I clutched my chest, the imagined pain starting to feel real. I couldn’t breathe. The once comforting roots of the tree now felt like they were strangling me, trying to tie me down, pull me into the ground. I knew I couldn’t sit there for much longer. But I didn’t want to burst out of the tree, revealing that I had been watching him this whole time. I struggled to contain myself but thankfully, after about five minutes, he sat up straight, like he had remembered something important. He muttered, “I have to do it,” and then he stormed off determinedly.
I parted the curtain of knobbly roots and stepped out, surveying the scene. I wished I had time to sort through these feelings, to try and understand what I had just seen. He always seemed so happy when I saw him. I wondered if it was something that had just happened—had he done poorly on his assessment? I doubted it. There was no time. There were no answers anyway. I ran back to the workshop with minutes to spare, distracted and weary.
I walked through the swinging double doors to the workshop and was confronted with a re-stressed Gomez flustering his hairy arms about. “Good, Rosa, you’re here. The judges will be here any second now.” He grabbed me by the shoulders and jostled me into line with the others, leaving palm-shaped wet patches on my t-shirt. I noticed that Rash had somehow managed to salvage his table and it stood straight. It was terribly simple and I didn’t hold much hope that he would score well, but at least it wasn’t leaning at a forty-five-degree angle anymore.
I stood between Rash and Henri, my two favorite people, and held my breath. The judges entered. One woman and one man both dressed in a red uniform with the same gold trim as the other guardians. I didn’t recognize them; they must have been from outside the Classes. Readers in hand, they walked to the first piece and circled it, whispering to each other. They scanned the boy’s wrist and proceeded to type things in, adding a score to his name. The woman seemed senior. She ordered the other one around, occasionally tucking her grey bob behind her ears as she spoke in a low, hissing whisper. She had a stern, nasty face that was set in a permanent frown. The man was younger and kept looking to her before typing in his notes. His small, brown face twisting like he had smelled something bad as he inspected every aspect of the pieces. He reminded me of a rat, twitching and sniffing, following the other one around waiting for crumbs to fall.
I was the second to last to be appraised and it was agonizing waiting for them to get to me. I leaned and swayed on my tiptoes, inadvertently peering at the male Guardian’s screen. He scowled at me and tucked it under his arm, protecting his piece of cheese. All he needed were whiskers to complete the transformation.
When they got to Rash, they didn’t take much time. The woman raised one eyebrow as she stared down at my friend. I noticed she was wearing makeup, a rare luxury. It was caked in the corner of her eyes, balled up bits of black grit that made her blink too much. Rash shifted uneasily from foot to foot under her critical gaze, smiling inappropriately at her. I had a moment of panic, thinking he might be stupid enough to wink at her. I wanted to whack him and tell him no amount of charm was going to help him today. When they moved on, I heard him sigh in relief. It was my turn.
The woman lifted the lid to my jewelry box with her little finger. It glided open gently, elegantly. She inspected every compartment with a critical eye, checking the workmanship meticulously. She closed the lid and ran her hand over the emblem on the front, tracing each individual circle of timber with her finger. I wanted to talk, explain to her the differences in the timbers, the purpose of each compartment. I bit my lip, tasting blood. She turned to her colleague and she smiled. It didn’t look right on her shrewd face. But her teeth were showing through her thin lips caked in dried-up lipstick. Mister Gomez was looking very pleased as she nodded her head approvingly in his direction. She typed in her scores and moved on to Henri. I relaxed a little. Rash and the other boys were all grinning at me. A feeling of elation was creeping through me, threatening to make me do something crazy, like jump in the air or yell out. Maybe this could work, I thought. My love of this craft was not misplaced—I might actually succeed.
The judges both seemed quite pleased with Henri’s desk as well, nodding and whispering in a painful performance that only heightened the tension in the room. We wanted it be over. When they had completed their assessments, the judges walked to Mister Gomez, their gold-embellished shoulders glinting under the fluorescence, and turned to face the class. I looked down the line—eight young men with their futures hanging in the balance. They were all strong, good boys with sawdust in their hair and oil on their calloused fingers.
“You have all performed satisfactorily in this assessment,” she stated. “Your score will be prepared and provided to you tomorrow morning. Perez.” She motioned for him to step forward and then she placed a hammer in his hand.
I wish I had been prepared for this. I’m not sure whether it would have changed anything but maybe it would have. There could have been a chance. I could have had a chance.
Perez’s face looked devilish as he moved to the first table. Without ceremony, without hesitation, he smashed it. I watched each of my friends’ devastated faces as he moved from piece to piece, destroying their work. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. What was the point to this? I felt each blow like he was striking me. My arms held up in defense, my body vibrating with every crash of the hammer. I couldn’t stand it anymore. Three pieces into the destruction, I screamed.
“Stop!” Everyone stared at me. The boys were shaking their heads, pleading with their eyes for me not to continue. Henri whispered, “Soar, no,” but this was me—I couldn’t stop even if I wanted to. “Please,” I begged, “you can’t do this.” I was shaking. Even as the words escaped my mouth, I knew it was futile.
Perez took three steps towards me and pounded me in the face with the flat side of the hammer. I flew sideways, knocking Henri’s desk over in the process. I felt teeth from my right jaw rattling in my mouth, which filled with the metallic taste of blood and threatened to drown me. The pain was immense as it spread from my jaw up and around my head, throbbing. The torn flesh of my face was searing hot, each nerve ending screaming. I couldn’t focus, vision blurred but not from tears. I stayed silent. Trying to breathe, trying really hard not to panic.
As I lay there on the floor clutching my broken face, I wondered why Mister Gomez hadn’t warned us. He had always been strict but never cruel. This was cruelty. Then it came to me, as bits of wood and lacquer rained down on me from above. Shards of my proud creation were landing in my hair and sticking to the growing pool of blood around where I was lying. There were two reasons. One, we probably wouldn’t have tried so hard if we knew. And two, this was part of the assessment. It was a test. And I had just failed with flying colors. In one swift move, I had ruined everything.
The noise of my beautiful jewelry box being shattered marked the end for me. I knew it, as well as everyone else in the room. Rash stepped forward, foolishly trying to diffuse the situation. “C’mon guys…” he said as he took a step towards me. The expression on his face showed me how bad I must have looked. The grey-haired woman stepped forward and touched a black device lightly to his chest. His body jolted unnaturally and he fell to the floor. I hauled myself over to him, leaving a smear of blood-sticky woodchips in my wake. He was still breathing but he was unconscious. I saw the other boys, my treasured family, moving forward, like they were about to act. I pulled myself up to sitting, a mixture of blood and teeth spilling from my lips as I spoke, “No. Help Rash.” Whatever was going to happen to me, I didn’t want them dragged into it.