One is still what one is going to cease to be and already what

Host: The river moved like liquid glass beneath the bridge — slow, cold, relentless. The moonlight spread across its surface in trembling ribbons, breaking against the current like forgotten thoughts. The city beyond lay half-asleep, its windows blinking with tired light, its streets breathing a slow, uneven rhythm.

Jack stood at the edge of the bridge, his coat collar raised against the wind, a cigarette glowing faintly between his fingers. Jeeny leaned against the railing beside him, her hands clasped together, her hair stirred by the chill. The air smelled faintly of metal and rain, of something both ending and beginning.

Jeeny: (quietly) “Jean-Paul Sartre said — ‘One is still what one is going to cease to be and already what one is going to become. One lives one’s death, one dies one’s life.’”

Jack: (exhales smoke) “Only Sartre could make a sentence sound like a funeral and a birth at the same time.”

Host: The smoke drifted into the night, twisting into ghostly shapes before dissolving. The river below caught fragments of their reflections, shivering them into movement — neither fixed nor free.

Jeeny: “It’s not just about death, Jack. It’s about transformation. He’s saying we’re never fixed — we’re always dying into who we’ll become.”

Jack: “Sounds poetic. But if everything’s always dying, what’s the point of being alive at all?”

Jeeny: “Maybe the point is the dying. Maybe change is the only proof we ever existed.”

Host: The wind cut through their words, scattering them like ashes. The moon hung lower now, pale and indifferent. A dog barked in the distance, the sound hollow in the vastness of the night.

Jack: “You make it sound beautiful. But Sartre was a realist, Jeeny — a man who thought existence came before essence. He didn’t believe we’re born with meaning. He believed we invent it — while slowly disintegrating.”

Jeeny: “Exactly. We die piece by piece as we define ourselves. Every choice kills a possibility — every ‘yes’ is a thousand ‘no’s.’ That’s what he meant. We live our deaths because every moment, we become something smaller than the infinite we were.”

Jack: “And that’s supposed to comfort us?”

Jeeny: “No. It’s supposed to wake us.”

Host: A single car crossed the bridge, its headlights sweeping over them like a fleeting revelation — two figures caught in light and then swallowed back by darkness. The sound faded, leaving behind only the low murmur of the river.

Jack: “So you think we should celebrate the decay? Toast the rot?”

Jeeny: “Not the rot. The movement. Think of it like seasons — you can’t cling to summer without betraying autumn. Every time something dies in us, something else begins. Sartre was just brave enough to admit both happen at once.”

Jack: “Then what about people who never change? The ones who stay the same until the end — routine, safe, predictable. Are they not dying? Or are they just dead already?”

Jeeny: “They’re dying slower. But maybe that’s a kind of death too — the one that happens behind the eyes.”

Host: Jack looked down into the water. His reflection wavered, blurred, became two — one fading, one forming. He dropped his cigarette and watched the ember vanish beneath the surface, a tiny star extinguished.

Jack: “You know, when my father died, he looked peaceful. But what struck me wasn’t the stillness — it was how much of him was already gone before that night. The last few years, he stopped laughing, stopped arguing, stopped wanting anything. It was like he rehearsed death for so long that by the time it came, it didn’t have to do much work.”

Jeeny: (softly) “He lived his death.”

Jack: “Yeah.” (pauses) “And I wonder if I’ve started mine.”

Host: The night air seemed to tighten around them. Jeeny turned to face him, her eyes dark and luminous, carrying both compassion and defiance.

Jeeny: “You’re too aware to be dead, Jack. The fact that you question it means you’re alive. Sartre would say you’re in anguish — that’s the proof of freedom.”

Jack: (half-smiling) “Freedom’s overrated. Everyone romanticizes it until they realize it comes with the burden of choice.”

Jeeny: “Then maybe that burden is life. The weight we drag that keeps us moving forward.”

Host: The river sighed beneath them. A faint mist rose, wrapping their silhouettes in a thin veil. The moonlight brushed against their faces, revealing lines of thought, exhaustion, tenderness.

Jack: “So tell me, Jeeny. If we’re constantly becoming, when do we ever arrive?”

Jeeny: “Never. That’s the point. We’re always unfinished — always mid-breath, mid-fall, mid-prayer.”

Jack: “That sounds exhausting.”

Jeeny: “It’s beautiful.”

Jack: (laughs softly) “You find beauty in what terrifies everyone else.”

Jeeny: “Maybe because it’s honest. You can’t love something static — not really. Love, art, meaning — they all depend on motion, on impermanence. That’s what Sartre was really saying: that our identity isn’t a monument. It’s a river.”

Host: The wind shifted, carrying the smell of wet earth and faint smoke from a chimney somewhere across the valley. Jack closed his eyes for a moment, letting the sound of the water seep into him.

Jack: “You ever think maybe we overthink it? Maybe death isn’t poetic. Maybe it’s just… the end.”

Jeeny: “Maybe. But even endings are stories. Death gives shape to life — it frames it, gives it edge. Without death, everything would be flat, endless. Meaningless.”

Jack: “So we need death to feel alive.”

Jeeny: “Yes. Just like we need darkness to see light.”

Host: For a moment, neither spoke. The river went on whispering. A faint train horn echoed somewhere beyond the hills, distant and ancient, like a memory of motion.

Jack: (quietly) “You know, there’s something comforting about that. The idea that we’re already dying — it means there’s no surprise waiting. Just a gradual unfolding.”

Jeeny: “It’s not just dying, Jack. It’s becoming. Every death inside you births something new — a thought, a forgiveness, a version of yourself you didn’t expect.”

Jack: “And if the new version is worse?”

Jeeny: “Then you’ll die again. And maybe next time you’ll be better.”

Host: The moon climbed higher, the river turning to silver beneath it. Their shadows stretched long and thin across the bridge, almost touching, almost merging.

Jack: “You make death sound like mercy.”

Jeeny: “Maybe it is. Life keeps reinventing itself through endings. Every loss — every mistake — it’s just the universe editing its own poem.”

Jack: (smiles faintly) “Then I guess we’re all unfinished verses.”

Jeeny: “Yes. And maybe that’s the point. The beauty isn’t in the completion — it’s in the revision.”

Host: The wind softened. The world seemed to pause — as if even the river were listening. The faint hum of the city pulsed far away, steady and mortal.

Jack turned, looked at Jeeny, really looked — as though seeing not her face, but her becoming.

Jack: “You know, Jeeny… if Sartre was right, maybe we’re living our deaths right now — but at least we get to choose the kind of death we live.”

Jeeny: “Then choose one that keeps you alive, Jack.”

Host: She smiled — small, quiet, infinite. The kind of smile that carries both farewell and forgiveness. Jack looked out at the river one last time, the cigarette’s ember dying at his feet.

Above them, the clouds began to drift apart. The first hint of dawn crept across the sky — soft, colorless, fragile. The world was still dying, still being born.

And as the first light touched their faces, something wordless passed between them — a mutual understanding that life and death were not enemies,
but mirrors.

Host: The camera would rise slowly, leaving the bridge, the river, the two shadows standing side by side — one fading, one beginning. The city below shimmered awake, its lights trembling against the sky’s awakening.

And in that fleeting balance between night and day, one truth whispered through the wind:

that to live is to die in fragments,
to die is to live in echoes,
and the soul is nothing more
than the endless act
of becoming.