Happy Endings Require a Sacrifice

I am here to testify that what happened in Oakhill was no dream, nor even a daydream, but a mingling of hot imagination and cold reality colliding into a thunderstorm of story-telling that took even Juliet by surprise. This is her story.

It all started on a typical Thursday afternoon at the close of 7^thperiod English.

“Due Friday: Three-page original fairy tail”

Juliet winced at the spelling error on the blackboard. She had a few choice words, but her eyes dropped to the collection of buttons on the backpack sitting at her feet. “Be nice. Be nice. Be nice,” they reminded her, and “Give peace a chance.” She smirked instead and when the final bell of the day rang, she swung her backpack over her shoulders and hurried off to her collect 10-speed Schwinn. 

Her drive out of the schoolyard and past the line of yellow school busses took her through an aging downtown square where statues of city fathers stood surrounded by the applause of fuchsia azaleas and angel-white dogwoods. Juliet steered comfortably down empty sidewalks cluttered with phone booths and metal newsstand boxes.   

She was headed the long way home. Not the wrong way. The long way. There was no reason to hurry; her mother wouldn’t be home for several hours, and Juliet could write 3-page stories in her sleep. Not that she was asleep, mind you. No, she was, in fact, meditating on this fairy tale assignment while pedaling through the town’s single park.

Fairy tales were not exactly the genre of choice for 14-yr olds. Especially not 14-yr olds constrained by school uniforms of drab grey knee-high socks, suspenders, and neck-ties. And 14- year olds whose fathers went missing in unwanted wars. Fairy tales were sweet and predictable and required happy endings. And Juliet’s world was nothing like that. Despite her reproach for the genre, she felt herself drawn in by a longing for something this project had to offer.

She stopped at her usual spot beside a scrubby old oak tree, and pulled off her ratty backpack. It belonged to her father in another life-time. While Juliet had no memories of her father, she had stories. Not stories of actual events but tales she made up to amuse and comfort herself. Often she studied rows of his buttons and imagined the events of his life. A wide assortment of anti-war buttons led her to imagine a scene in which her Dad argued with an overbearing father about the duties of men to defend their country from communists. Even though she never remembered meeting the man, she pictured her grandfather as an uptight General-type, the perfect villain responsible for sending her Dad off to a war he didn’t want to fight. “Make Love, Not War” buttons made it simple for her. In the battle of love versus war, war had won. 

Juliet leaned back against the tree, removed and stashed away her school tie, and stretched out her legs. She traced the edges of “we can’t hug a child with nuclear arms” and envisioned the time when her father put that very pin on this backpack and was thinking of her somewhere in the future. Could he still be out there? Thinking of her right now?

 An acorn plummeted into Juliet’s lap, awakening her from a familiar reverie. 

Back to the task of creating an original tale, Juliet began jotting ideas in her notebook. She quickly created a female protagonist named Peace who would go on a journey to rescue one of the king’s knights who had been captured while on a mission to free the people of the Southern Kingdom. She decided her knight might be held captive by the Red Wizard’s pet fire-breathing dragon named Nuke. And mountains seemed like a good place to search for dragons. 

“The hills of Oakhill will have to do,” she muttered. Not one to sit still for long, Juliet returned her knapsack to her shoulders and headed resolutely for the nearest hill at the south end of the park. She was hiking halfway up the slope when she realized a police car must have pulled in somewhere beyond a thicket of trees at the top of hill. She could see the glow of the flashing red lights of the patrol car through the trees. Had the old man from the nearby nursing home escaped again? Was there a burglar on the loose? Or was it the Red Wizard seeking his next prey? 

Juliet, thinking this might be an exciting source of material for her story, continued on, climbing the hill and bouncing lightly from tree to tree, using them as cover. She was watching the officers search the area when a hand clasped her mouth, and she felt the body of a man behind her. He grasped her arm, and she froze.

“I’m not going to hurt you. Just please don’t say anything. I’m on an important mission.” Taking in the rusty voice and the musty smells of a pajama sleeve, Juliet sensed her abductor was the man from the nursing home, a harmless little man, hardly an outlaw to be chased down by police armed with weapons. Disappointed with the lack of real excitement, our protagonist nodded, relaxed as he released her, and peered back toward the Red Wizard police force.

Dusk was settling in, and in the shadows of the trees, the unlikely pair were well hidden. “Don’t let them take me back. Not yet anyway.”  She put her finger to her lips and crouched down slowly. Her new friend followed. They sat huddled in the encroaching darkness until the squad car pulled away taking the Red Light of Power with it. They both let out a deep breath.  

“Thanks for keeping my secret. I’m Billy.” He smiled genuinely and held out his feeble hand.

Juliet shook it. “I’m . . . Peace.”

Billy scratched his head. “I’ve never met a Peace before. But I like it. Nice to meet you, Peace.”

Juliet smiled awkwardly and rose from her hiding spot. She had a story to finish. “Good luck with your mission.” 

Suddenly a flash of light blinded her. Someone stepped between Billy and her, effectively pinning her to a tree. She heard leaves rustling and voices shouting and a then a thud – and a pitiful moaning. She heard herself cry, “don’t hurt him.” But she couldn’t see, couldn’t tell what was really happening. Why did they have to take him back? She wanted to stop them, but the intensity of the light paralyzed her. 

When the light finally vanished, Juliet remained too blind to see anything. She heard a few more retreating footsteps, but then all was silent. When her eyes adjusted, no one was there. Just Juliet and her unfinished fairy tale. 

And a note! Right there in her notebook, in a most peculiar handwriting. A jolt of electricity – or maybe just the prospect of a new adventure – brought Juliet to her feet. She stumbled to the top of the hill to read the note in what little daylight was left of what started as the most ordinary of Thursdays.

She read, “You have until dawn to find your precious knight. By morning, Sir William will be dead to you.”

I know what you’re thinking – it’s what everyone is saying -- that Juliet had passed out with fear, and this is where our story becomes a foolish dream. While it is true that for Juliet, dreams were a welcome reprieve from reality, I assure you she was wide awake. And though her imagination was a wild as ever, this is the day Juliet’s real living would begin.

Rattled by the preceding events, but still determined to follow this new trail of inspiration, Juliet set off in search of her captured knight, “Sir William.” She pictured pimply-faced William Johnson from homeroom and thought better of this choice of names. 

The path she chose did not lead to mountains or dragons, of course, but eventually she did come to a wall, a very big solid wall. The letters ONH were barely visible in the moonlight. It seemed the perfect insurmountable obstacle for a protagonist to overcome in order to rescue her knight. She walked back and forth but could not come to the end of it in either direction. In the dark, she could not even see the top of it. Thinking maybe she could climb it, she tried scaling that wall until her hands and knees were blistered and bleeding.   

It was a long night. She scribbled in her notebook, but it was a fairly useless night as far as fairy tales go. The sun was tipping over the horizon, when she collapsed dejectedly on the ground next to the wall. Convinced that she’d failed both a knight and a fairy-tale writing assignment, she finally fell asleep, hoping that when she awoke, she would discover it was indeed a dream. 

But the wall was all too real. And when she awoke, she found herself on the other side of it. 

When she opened her eyes, she was facing a man in blue striped pajamas lying neatly on his back. His face sagged with age, but his grey disheveled hair was wild with a life of its own. “This is Sir William?” she questioned. “Weren’t we supposed to marry and then live happily ever after?”

She crawled closer to take a good look at him. He seemed vaguely familiar. She wanted to wake him but hesitated and settled for watching his shallow breathing. She thought of Sleeping Beauty lying on a stone slab waiting for her curse to be lifted with a kiss. She couldn’t kiss this man; he was ancient.

“Maybe that’s part of the curse. I have to kiss him like the princess who kissed the frog. And then he’ll turn back into a younger Sir William.” She turned her head. Behind her stood a wall as big as the one in front of her. Both Knight and Heroine captured. She was desperate. 

She leaned over and gave him a peck on his cold leather cheek. 

His eyes opened. Startled, he tried to lift himself up on one arm. “Where am I?”

“You’re in my story. You failed your mission so I tried to rescue you, but I failed too. So now we’re both trapped in here. Do you know how the curse works or where the dragon is?”

The confused man couldn’t answer. “My head hurts.” And he laid back down and closed his eyes. 

She rolled her eyes and groaned and paced beside the wall. Her patience for fairy tales was wearing thin.  

Finally, her attention came to rest on several small murals that had been etched onto the walls. The first was an idyllic scene sketched out in charcoal picturing a mother with a toddler in her lap. They were sitting under an oak tree in front an average bungalow, like any house you might find on a street in Oakhill. The next picture showed a father pitching a baseball to a little boy holding a bat. “American as apple pie,” she grimaced. 

The next image consisted of a teen in a graduation cap and gown flanked by proud parents. The final picture forced Juliet to do a double take. She saw a young bearded man in long hair standing in front of hippie van. He had a backpack shoved onto one shoulder. She looked more closely. Just like hers. With buttons. She examined it wide-eyed. Those were herbuttons.  

She swung around, her eyes pinned on the sleeping man. “Dad?”

She ran over and shook him by the shoulders. “Dad! Dad, is that you?” But he was fast asleep under this unexplainable spell.

She examined his face again. He looked older than she imagined her father to be, but it had been a long time. War would age him. Prison camps would age him even more. It made so much sense now. She was here to rescue her real-life soldier Dad, not some imaginary chivalrous knight. Maybe fairy tales had more to offer than she ever dreamed.

She hadn’t exactly rescued him yet, but she hadfound him. They were together, and Juliet was convinced that she had found herself a little slice of happy endings. 

She sat contentedly with him for a while, put his hand in between hers, and watched him, wondering what battles he had endured to end up here. She drew his hand to her cheek and whispered. “I missed you.”

His eyes fluttered open again and a questioning look passed over his face. “I’m sorry, child. I’ve been looking for him. I wish I could bring him home again.” And then he closed his eyes again.

Who did he think she was? She had secretly hoped maybe he would recognize her. People said she looked like her mother. And who was he looking for? Someone else lost in the war?

Thinking maybe there were clues in the pictures, Juliet returned to the wall of murals. The mother in the scene must be her grandmother; she had died before Juliet was born. The father in the scene must be her grandfather. She wasn’t sure what happened to him and never dared to ask. Who was her Dad trying to bring home? There was no indication of a brother. Or fellow soldier. Or anyone else really. 

When a loud crashing noise echoed from beyond the wall, Juliet recoiled as if shielding herself from a coming attack. But no one came. No dragon-fire poured from the sky. They were safe for now, but for how long?

But the commotion seemed to awaken the sleeping man who began to yawn and stretch, bringing Juliet scrambling back to his side. 

She had no time to waste. He might pass out again. “Hi. My name is . . . Juliet. Do you know who I am?”

His eyes met hers. “I remember I was enjoying a good nap before you woke me,” he said with a smile.

“These pictures on the wall,” she pointed eagerly. “Is that you?”

He rose up slowly and with her help teetered over to the scenes in question. His cheery face seemed to melt. He nodded, “Long time ago.”

“Do you remember what happened . . . after the war?”

He studied Juliet’s face. “The only thing I remember is your voice. That day . . .” He could barely look at her. Darkness filled his eyes. He cowered like a child who had been scolded. “You were yelling at me.”

“But . . . but I’ve never seen you before. You left before I was born.”

“No, no . . . I remember.” He looked off into the distance as if trying to capture the memory from a fog. “You were mad at me.” He was wringing his hands now, and his voice trembled, “You said I killed him. I drove him away.” His drooping shoulders began to shake.

It was then that Juliet’s story was disrupted by flying shards of a buried memory. A memory that once felt like the scattered pieces of a broken plate lying haphazardly around in her head. She closed her eyes and heard her mother’s voice and the voice of an older man she didn’t recognize . . . until now. 

The fragmented pieces came together like a verbal kaleidoscope It was her mother who had been angry. Juliet couldn’t have been more than three or four. Her mother was screaming curses through the front door for someone to leave them alone. She heard the screen door open and a voice – his voice - cry out in agony, “I just wanted him to get a job. Treat you right. Take care of you and the little one. But he didn’t want to grow up. I never meant . . . ” 

Her mother stomped off to the back of the house, but Juliet heard his whimpering through the door. “I miss him too, child. Every single day. Please, forgive me.”

Daydreams had not prepared her for this. Reality had crashed into Juliet’s fairy tale. 

She stood in stunned silence. The cold truth was that the man weeping before her right now was not her father at all. And the worn out old man she was trying to rescue in this fairy tale was the very same character she had pinned as a villain in a broken childhood narrative.

This is where I found them, the hero and the anti-hero compelled together not by the presence of a dark magical Wizard, but by the absence of a missing veteran. A girl looking for a lost father. A lost father looking for forgiveness. 

When nurses finally made their way to Billy’s room, the two held onto each other fiercely. She wanted to rescue him but felt somehow that he had rescued her. “I still miss him, but I’m glad you’re here with me.” 

His voice crackled with emotion, “Me, too, child. Me, too.” 

This was Juliet’s story. It was real. Do you believe me yet? Nobody believes Juliet’s stories, but I do. I’m not a doctor. But I am the night security guard at the Oakhill Nursing Home, and I watched her that night as she paced outside the walls after we brought Billy back. At dawn I found her asleep outside, and I put her in the bed next to Billy’s. She seemed to know him, to need him, and I felt compelled to intervene. So I created quite a stir on the second floor to keep the nurses out of Billy’s room for the morning shift. But Nurse Edna - they call her the Dragon Lady – caught us, don’t you know. I will probably get fired for this. But some fairy-tales require a sacrifice, and I am privileged to have played my role in the happy ending.