Drought

„The Freedom we will fight for, side by side, throughout our lives until we have won our liberty”.
The words rang through the gigantic hall. The rocky walls threw them back to the speaker in the middle of his audience. After the words had been repeated by the members, everyone sat in silence, listening to the echo oft the words in their ears. They were like an earwig, like a mighty, charming earwig of words, wriggling itself through the mind of everyone listening. They were from the freedom charter, the last paragraph. It was a banned document, but some people had managed to save the words and spread them all around South Africa. The people that had founded this secret club thought that the words were good words and so they became their slogan. 
The people who met each other at this place were different in colour ad race, but they fought for the same and they saw each other like sisters and brothers. They were young. Most of them not older than thirty, but they knew, their country, the way it was ruled in those days, was a prison for the Freedom in thought. They fought for the future. For their future and for the future of their children. 
The place where they met was secret. Just a handful people knew about it and all of them had had to swear an oath not to tell where it was ever and rather to die than tell the police or government. If there was someone in expectation to become a new member he was followed for weeks without knowing and only if he meant well he would be allowed to see the old cavern where the meetings were held. 
The words faded away. The echoes in the cavern and in the minds sopped. Everything was quiet even the dropping water seemed to have stopped trickling down the walls of stone. A clammy wind wheezed through the cavern, while the members looked at their leader wanting him to hold his traditional speech.
“Today, Stephen Biko died”, he said and everyone could hear the mourning in his voice.
“Officially he died in a hunger strike, but you all know just as well as I that this is not the truth” He spoke slowly, thinking about every word, like he always did.
“I know”, he took a deep breath, “that some think: If even Biko is not able to survive Apartheid, then who is? I know some of you might think that what we do is too dangerous. And I want to tell you: You are right. It is dangerous. And I will never in my live resent your quitting”. Then he became silent again as if waiting that some of his thoughtful listeners would get up and leave the cavern, but nothing happened.
The leader looked around and everyone in the eye and nodded.
“I thought so”, he muttered to himself and added a bit louder: “I want you to think about my words. The meeting is closed now. Go home and pray to god for Biko’s soul. This day is a bad day for the resistance against apartheid.”
The leader was the oldest of them, although no one knew his real age. The people called him “The Leader” or “The Old One”, but the name that really fit him was “The Colourless”. Some people said he was black, some said he was Asian, because of his almond eyes, and some said he was a dark white. But no one could really say which race he belonged to, and that was the reason that he was the leader.
After a while every member had left the cavern. Slowly, quietly. They had to watch out. There were many entrances to the cavern, but it still took a long time until everyone had left.
Only when the last member had gone, the leader moved. He blew out every candle, candles were easier to light a secret room with than electricity, and they were easier to get.
When the last candlelight was gone the whole cavern was dark. The wise, old man knew it intimately and could find his way out without light. He hardly made any noise, he didn’t even think while he was walking, he just acted and reacted. The tunnels and caves he went through were high enough to walk, not like some others, in which one had to crawl to get through without hurting oneself. He felt too old for those that day. The tunnel walls were wet and slimy, so he did not touch them, he found the right way instinctively.
He needed a few moments to acclimatize to the light and the dry air. The heat hit him like a cosh. The still air was thick ad seemed to burn the throat when he was breathing it.
The land had been hit by a drought two month ago. Water was getting short and everyone was waiting for the rain. The old man walked through the dry bushes and was drenched in sweat after a few steps. He had parked his car between a few trees that had been parked down to the ground be the wind. This place could not be seen from the street. Around the entrances to the caves were a few more parking places like that, but most of the members had to walk a long way to get to the meetings.
The moment the Colourless reached his car, he recognized a young woman, nearly a girl, who was standing beside it. She moved so carefully that he hadn’t seen her until he was only one or two steps away.
“I have waited for you”, she said.
The Old One nodded and said: “I have expected that.”
“I wanted to talk to you.”
The man nodded again. “Get into the car, I’ll drive you home”.
He sat in the driver’s seat and started the engine. The street was empty.
“May I ask you one question, Leader?” the girl asked.
“You already did”, he said with a smile on his lips.
The girl smiled, too. “But of course you may ask another question.”
“Is there still hope? Will there be a free South Africa?”
They covered a few miles without speaking and then he stepped on the brake. He mad a U-turn and accelerated again.
“Where are we going?” the girl asked.
“I have to show you something” he answered. And those were his last words for a long time.
The drove to a small hill, the only one in the flat land, from where they could see all over the land.
“Get out”, the Colourless said.
She did as he said.
“What do you see?”
“Some bushes, brown, sandy earth, the blue sky.”
“Do you see the river in the east?”
The young woman strained her eyes. Yes there was a shining silver ribbon far, far away.
“It has not much water now, because of the drought. If it doesn’t start to rain, it will dry out. A few months later there won’t be any bushes or animals in this land anymore. In one or two years this steppe would become a desert.”
He kept silent a few moments while he looked at the landscape.
“But the rain has to come back”, the girl said.
“So you do have hope that it will rain soon?”
The girl nodded: “It always has!”
“So why do you ask me if there is hope for freedom?”
“I… I don’t understand.”
“See, Apartheid is like a drought. The river is the hope. If it is dried out, the land will die. It’s not the question, if there is hope; it’s the question if you want to believe.
“After every drought there will be a rainy season, it has always been like that, and it always will be. So there will be a season of freedom and humanity after Apartheid in South Africa. This is our land and it is your decision if you want to believe in it.”
A few minutes later they were back in the car and the street. They drove through the dry landscape in silence and one hour later they arrived at the girl’s home.
He brought her to the door; the streets were not safe, especially for young women. 
Before she closed the door, she said: “Thank you.”
“You don’t need to thank me for anything; you could have thought of it yourself.”
Then he turned around and walked back to the car.
Suddenly there was a loud noise and something hit his chest very hard. He looked down and saw a little hole in his shirt. He sank to the ground. There was this big pain. He heard the girl screaming and a dark voice that said “Bye, bye old man.” He felt the girl’s hand touching his shoulder and tearing his shirt and he recognized that he had closed his eyes. He opened them and stared into the girl’s eyes that were crying.
“Please, don’t leave me, not now”, she cried. She left his sight and he could hear her screaming for help. And then there was something new. Something that hat nothing to do with the bullet that had torn his chest into tatters. It was something wet and cooling. He stared in the sky and wondered what it was. At that very moment, when the girl was back in his sight, he knew it.
“There is hope, girl”, he whispered. “Promise me, that you’ll always believe in that.”
The girl promised.
“Look”, the old man said and stared at the sky.
There was no pain anymore. There was nothing but the lightly dripping water that felt so fresh and great on the skin. The blood was washed away and happiness was shown in the old man’s face. 
“Look”, he said again and now the girl raised her head and saw, what the man saw. She saw the hope that came from heaven and her eyes were filled with tears of both grief and hope. Yes, he was right, there was hope. It was in every soul of this country and it was in every drop of water that fell down from the sky. Because now the drought was over. The sky had opened his sluices and the rain began to fall.