Johnna Adams’ “Gidion’s Knot” in an immensely emotional play constructed for two women. The power of the drama gets its due and then some from actresses Jen Klika and Alanna Romansky at None Too Fragile Theater’s production of this play.

Jen Klika and Alanna Romansky in “Gidion’s Knot.” Photo courtesy of None Too Fragile

Go see it. You’ll be glad you did.

It’s hard to write about it, because to tell too much would be to undercut the whole point of the story – unraveling the turns and twists of what happened to Gidion. When you think of the allusion of the title to the idea of the Gordian Knot, you can see what’s at stake. In that mythological setting, the famed Gordian Knot was slickly and seemingly magically put together with a challenge to one and all to see if they could undo how it was done.

None could. One version has it that the famous Alexander the Great tried, couldn’t, and never to be at a loss to conquer and solve something, took a sword and simply sliced through it. It fixed the problem, to be sure, but didn’t solve the mystery.

This much is safe to say. Gidion was suspended from his fifth-grade class by teacher Heather (Alanna Romansky). Before his mother Corryn (Jen Klika) could take the school up on the offer of a parent/teacher conference, Gidion committed suicide.

Corryn shows up for the appointment anyway, much to the surprise of Heather, and wants to know what happened to her little boy.

The remainder of the play is basically the stripping away of layers of Gidion’s story. It is an intense journey as both teacher and mother have all their previous assumptions and conclusions undone by snippets of facts creeping into the stories they’ve told one another.

It’s a heart-wrenching tale. How could it not be, when faced with a grieving mother suffering the loss of her only child? Jen Klika is amazing in the role. She captures the mother’s distress, anger, frustration, consternation, guilt, and you name the emotion, with palpable power as she keeps coming at the hesitant Heather so she can find out the truth.

Teacher Heather (Alanna Romansky) has reason to be hesitant. Clearly school officials (who are afraid to show up) have cautioned her about legal ramifications. She also knows things of the child she’s not sure the mother really needs to know about her son after he’s gone – perhaps preferring to live on memories rather than messy new truth she cannot work out.

Romansky plays all that skillfully, yet keeps a strong undercurrent going that one imagines gets overlooked because of Corryn’s tale. Heather has her own problems and issues. It isn’t always easy to let someone else’s grief trump your own or to allow their emotions to have some sort of moral hauteur over your own.

Director Sean Derry handles the shifting scene deftly. For the most part he keeps the characters away from one another – as though wary and a little stalking. They come together when it counts – namely, when something important is going to be said or announced.

Go see the play – for one thing, to find out all that the characters do as they talk to one another, and for another, to watch some superb stagecraft as these two actresses do their thing

Johnna Adams’ “Gidion’s Knot” will be performed at 7:30 p.m. on Thursday; 8 p.m. on Friday and Saturday; 2 p.m. and 7:30 p.m. on Sunday; and 7:30 p.m. on Monday through April 19. The play is being staged at None Too Fragile Theater in Pub Bricco, 1841 Merriman Rd., Akron; 330-6761-4563;  www.nonetoofragile.com. Tickets are $20 (or pay what you can).