Walking Dollar Bills

Chapter 10: Riding the Winds of Change on a Bird's Back

Exhaustion.

Amara wills her legs to take the next step forward. For her, each step feels like a mile, and each mile feels like an inch closer to death. She grips the straps of her backpack and strains her eyes at an image in front of her.

Five massive smokestacks exhale viscous black smoke into the sky causing the natural white clouds to mingle with the toxic black clouds that invade their space.

"A factory" mutters Amara.

She limps closer to the building. Her feet sink into the deep pools of sand that drown the ground. Her cheeks are flushed and a wet coat of perspiration masks her face like make-up.

Amara reaches a sturdy brick wall and places her hands against it for balance. She takes large breaths that pale in comparison to the smoke the smokestacks produce.

"I made it. All alone, but I made it. The sixth ring of the Benevolent district" heaves Amara.

Amara presses her body against the brick wall, turns so that her back is against it, and then slides to the ground on her backside.

"The entrance is on the other side. I need to..."

Amara's eyelids clamp shut and she collapses onto her side. Thankfully, she unconsciously rolls over on her back, which prevents the sand from blocking her air passages and suffocating her. Symbolically, Amara's lifeless body serves as a warning sign to those approaching the factory. Paradoxically, the unconscious girl on the outside is better off than the conscious girls inside the factory. Whereas Amara represents the body in the casket, the factory workers represent the buried alive.

***

The inside of the factory is a sweatshop. Hundreds of women pack into a rectangular room with high ceilings, no windows, and no air conditioning. Eight workstations slice up the room. The stations extend from one end of the wall and stop short of touching the other end. Two tables sit on the left and right of the workstations. There are ten total tables on the workstation: five on each side. A narrow bench built into the floor seats three women, although there is only enough space for two. Between both tables are open slots, where baskets of rolled silk, rotary cutters, fabric pens, needles, silk pens, and other items await use by the women.

As the hundreds of women diligently focus on their task, one woman swiftly moves from one station to the other. She wears a brown silk dress that falls to her ankles and she has shoulder length black hair tied in a bun. A patch with the number "689" clings to the front of her dress. All of the women have patches with numbers on their dresses.

"Just imagine. What if we planned a walk-out? We could shut down the entire economy. Us!" whispers the woman.

"Byrd, you're just going to get yourself and your family thrown into a prison cell. Is that really what you want?" replies a young woman (17), who keeps her eyes focused on her sewing.

Byrd frowns and quickly dips below the woman. A male supervisor looks in her direction with curious eyes that linger for a long moment before he shifts his attention to other women.

Byrd checks that the coast is clear and then continues,

"They can't throw all of us in prison. Who would work in these silk factories?" says Byrd.

"Oh, Byrd. Please just fly away. You've been around me for too long. I don't want people to think I'm working with you or something" pleads the woman.

Byrd relents and scurries over to another station, but just as she takes a seat, a supervisor moves behind her.

"Number 689. The boss would like you to report to his office" says the supervisor.

Byrd hides a grimace underneath a faux smile.