Amara sat cross-legged on the mat, folding each slip of paper the same way — square, anonymous. Some had names, some numbers, some only marks; all went into the bowl. It didn’t matter how you entered — once folded, each slip was equal.

Above the grocery shop, two dozen people sat on plastic stools, waiting. A single bulb buzzed overhead, shutters drawn tight. Everyone knew what the lottery funded: teachers on strike, banned papers, rice for prisoners’ families. Hope was dressed as luck.

Ko Than, the grocer, whispered: “Too many tonight. If soldiers come—”

“They won’t,” Amara said, steady but taut. “Fast and clean. Always the same.”

Then the opposition’s district official arrived. His longyi too fine, his smile too smooth. He crouched beside her mat. “Comrade, let tonight’s slip fall to U Min. Just once. He’ll protect our sellers. Without him, we cannot last.”

Amara didn’t look at him. “The slips are already folded.”

“A crease, a corner, no one would know,” he pressed. “Think of the future.”

She raised the bowl, stirred the slips with her hand, and then lifted her voice so all could hear:

“Everyone — look. Each slip is the same. No marks, no corners. If you doubt, check them yourself.”

One by one, hands passed the bowl, unfolding, refolding, nodding. When it came back, Amara set it in the middle.

“The rules are simple. One bowl. One draw. One winner.”

She called forward a boy of twelve — son of a prisoner, silent by the door. His hand shook as he reached in. He pulled a slip. Amara read the name aloud.

The room erupted. A teacher had won. Relief and laughter rose like steam. The boy blushed as hands patted his back.

Amara raised her voice again, cutting through the noise: “You all saw it. The choice was luck, nothing else. Break that once, and it dies forever.”

The official had already left.

Later, when the room emptied, Ko Than found her still on the mat.

“You kept it clean,” he said.

She shook her head. “I won’t sit at the bowl again. Trust lives only if it’s seen, every time. My place is to guard the frame, not play the hand.”

She stood, brushing dust from her skirt. “People join because they believe. They stay because they see it’s fair. Lose that, and it ends in one night.”

Outside, laughter carried into the street. Amara paused, listening.
“That’s why I stayed this long,” she said softly. “To prove it can be done without bending. But if I give in once, I betray them all.”