The story, the one story that had no purpose, no meaning, other than that of a telling of a small truth, known only to one, was the same story that would later be finally written into words. But how is this possible, one might say, since this is the wordless story. Some words have a deeper meaning than what is written. A meaning so deep, that no language exists that can explain this meaning.
This underlying, unspoken meaning can only be understood in the mind. Thus why this story has no words, no language, no valuable content except that of the meaning that is hiding behind the ink on the page. No one can speak for it, of the meaning that is. The meaning hides among the page, yearning to be found. Hoping, wondering, wanting to be picked out. Whether or not the meaning is found, the words do make story. Without this meaning, however, this is exactly that: just another story, telling the tale of a situation that happened.
One average, ordinary, boring morning, Cael awoke on his bed. As he lay there, wondering what new and exciting problems this new day will throw at him, he started to feel cold. Nope, just another day, he thought. He jerked the comforter off of himself and quickly hopped to his feet. He could feel the blood drain from his head and rush all throughout his body, trying to reach equilibrium inside his veins.
“An ordinary day,” Cael thought. “Great, exactly what I need. Another one of these insignificant, dry days where nothing happens that is so important that I be there for it. Oh, that bed is calling my name again, calling for my presence in its deep bowels. Wow, I never know what I’m thinking about in the morning. Why am I still thinking? I need today to start soon. I’m starting to lose it and it’s not even six yet.”
Cael Amery was the type of person who would find interest in even the smallest of things, and thinking about anything was his passion. But of course, no one knew this. Not even the tiniest mouse knew his secrets. For he kept them well hidden, inside his mind, because he didn’t know where else to store them. He didn’t trust anywhere else.
As usual, Cael cleaned himself up, and headed down to his kitchen to fix himself some morning eats. Cael was not the biggest eater, but he did have an appetite fit for any well deserved king. Eating, however, was not his focus. In fact, if anything could be said about Cael, it was that food was the one thing holding him down, restrained against freedom. But he, as well as any man, knew that that was not true.
School, he thought. The very next thought in his mind was not that of words, but of gestures. “Ug” nearly begins to describe what he felt. Cael did not mind school, he actually enjoyed going to school. This was only because he put school as a facility to watch others and learn from what they did or did not do. Even though there were moments of this so called “learning process” that he found interesting, most of the real learning, the learning about what life will wallop in your face with instead of what colleges will mount in front of you, happened outside the classroom.
Interaction is what he needed and being a somewhat ostracized socially did not help his status. He needed to climb the ladder, and he was not far from the bottom. He had his usual posse of friends, moral support mainly. But there was no one he could consider his “friend.” A friend to Cael was more than just a buddy who will sit next to him during school lunches. A friend, in Cael’s definition, was someone he could spill his mind to, his deep, hidden secrets, and not worry about facing detachment from that so called friend forever.
Cael needed someone to understand him, someone who could relate to the deviant thoughts that went through his mind. Cael thought he wanted a friend who would, at the least, agree with him, whether that friend really understood or not. Or so he thought that was what he wanted. But he soon concluded that agreeing was not understanding, but a form of misunderstanding, as only a true person of understanding could hardly agree with all the thoughts that entered his head.
As Cael went along his merry way, up the social ladder, he found a few candidates for his friends, but found they were the untrustworthy people he feared would not only despise him for his thoughts, but would also go around sharing his mind, like it was some sort of grand opening at a deli. After a few failed attempts, Cael closed shop. He decided it’d be best to just never speak of his thoughts again. To his demise though, when he shut off his mind, not only to the world but to himself, he saw that it didn’t just affect other people. It affected himself.
Cael’s mind was slipping, his anger control was belittling, and there was no confidence left that his hands could hold. He was deteriorating away, like a bird slowly fading into the horizon. But after a few spin-outs and a well-deserved sleep, he began to solve his mind. He started to think again, only to himself though, trying not be caught off guard by his mouth. When Cael started to think again, started to let his mind breathe, he felt the whole world had been lifted off of his shoulders. The only problem with that feeling was the rest of the universe still made home to his back, giving him no rest.
Cael needed someone. Just one person to be his crutch. Just one person to listen to him. He was slowly fading away into the abysmal abyss. He needed help, and he needed help fast. But where was there to turn to? All of his friends were either too ignorant to handle Cael’s thoughts, or too good of a friend to leave burdens on. Cael was running out of options rapidly.
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Cael needed to climb the social ladder higher, and he needed to climb it fast. He had little time, but he couldn’t mess it up with the ones he wanted to befriend, so he practiced. He tried small feats at first and then moved to larger and more difficult challenges. Cael could see the improvement and resolved his downsides quickly and effectively.
The next few months were all about work. Cael couldn’t stop thinking, thinking about small conversations. Cael always thought about conclusions to several different paths he could take, before he finally chose one. Talking, for instance, was just another door with many paths. Instead of exploding in an argument, he took time to think about what he was going to say next. But Cael never just thought about what he was going to say next. No, he thought about it deeper than that. Cael thought about the possible rebuttals to what he would say and then thought about possible answers he would comeback to the rebuttal against his opening argument.
Because of these exercises he always performed every time he spoke, Cael was sharper than a wire. This excessive sharpness, however, weakened his ability to create small talk with others¬--a valuable resource when climbing the ladder of sociality. As soon as Cael pinpointed this flaw, he began to work his skill as a potter would work his clay.