Broken Moon by Kim Antieau

Author:Kim Antieau
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Simon & Schuster Children's Publishing
Published: 2007-09-03T04:00:00+00:00

Second Day at the Camel Camp

I AWAKENED PREDAWN TO SAND in my face and screams in my ear. I sat up gasping. One of the older boys from yesterday yelled and kicked at us. He, too, now spoke another language.

We ran to the barn. Once there, the older boy disappeared. I reminded the two smaller boys that they were going to start by feeding the greens to the camels. The rest of us began “cooking” breakfast. Suleiman and Youssef quickly caught on to my idea, and we fed the camels in no time. The two smaller boys cleaned and brushed the camels, while the rest of us shoveled away the dung.

Three older boys came and put saddles on five of the camels and led them away.

We were allowed to go back to our shack, where someone came by with bread and beans again. We sat on the sand with the other new boys. Three of them had bruises on their faces.

“What happened?” I asked quietly.

“What do you think happened?” one of them said. “The other boys showed us who is boss of this camp. Your turn will come.”

Then the five of them moved away from us and ate by their shack.

We returned to the barn and cleaned it, then we brushed the camels.

During the hottest part of the day when most of the boys napped, I went around the camp looking for you, Umar.

I ran from shack to shack and looked inside to see if you were there. Many boys were sleeping, but some were not, and I saw things I never want to see again. Some bigger boys beat smaller boys. They were so quiet, these beatings. Just the sound of flesh against flesh. And some of the older boys attacked the smaller boys the way those men in the village attacked me. The little boys could not escape, just as I could not. I wanted to save them, Umar. I did. But I could not risk getting caught. So I ran back to our shack, went inside, and cried quietly. I hoped the big boys would not leave scars on the bodies of the little boys like the men in the village had left on me. I hoped their bodies would not be covered with little broken moons for the rest of their lives as a constant reminder of what had happened to them. That is not a happy way to live.

I realized then how foolish I was to come here. It was going to happen to me again—-just as it had at the village—only this time I would not live, I was certain of it. And what of these boys who were hurting other boys? They had all once been sweet children. The evil things they did now were not their fault. They had come here when they were so young, and now they knew no other way, no other life.

How was I going to keep it from happening to me and the four boys who were with me?

Once again, I was exhausted when night came, and the boys were worse off than I was.

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