I shall allow no man to belittle my soul by making me hate him.

Host: The streetlights hummed softly against the evening wind, their glow spilling over the edges of a quiet neighborhood café. The windows were fogged, the air heavy with the scent of coffee, rain, and something warmer — forgiveness, perhaps, if forgiveness had a smell.

Outside, the rain had slowed to a drizzle, tracing thin silver lines down the glass. Inside, at a corner table where the light flickered low, Jack sat with his arms folded, his jaw tense, his eyes distant — the look of a man wrestling with ghosts. Across from him, Jeeny sat quietly, her hands wrapped around a mug, watching him without judgment.

The radio murmured faintly in the background — old jazz, soft and melancholy. Between them lay a small notebook, open to a single handwritten line:

"I shall allow no man to belittle my soul by making me hate him." — Booker T. Washington

The words seemed to vibrate between them, alive in the space, heavier than the quiet.

Jeeny: (softly) It’s a hard thing to live by, isn’t it? Not letting hate own you.

Jack: (bitterly) Hard? It’s impossible. Some people don’t just deserve hate — they earn it.

Jeeny: (nodding slowly) Maybe. But what they earn doesn’t have to cost you your peace.

Jack: (leans back) Peace? You can’t reason your way to peace. Not after betrayal. Not after someone’s tried to break you.

Jeeny: (gently) But you can choose not to finish their work for them.

Host: A single drop of water slid down the windowpane, catching the lamplight like a tear that refused to fall. Jack’s eyes followed it — slow, heavy — before turning back to her.

Jack: (quietly) You ever hate someone, Jeeny? I mean, really hate them — so much that it changes the air around you when their name comes up?

Jeeny: (after a pause) Once. For a long time. It hollowed me out. Every day I woke up rehearsing an argument I’d never win.

Jack: (softly) What happened?

Jeeny: One day I realized — the hate wasn’t protecting me. It was keeping me connected to him. Like a chain I’d forged myself.

Jack: (looking down) So you let it go.

Jeeny: (smiling faintly) Eventually. Forgiveness wasn’t mercy for him. It was freedom for me.

Host: The café door opened briefly, letting in a gust of cold air and a man shaking off his umbrella. The bell above the door chimed once, twice, before the sound dissolved back into the murmur of rain.

Jack: (gritting his teeth) That’s the thing — I don’t want to forgive. Forgiving feels like letting them win.

Jeeny: (softly) Then you misunderstand the game. Hate doesn’t punish them, Jack. It just preserves them — keeps them alive inside you, like a parasite that feeds on the parts of you that used to love.

Jack: (after a pause) So what — I just let them walk away clean?

Jeeny: (shakes her head) No. You let yourself walk away whole.

Jack: (laughs, bitter) You make it sound so noble.

Jeeny: It’s not noble. It’s survival.

Host: Jeeny’s voice was calm, but it carried a quiet strength, like a candle that refused to bow to the wind. Jack’s face, meanwhile, had softened — only slightly, but enough for the room to feel it.

Jeeny: (gently) You know what Booker T. Washington understood? That hate is the most obedient servant power ever had. When you hate, you hand over your soul willingly — because you believe the burn belongs to someone else.

Jack: (leaning forward) You’re saying hate is surrender.

Jeeny: (nods) Exactly. It feels like strength, but it’s servitude in disguise.

Jack: (quietly) You sound like you’ve lived it.

Jeeny: (smiles sadly) Haven’t we all?

Host: The rain picked up again — soft, rhythmic, cleansing. The sound filled the small café, blending with the faint hum of jazz and the clinking of spoons against porcelain.

Jack: (after a long silence) You know, I’ve carried it for years — the anger. I told myself it was fuel. That it kept me moving. But lately… I can’t tell if I’m chasing something or just running from myself.

Jeeny: (softly) Maybe both. Anger can build roads, but it can’t tell you where to go.

Jack: (half-smiles) Poetic.

Jeeny: (grinning slightly) Pain always is. It wants to be remembered beautifully.

Jack: (quietly) And forgiveness?

Jeeny: (pauses, thinking) Forgiveness isn’t beautiful. It’s awkward. Clumsy. It doesn’t erase the wound — it just stops reopening it.

Host: The light above their table flickered once, dimmed, then steadied. The dog from the street earlier — a small, ragged creature with rain in its fur — padded up to the café door, sitting just outside in the glow. Neither of them noticed it yet, but the universe did.

Jack: (after a pause) I keep replaying the moment — what he said, what I should’ve said back. Like if I could just win the argument in my head, I’d get the peace I never got in person.

Jeeny: (gently) That’s the illusion. Revenge always happens in imagination. Forgiveness happens in reality.

Jack: (bitterly) And reality’s overrated.

Jeeny: (leans forward) No, Jack. Reality’s where freedom lives. You can’t be free in the past. That place is already gone.

Host: Jack looked down at his hands, then at the faint steam rising from his cup. The world outside blurred — rain against glass, shadows against light — and for a brief moment, it was hard to tell whether it was the café or his own mind that felt heavier.

Jeeny: (softly) Hate’s clever, you know. It convinces you you’re the victim, even while you’re doing its bidding.

Jack: (nodding) Yeah. I see that now.

Jeeny: (quietly) So — maybe tonight, just for a moment, don’t look at them. Look at yourself. Ask what your soul needs to breathe again.

Jack: (after a long pause) Maybe it needs mercy.

Jeeny: (smiles gently) Mercy’s just love with its armor off.

Host: The dog barked softly outside, breaking the silence. Jack turned, watching it through the glass — a small, wet shape, eyes bright even in the dim light. Without thinking, he stood and opened the café door. The bell chimed, the cold air rushed in, and the dog trotted inside, shaking off the rain.

Jeeny smiled as it curled up by his feet.

Jeeny: (softly) See? Even the universe sends reminders.

Jack: (kneels beside the dog) Maybe it’s reminding me to be kind — even to myself.

Jeeny: (smiles) That’s where it starts.

Host: The dog sighed, curling tighter against the warmth of the café floor. Jack’s hand rested gently on its head, his shoulders relaxing for the first time all night. The rain had softened now, a whisper rather than a weep.

The quote still sat open between them, its words almost glowing in the dim light — quiet, steadfast, unwavering:

"I shall allow no man to belittle my soul by making me hate him."

Jeeny looked at it, then at him, and whispered — not to teach, but to remember:

Jeeny: The soul doesn’t stay small because it was hurt, Jack. It stays small because it keeps measuring the wound.

Jack: (quietly) And maybe forgiveness is the only way to stop measuring.

Host: The clock ticked, soft and patient. The lights glowed warmer.

Outside, the rain finally stopped, and in the reflection of the window, two faces appeared — older perhaps, wiser definitely — and just a little freer.

And as the scene faded, the echo of Booker T. Washington’s truth lingered in the air like incense:

Freedom is not the absence of pain.
It is the refusal to let pain decide who you become.