Panda Heart

I am woken up by a pain in my back. I guess I did not hear them bang on the doors again.

“Get the fuck up!!”, I hear as I am jabbed again.

I fly up and run out of the room, grabbing my bucket as I almost slip to reach down for it. I missed our first meal again, this will be a long day. I won’t get another one until we are done for the day. I run as fast as I can until I see the line of us, waiting for another day in the sun mining for our grey rocks with shiny crystals in them. If I don’t hurry, I will not get as much water today. I make it to the back of the line, just in time, stomach growling and in pain. Not much I can do, if I ask questions, I am usually beaten and sent to “entertain” the ones that come at night.

“Move out. RUN!! MOVE IT!! MOVE IT!!” This usually signals the start. Everyone sprints as fast as they can out of the door, half of us fall down as the others push their way outside. The ones that fall down are hit until they get out of the door. They will have a busy night. I manage to jump over those in front of me and make my way to the trucks outside. I am blinded by the sunlight, as the inside is dark, with very little light. I know where I need to go and my body just takes me there. After some time, we are greeted by more sunlight, as we ride blindfolded. I jump out of the back, sprint over to my place and pull my tool out of the bucket and immediately begin hitting the ground. Please, please, please let me make my quota today.

Yesterday I did not make it and I woke up late because I could not move after I was allowed to leave the “Fun Time”. I do not like that. I would rather dig for three years straight than to have another night of that.

“How do your eyes feel today?”Carlos asks me.

“Not that bad this time. I only had to do that once.”, I say, trying not to cry and feeling if they are still sore. “The other was not fun either.” I stare at my spot and start digging with all this pain. Why did I have to do this every day? I stare at the sky and wonder if the rest of the ruined world is like this.

“WATER!! HURRY THE FUCK UP AND GET BACK TO DIGGING!! ONE MINUTE FOR ALL OF YOU!!”

We rush the water bucket and fight for even a drop of water. We have gotten used to this and we have worked on rushing it quickly and in a way that we can each run past and get a handful of water. If only I was that lucky today. As I run from my spot, I slip and hit my chin on the rocks. I am stunned and stumble towards the bucket. The person standing by it waves me over.

Right as I get to it, he kicks it over. “I SAID ONE MINUTE FOR ALL OF YOU!! IF YOU CAN’T GET HERE IN THAT TIME, I GUESS YOU ARE THIRSTY!!! BACK TO WORK!!”

I am able to at least grab some mud water from the ground and at least get my mouth wet. I run back to my spot and start digging away again. I think they treat us this way to work harder but since I have known nothing but this, I don’t think about it. I know I feel like it is not right but I accept it. Like they tell us, “If anyone wanted us, they would not have us. We are your family. We take care of all of you and that is better than anyone else would do.”

I pull my tool out of the ground and get sprayed with more dirt, this gets into my swollen eyes and stifle a scream. You can’t speak, even in pain, without getting more pain, one way or another. I wipe them as gently as I can and work even more. I find my first grey stone and place it in the bucket. Finally, I am going to be fine. Just keep digging and things will be fine.

By the time the water is called again, I have half of the bucket filled. I run towards the bucket and this time I am able to get a big handful of water and suck it down fast. Time to turn around and run back. As I am running back, my foot twists and I fall down. My face is pressed into a wet spot, but the water bucket is behind me. Ugh. One of them must have gone here. I stand up and run faster to my spot. I have more work to do. More stones to gather. I will be fine tonight, I know it.

“Did you hear about Gloria?” Carlos asks as we both dig, not looking at each other.

“No. I saw them there last night. Just through the door as it was opened for someone else. Did she come back?”

“She was strung up in the eating area. We were all given half our food today and reminded to never say NO. I am going to miss her. She was only here for a few days but she was fun to talk to. Did you know that she worked somewhere else?”

“No. There are other places like this?”, I ask as my eyes get wide. How much of the world is like this? How many people go through this stuff?

“She said once that she heard of hundreds of these places. Scattered throughout the world. Usually hidden. Protected.” He stops digging for a second to wipe his eyes of tears. We both steal a look at each other, nod, and get back to digging.

I DID IT!! I MADE QUOTA!! I hide my smile as they slam my bucket back to me, knocking the wind out of me and hurting my ribs. I don’t even whimper. I am safe tonight and I will be able to sleep better. I am so relieved that I almost fell asleep before I finally eat today. I grab my cup of food and run back to my room. Carlos is in there, crying. He did not meet his quote today and he was not fed. I sit next to him and we share my cup.

I hear Carlos come back that night, along with the others in the room. They are thrown in their beds and make no noise of pain until the door is closed. Once the footsteps walk away from us, you hear them all cry into their pillows. I crawl into bed with Carlos and we cry together until we fall asleep.

I hear the banging on the door today and make sure I nudge Carlos awake but he is not in bed. As we run down to eat, I ask one of the kids if they heard anything last night. They shake their heads and then we all stop as we enter the room. There he is. Hung up on the wall, eyes bulging out. His wrists are nailed to the wall and his hands and feet are missing. He is still breathing but it is very slow now. It won’t be long and he will be free. I hope so at least.

After we eat up, we run over to the line, get into our trucks and then out to our spots. Andy takes Carlos’ spot and he is already digging. I take my tool out and start digging. I noticed that one of the rocks came out very easily. As I pull it out to put in my bucket, I catch a glimpse of something behind it. I put the rock in my bucket and grab the thing behind it. It is on a golden chain and the heaviest part of it is in the shape of a heart. I see that the heart is pink and sparkling in the sun, with a hinge on the side. It is the most beautiful thing I have ever seen. I don’t how long I stared at this but the water call broke me of its trance. I stuff it quickly into my underwear and run to get a handful of water.

Each time I started to dig, I thought about that heart. The color, the way it sparkled in the sun. How could something that beautiful be in a place so dark? I kept getting preoccupied and barely missed my quota. A part of me wanted to cry and the other part just wanted to look at this all night. It was way better than that teddy bear. Where did it come from? How did it get here? What….what would happen if I was caught with it? I did not want to think about that. I just wanted to get back to the room and look at it.

I skipped dinner that night. I was not hungry, just amazed by this heart. I held it in my hands and just laid on the bed and must have fallen asleep…

I wake to the sound of the door squeaking open. It must be time to “entertain” again. Clutching the heart in my hand, I get up and make my way to the door but I am stopped. I look up and notice that three guards are walking around looking at the others in the room. Strange, no yelling. One of them walks over to me and squats down, placing a hand on my shoulder. I flinch as he says, “It’s ok. Come with me.”

The voice is…...nice sounding. What is going on? I have never been talked to that way. Just yelling and hitting.

I flinch as the person reaches for me. What happens next still makes me cry. This person takes off his mask, showing his blonde hair and beautiful blue eyes, smiles at me, points to his sleeve, and pulls down a piece of cloth to show me something.

“What is that?”, I ask. I had never seen that…….wait a minute! That is the heart on the locket! “Who are you? I have seen that before.” I lift my hand to show the man what I had found yesterday.

“I know. We almost had to drop another one. We did not think anyone would find this. You are holding a GPS device. We had one of the others, a very quiet woman, who can sneak up on anyone, place it two days ago. This is what helped us find this place. Come with me. You are now safe. Come on.”

He gently takes my hand and just smiles at me with tears in his blue eyes. I stand up, my head feels light. I almost fall over, he quickly bends down and he just picks me up in his arms. He squeezes me and it is the best thing I have ever known. We walked out of the room. “Now I will cover your eyes as we walk. You have been through enough and don’t need to see some of this stuff. They put up a fight, they always do.” He covers my eyes and I hear his heartbeat. So calming. The next thing I know, we are outside. This time it is different. This time, my dystopian story ends.