boy wandered around trying to see every face and every person. He dodged, ducked and weaved through the crowds, all the while wonder gleamed in his eyes. The creatures…the people still ignored him, but now he saw them for what they truly were.

As the boy wandered, he saw a strange reflection of himself. He could see the outline from the reflection of a small figure huddled in a distant corner. The boy wandered his way over and sat down in front of the reflecting figure. The figure sat up with a start, but the boy just smiled.

“It’s ok,” He said. “I see you.”