letrasypalabras: How to Dismantle a Labyrinth

martes, 13 de octubre de 2026

How to Dismantle a Labyrinth

How to Dismantle a Labyrinth

By Benjamin Gavarre

bengavarre@gmail.com

(The stage of a school auditorium, hours after the festival. Low backlighting silhouettes NATHAN and AARON, two young men in their late teens whose features are nearly identical, though they aren’t twins. At their feet, the wooden stage is littered with shattered stage bulbs and broken mirrors—the wreckage of a musical performance that ended in catharsis. NATHAN holds an unplugged microphone like a shield. AARON kicks a shard of glass.)

AARON (Watching the reflections on the floor) Listen to it crunch. Sounds like ice breaking. Or bones. That’s Julian’s impunity, turning to dust under our sneakers.

NATHAN (Looking up at the empty seats) He’s gone. He ran for the emergency exit like a blind rat when you throw the lights on. And to think for years we believed this moment was impossible. That the labyrinth was endless, and we were just meat for the Minotaur.

AARON The labyrinth was perfect, Nathan. Built to measure. By day, the house looked normal. We were free on our bikes, tearing through the streets until our lungs burned, pedaling as if we could outrun the night. But the night always came. And then the house would shift.

NATHAN (In a low, reciting voice, remembering the dread) The hallway would stretch. The walls would sweat. And we’d barricade ourselves in our room. Our only defense was each other. Two bodies under one blanket, backs pressed together, whispering songs. Remember? We were the greatest rock duo in the world, playing air guitars, raising the volume of our imaginary voices to drown out the creaking of the floorboards. So we wouldn’t hear his footsteps getting closer to the door.

AARON Sometimes we thought we were ready to fight back. We spent afternoons planning our resistance, swearing vengeance. "If he comes in today, we break the lamp over his head. If he comes in today, we scream until the neighbors show up."

NATHAN But the fracture was always there. The monster knew where to strike. He’d walk in, filling the room with his massive shadow, his heavy breath, and all our plans would collapse. The Minotaur always devoured us. We’d bow our heads. We’d let the night do its worst, swallowing the bile, just waiting for the sun to come up.

AARON And the next morning, breakfast. That smiling wife, pouring orange juice as if the house didn't smell like sulfur. Her silent complicity. Even the school doctor—so clinical, so quiet, writing off our anxiety as "growing pains" and swallowing her own observations. That silent nod from the adults, pretending the monster was just a strict stepfather. They wiped the tables and signed the papers, trying to erase the invisible blood, sealing the walls of our cage.

NATHAN (Walking the edge of the stage, energy rising in his hands) But they forgot one thing, Aaron. They forgot that by locking two of us in the same cage, they made us one. We weren’t prey fading into the wallpaper to avoid being seen anymore. No. We became resonance. Like two strings on the same guitar, tuned to the exact same frequency.

AARON (Finally smiling, kicking another piece of glass) A frequency that shatters glass.

NATHAN Exactly. The game saved us. And the game destroyed him. Today, in front of the whole school. In front of the civics teacher, the parents in their folding chairs, in front of her and her paper-thin smile.

AARON We didn't sing the harmless ballad we rehearsed.

NATHAN No. We sang to him. We pointed him out with every lyric, every chord, every glance. We were two voices in a single scream, a rock duo firing point-blank truth from this very stage.

AARON (Laughing at last, a clean, breathless laugh) You should have seen their faces, Nate! The exact second the teacher understood the lyrics. The moment the crowd's murmurs turned to disgust, like knives plunging into Julian’s back. The mother tried to clap, tried to drown out the scandal with a hysterical laugh to bury the truth, but it was too late. The acoustics of our alliance were deafening.

NATHAN (Drops the microphone to the floor; the heavy thud echoes through the empty auditorium) The monster can’t stand being seen. He’s nothing but a shadow, and under these spotlights, he disintegrated. He fled through that door. And we’re left here, breathing. Two stones that leaned against each other to keep from falling, and ended up building a bridge out.

(NATHAN and AARON look at each other, surrounded by the glint of broken glass. There is no fear left in their faces. Only the fierce calm of survivors. The lights slowly fade to black on them.)

CURTAIN