Words can be said in bitterness and anger, and often there seems

Host: The night hung heavy over the small kitchen, the kind of quiet that feels earned — the aftermath of something that had been said too sharply and couldn’t be unsaid. The clock ticked softly in the background, indifferent. The only light came from the overhead bulb, casting pale shadows across the chipped table where Jack sat, his elbows on the wood, his face buried in his hands.

Across from him, Jeeny stood by the sink, motionless, the faint sound of dripping water filling the silence between them. She didn’t move to dry her hands. She didn’t speak. The air was thick — not with smoke, but with regret.

Then, finally, Jeeny broke the silence — her voice soft but steady, trembling only at the edges:

"Words can be said in bitterness and anger, and often there seems to be an element of truth in the nastiness. And words don't go away, they just echo around." — Jane Goodall

The words didn’t fall like a quote. They fell like truth, ancient and quiet, but sharp enough to leave a mark.

Jack looked up slowly. His eyes were tired, softer now, as if the fight had drained the venom and left only ache.

Jack: (quietly) “You’re right. They do echo. I can still hear what I said, even though I wish I couldn’t.”

Jeeny: (turning toward him) “You didn’t mean all of it.”

Jack: “Maybe not all. But enough.”

Jeeny: “It’s strange, isn’t it? How anger feels like control when you’re in it. And then, afterward, it feels like drowning.”

Jack: (bitter laugh) “Yeah. Except this kind of drowning doesn’t kill you. It just keeps you awake.”

Host: The wind outside pressed against the window — a slow, hollow sound, like the sigh of something ancient. The streetlight flickered, and their shadows danced across the walls: two figures caught in the aftermath of words that couldn’t be taken back.

Jeeny: “Jane Goodall understood something about language that we forget — that it’s not just sound. It’s energy. Once it leaves your mouth, it doesn’t die. It circles.”

Jack: “Like gravity. It pulls things down with it.”

Jeeny: (nodding) “And sometimes it pulls people down.”

Jack: “So what do you do? Apologize? Pretend the echo’s gone?”

Jeeny: “No. You wait. You listen to what it’s trying to teach you.”

Host: Jack’s eyes drifted to the window. The reflection there looked foreign — someone older, smaller, hollowed by something invisible but undeniable.

He rubbed a hand across his face and sighed.

Jack: “It’s the truth part that hurts, isn’t it? When you lash out, you don’t invent things — you just weaponize them.”

Jeeny: “Yes. You take what’s real and twist it until it cuts.”

Jack: “And then what? You live with the blood on your tongue?”

Jeeny: “You live with the choice. That’s the real punishment. The echo doesn’t fade until you learn to speak differently.”

Host: She walked to the table, sitting across from him. The distance between them felt smaller now, but not gone. It was the kind of silence that follows understanding — not peace, not yet, but the beginning of it.

Jeeny: “Do you remember what you said?”

Jack: (closing his eyes) “Every word.”

Jeeny: “Good. Then maybe they can stop echoing if they start meaning something else.”

Jack: “How?”

Jeeny: “By replacing them with better ones.”

Jack: “Like what? ‘Sorry’?”

Jeeny: “No. Something real. Something earned.”

Host: The clock ticked louder, or maybe they were just listening harder. Outside, the rain began — slow, deliberate, each drop a soft percussion on the windowpane.

Jack: (after a long pause) “When I said you never listen, what I meant was… I was scared you’d stopped hearing me. And when I said you didn’t care — that was the part of me that didn’t want to admit I’d made you tired.”

Jeeny: (quietly) “And when I said you were impossible — I meant I was afraid to lose to your silence.”

(She smiled faintly — sad, but soft.)
“I think that’s what Goodall meant. Words don’t just echo because they’re cruel. They echo because they’re honest — and honesty doesn’t stop resonating just because it hurt.”

Jack: “Then maybe the trick isn’t to stop the echo.”

Jeeny: “Maybe it’s to let it guide you back.”

Host: The light flickered again — just once — and the shadows melted into stillness. For a long time, neither spoke. The rain filled the silence like forgiveness slowly arriving.

Jack: “You know, people talk about evolution like it’s something that happens over centuries. But I think sometimes it happens in a single sentence.”

Jeeny: “When we learn to speak without cruelty?”

Jack: “When we learn to speak with care.”

Jeeny: (smiling) “That’s evolution in its purest form — empathy taught by error.”

Jack: “And yet we keep making the same mistake.”

Jeeny: “Because words are easy. Meaning is work.”

Host: The rain softened into a hush — steady, healing. The bulb above them dimmed to a gentle glow, the kind that makes even regret look human.

Jeeny reached across the table, resting her hand on his. He didn’t pull away.

Jeeny: “You know, when we speak in anger, we think we’re releasing something. But we’re really planting it.”

Jack: “Seeds of what?”

Jeeny: “Echoes. They grow in the dark until you decide to replace them with something that doesn’t hurt.”

Jack: “And if you can’t?”

Jeeny: “Then you live inside the noise you made.”

Host: Jack nodded — slowly, as if each movement took effort. But there was light in his eyes again. A kind of surrender, but the kind that comes before rebuilding.

He took a deep breath, his voice low but sure.

Jack: “Then let’s plant something better tonight.”

Jeeny: (nodding softly) “Let’s.”

Host: They sat together in that small, quiet kitchen — two people surrounded by the ghosts of their own words, learning how to speak again.

Outside, the rain washed the city clean. Inside, the air began to change — softer, warmer, threaded with the fragile peace of people who had chosen gentleness over being right.

And as the night stretched on, Jane Goodall’s words echoed — not as condemnation, but as wisdom:

"Words can be said in bitterness and anger, and often there seems to be an element of truth in the nastiness. And words don't go away, they just echo around."

Host: Because words don’t die —
they linger,
they shape,
they haunt —

and sometimes, if we’re brave enough to listen,
they teach us how to speak softer next time.