The Time of the Boy

Chapter 1

   The teenage boy rises early in the morning everyday and heads off to work even before the sun rises. He arrives at the factory, sweat glistening on his nose and forehead as the sun starts to peak up over the hills. The boy trudges in along with the others and starts the day off. The sun shines through the windows, seemingly innocently. But the sun's bright light raises the temperature within the factory, making their job even more miserable. But what choice do they have?

   Poor families have no choice but to send their children to work, earning a very small pay for 14 hours of work a day, for 6 days a week. The children walked around on the mildew-ridden floors, barefoot. They walked around, taking no safety precautions. Countless kids and other employees have been injured on the job, with many different machines with several moving parts.

   The extremely hot temperatures are made worse with the dust hanging around in the air and the fast-moving machinery. The dust clings to the boys clothing as he maneuvers carefully around one machine to fix another. One wrong move, and it could cost something larger than the job.

   The sun finally sets behind the factories, but their work days isn't over yet. Fatigue hangs around the factory like grief at a funeral. But there's no time for rest. Work has to be done in order to earn your pay. The moon rises and the stars come out, and the work day is finally over. The children step out into the cool night air without a second thought.

   But not the boy. He steps out of the factory, and it feels as if the world was lifted off of his shoulders. Like all of the dust, sweat, and work slowly melts away. He enjoys this moment everyday, but is it worth it? Working 14+ hours everyday, just for a sensation that lasts only for a short moment? The only way to make it all worth it was a raise in pay, but the chances of that happening was almost nonexistent.

   The boy takes his time walking home. Unlike the other children who raced home to get a good nights sleep for work the next day. His mother hates seeing her 15-year-old son walking in through the crooked door and nearly collapsing on the bed. It doesn't take long for him to fall asleep. His mother quietly walks over to him and carefully removes his work clothes. She covers him up with the tattered blanket and hangs up the boys clothes.

   The boy wakes up the next morning with dread of returning to his job. His mother walks to his side and informs him that today was his duty to clean out the factory's chimneys. The boy slips into his work clothes and says one last goodbye to his bed-ridden father before heading off to work. The boys father was diagnosed with Cholera, and was on the brink of death. Keeping him hydrated throughout the day was a challenge, but getting clean water to hydrate him was even more of a challenge.

    The boy always worried that after a day of work, his father would be dead. Without sufficient funds to help rid his father of Cholera, the chances of him dying grew more and more each day. The thought stuck in the boys mind during the day more than it had before. He returned home at the same time as the previous day, coughing and hacking due to the large amounts of dust and soot that he had inhaled while cleaning the chimneys. The boy removes his work clothes and looks over to his father. His body was still. He looked up to his mother's grief-ridden face. The day he had feared had finally arrived, his father had lost his battle.