If I were dying, my last words would be: Have faith and pursue

Host: The city was quiet, the kind of quiet that comes after midnight, when the streets glisten from the last rain, and neon signs flicker like forgotten dreams. A small rooftop bar overlooked the river, its tables empty, save for two figures under a single lamp that hummed like a tired bee.

Jack sat there, jacket undone, tie loose, a glass of whiskey half-full beside him. His eyes were fixed on the horizon, where the city lights melted into the fog. Jeeny leaned against the railing, wind lifting her hair, face soft, eyes steady.

The air was heavy with reflection, the kind that only comes when life feels both too long and too short.

Jeeny: “You look like you’re staring into something that doesn’t want to be seen.”

Jack: “Maybe I am.”

Jeeny: “What is it?”

Jack: “The end.” (he pauses) “I came across a line tonight — Oliver Wendell Holmes said, ‘If I were dying, my last words would be: Have faith and pursue the unknown end.’ It’s been rattling in my head ever since. I can’t decide if it’s brave… or delusional.”

Host: A gust of wind moved across the roof, rattling the glasses, carrying the distant sound of a passing train. The lamp flickered, casting shadows that made Jack’s face look older, tired, yet alive.

Jeeny: “Maybe it’s both. Faith always is — part courage, part madness.”

Jack: “Faith is blindness. A kind of self-induced illusion to keep people from realizing how little control they have. ‘Pursue the unknown end’? That’s poetic suicide.”

Jeeny: “No, it’s human. It’s the one thing that makes us more than animals — that we walk into the dark anyway.”

Jack: “Because we have no choice.”

Jeeny: “No. Because we choose to.”

Host: Her words were soft, but they hit like quiet thunder. The river below shimmered, reflecting lights like scattered stars trapped on the surface.

Jack: “You think faith is a choice? Tell that to someone who’s watched everything fall apart. Tell that to a man who’s buried his reasons one by one.”

Jeeny: “Maybe he still has one left — the fact that he’s still standing there talking about it.”

Jack: (smirks) “So surviving is faith now?”

Jeeny: “Sometimes, yes. Sometimes just breathing is faith.”

Host: Jack leaned back, his chair creaking, eyes narrowing. He watched her, like he was testing whether she actually believed the words leaving her mouth.

Jack: “You talk about faith like it’s a fire you can hold. But faith burns. It blinds people. It makes them follow ghosts. Wars have been fought over faith. Families ruined by it. Tell me what’s noble about that.”

Jeeny: “The nobility isn’t in the faith itself — it’s in what it takes to keep it. Faith isn’t about certainty; it’s about walking when you can’t see the ground.”

Jack: “That’s a good way to fall off a cliff.”

Jeeny: “And yet, people fly that way too.”

Host: The rain started again, soft and uncertain, like a memory returning. Drops landed on the table, dimpling the whiskey’s surface. Jack didn’t move, his gaze fixed on the darkness beyond the river, where the city lights vanished into the void.

Jack: “You ever think about it? The end? What it means — to ‘pursue’ it?”

Jeeny: “Every day. But I don’t think it means chasing death. I think it means moving toward mystery — not away from it.”

Jack: “Mystery. That’s your word for the unknown, isn’t it? Mine’s chaos.”

Jeeny: “They’re the same thing. The only difference is what name you give it.”

Host: She walked closer, raindrops glistening on her hair, face calm, voice steady.

Jeeny: “You think Holmes meant faith as religion. I think he meant it as courage — the courage to go forward even when you know you won’t understand everything. To keep building, loving, trying, when you know the world doesn’t owe you a thing.”

Jack: “That sounds like denial with better grammar.”

Jeeny: “No. It’s surrender without giving up.”

Host: He laughed once, short and rough, a sound half-broken, half-relieved.

Jack: “You sound like my mother. She used to say the same thing — that life isn’t about the finish line, it’s about whether you had the guts to run blind.”

Jeeny: “She was right.”

Jack: “She died with that kind of faith. I envied her for it. I couldn’t understand how someone could face the void smiling.”

Jeeny: “Maybe she wasn’t smiling at the void. Maybe she was smiling at the mystery waiting on the other side.”

Host: Jack’s hand tightened around the glass, the amber liquid trembling in the dim light. He looked like a man standing at the edge of something — anger, grief, or realization.

Jack: “I don’t want mystery. I want meaning. I want to know the ‘why’ before I die.”

Jeeny: “Then you’ll die waiting. The ‘why’ isn’t given, Jack — it’s made. Faith is what builds the bridge to the unknown end. Not to understand it, but to meet it without fear.”

Host: The rain intensified, pouring now, drumming on the metal railing. Jeeny didn’t flinch; she lifted her face, letting the drops hit her skin, her expression radiant, almost defiant.

Jeeny: “Look around you. The world doesn’t pause for our fear. It keeps turning, keeps creating, keeps ending. That’s faith — the world keeps going even when it doesn’t know where it’s going.”

Jack: “And you think we should be like that?”

Jeeny: “We already are. Every time you wake up, every time you love someone knowing you’ll lose them, every time you take a step without knowing where it leads — that’s faith. You just don’t call it that.”

Host: He looked at her — really looked — and for a moment, the cynicism faded, replaced by something raw, human, almost childlike. The rainlight caught in his eyes, turning them silver.

Jack: “You ever wonder what Holmes was thinking when he said that?”

Jeeny: “I think he’d seen enough of life to know that fear of the unknown kills faster than death itself. He fought in the Civil War, saw men die not because they lacked strength — but because they lost belief.”

Jack: “Belief in what?”

Jeeny: “That there was something worth walking toward — even if you couldn’t see it.”

Host: The storm began to ease, rain softening to a mist, as if the sky itself exhaled. Jeeny sat down across from him, the lamplight flickering between them, two faces — one scarred, one serene, both lit by the same fragile glow.

Jack: “So what do we do, then? Just keep walking? Even when there’s nothing left?”

Jeeny: “Especially then. Because that’s when faith stops being an idea and becomes a choice.”

Jack: “And what if the end isn’t worth it?”

Jeeny: “Then at least you met it with your eyes open.”

Host: The river glimmered, reflecting stars breaking through the clouds, the city slowly breathing again. Jack took a sip, the whiskey warm, his shoulders easing for the first time that night.

Jack: “You really believe there’s something waiting at the end, don’t you?”

Jeeny: “Yes. Even if it’s just peace.”

Jack: “And you have faith in that?”

Jeeny: “I don’t have faith in it. I have faith toward it. There’s a difference.”

Host: The clock inside the bar struck two, a low, echoing sound swallowed by the mist. The world felt suspended, balanced on the edge of stillness.

Jack: “You know, for a moment… I think I get it. It’s not about knowing. It’s about going.”

Jeeny: “Exactly.”

Host: He smiled, small but genuine — a rare crack of light through the armor. The rain stopped completely, and the moon, pale and distant, broke through the clouds, illuminating the river like a silver road stretching endlessly forward.

Jack: “If I were dying,” he whispered, half to himself, “I’d probably just say what Holmes said. Have faith and pursue the unknown end.”

Jeeny: “And maybe,” she said softly, “the end isn’t the end at all. Maybe it’s just the beginning of understanding.”

Host: The camera of night pulled back, revealing the two figures sitting beneath the lamp, the city quiet, the river glowing like a path to somewhere unseen.

Faith — fragile, irrational, luminous — lingered between them, a flame refusing to die, guiding them not toward certainty, but toward the beauty of the unknown.