The Boy Who Dared To Enter

A story of a young boy becoming a young adult.

 

 

 

 

THE BOY WHO DARED TO ENTER

 

By J.M. Gershom

 

 

           Alan Marcus Smith was lying down on the soft grass looking up at a clear summer’s night sky.  The sound of cicadas rang in his 12 year old ears.  He knew that someone had mowed the grass earlier in the day because the pungent fragrance still lingered in the air.

The stars shined brightly.  Directly overhead, a faint mist of stars divided the sky in half from the south to the north.  Large prominent stars formed a constellation that he tried hard to remember.  He strained his mind, but still it wouldn’t come to him.

“It’s Cygnus, the Swan.”

Alan rolled over to his side and saw his older brother Joshua on the ground beside him.

“Remember, Alan?  I told you about it last year when we went camping.”

“Oh yeah!  Now I remember.  I thought how corny it was to name a constellation after a bird.”

Joshua gave a light chuckle.  “I suppose, but remember the swan is floating on that starry mist.  The Milky Way looks so calm and tranquil when you see it on its side.”

Alan looked up again at the swan.  “I wish it looked that calm when you threw me in the lake last summer.  You said you were going to teach me to swim.  I thought I was gonna drown.”

“But you didn’t, did you?”

“No.”  Alan felt ashamed.

“You know I wouldn’t let anything happen to you.”  Joshua looked at his younger brother with loving eyes.  “I knew that if I left it to you, we’d both still be standing on the shore waiting for you to jump in.  I was just trying to motivate you.  And what happened?”

Alan still had his head down, “I started swimming.”

“Well, I guess you could call it that,” Joshua said with a smile on his face.  “As a matter a fact, you actually did start swimming.  I thought, that’s my little brother, the great adventurer!”

Alan started laughing out loud.  Soon he quieted down and looked up again.  “Joshua?  Wasn’t there something special about Cygnus you told me?”

“Yes, something very special.  Somewhere in that graceful swan lurks a mysterious and violent object.”

“A black hole!  Now I remember.”

Joshua had a grin from ear to ear.  “You do remember.  What else?”

Alan closed his eyes trying to recall the details.  There was that time when he raced to the library on his bike to find a book about them.  Joshua had said to ask a librarian where a book would be, but Alan knew how to use the electronic card catalog.

After putting ‘black hole’ in the keywords box, a series of titles flashed themselves onto the screen.  One looked really cool, Black Holes and Other Weird Space Stuff.  He found it on the shelf, and then he went to sit down on a chair by a full-length window overlooking a busy street.  Alan was briefly in a trance while looking at cars zooming to and fro.  He comically shook his head to get himself out of a daze and back to his task.

There weren’t any pictures of black holes because the author said that was impossible.  “Light itself cannot escape from a black hole!” she explained.  The book talked of the birth and death of stars.  It was the death of stars that created a black hole, if the conditions were right.

“You can travel through one.”

Surprised, Alan found himself back with Joshua under the crystal clear sky.  “What was that?”

Joshua was looking up, “I said, you can travel through one and end up somewhere magical.”

“But you’d end up torn apart!” cried Alan.

“How do you know?  Has anyone tried?  Wouldn’t it be a fantastic adventure?  One I know you’d be up to!”

“I would get hurt, maybe even die.”

“But you don’t know for certain.  You have to try, Alan.  You might even learn something wondrous that may help you or help other people.  Don’t you think that’s worth taking a chance on?”

“I still don’t know.  I might die, like you did.”

Joshua’s face became a warm fuzzy glow.  “You recall how I died, Alan?  Yes, I know you do, even if you don’t want to.  I had no intentions of dying; it just happened.  I was helping people, complete strangers, but I had to do it.”

Alan’s eyes began to water.  He fought hard to hold back the tears.

Joshua continued, “It was the right thing to do.  If the same situation happens to you, I know you’ll decide wisely.  Just remember one thing dear brother, if you ever find yourself in front of a black hole or anything else that frightens you, don’t be afraid, take a chance. You might just help someone who needs it.  And you will learn something important about yourself.”

Alan wiped his wet eyes.  He went to look at his brother, but all he saw was the fuzzy, warm glow break-up into a hundred points of light.  Quickly the fireflies flew away into the quiet summer night.

Author's Note

This is just the beginning of what I hope is a novella length story.

Reviews

[Tommy]

This read with ease, and has a captivating verve to its diction. It enthralled my mind enough to desire more and that is the real essence of a good story. Looks to be a great start to a fantastic fanciful piece.

Great Write!
RLG,
Tommy

[.]

i think this is a wonderful start--the dialogue and narrative/imagery
really reads seamlessly well...make sure you end me the follow up
writes--i will be happy to read :)