Little Tommy Stood Up

Where were you when the moon landing happened? Where were you when Kennedy was shot? Where were you when a policeman brutally squeezed the life force from George Floyd's flesh and bones?

These are questions that people often ask. It's our way of being part of something bigger than our solitary lives. Let me ask a different question, though. Where were you when little Tommy stood up? Regardless of your age, background, or birthplace on this blue planet, I'd be surprised if any of you even know who I am talking to, let alone when it happened. Most readers of this essay will not understand the significance of Little Tommy Bordello's actions in the broader world. It has long been lost and forgotten in the annals of time.

Looking at the news, you see all the pushback against the government. Pushback that’s raged for decades., it's hard to imagine a time before. It was a darker time when we just accepted what was happening. When we lived as cattle for slaughter, the government saw us as. You were nothing unless you were of the Glorious and Majestic, the so-called 1%. Be you a doctor or a humanitarian, or the second coming of Jesus himself, if you were not of particular stock, you were considered lame and good for enslavement and nothing else.

Conditioned to live for work and work for the government, enjoyment and recreation were luxuries not afforded to you. Yet, in the middle of this darkness, when humanity had been all but broken, little Tommy Bordello did something unthinkable. I know, doesn't it sound like the unstable world we live in now? A world where the government is losing its vice-like grip and control over people who refuse to settle for anything less than the freedom to be who they want. It's a mess, but it's a prettier, hope-fuelled mess compared to the world before.

Now, we are far from the freedom we enjoyed in the almost-mythological, fantasised Golden Times. But, the resistance continues to chip away and ignites a fire in each new generation born into this world. The fact that new generations can now be born safely, without fear of the Masters and Mistresses collecting the offspring, is a testimony to how much things have changed.

The subjugators worked many of us until our feeble and brittle bodies gave out. Even the less violent Masters and Mistresses of those dark days were cruel in other ways. Sex slaves, dogsbodies, and servants took care of all the jobs that the rulers felt were beneath them. While they enjoyed lavish food like bread, cheese, chicken, fresh fruit and vegetables, the other 99% percenters were forced to survive on nothing more than rice and grains. The government even forbid the making of bread for one’s own use.

The Glorious and Majestic had decreed that if you had the energy, time and inclination to make bread for your consumption, your energy, time and inclination would be better spent on the ruling class.

Tommy Bordello was like other children born into the rotten world we endured. Bright-eyed and full of hope, a hope that would soon be pummelled out of him in the workhouses. That is why the local Masters in the small town in Wisconsin that Tommy called home did not pay too much attention to Tommy's wildly active mind. A mind that was both intrigued and perplexed by the world around him.

When he was old enough, at 10, to understand what was happening and had his own opinions, thanks to his Gramma, he could not understand why the subjugators had been allowed to reign in fear and terror. Gramma's dulled and failing eyes would come to life whenever she spoke of brighter days, children laughing and playing without a care, and music. Oh, the sound of Gramma's singing reverberated in Tommy's subconscious and soundtracked his dreams.

Howard Zinn, a historian and playwright from that long-forgotten time, once noted, “Small acts, when multiplied by millions of people, can transform the world.”

On the least significant day of the year, a Tuesday in late October, there was a shift in the tectonic plates beneath the surface of this rotten world. The balance of power was destabilised irreversibly in favour of the 99$. In the workhouse where Tommy had been working for the hideous oaf, Reginald Ambridge, things were normal. There was no scent in the air, tension mounting, or anything that indicated anything momentous would happen. The air reeked of claggy mildew and sweat, and a constant barrage of clattering tools echoed off the damp and mouldy stone walls. Dust hung visibly in the sunlight, streaming through the filthy windows, lining the throats of the infantile workforce, and their coughs added to the cacophony of sounds.

Much to their chagrin and fear of getting into trouble, Tommy often gave way to chatter with the other boys. He had been trying to cheer up his friends. Gramma had taught him some funny songs from the golden days she remembered so vividly.

"When I wake up in the morning, love" he crooned. Some of the boys would try to shush him before Ambridge heard him. Others smiled and laughed at the strange words in the song. "And the sunlight hurts my eyes. And something without warning, love, bears heavily on my mind," he crooned, getting lost in his musical world.

No one in that grimy workhouse could have imagined that the boy humming under his breath would one day shake the world. Least of all, Tommy Bordello himself

Tommy didn't hear Ambridge walk up behind him and wasn't aware that he was standing with his fist raised until he turned around singing, "Then I look at you and the world's alright with me. Just one look at you..."

"What do you think you're doing? Get on your knees, boy." Ambridge snarled.

Tommy choked and kneeled immediately, feeling the vulnerable skin of his knees scrape across the dirty workhouse floor. He kept his eyes facing downwards, sweat beading at the top of his head and dropping fast. He held back the tears and the fears growing inside of him.

"How dare you sing while working. Your work is a privilege, and you should give proper attention and focus to it. As this is a first offence, you will not be punished too harshly but will be made an example of. An example of why no one ever dares sing or enjoys working in this workhouse. We'll start with a simple apology. Do you think you can do that, you little piece of crap?"

Tommy remained silent. He was trembling.

"Are you deaf now as well as stupid?" growled Ambridge as spit flew from his mouth to land on Tommy's head.

"Are you going to apologise or not?" he hissed, losing his patience with the insolence runt.

"No."

There was a gasp throughout the workhouse at Tommy's response.

"Did you sa—?" Ambridge’s voice tapered off as Tommy stood up.

"No", he repeated with defiance as he gazed into Ambridge's dark wells of hatred.

His legs trembled, but his eyes focused intently on Ambridge's. The invisible chains, the reminder in his mind of the real chains employed, were suddenly lifted.

As several rounds of bullets ripped through little Tommy Bordello's flesh, spraying his blood on the workhouse floor and any of the child labourers who happened to be close, Ambridge ranted about the penalty for defiance against our Masters and Mistresses. Tommy had little time left to feel the searing pain that spread across his chest. As his knees buckled and he fell, it was not in fear or subjugation. It was in the sweet relief of freedom. As the embers of his life faded to nothing, his Gramma's smiling, singing face flashed before the nothing of death took hold.

As the clawing, suffocating scent of gunfire and death hung in the air, a sweet aroma and strange, foreign sensation lifted the atmosphere.

The silence in the workhouse was deafening. Ambridge wiped the gathering sweat from his brow with a trembling hand.

He muttered nonchalantly to himself, "That'll teach them". There was silence as he shut his office door harder than usual. Why did that ridiculous runt force him to take action?

For a moment, no one moved. The children stared at the blood-soaked floor where Tommy had stood, their breaths caught in their throats. Then, the children began one by one, with tears streaming down their faces, quietly humming the same melody and stopping only to avoid Ambridge's wrath when he turned to face them.

On the day Tommy stood up and said no, the taste of freedom in the air that mingled with the acrid stench of his death spread beyond the confines of that dingy building. His body may have been torn with bullets and burned at the local body furnace, but nothing could stop the sowing of the seeds of rebellion.

The story of Tommy Bordello spread like wildfire. From one workhouse to another, state to state, until it crossed oceans and borders. His song, which he sang that day, became a universal anthem of resistance. Even those who knew they might die trying sang it. Because of Tommy, the people knew—no matter the cost—tomorrow would be a lovely day.

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Thanks for reading!

Author's Notes: First entry into for The Moment That Changed Everything Challenge. To be clear, this is a work of fiction.