The Golden Dream

CHAPTER I

        Thank God it's Saturday. The alarm goes off at 6:30 AM, I get out of bed and wash my face. My eyes are still red from last week's dust. I prepare breakfast: beans, bread and a glass of water. It's the best breakfast someone like me can have. My sister and mother are still asleep. My mother woke up twice to vomit last night and after several hours of trying she finally fell asleep. My sister is too young to understand what's happening, the only thing that makes me happy is that she is seven and she is studying. It's the best thing in this house, If she keeps going to school she won't have the same life as I do.

I put my helmet pickaxe in my backpack. The pickaxe is already worn down and soon I'll have to buy another. I cannot rely on the ones they give us, they are old and rusty and are as sharp as a spoon. It is better to invest in your own equipment because it makes the job easier. Today is Saturday, Speech Day, we will gather downtown, I wonder who will be the victim today.

I leave the house and walk downtown, the crowd of workers were going there too, and the color of their skin is as dark as mine. Malagueña is a small mining village, here you are born to mine and mine to die. My neighbor is a miner, my friends are miners, my father was a miner, his father, and just how destiny would have it, and I will live and die breaking stones. I only hope it will be quick and painless, that my sister will be old enough and my mother is healthy so they can take care of each other. After all, it will be one less mouth to feed and with what my mother earns selling clothes they should survive.

People already gathered, their faces are the same as always: immutable. This is common on any given Saturday. Actually, it's an everyday thing. I make my way through the crowd, to see who will be punished today. A familiar face: Ronaldo. I don't know him well, I cannot say we are friends but we have common interests. He probably did it for money. I know his younger brother was bitten by a mosquito last week and got infected with malaria, same old story. He is kneeling with his hands tied to the front.

In front of him stands General Fabio Santos, a big strong man, with military clothes and a red beret on his head. His skin is a trademark of the people here, black as coal. His machete is always hanging from his belt. "The Judge" he calls it, because it is the one who decides what to remove and what to leave.

General Santos draws "The Judge" and cut Ronaldo's ties. The guerrilla soldiers take his left arm and stretch it to the front. The fear in his eyes was the same as all the people who go through this.

The general draws up a gold nugget from his pocket and shows it to the multitude. It isn't a large piece, but on the black market you could sell it to buy medicine to treat malaria.

"Why are we here, my brothers?" The general asks. The audience keeps silent. We knew why we were here, we just don't know what he want us to answer "Is it about gold or is it about a petty thief?"

"This person" The general says pointing at Ronaldo. "In his selfishness took something that does not belong to him and today he will pay the consequences. We are not here for this insignificant piece of gold or for the thief himself, we are here for you. This dirty thief didn't steal from The Bosses or me. No, he did something far worse: he stole from the people, from you."

"What is this?" continued the general as he shows the gold nugget to his audience. "Can anyone tell me what it is?"

"Death!" yells a voice from the crowd.
"It is not death" the general refutes. "On the contrary, what we have here is the life itself. This, my friends, is what puts food on your table, what gives you clean water and medicine for your families. Every time one of us, led by our selfishness, decides to take that which doesn't belong to us, that which belongs to the people, we die. We don't meet every Saturday so you can remember what happens if you steal from the people. No, no, no, we already know that. We're here every Saturday in order to protect what is rightfully yours. We are here for you."