At the Gallows

There is a moment when the purview of humankind is extended to breach all the knowledge and secrets of the world. When perhaps everyone reaches an instance of perfect contrition, reveling in the goodness of creation. These types of moments were common at the gallows, as the convicted stolidly stood on the platform between them and death; and Noah knew them well.

She made sure the floor was swept from beneath those waiting feet.
·
“How strange. I hear in Chester the hanger-man lets some people go free,” a woman said, letting her cigarette smoke sultrily twirl about her.

“How does that work out? The hanger-man can’t just let people go free…” a man responded, glancing over the daily newspaper. A third man, with very witty glasses perched upon his crooked nose, jumped into the conversation.

“Oh yes they can. Law #19 states “the hanger-person has every right to redeem a soul, based on their own sound judgment.” The woman raised her brow.

“Does it really say “hanger-person” in this law?

“Well… I don’t remember what you call the person who hangs criminals.”

“It sounds like a rigmarole of rubbish to me anyway,” the reading gentleman declared, sipping his coffee and burning his tongue.

Noah flitted by the table, for a prescience told her the man was about to spill. He did, coffee steaming all over his pants. Her laugh lasted for only three seconds, never longer. No one knew she was the “hanger-person,” her calm face always hidden under the---

“Executioner! That’s what you call them!”

---always hidden under the executioner’s hood. And it was true she had made a martyr of every single criminal, murderer, and lowlife. Their ignoble lives became something worth remembering the instant their hanging made front headlines in the paper.

“Noah! Table 4 has been waiting 5 minutes! You’re giving The Gallows a bad name!”

The Gallows was the name of the café behind the actual gallows. Call it dark humor, sick, or just a chance at the best seats in town.

“Sorry, sir, what would you like?” Noah looked at a point just beyond the man’s face, barely taking in his wayward blonde hair and green eyes.

“I don’t know, what’s the best you got?” a cheerful voice responded. Noah sighed as she realized she would have to look at him.

“Most of it’s crap except the hot cocoa,” her voice faltered as she glanced over his face. The man was her age, and certainly not from here. His eyes glowed with a profusion of light too mystifying for him to be from anywhere near here.

“I’ll have two then. I think you deserve a break,” the man said kindly, eyeing Noah’s boss chugging a tankard.

Noah’s mind thought of a sundry of excuses she could have and perhaps should have used, but all she said was “Alright.”

“I’m Roy. I apologize beforehand, but I’m new at this. I‘ve been traveling by myself for quite some time,” the man said smiling.

Noah attempted a grin. “Me too.”

Every morning for a month Roy sat at Table 4 and invited Noah to some cocoa. Day after day she tried to refuse, but something about him always made her linger. She began to laugh more, and discovered it eased so much pain, even if it lasted for a few fleeting moments…
·

Noah donned her cloak and lowered her hood on the morning of December 13 for a scheduled hanging. Roy would have to drink his cocoa alone, for Noah had no room for a morning chat when someone’s life was in need of a swift end.
·

“Did you hear the dolorous news?” the smoking lady drawled on the same frosty morning.

“Dolorous? They finally caught a criminal that has been missing for months,” the man responded, reading the daily newspaper.

“What did he do anyway?” the second man jumped in, adjusting his glasses.

“Shot a civilian during the war,” the woman sneered.

“Ouch.” The man had burnt his tongue, and was left to mop up his spilled coffee alone for Noah was not present.
·

There is a moment when the purview of humankind is extended to breach all the knowledge and secrets of the world… Noah was late for that as she shuffled up the stairs beside the convicted. Her stony visage was in place, not that it mattered since it was hidden beneath the hood. She moved to stand beside her nemesis, the label every criminal earned upon her gallows. Ever since Noah’s family had been murdered in the war, she had devoted her life to delivering an equal fate upon criminals.

But through the shadows she did not see the grey eyes of lost hope, but rather, green eyes filled with light. Glancing at the scroll in her hand, she read the man’s sentence in her head, then looked again to his radiant face.

How could a murderer be kind? Laugh as he sipped hot cocoa and teach a soul to laugh along? What unlikely destiny gave impetus to their meeting? All Noah’s past motivation suddenly stultified within her heart. Roy sensed a pause in the executioner’s actions, the sentence scroll still in Noah’s hands.

“If you must know, the civilian was my mother’s killer. Some misogynist or something. It was me, or him, and when he pointed his gun, I chose… me.”

Noah blinked away hidden tears as she recalled all the pain the war had brought. In a sense befitting of English requirements, Roy and Noah lost each other that moment at the gallows, when the hatred of war hung in the balance of Roy’s fate.

But then, she chose Roy too. His laugh, smile, and overall capacity as a love interest almost died that day in the war, and Noah was going to make sure it kept living. Raising her hood and looking out over the bright horizon, Noah thought she recognized a new beginning in Roy’s eyes.