Antonio Quijada was eleven when he saw the soldiers, heard the shot, and saw his father lying in a pool of blood. “He was just a poor farmer,” Antonio says.
In Chalatenango, El Salvador, the army suspects farmers of providing food to the guerrillas. Antonio’s three older brothers, forbidden to grow food on their land, left for the mountains. The army assumed they had joined the guerrillas. They killed all three brothers. One was found floating in a river, his face unrecognizable. Young Antonio carried his body from the river. And he sat awake at night as his mother tore out her hair.
At age eighteen, Antonio fled El Salvador.
In El Salvador, Antonio had no nightmares. “I lived in real fear each day,” he says. “So I didn’t have nightmares at night.” He was here in the United States, working at a bakery, when the dreams began.

Antonio’s Dream
I am in the bakery, dough draped over my arms. Suddenly it is not dough in my arms, but a dead body. I am putting the feet in the oven when I feel I must wake up and cry out. But I cannot. I grab my skin and pull my fingernails to force myself to move. I wake up with bruises all over and my heart pounding in my chest.
For days after this dream I could not sleep. When I slept again, I had another dream.
I am in the countryside, alone and terrified. Suddenly three men run by. I hear the noise of the helicopter and I run also. A bomb drops at my feet and I throw myself to the ground and cover my head. But the bomb does not explode. I run again and another bomb falls and I throw myself to the ground. But it does not explode. Three times, no bomb explodes. I run, and another bomb falls. I know it will not explode, so I remain standing. But this bomb does explode, and I fly through the air and land on my back.
Then I am in my bed and crying out. And my heart pounds so strongly I don’t know what to do. Again I could not sleep for days. I was so exhausted I became crazy and had to go to the hospital.