Natural Order

Hot air filled her lungs, suffocating and scorching her from the inside out.  It was always hot those days, and it had been hot decades longer than her seven-year-old son could remember.  It was getting worse, no denying it.  She only ventured out when there was no other choice, and only in the early parts of the day.  Water was the main concern--the well could only be reached in the early morning or middle of the night when the sun gave slight reprieve.  She always went in the morning, though, when the lines were short.  Of course there were others closer to the well, richer, with nearly unlimited rations, but she did what she could to get by.  

A wheelbarrow full of large clay jars tottered along in front of her, pushed by blistered hands.  The ground already seared through her thin-soled sandals, lancing her thick calluses with fiery spears.  She was strong, and a good thing too--the twenty minute walk from her house had killed more than a few younger, healthier neighbors.  Her lungs were caked with tobacco tar, her eyes foggy from too much sun, and her heart pumped thick blood irregularly through hardening veins.  Still, she trekked every day because her son couldn’t make the journey for himself.

The air cooled a bit as she approached the well.   Still only halfway there, she stopped to rest for no more than thirty seconds or so, in the shade of a house larger than hers, with a small potted cactus by the door.  These neighbors had enough water to keep it alive, which was practically a miracle.  People did what was needed for their own survival, and she didn’t begrudge them.  Small things like a potted plant could be all one had to cling to.  She had her son, her own little cactus in the desert, and she was grateful for what little time she had left with him.

A few yards in front of her, a bird fell dead in the street.  She mourned its loss, so near the well where it could have rested and regained some small strength.  Not many birds were left anymore, and she was always sad to see another succumb to the bludgeoning sun.  She remembered the birds--whole flocks of them, hundreds at a time, singing in trees and pecking cheerily at fields of corn.  She sang their stories to her son while he slept his long, fitful sleep.  She told him of the shade, and of the green--a color he’d never seen and probably never would.  Even her old photographs had been bleached white by celestial fire.

She trudged toward the brilliant white box--white paint kept the well cool, and the water from drying up like so many others baking empty in the desert.  When the well goes dry, so too does the town.  She imagined hundreds of thirsty residents wandering the desert for miles, searching in vain for an untouched puddle, until strength failed at last.  She’d seen it before--caravans in the distance, too far to reach her town and likely unwelcome even if they could.  “Encroachers” they called newcomers--threats to the precious resource at the center of town.  Even one extra mouth to supply, or one person failing to follow the natural order of things, threatened survival.

The well loomed, approaching slowly in her failing vision.  Slow and steady steps kept her jars from toppling to the ground to shatter.  A grey-suited man, muscles bulging beneath the fabric, stood under a sun-rotten canopy.  Each resident had their role, and his was to protect the well--a role bequeathed by the Night Goddess upon the strongest, able to withstand the heat. 

He nodded respectfully.  She approached and the man slid a heavy stone door on its track to open a gap just wide enough for her to slip through with her cart.  A long, winding ramp spiraled the side of the cistern, down, down, hundreds of feet to the cool water’s edge.  She longed for its touch, for the reprieve it offered from the torrid desert above.  It was forbidden to touch the nectar of the Night Goddess.  She sent a cleansing prayer to the night, then carefully, soas not to taint the precious liquid, dipped her jars into the reservoir, savoring the sweet trickling music.  Reverently she filled each jar, replacing it with care in her barrow.  Pausing for a final glance at the dark water, concern welled within her.  The water was falling.  Of course she knew the Night Goddess reigned over the waters.  She knew the deity would provide as She saw fit, but the protruding measuring lines worried her nonetheless.  She faltered her way up and out into the garish daylight.  The temperature had risen at least twenty degrees, and she made her way home with painstaking care, but as hastily as she dared.

Her ration went quickly throughout the day, between her own mostly neglected needs and her constant work to keep her son cool and at peace in his long sleep.  By the evening the jars were dry and she fell into a parched but restful slumber.  What happened in the night was up to the Night Goddess.  Surrendering control to Her for the night was comforting as it was unsettling.  She dreamed of the old times--of rolling in cool grass, fresh vegetables on the table, and of great pools of water, three times the size of the Well, where children would splash and play--water unfit for drinking, wasted for a few moments of leisure.  She dreamed, too, of rivers and lakes, and creatures that lived in them.  When she awoke she questioned if those things existed at all, or if they were feverish dreams.  Of course they had existed, she remembered from her childhood.  Pausing only a moment to remember cooler days, she collected her jars and barrow and ventured into the heat again.

 She approached the well, and the grey-suited conservator. He shook his head slowly.  The gesture sapped her hope and her strength.  She rendered a deep, understanding bow.  No rest at the well before her journey home, but she would make it.  The Night Goddess saw fit to withhold her nectar that day.  It had happened before; less water flowed into the dying well and with each withholding, the town shrank.  Her turn had come, as she knew it would one day.  

She gave thanks to the Night Goddess on the blistering journey home--thanks for her son, thanks for life beyond that of her neighbors, and thanks for the all-knowing wisdom of the Well.  She did not pause to bid farewell to the little potted cactus, or to acknowledge the sun-bleached bird desiccated in the road.  No time for such things on this day.  Reaching her door, she collapsed, dizzy from the heat and cotton-mouthed.

Strength regained, she set her jars outside in a little row to match the empty houses of her neighbors.  Her son, slight of frame from his long sleep, she carried easily and set into the barrow.  She covered him in white cloths, reserving just one for her own head, and made her way out into the day once more.  Her wrinkled hand caressed the doorframe, thanking the Night Goddess for the home.

The day grew hotter, sun high above.  The cloth head covering did little to assuage the angry rays.  The city had been expansive once, but this was not the first time the water had fallen in the Well.  She was not the first to don the white cloth and wander into the daylight.  It was custom.  It was natural.  It was the circle of life as dictated by the Night Goddess.  Everyone followed the natural order.  One selfless act threatened the collective.

Bones of predecessors lay disintegrating in the streets, wind-tossed cloths still clinging to some.  A dust-devil twirled in what she thought had been a lush park decades ago--as good a spot as any for the long rest.  Her cloth dried, no more sweat moistening her brow.  Her son’s cloths were dry against her hand as well and his shallow breaths rasped in her ears.  At least he was asleep--that comforted her.

Her eyes swam.  Houses bent and distorted in front of her.  The road stretched and sprang back.  She blinked against the dizzying display.  It made her head ache, dull and deep, her quick pulse fluttering painfully in the back of her neck.  Her lungs gasped buckets of scorching air.  The old park seemed an eternity away as her legs struggled to move through viscous heat, elastic ropes pulling against every step.  She paused a moment, slumping against her barrow.  This was the trek thousands made before her, and the trek awaiting a few hundred more when the well dried.  Many set out with hope of finding a new pool of mercy from the Night Goddess--telling themselves stories of an oasis paradise just on the other side of the city.  She knew better.  She knew her fate was with the dry bones around her, and that was okay.  She had no need for lies or fairytales of fresh flowing water and cool shade; she had her son, and he was enough.

A crumbling skull and ribcage who could have very well been her neighbor two years before, turned to look at her, beckoning with a bony arm.  A skeletal bird flapped featherless wings above her, diving at the barrow’s precious cargo but flitting away before she could swat it with her cracked and wrinkled hand.  It dove again, and again.  She swatted again, and again.  One swat slipped through the creature’s body, as if it were just a mirage.  As she stumbled forward, she knew it was just a trick of her sunbaked mind but still she struck at it.  Her footing slipped, sending the barrow skittering down the road.  Her son tumbled out.  On blistering hands and knees, she crawled toward him through thickening air, yelping with each touch of the searing dirt.  

The Night Goddess wrapped her in cool, comforting shadow that numbed the sizzling in her hands.  She laid down to rest as sounds of children splashing played in the distance.  Eyes dark and unseeing, she smelled fresh cut grass and tasted homemade lemonade.  Her mouth would have watered.  Laying on the dusty road, she faintly knew the sun had already boiled the side of her face, but the pain was distant like memories of tire swings and swimming pools.