That night, Evelyn dreamed. She was seventeen again.
The air felt damp. The smell of earth mingled with the scent of rotting wood, filling her nose. From somewhere in the distance, a bell rang sharply, shattering the morning silence.
She opened her eyes.
The sky was still dark.
All around her, dozens of women rose from the wooden beds packed tightly inside a long building.
"Get up!"
An overseer's voice echoed from outside.
The door was thrown open.
A large man stood there holding a lantern.
"Out! You're late!"
Young Evelyn immediately stood up. She was wearing a ragged dress that had been mended countless times. The fabric was far too thin to keep out the cold.
Outside, rows of wooden buildings stood on mud-covered ground.
Black Hollow Plantation.
A place that had never truly faded from her memory.
A place she had spent twenty years trying to forget.
Dozens of people walked in formation toward the fields.
No one spoke.
Everyone understood the unwritten rules.
Don't argue.
Don't resist.
Don't draw attention.
At Black Hollow, people were not treated as human beings.
They were labor.
Numbers.
Names on a list.
Goods that could be moved, traded, sold, or discarded at any time.
Evelyn followed the line with her head bowed.
Beside her, an old woman shuffled along.
Her steps were slow.
Her body was thin.
Her hair was streaked with gray.
"Did you sleep last night?" the woman asked.
Evelyn shook her head.
The woman gave a small smile.
"No one can sleep well in a place like this."
Evelyn knew the woman well.
Her name was Martha.
She had been at Black Hollow long before Evelyn arrived.
Martha often said that a person could survive as long as their body was strong.
But a person would shatter once their soul surrendered.
That day, the sun blazed overhead.
The work continued without pause.
Evelyn's hands began to ache.
Sweat covered her back.
Every so often, she lifted her head and looked at the grand house on the hill.
The plantation owner's house.
The building was magnificent.
Its walls were painted white.
Its windows were wide.
On the front veranda, several people enjoyed tea as they chatted.
Only a few hundred yards separated those two worlds.
One group lived in freedom.
The other lived under someone else's control.
Around noon, a horse-drawn carriage entered the plantation grounds.
Everyone stopped working.
Several neatly dressed men climbed out of the carriage.
They spoke with the plantation owner while occasionally surveying the people working in the fields.
Martha lowered her head.
"Don't look at them."
"Why?"
"Because they're choosing."
Evelyn didn't understand what she meant.
Until, moments later, an overseer called out three names.
A man.
A woman.
A young boy.
The three were separated from the group.
The little boy cried as he clung to his mother's leg.
"I don't want to go!"
His mother began to cry too.
"Please! Don't separate us!"
No one listened.
A man dragged the boy away.
His mother tried to chase after him.
A hard slap sent the woman crashing to the ground.
Evelyn froze.
She couldn't look away.
Martha gripped her arm.
"Don't watch."
Tears streamed down the face of the woman who had lost her child.
Her sobs sounded unbearably painful.
Evelyn felt something strange in her chest.
Anger.
Fear.
Helplessness.
Only then did she realize one thing.
No one was safe at Black Hollow.
No one truly owned anything.
Not even a mother had the right to keep her own child.
Toward evening, the workers returned to the barracks.
Their steps felt heavier than usual.
The woman who had lost her child sat in the corner of the room, hugging herself.
No one could comfort her.
No words were enough to ease her pain.
That night, Evelyn sat beside a small window.
She stared at the forest stretching behind the plantation.
The trees looked like endless black shadows.
"You're thinking about something."
Martha's voice was soft.
Evelyn nodded.
"I was just thinking."
"About what?"
Evelyn looked toward the forest.
"I want to leave this place."
Martha smiled bitterly.
"Everyone wants to leave."
"No. I mean really leave."
The old woman fell silent.
A few moments later, she sat down beside Evelyn.
"If you ever manage to escape, don't ever come back."
"Why?"
"Because a place like this will keep living inside your memory."
The dream ended when someone called her name.
"Evelyn."
She opened her eyes.
She was breathing heavily.
She was back in her room.
Morning sunlight streamed through the window.
Her hand clutched the blanket tightly.
Twenty years had passed.
And yet Black Hollow was still alive inside her.
She could still remember the sound of that woman's sobs.
She could still smell the earth at the plantation.
She could still see the faces of those who had once walked beside her.
The plantation might have been far behind her by now.
But the memory of that place had never truly left.