I'm lying on the ground. All around me the hills are dead. The world is vast but I can barely see any of it. The ground is bone-dry, sandpaper-rough, and hard against me. All around the wind tears and screams and grates and howls, slamming into my body. Woven through the wind, into its very being, are sharp and grating grains of dust, raging and swarming in every direction. They tear into my body like a thousand tiny shards, cloud and burn in my lungs until they feel they might be bleeding. I try to shield my nose with my hand, with my clothes, with anything, but I find that it doesn't help. Everything is pain. And this isn't remotely new. But this is strange. Inside me burns and screams incomprehensible fear. And it paralyzes me, making me unable to do anything but lie on the ground and breathe the pain around me.
Suddenly I feel something warm and smooth move up my arm. I brave a glance at it, my curiosity strong against the wind. Somehow, there is no dust in my eyes. And I can see the small, green head of a snake peeking through the dust storm. It's beautiful. It's strong. It's so small and I don't know how it's holding its own in the wind. I smile. The snake slithers closer, curling its thin body around my neck. I feel a surge of protectiveness. I know I will have to find shelter or something for the bright green little snake. So I struggle and fight against the wind to stand up. I struggle and fight for every single step that I take in the swirling mass of air and dust that circles and tugs everywhere. And I keep walking, one hand pressed against the cloth on my nose and one hand hovering in front of the head of the snake.
I walk and walk until I find the eye of the storm. Everything is calm around me. I open my eyes. And I look up. The sky is a sickening, oily deep purple shade, somehow darker than the darkest sky I have ever seen.
The snake coils around a little closer to me. It's just a tiny little thing. Bright green as a fresh spring bud but with little button eyes and a pink tongue. No longer than my forearm. I feel so very protective of the little guy. I whisper to it in reassurance.
"Hey little guy. I've got you. I will protect you."
"Will you now?" I startle. The voice is deep and booming. Haughty and contemptuous and patronizing. It sends a shivering song of dread down to my very core.
I look in front of me. There, is a man. He has midnight-dark hair and hard blue eyes that remind me of dead fish. He is perched on a shining new motorcycle of red and black, accentuated by gold. It's very tall. He makes me want to cower. I step back, the howling dust storm digging into my back. I notice for the first time that I'm not wearing any clothes. Nothing to protect me against the wind and the storm and the heat and the dust and all the other elements. I'm soft. Vulnerable. And I hate it. I can't take my eyes off of the motorcycle rider. I'm too afraid to. But as I back out towards the storm, the snake ducks its head into my shoulder for protection. I can't go back out there with it. I need to protect it. This is the only safe spot.
I cover myself as best as I can with my arms. And I look the rider in the eyes.
"You don't scare me." I stand in front of him. As tall as I possibly can. He glares down contemptuously still. Doesn't see me. Not really. Suddenly he raises his palms to the sky, spreads his fingers out and curls them in like strange claws. He raises his arms and when he lowers them he brings the inky mass of dark violet above us down, down. And it descends, twisting and writhing in thick clouds. And it terrifies me.
I run into the storm. I keep running, and running, shielding the snake as best as I can with my hands. And I don't stop. I breathe hard and it feels like my lungs are burning and bleeding and being scraped away. It feels like my skin is being bitten by thousands of insects. It feels like my soul is being suffocated. But the snake is safe. The snake is still safe.
I startle up in bed. Well, not bed. The thin, threadbare sleeping roll on the floor that I sleep in. Ocotilla is beside me, her raven black hair shadowing even in the darkness of the night. She has a soft hand over baby January and on the other side of the baby is Delta. Beyond Summer Magni is sleeping. It's all so normal. Not good. Not with the exhaustion and the chemicals in the air and the knowledge that tomorrow will just be more work. But it's dark and slightly damp and too cold. I'm surrounded by my loved ones. By my family made of ties of shared pain and unquantifiable love. This is home. And yet the terror of the dream doesn't fade away into nothing as it should. It stays. Stays stays stays. More real than the silence and darkness around me.
I do not want to wake anyone. They have a long, hard, gruelling day of work ahead of them. So I lay down. And clutch my arms to my chest. And start shivering.
"Rain?" Summer's voice is drooping with sleep. Oh shit I woke her up.
"I'm okay. Just. I had a nightmare."
"Oh. I'm sorry."
"It's not your fault though."
"I know I just wish I could do something. I hope you feel better soon, for what it's worth."
"Thanks. You too."
"I wish I could help you."
She holds me. Gently. Tenderly. Almost anxiously. Like I'm baby January. And it makes me feel better somehow. We lay like that until I fall asleep again, thankfully this time to dreamless blackness.
———
I wake up and it's dawn filtering in through the cracks of the windows. Dawn would be beautiful if it didn't mark the start of another goddamn day. But it does. And another goddamn day means more goddamn work at that hot, stuffy, whirring screaming factory dying fabrics until my hands sting and my head goes dizzy. Ocotilla's lucky. She doesn't have to go until January is a bit older. But still. Raising a baby with barely any resources is not even remotely easy and is traumatizing in its own way. I don't know if I envy her or not.
Before we have to go do our work though we have half an hour to eat breakfast and get ready. And Delta is holding baby January close to his chest and lightly rocking him. And Magni and Ocotilla are preparing breakfast. And Summer is doing a rushed sweep of the room.
"Rain had a nightmare." Her voice is worried but controlled. "It was really bad. They were shivering. And dead-cold." She's a year younger than me and merely a child but I swear to God she has moments of such maturity.
Everyone turns to look at me. Thanks Summer.
"I'll pray for you," Delta promises, his voice more concerned than it ought to be. He's the concerned older brother.
"It was just a nightmare. But, holy shit it was a weird one. Really weird. I was in a dust storm. And there was a snake. A little green guy. Just small. I had to protect them. I didn't know why. But I had to try. And then ... then there was this man. On a motorcycle. And he brought with him this strange, not-quite darkness."
Ocotilla and Magni stare at me in amazement.
"Child are you sure that wasn't a prophetic dream?" She asks me.
"I ... I mean maybe."
"You've heard of the story of Eke Bonne right?"
"Which one? There are so many."
"The story of Eke Bonne becoming Eke Bonne."
Of course I'd heard of that story. Many times. There was a young slave who got captured when her lands were taken over by invaders. She was very young when this happened. Just four years old. She cried and she cried and she cried for her parents and the invaders kept her far away from them. She cried and cried for her freedom and they kept her under their power. She cried and cried for her childhood but they took that as well. She began to lose all hope. As one does.
Every night she looked up at the stars and she remembered all the stories her community used to tell her. One day she was looking at Sirenna Ele, the great wolf. And she found that there was a strange and mystical force coming over her. All her pain and misery and heartbreak and hopelessness was being transformed into rage. She was made to sleep outside but this land was warm so it wasn't much different from sleeping inside. But still it was cruel. Still it was harsh. And dehumanizing. But it was an opportunity. All the wild beasts came to her, the young, fragile sleeping girl. They taught her their powers. They taught her how to fly, how to climb, how to dive. They taught her how to burrow. How to hide. How to fight. How to slip away unnoticed. How to weave webs. How to build nests. And they taught her how to take hope and store it deep, deep, deep within herself. And they taught her to find small bits if freedom wherever she could. If even just in the depths of her thoughts. They taught her to look up at the sky and see the Lifemaker looking down upon her. And they taught her to see the misery within herself and transform it into power.
So then, then she wasn't rebellious yet. She was still a child without hope, without fight. But one day she was walking down the cut grass of the hills, carrying the bags of the invaders behind them. They were ignoring her like she was a shadow. But she was feeling angry. Not just downtrodden and ashes, but angry. She tripped, just by accident, and she fell. She felt fear spike thundering in her heart. They would yell at her. They would yell at her so hard. She knew she did not deserve it. All she thought of was escape. Quickly she transformed into a snake. Small and green to hide easily within the Living Earth. And then she slithered away. Gone.
The invaders turned and began to shout, but saw there was no-one there. Just a pile of bags and baskets on the ground. So then they looked around. And nobody was around the hills. All they saw was a little green snake slithering.
The Weapon Incarnate, one of the invaders, saw the fragility of the snake, saw the fluid movements. And she decided that she needed to capture it. She ran after it and caught the snake in her hands. But the little snake sprung back to bite her on her arm. The Weapon Incarnate screamed and let the snake go. The little girl-snake fled as fast as she could, quickly climbing a tree. The Weapon Incarnate got out her sword of death. And moved to strike the snake.
But the tree transformed. Transformed into The Lifemaker Themself and shifted and Their body was made of the Earth itself, shimmering with Life. They opened Their mouth. And out came a pouring of fire that scattered the invaders every which way yet without consuming any of the lands and the grasses. It did however send the invaders running.
Then the Lifemaker Walked on into the nighttime, the girl still coiled around her. They protected the girl and taught her how to have rebellion.
Ocotillo told me this story back when I was much younger. She was a mother to me, because she had to be, because we were all losing grasp of stability within the midst of suffering. And she loved me with the force of a thousand supernovas and she made sure I knew it.
"So do you think this snake was Eke Bonne herself?" Magni's eyes are soft with contemplative wonder.
"I think so," I state, mind soaring at the thought. Eke Bonne came to me in a dream. What does this mean? What does she want me to do?
"Well you should tell everyone of this after work," Delta states wisely. He's right. It's a good idea. I should.
"Thanks Delta."
I'm dreading another day of work but I always am.
———
Work is frantic and screamingly fast, as it always is. I'm drowning in it, as I always am.
The factory is suffocatingly hot. It always is. It's what I've had to deal with since childhood. They do not pay for adequate ventilation because they do not want to spend any money more than necessary on us. It's hard to breathe in here. It's hard to breathe and I can feel the sweat pool on my back and my throat getting dryer and dryer.
Again and again and again and again I have to put the fabric under the dying solution again and again and again and again and I have to do it quick quick quick quick quick. It makes my bones ache. I'm too young to have bones that ache. But they do ache and my joints ache and my muscles ache and they ache for hours and there's nothing I can do about it.
The work is so agonizingly monotonous. So achingly repetitive. Again and again and again and again the same motions each time. And yet I have to do it perfectly each time. It requires so much concentration. It's mind numbing and grates on my nerves. Again and again for hours until I feel as if I am drowning in it. All around me is swirling just fabric and dye and fabric and dye and my soul is dying.
The smells from the dye are noxious. They're not so bad at the beginning of the day. But they seep into my clothes and my shoes and my hair and my skin. They make me feel lightheaded and dizzy and I have I work through the dizziness until I don't know anything anymore except that I'm worth nothing.
I'm worth nothing. Worth nothing. I'll never be worth anything all that exits is fabric and dye.
The foreman is always prowling up and down the stations. Making sure we all give our blood and soul and everything to this job. I am very afraid of him. If anyone ever falls a bit slow he yells so hard it shakes me to my bones. There have even been times when he has beat people for failing to meet the horrify large quota. I cringe under his wrathful watch.
There are so many of us lined up in neat rows on the assembly line, in many parallel asssembly lines. Yet all of us are so forced to give everything in our being into our work. To concentrate on it and only it singularly. Though it's monotonous and agonizing and mind numbing. And so it feels as if we are all alone, abandoned, unseen, uncared for.
Though in the universe we truly are abandoned. If we were not abandoned we would not have to do work like this.
The minutes and hours bleed together until I have no sense of time. After seemingly an eternity of draining myself completely dry finally the foreman tells us it's time to go home.
I feel like I'm no longer alive. Like a shadow. Like a ghost. I walk through the world and yet I feel nothing except a deep weariness that reaches down deeper than my bones, down to my very core, leaving me with nothing but the taste of ash and dust in my mouth and a pounding dizziness in my head. I want to rest my soul and it feels as though rest will be something forever denied me.
We all walk like cattle down the stairs of the factory. A collection of ghosts all floating down in utter silence.
But we look at each other. We look at the silence and weariness in each others' eyes. And we see each other and ourselves reflecting in the glassy, weary eyes of every worker. We are all worn down. We are all weary. We are all ghosts. We are all people. We are all the children of The Lifemaker. And we are all feeling as though we are only ghosts and nothing more. We are together in our suffering. And we don't feel so alone. And that starts the slow and inadequate process of healing.
When we find the strength to we start smiling at each other. They are tentative, soft things. We exchange a few words with each other. And then more. So that we can start to bring each other out of the shadowy place.
Today I have very important words to say. So I look out over the crowd. And I say them.
"Eke Bonne came to me in my dreams. She sat on me as a snake and I shielded her from the dust. We hid from a rider."
In people's eyes hope sparks and flickers into a steady, sparkling light. Hope the type of which I'd never seen before. And it gives me a steady, flickering hope.
———
I am sitting on the floor in the crowded room of my neighbour. There are ten of us cramped in this room in total. People from the surrounding community. People from neighbouring communities. They are our people, all of them. Fellow workers. Fellow poor people. Fellow people who know what it's like.
Beside me on the bed is Anaka, a woman who is at the end of her life despite only being in her fifties. I softly brush my fingers though her hair, trying to give her as much comfort as I can. Lord knows she gave me comfort over the years.
She had refused treatment for her disease. Treatment was too expensive anyways and she thought that the money should go towards younger people who had lived less of their lives. She was a brave spirit.
I tell the story of my dream to all the people who are gathered here. They draw strength from it. Hope. We talk about how this dream means that Eke Bonne is with us. With our people. We talk about how it means that great things are beginning for all of our people. We talk about how I am with my people as much as I can be no matter what. And we have hope.
The dream came from me. But it belongs to the whole community. I will give it to the whole community. And that means we must all pass it on as much as possible. Share it with as many people as possible.
And so after I'm done passing my dream to this group of people I make my way to another hut to share it with the people there.
———
People press crowded around me, making this stiflingly hot day even hotter. The air is filled with dust and noise. People talk and haggle over prices. The dusty market square is filled with vendors selling mostly rice, beans, and potatoes, the poverty foods thy people can afford. I am waiting in line to buy my family some extra potatoes, a rare treat. I wait in the heard for what feels like hours, other people pressing against me and me pressing against them, until I can get a turn with the vendor. I then buy a small paper bundle of potatoes and carefully hold it in my arms as I go to where Delta and Magni said they'd meet me.
The market square isn't actually a square. It's a collection of sides and ends and alleys that are all connected together to form a strange twisted shape whose name I do not know. I come to a stop near the bottleneck where the walls on either side of us close closer for a distance and the crowd presses together. I wait here, knowing that passage through these parts is difficult and takes time.
Suddenly the people behind me press to different sides, parting the crowd.
"Please! Let me through!" A young girl calls. I look down to see gangly limbs and a mop of unkempt black hair dashing through the crowd. I shove myself to the side somehow and the people in front of me do as well as she disappears in the crowd. I can see a flash of something colourful and orange in her hand.
After that strange event the crowd goes back to normal, slowly pressing forwards. The sun is hot and my head hurts.
"Hey!" This voice is older, male, and instead of being scared it's enraged.
I startle and whip my head in the direction it booms from. There is a slightly fat, well-dressed man with hard eyes and a tall body. He stalks towards me. My heart freezes with fear as he grabs me by the shoulders and shakes me.
"Did you see where that little wench ran off to?!" His voice is forceful and demanding. I crumble under him. My mind thinks back to that little girl who is hiding in the crowd.
"No sir. Sorry," I manage to choke out. I want to protect her.
"Bullshit! You know where she went! You better tell me!"
I try not to. But he just keeps holding me there, screaming at me, for I don't know how long. He's rich enough to undo me. I know he is. I don't know why he's even at this market. I don't dare ask him.
I try to stay strong. I really do. But he's standing in front of me crowding into my space. His fine clothes and confident rage contrast against my worn rags and fear. He hold me there and holds me there. And I want so desperately to be anywhere else. I feel like a small child again, tiny against the rage of the bosses. I feel like nothing against him. There are only his desires and his demands and his wants. He holds the power here and I know it. He just keeps yelling at me and yelling at me and eventually I can't help but cave in.
"She went that way!" I blurt out, briefly pointing with my hand.
"Finally! Something useful!" He pushes me away and tries to jostle to the front of the crowd. He goes slowly. It's much harder to make room for a grown man than it is for a scrawny little girl. I hope I bought her enough time to escape.
It isn't until an hour later that I see her again. This time I'm in line to buy soap. She slips beside me like a shadow. Her voice once again startles me though she's much more quiet this time.
"Thank you for standing up to him," she whispers.
"I only stood in front of him for as long as I could before I crumbled."
"That's something." She smiles, before giving me a section of a pealed orange, and disappears back into the crowd. I put the orange in my mouth. I've never had one before. It's sweet and sour and overwhelming.
———
I stand in the middle of a desert. No not a desert. The ground is much too barren and cracked parched to be a desert. It's a land that used to be something else before it lost all its water. Before it lost all its life. All around me it's so dry that my throat aches.
I look around. And there's nothing there. I look around. And there's nothing there. I look around. And I see a tree, large and lush and crowned with emerald green leaves, standing a few yards away from me.
I walk towards the tree. And I find some cool shade under its branches. Within the tall, sure trunk of the tree I see a face. A face made out of living wood, that constantly moves and shifts in its colours and its features.
"Hello, my child." The tree opens its mouth to talk to me and a voice like a thousand voices at once comes out. Voices of every kind. Male and female and in between and neither. Young and old and in between and neither. Every voice is so concentrated with love.
"Lifemaker," I manage to speak through my awe, "you're here."
"Listen, my child. I am always with you. I am always with you all. I will always be with you all. I will always protect you and watch over you."
———
I wake up. I had a dream about the Lifemaker. I feel very honoured and awed. I remember the dream perfectly, up until when the Lifemaker said I am always with you. I do not remember the dream after that. I will have to share it with my people.
———
My soul aches. I'm sitting beside Anaka. On her death bedroll. I want as much time with her as I can. I savour each memory I have. But already I feel so achingly empty inside. I have lost loved ones before. I've lost them early and I've lost them brokenly. People like us don't live very long. Not when all we have to eat is empty calories and we work in the middle of dangerous chemicals and whatnot. Each death always leaves me empty, hollow, aching and lost in the dark. In a dark cavern from which there is no way out.
And yet I'm happy for her. Happy that she is going somewhere where she can rest. Happy that she is going to a place where she can finally be free. Free form the sickness and burden and work. Free from the back pain and joint pain that sets in young. From the headaches that are induced by chemicals and whirring machinery and razor-sharp focus. I'm happy for her as much as I am sad for us all.
And that's why I smile through my flowing tears as I sit beside her and massage her back. I can tell she's in an incredible amount of pain. I hope the pain ends soon. But at the same time I don't want to lose her, I don't want to lose her, I don't want to lose her yet.
Around me the small hut is packed crowded, more crowded than it normally is. Her family, me, some of our other neighbours, all crowding in to bid her farewell.
Her kindness will be missed. And her sharp, rebuking yet loving tongue. Her wisdom and advice will be missed. So will her anxiety and worry. Everything about her will be missed. Will be missed for years and years until we can see her again in our own deaths.
I almost can't stand being by her side. But I can't stand the thought of being away from her even more.
I feel so much hatred at the bosses. They made her work with the deadly chemicals that caused her to get this horrible sickness. Yet my anger will amount to nothing. They have all the power and we have none of it. I wish I could destroy everything.
"Listen," Anaka whispers. We all lean close. These might be her final words. " I am always with you all. I will always be with you all. I will always protect you and watch over you."
I feel her soul leaving her body through where I am resting my hand on her back. I break down into sobs. Already I miss her immensely.
But in the midst of my brokenness I remember the rest of my dream.
And as I lay down to sleep that night I whisper my dream to Ocotillo, my adopted mother.
———
I'm preparing some smashed baby food for little January in the chatter of our hut. I'm still reeling from Anaka's loss. It's still fresh, jagged, and sharp inside my chest. But work never ends. The baby needs to be fed. The food prepared. The rice bought. The clothes made.
At least I do not have to go to work today, this being the day of prayer.
There is a loud knock at the door. It makes my heart jump. Who would knock? They know that the door is open.
"Police!" Shit. What the fuck. My heart freezes.
"Police! Open up right now!"
"I'm coming!" Magni calls out. He passes baby January to Summer and opens the door and I am met with the man from the market a few weeks ago and three mean-looking officers of the law.
"We're here for Rain Arakea," they bark out.
"I'm here." My voice wavers.
"Come with us."
———
I'm sitting at a table, which wouldn't be a problem if it hadn't been for the fact that I am handcuffed to it. Around me there are six other people, all from the market on that fateful day.
There is an older woman in her forties. A man in his thirties. A child who looks to be about ten. A man who's the same age as me. A woman in her thirties. And an old man who must be fifty years old.
We all look at each other. None of us knows each other's names. But we all see our own fear, worry, and grief in each others' faces.
"Sparrow Yarbis, Winter Amelelo, Yallayi Keylann, Spruce Sardardo, Savannah Collami, Rain Arakea, Fellowma Geogeni. You have all been brought here in relation to a theft that happened on the fourth of April." The police officer's eyes are hard, and dead, and dangerous. Like a viper ready to strike. His words are hard and serrated like a saw. He stands menacingly tall and well-muscled. I fear him. I look around the room. Everyone is filled with fear. Yet still. There's a spark between us. Something in their eyes as well.
"One upstanding and revered Carlton Bradbury was at the open market getting food for his servants as that day his servants were being punished and were not allowed to leave the estate. Lord Bradbury was at that location when he had an orange of his stolen by a young miscreant. We have ascertained that you lot were there and saw the miscreant firsthand. Your job now is to give us as many details as you can about her so we can find her and deliver her to justice."
I know what justice looks like in the eyes of the powerful. It looks brutal. Death even was a better option than to languish in the labour camps they put prisoners in. The young girl was probably hungry. Better yet, the young girl probably saw the chance to taste something only the rich and powerful could taste. And she took it. Probably a combination of both. She is young. Too young to understand the consequences of her actions. Yet young enough to be enraged by the injustice of the world and its hierarchies.
And she is hope. I don't know how a small act of thievery could give me hope. But it does. But it is. And I look around the room. Past the police officers with their handcuffs and guns and towards the people sitting handcuffed to the table, all thinking the same thoughts about the girl who captured our imaginations, who the police meant to capture. They are all dazed by her. Amazed by her. And so am I.
But the police are going to capture her.
But I look around again. There is hope in the eyes of the people. There is rage. There is strength. There is something that the police can't even see. Could never see. We don't know each other's names but we know all the names of each other. Sparrow. Winter. Yallayi. Spruce. Savannah. Fellowma. Those are strong names. Powerful names. Their parents were thinking of the stories when they picked them out. I remember the stories now. The stories are always with us. But even more powerfully the bonds of love are always with us.
The police officer first goes up to the old man. He is at the end of his life. The cop cannot take an old man and interrogate him.
"Now tell me," the cop barks out, grabbing the man by his shoulders, "everything you remember about the thief." The old man looks at the cop crowding into his space. He looks past him towards all of us. I try to give him as much strength as I can with my eyes. He's strong. He's strong. Whatever he chooses to do I hope he stays strong. Finally he opens his mouth to speak.
"I am an old man. My memory is failing me. I do not remember her." I know this is a lie. And I am astounded.
The cop looks enraged. It fills me with fear. He has all the power.
"Tell me what you know!" He screams, shaking the man.
"I told you all I know. My mind is old and it is failing me." The cop has all the power. And yet. How convincingly this old man lies.
The police officer questions him for an hour. And we all look at him with eyes that are amazed. We all look at him with mouths that are astounded. And we give him our strength. And he gives us strength.
Finally we are all weary at the long interrogation. But the police officer looks over to his coworker and says,
"These poor people expire fast. Their minds are weak and feeble and fall quickly to the senility of old age. Perhaps it is true that this man does not remember. No-one can withstand our interrogation for an hour unless they are telling the truth."
I can barely believe what I just witnessed. In the dust and the heat and the entrapment of this police station the man managed to trick the enforcers of our world. I look around. No-one else can believe it either. Yet here we all are.
The police officer then walks up to the child. They look up at him with big eyes. He looks down at them with pure hatred.
"You have the rest of your life in front of you. If you want to find work in the future I suggest that you tell me what you know." We all freeze. That's a very grave threat. We look at the child. With kindness in our eyes. Children need kindness. Especially in this unkind world. We do not know how we want the child to answer. We can only support them as much as we can. And wait.
"I don't know what she looked like. I wasn't paying attention." The child's voice rings clear and sweet and though it wavers with fear there is something strong behind it.
"Bullshit! You're lying you little wretch!" The cop screams in their face. They shrink back. They look at us. We look back at them sympathetically. And they look back up at the police officer with determination behind their eyes. They endure his screaming with a blank face. I know it's breaking them inside. I can see the fear in their eyes. But still they stay strong. If they can win against a police officer that will be a victory unlike no other.
"I'm not lying," they say meekly, "I was not paying attention."
The police continue to yell and rage at them. But they hold firm. I don't know how. And we continue to give them as much kindness and strength as we can. Until finally the police give up on them too.
"The children of the workers are very badly taught," one officer says to another, "they cannot be expected to pay attention to the simplest of things."
And so the child too is let go.
They turn them to the woman in her thirties. Her eyes hold a tiredness that has no place in a person, let alone a person so young.
"Tell us what the thief looked like!" He slams the table in front of her. She startles. Her eyes dart around, as quick as a hummingbird. And she sees the old man. She sees the young child. She sees all of us with our faces set with growing determination and blossoming awe. And she sees the way a breeze of hope blows invisible through the hot and stifling room.
"I wasn't paying too much attention. I don't have a good eye for detail. I don't notice the way things look. I remember she had black hair. And her skin was dark from the sun. She was not too tall. Though that can be expected of children." Those details don't help at all. Everyone in this land has dark hair. Everyone has dark skin. Except the rich and powerful ones who have never had to work under the sun, and have lightened skin.
"I cannot believe this! Surely you have noticed more details! Stop lying!" The police officer screams into her face. He grabs her by the shoulders. His large fingers slide close to her chest. She does not give in. And in her I see the strength of generations of women who worked and toiled and suffered and hugged their loved ones. And in her I see hope.
She endures the barages from the police and their casual violence and she keeps on insisting that she did not notice anything of note. I can tell that everyone in the room is getting weary. The police are getting weary. The people are getting weary. And yet still the woman has strength. And yet still we give her our strength.
And the police finally relent.
"Women from the lower ranks are not like our women. They do not have attention to form and style and detail. It's not so implausible to believe that she did not notice the details of how the thief looked."
Then they ask the younger man what he noticed. But for a full hour he holds out the lie that he was too busy ogling the women of the marketplace to pay attention to a scrawny little girl. And they believe him.
They turn to the older woman. She says that she was so tired in that day she was floating on a haze of exhaustion and scarcely noticed her surroundings.
They ask the older man. And he says that he was so angry that day about all the mischief his children had caused that he did not even notice the mischief the little girl had caused.
And finally they turn to me. And they hold me there. And they scream at me. It's just like the man at the market. Except worse.
But I've seen too many amazing things to crumble under it this time. I look around. Everyone is exhausted. But everyone is looking at me with secret embers glowing in their eyes. We're almost out. We're almost free. The little girl is almost free. An orange has been eaten by our people and there will be no consequences. If we can come together and pull through for one last hour. If I can sit under the police officers and take the lead.
"She ran so fast through the crowd I only noticed her dark hair," I say, "and then I never saw her again."
———
As soon as I get home from the police station I lie under the blanket and fall asleep. I felt a wave of exhaustion crash over me the second I stepped out of those doors a free person. I did not realize just how much terror and stress I was holding on to while I was in there. But the sense of relief makes it almost worth it.
Sleep envelops me in darkness for a while. But then I find myself back in the dust storm. My lungs bleed and my throat burns. The dust-infused wind scrapes on my skin and the soles of my feet are dry and cracked. I can barely open my eyes for fear of the dust blowing into my eyes and blinding them. My eyelashes offer me bare protection.
But again the snake is on my shoulder. Little Eke Bonne is on my shoulder. And I lift my hands to protect her. I walk on my parched and bleeding bare feet, through the storm, looking for some kind of shelter. But all around us there is nothing. Nothing but the biting dust and the raging wind.
I finally see another figure shillouetting in the storm. They move quietly on their feet like me. And I walk towards them. And they walk towards me. We reach each other and I can make out their shape much more clearly now. They wear rags like I do. And on their shoulder is another little green snake. Another little Eke Bonne. We walk together through the storm.
Off in the distance, over the dust dunes, we see two more figures walking along, together. We walk towards them and join up, the four of us walking together. They are ragged. Bleeding. They carry little Eke Bonnes on their shoulders. Walking in formation, the wind seems a little less strong. We take turns walking in front, shielding the people behind us from the wind. We walk without direction. But not without aim. Shelter. Shelter. There must be shelter somewhere. For ourselves and for the snakes.
We meet up with three other walking people. Then two more. Then four. Then six. Then three. Then one. We keep meeting more people until I have lost count of how many people are with us, walking, together. The storm cuts into us less now that our bodies shield each other from the winds. And yet the the storm still cuts.
Off in the distance I see flashes of blue. Blue sky. I turn to the others on either side of me. Without speaking, we all start walking towards the blue sky. It's hard work. Our feet bleed. Our arms bleed. But finally we all emerge out of the wind into the brilliant blue sky and the cool, still air. The ground is still patched and dry. Bits of dust still dig into the cuts on our feet. But we walk forwards. We walk on.
I can see everyone's faces now. We're a crowd. An army. Innumerable faces adorn the crowd, intimately familiar and entirely unfamiliar and everything in between. These are all my people. The ordinary people. The poor people. The workers. We are the people of the land. And the land weeps. But the land loves us. And we will return to it one day.
In front of us is a river. It curls and flows onwards through the parched earth, cool and blue, a perfect mirror to the sky. Behind the river the soil is rich and dark and moist. There is green grass that grows tall and wild, and all manner of herbs and shrubs. And behind that extends a forest that is green and deep and infinite. The sight of it fills me with hope. Fills me with longing. But in front of the river is the problem.
There stands a row of riders. All like the one that scared me so in the dream last time. They are mounted on motorcycles of different colours and different styles. They take their helmets off and stare us down. Mean and hard and devoid of and love, and of life. They extend their hands, curl their fingers like claws. And from their hands manifests an oily, inky, polluted black.
But I find myself not as afraid as I was before. I am surrounded by people, by my people, and there are more of us than there are of them. It doesn't mean that I am not afraid, no. I am filled with fear at seeing the power these riders have. The way they stand with their mounts and their helmets and their hard, hard eyes. The promise of torture and death they hold for anyone who dares cross them. And yet.
I feel hands grasp my own. I clutch back. I look around. People are holding hands. Are standing beside each other. Are standing up tall against the riders.
We are not going back into the storm.
———
I wake up. It's morning. Everyone is already awake. Shit I have to get ready for work.
"Did you have another nightmare, yabhi?" Magni asks solemnly.
"No," I reply, "I know how our people can win against them."
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