The Well(Emotion)

Let's call her Jane, Jane Doe will do. She's nothing special I'm sure, just another person walking from place to place. Nothing but part of the backdrop for your life, but what if something happened to her? Would you notice? Are you sure? We shall watch, as Jane goes about her daily life; moving from place to place, doing things that seem to carry the world to her and those around her. And they do, the weight of everything she does is real and has a real impact on the world. Until one day, Jane fell down a well.

She didn't see it coming, that's for certain, but it was always there. Every day she passed through the large empty field, carrying everything she needed to do, until one day the weight of it all was too much and she broke through the thin seal and fell tumbling into the darkness below. The walls of the shaft, wider than she could reach from either side, were lined with bricks filled with mortar and moss. The water at the bottom of the well was deep, perhaps endless? For a moment, Jane simply floated there, bobbing on the surface of the deep cold water, looking around at the stone walls. Far above, well out of reach, she could see the circular light of the sky; a ring of blue in the eternal black. The hole was wider than Jane, she could float on her back and not touch the sides, but it was so tight at the same time. Never had she felt so constrained, so restricted. It felt to her as if the walls were pressing in on her, no matter how much she tried to rationalize that they weren't. Jane was alone. Endless water beneath. Peerless darkness above. Walls closing in on her. She couldn't breathe, but she wasn't drowning. Couldn't see, but she wasn't blind.

Jane could only think of one thing, She was trapped down there in that hole. Clawing uselessly at the bricks around her, pulling herself from the water and dragging herself up the wall. The bricks seemed to cut at Jane, slicing her fingers and her legs as she desperately struggled to pull herself up. When she grabbed some moss it pulled free, sending Jane tumbling back down into the dark water. Again and again Jane tried, each time moving less and less as she grew more and more tired. Eventually she gave up, resolved herself to floating on the surface in the darkness. On her last attempt to pull herself from the wall, a small rock crumbled from the brick and into her hand. Jane pressed the rock back where it came from and simply lay on the surface of the water. It was dark, it was cold, and Jane was alone. She couldn't even pull herself from the water anymore. Jane was useless.

---

Days passed, as Jane struggled to stay above the surface of the still and silent abyss. She was so alone, no-one would be able to hear her. In a desperate plea, Jane took the stone from the wall and scratched some simple words on her prison; "Jane was here". Before returning the stone to it's home. Jane was starving, always in need; always feeling the pain of her hunger, but unable to satiate it. No matter what she did, the pain of hunger and loneliness never faded. She could sink? Jane could sink below the surface, let the darkness and the solitude claim her. But she was scared, there might still be hope? Someone might still save her. But Jane didn't really believe that. After all, no-one cared about her.

The ring of light had gotten further away, it was smaller in the expanse of darkness. The more Jane looked up at it, longed for it, the smaller and further away it became. Weakly she grabbed at the wall, half-heartedly yearning to pull herself up, pull herself out of the hole. But she grabbed moss, tearing it from it's resting place as she slumped back into the darkness, her legs and hands being sliced at by the wall as she fell. In the fading, almost non-existent light, Jane saw something; words carved on the wall. They were close to her own, and had been hidden by the moss. "John was here" they read, fresh as the day they were cut. Someone had been here before her. Had he been rescued? or was he part of the darkness now, the shade that devoured her? Jane felt the weight of the cold air upon her, and to shake the sense of dread, she pulled her carving stone from the wall and wrote something. Below the newly revealed letters she carved "John will be missed". Never before had she felt as alone as right this moment. After Jane returned the stone to the brick, staring around at her prison, she noticed something that confused her greatly. Below what she had carved, below her response to John's grave, Jane saw new words. Words she had not carved, "You're wrong"

---

In the weeks that followed, Jane pulled more and more moss from the walls, finding more and more carvings around her. "Peter was here"
"Michael was here"
"Abigail was here"
"Iz was here"
"Will was here"
The carvers spoke to each other, at first their words seemed cold and distant. But as she scratched responses into the stone around her, she could see more replies to what she said. As she scratched at them, responding to the words forgotten on the walls around her, Jane forgot her hunger. Though she was cold and isolated, locked from the world around her. Jane was not alone. The scratchers asked about her. They wanted to know what her life was like, about the people outside the hole she was in. These marks on the wall cared. These marks wanted to know about her. So she told them. Jane spilled her life on the walls of the well around her, every mark growing brighter in the light of the entry. And then one day she found it. After weeks and months of writing, she found a message by John, hidden behind a brick she pried from the wall when she tore at the moss. "There is a way out" It said. With renewed vigor she climbed, reaching as high as she could, but not quite meeting the edge. Every time she fell, there were words she'd not seen before. They were encouraging her. Jane's friends wrote for her, urging her onward and upwards. In frustration she lashed out, scratching at the rock beside John's cryptic message. HOW? She smashed against the wall. Floating away she stared, awaiting the reply. With baited breath Jane watched as simple letters ground themselves into the stone. "ask"

Jane was stunned, she looked up to the top of the hole. It was so simple. Why hadn't she thought of it? The more she wondered at her stupidity, the further the entrance fell. For a moment it had seemed closer than ever before, but now it was retreating again. Opening her lungs, Jane screamed. Screamed for help, Screamed for someone to save her. She didn't notice the writing on the wall. She didn't watch as thousands of notes scribbled themselves around her. Some saying 'louder', others 'don't give up'. Every word of encouragement... Until they all melted away. All the words were gone, and six faces peered down at her. Six people above Jane, looked down into the well where she floated. All together they lowered a rope, a small knotted rope that only went half way down the pit toward her. Jane was heartbroken, it wasn't long enough. Those people couldn't save her. Yes they could. They could save her, but Jane would have to help them. Grabbing onto the slick stone brick wall, she climbed. Her prison cutting at her as she pulled herself higher and higher, until she was able to grab the knotted line.

When Jane's hand wrapped around the cord, Twelve strong arms began to pull as one. Six people lifting her, as Jane climbed the brick wall of the well. Pulling her arms over the edge of the hole, she felt as John and Abby grabbed her. Every bit of effort she gave to pulling out, they gave to help her. When Jane was free, she stood among her friends and smiled, looking around at a field of hundred of holes.
"Why can't we save them?" Jane asked, hearing the splashing of people far below.
"Because they have to save themselves. Like you did."