Voice of a Comrade

The aged man across from me sits carefully, savoring the warm drink in his hands. He had accepted the interview on the condition that it take place in this coffee shop in particular, a homey place on this chilly winter’s day. I ask him about his experiences of the day Red broke free.

“I’m old, now, too old- too old to tell you the date it happened without checking a book. But I still remember how it felt, how I saw it, if not how it happened. I wasn’t there when it happened, not really. Times were rough, then- winters as cold as this one, except no one I knew had a fireplace, let alone anything to burn in it. It was hard to find work, hard to find food, everything. I was luckier than most, which isn’t saying much, really… I was on a street corner selling apples, like dozens of others around me- wouldn’t make a man rich, but at least I could eat what I didn’t sell…”
 [He pauses to savor his drink.]

“By the time I heard he was gone, it was already late into the afternoon. I wasn’t exactly a person of importance, not someone people were going to tell first, but even then, I practically only found out when the confetti started flying… Flames, I had never considered ‘Ole Claps’ could ever be anything other than in power, somehow. Guess that’s why it took me so long to figure it all out.

“People were cheering, people I’d never seen in the streets before, parents who would never have dared to show their children to the mean streets beforehand were out there with the kids, dancing and smiling...The kids had no clue what was happening, of course, they were just happy that folks were happy, and watching the cheering, and so was I… I just assumed it was some wedding, or something, but at some point the celebration was too large for that to make sense. So I abandoned the apple cart- I guess it felt pointless to cling to that lifeline, with everyone acting so free- and I looked for someone with a radio. It was illegal to carry ‘em, under Ole Claps, cause of the rebels. People glamorize the Courier, and for good reason, mind you, but the early “Comrade Radio” was just as potent, I think. Less people had access to the radios, but it was easier to tune in to that than to get ahold of the newspapers.

“Quickly, I found someone listening in. There was already a crowd gathered around him, other folks just like me, apple sellers, and bootleggers, trying to figure it out, too… The radio’s owner was in the open, not trying to hide the bulky radio set whatsoever, not anymore. Just from that, anyone could have seen that things were profoundly different. There was no fear, no subterfuge… The radio announcer spoke up, and her words will be forever carved into my memory, I think. ‘My comrades-in-arms, we fight no longer,’ she said. ‘The leader whose paranoia and cruelty we have endured for so long is, for reasons yet to be determined, no longer in power. Ex Nihilo Nihil Fit, comrades. From nothing, comes nothing. We must take this opportunity to completely escape the choking grasp of tyranny. My compatriots, no longer shall we fear the light! We will become the light! Go forth!’ Flames, I can still hear it…”

[He pauses again, pawing at some amulet or token under his shirt.]

“And it just kept going from there. The streets looked like they were on fire, from all the candles and lights and paper lanterns- I had predicted riots, police brutality, repression, violence, but there was none of that. No one knew where Claps had gone, he hadn’t been killed, he hadn’t exactly resigned- no one could use his disappearance as a political tool, since no one knew what happened. If he orchestrated it, then I have untold respect for him, even with the atrocities he committed. Rebels, loyalists, all the factions on the brink of open war were struck dumb, really. There was nothing to do with the centerpiece gone, so they decided, even if unofficially, to cooperate. And so that’s how it happened, as much as I can tell…Red’s been standing tall ever since.”