Once

The Prompt

Write a story that ends in a desert setting with this last sentence:

Engulfed in the desert's parched silence, I was nothing but another grain of sand in the wind.

The music is "Cool Water" by Frankie Laine

Once

This used to be green fields with farmsteads. Families grew crops and raised livestock. They sold their produce and markets and all made a thriving community.

There was a school and a village hall and everyone supported each other.

Everyone watched out for each other and had good fulfilling lives.

Then everything changed.

The village was deserted, the buildings were derelict and what were once green fields had been overrun by the sands and dust of the desert.

It was decided that the lifeblood of the community, the water was required for corporate products.

The water came from mountain springs and rains that fed into the river, it was owned only by The Earth. That was until the Corporation bought the government, which then passed a law that The Corporation could take all the water it required.

The Corporation redirected the river to its bottling factories to sell at a premium price in cities. It was legal because a law had been passed.

The village officials contacted their representatives in Congress asking how this could be allowed. The answer was:

"Because it is legal. It is the law. If you challenge it you will be fined or even jailed. The law must be obeyed"

The village officials responded:

"Our water has been stolen. Without it, our village will die. The water comes from the Earth and is for everyone. Now you are telling us that it is only for those who will pay money to The Corporation."

Congress responded:

"The Law must be obeyed"

So the village officials left and came back to report on the situation.

The only water they could get was from any rain, but that was infrequent, and the barrels were all virtually empty.

People started to abandon their homes and farms. They had to eat.

Banks foreclosed on mortgaged properties and they were left to rot.

The fields turned to dust and the sand blew in, covering what once had provided sustenance for the village.

Now I look over the deliberate destruction of a community in the name of money. The Corporation bought the government which then passed the law. It is amazing how a law can be enforced no matter how immoral it is. The only justification is that is legal, but that is just changing the rules of the game to benefit certain interests.

And so I am here, the last occupant of what was once my village, which will soon sink beneath these desert sands, and no one will know that it ever existed.

I stand realizing that I didn't make a difference, as far as this world was concerned I was nothing. I paid my taxes, I worked hard, and I helped others, but in the end, it didn't matter.

I didn't have money, and apparently in the modern world that is all that counts. If I stay here I will die of thirst and then become one with the desert sands.

Everyone else has left to find something in the city, but that is not where I want to be. So I look over the rippling sands, blown by the wind. There is not a single blade of grass or animal or puddle here now, just sand and dereliction.

I stand thinking about how the law can be used to cause destruction, I need to leave and want to put things right but engulfed in the desert's parched silence, I was nothing but another grain of sand in the wind.