Humpty Dumpty

Humpty Dumpty was afraid of heights.

All the more reason to wonder how he could have let them talk him up here, sitting on a wall above a courtyard whose distance made his stomach queasy. Every time he looked down the ground seemed to swirl and blur; sometimes it seemed like it was rushing up to meet him.

The king’s cavalry, having taunted him up here in the first place, were trotting around, going through their paces, looking up at him every now and then, taking the time to mock.

“Are you scared up there, Humpty?”

“Are you a bit of a wuss?”

“Are you scared you might have a great fall?”

Well, he was. Exactly that. And the more they taunted, the more he feared falling, and the more he feared it, the more his hands sweated and his legs trembled, the less secure he felt sitting here, the more the tried to shift his position so that he was in less danger of falling.

Then somehow, in trying to secure his position, he was falling away from it, the wind sailing past him, the ground really racing at him now, like bull in full charge. It was harder than he knew a grassy field could be, barrelling right through him. He felt as if the earth itself had been lodged inside him.

His legs, he could see. He could see where the broken bits were.

The king’s cavalry, trying to help – sort of – milled around him, fussing, confused. Everybody was talking at once, but nobody knew what to do.

Picture credit/discredit: author's own work