Treasure of the World by Tara Sullivan (free ebook reader txt) 📕

hunch into my blankets, trying to block everything out, willing the night to be over.

My head bobs.

You’re getting sleepy, I think. You should get up and walk around for a bit.

But that realization comes a little bit too late and I nod off.

Seconds—minutes? hours?—later, a formless fear washes over me, coupled with the feeling of falling and I startle awake with a gasp. I nearly wake Abuelita, but I can’t bring myself to be that selfish, so I let her sleep. She’s here to help me in case of an emergency, not just when I get scared by a nightmare.

If only I could see the line between the nightmare and my life more easily. Like the devil in the mines, unless you find the right tribute, fate catches you eventually and savages your dreams with its broken-glass teeth. Perhaps I was a fool to ever think to look for a different future from the one I was born to.

I push to my feet and force myself to do a lap. As I walk, the cold wind whistles around me and I bend my head against it. Unable to shake the feeling that the Tío knows that I’m here, I stumble up to the edge of the darkness at the mouth of the mine and sprinkle a few of my precious coca leaves onto the mud.

“An offering,” I whisper, and climb back to my lonely perch.

Finally, long past the point where I’m sure I can’t bear it any longer, dawn arrives. And with the dawn, trudging up the slope, is Don Carmelo. I never thought I’d long to see his sour face, but the feeling of relief that washes over me when I see him is huge.

Stiffly, I get to my feet and wake Abuelita. She gathers our things while I clamber awkwardly off my perch to talk to Don Carmelo.

He considers me for a few moments, then holds out two paper bills and a five-boliviano coin. I take them from him with hands made clumsy by a night in the cold.

“I get paid every day?” I ask, wedging the thirty-five bolivianos into my pocket.

“No,” he says. “But I thought, for the first few days, maybe we’d do it this way.” He scratches his nose. “I’m paying you for just last night because maybe you’ve decided you’re not coming back tonight.”

Thirty-five bolivianos is not enough to repay Yenni, let alone feed my family or pay down our debt. I lift my chin.

“I’m coming back,” I say. “Have a good day, Don Carmelo.”

He shrugs as if it doesn’t matter to him one way or the other. Which I guess it probably doesn’t.

“Until later, then,” he says, and plods into the mine, starting the morning shift.

21

When Abuelita and I get home, a wave of exhaustion crashes over me, and I collapse into bed. The devil is waiting for me, as I knew he would be.

“So,” he says, standing. “You’re just like all the others.” The coca leaves and offerings slide off him to drift around my feet. He towers above me.

When I tip my head to meet his eyes, I reach reflexively for my helmet to keep it from slipping off. But my hand touches nothing but my hair.

Risking a quick glance at myself, I see that I’m wearing my outfit from today, right down to my ratty tennis shoes.

“Like who?”

The devil ticks off a list on his cracked red clay fingers.

“The conquistadores, the viceroys of Spain, the bishops, the mint masters, the pirates, the kings, the emperors, the governments, the multinational corporations, the mining cooperatives.”

“What do you mean?” I demand. “How am I like all of them?”

The devil of the mines leers down at me and his tone is possessive when he answers, “You’re a thief.”

When I wake, I find that I’ve clenched the thirty-five bolivianos I earned last night so hard in my fist that I can read the imprint of the metal coin on my palm.

I carefully put the money in the little jar on the shelf and force my stiff fingers to relax, refusing to cry. You only borrowed it, I tell myself, over and over again like a prayer. You’re earning it back.

I sleep most of the rest of the day. Though Abuelita tells me she’s fine and works outside with the palliri, after our midday meal I notice that it takes her a couple of tries to get up from sitting, like her whole body is hurting her. Belén rushes over to help her before I can, and Mami gives them a worried look.

That night, when I layer on all my extra sweaters and pack my manta, Mami appears at my elbow.

“I’ve told Elvira not to sit with you every night,” she says, helping me settle my bundle over my shoulder. “It’s too much for her old bones.”

“I didn’t ask her to come with me last night,” I rush to clarify, trying to keep my voice even. I knew it was too much to ask, but even with Abuelita getting on my case, it was nice not to have to face the unending dark hours alone. “Of course she shouldn’t come. We don’t want her getting sick too.”

“Exactly,” says Mami. “She can come with you every few days maybe, when she’s had a good rest in between. The other nights I’ll come with you.”

I feel a wave of relief, remembering the terror of the empty hours before Abuelita showed up last night; hours so lonely I would have done anything to see another living soul, and yet terrified that I might see someone at the same time. Then I think about what Mami is offering.

“No,” I say. “You didn’t sleep all day like I did. You worked as a palliri. You still have to cook, and clean, and take care of Belén and César. We can’t afford for you to get sick either. I can do this.”

Abuelita and Belén are listening in