It Emptied Us Read online

  It had rained the night she packed and ran out in a downpour and jumped in a taxi and drove off and left them alone. He didn’t know how to tell his son his mother left because she wanted more than a football coach and a little boy. Coach Joe ached at night when he rolled over on the bed they had shared and looked at the empty pillow where she used to rest her head.

  He raised his son as best he could, and it was hard and football got in the way sometimes, so he brought Tim with him to every practice and game because he didn’t know what else to do with a little boy. Tim picked up footballs and drank from the team water bucket and read books by the tackling dummies. The team helped Tim with his homework and talked about his day and told him stories about the things his father did at football practice and about their girlfriends and just about everything else that goes on with high school kids. Tim would stare at the players on his dad’s team and he thought they were gods.

  Tim would cry sometimes at night when he was a little boy and Coach Joe would go in and pick him up and sit with him in the rocking chair he bought for Tim’s mom the day Tim was born. He’d tell Tim stories about football and growing up and being in the marines and getting his first job and moving to Beaumont. It helped calm Tim down and he would settle into his dad’s lap and they would sing football fight songs and songs about being in the marines.

  Coach Joe looked at Tim beside him in the car. His son rubbed some of the grass stain off his football pants and pushed his hair away from his eyes. He looked at his dad and squinted from the sunlight that glowed around his father. He rolled down the car window and put his hand out in the form of an airplane and flew it against the wind and Coach Joe drove the car and turned into the driveway of the same house he bought when he got married and things seemed simple.

  The fumble never came up.

  Chapter 3

  Pistachios

  After they stayed in Phoenix for a few weeks, the Wilson’s packed up their meager belongings and took a bus west through Arizona and got off in Bakersfield, California. Gwen cabled her sister their location, and after renting a run-down apartment, the money arrived and she was able to move into an old, beaten-down house.

  They ate little until Gwen found a job at the local pistachio plant. She woke up at 5:00 AM each day. She roused Donna and Bobby and made them breakfast. It wasn’t much. They usually ate some cereal and maybe an English muffin and some milk. She helped the two get ready for school. Gwen took a shower when her kids were all set. When she finished her shower, she put on canvas overalls that seemed too heavy for the heat of the California desert, but she had to wear the heavy overalls since the pistachio plant was kept cold to keep the precious nuts from rotting. She kissed Bobby and Donna and walked out the door into the early morning California heat. She cooked in her heavy overalls and sat on a splintered bench and waited for the 7:00 a.m. bus. She climbed up the stairs and sat with other poor women and men who worked at the cold pistachio plant or the oven that was the pistachio fields. She sat across from many migrant farm workers who shared the bus with her. They talked quickly without looking at each other and she tried to understand their Spanish, but only caught a few words. She wondered what made them come to America. They looked at her and smiled and kept their own secrets.

  Gwen worked twelve-hour shifts. Her overalls were soaked with sweat in spite of the refrigeration in the plant. She took the bus back home and walked the quarter mile to the house where she knew her children waited. When she got home, Bobby brought her a glass of warm water and a sandwich. He and Donna helped her take off her overalls until she was dressed only in drenched shorts and a t-shirt. Donna helped her mother into dry clothes and took her wet garments and the rest of their dirty clothes down the street to a local Laundromat. She did her homework there and waited for the clothes to come clean. She finished her school work and packed up the cleaned and dried old clothes and walked home in the dark.

  Bobby pulled up a chair next to his mother and told her about his day. He told her about his math class and gym, and a teacher he didn’t like very much. He told her about the kids from school and how they already had their friends and there was no room for him. He talked about the Mexican kids with their old shoes and dirty pants and matted down black hair. They usually sat away from him at lunch, so Bobby ate his bologna sandwiches by himself.

  He told his mother he wanted to play football next year. He watched a practice after school and liked the way the guys hit each other.

  “If your grades stay up.”

  Gwen reached over and brushed Bobby’s gold hair away from his eyes. He sat crisscross on the floor and drank from an old glass. Donna came home from the Laundromat and the three of them read books and told stories and sang songs and stared out the window since they didn’t have money for a TV. A lone fan pulled hot air in from the desert. Gwen got tired and Bobby and Donna helped her to bed. Bobby leaned over his mother and plumped her pillow and kissed her forehead and tried to smile. Donna laid out the overalls she cleaned earlier that night. She set out underwear and a t-shirt and some worn out shorts to go along with green work socks. She scrubbed the green pistachio from Gwen’s shoes and dusted away the Bakersfield grit. She sat on the floor next to her mother and held her hand and sang a lullaby her mom used to sing when Donna was much younger. Gwen’s eyes closed and she rolled over on her side and her breathing became quiet and peaceful. Donna saw bruises on her mother’s lower back where there was a gap between her t-shirt and shorts. She gently pulled down the t-shirt so she wouldn’t have to look at the black and blue welts any longer. She leaned over and kissed her mother’s neck and brushed her hand through her mother’s blond hair. She stood there for a moment, then walked to the door and closed it so it wouldn’t make a sound.

  Donna undressed and took a shower. She washed her gold hair with soap and tried to clean the dirt off her shins. She rubbed a bruise on her thigh from when she got kicked by some Bakersfield townie that played on the soccer team. Donna tried out as soon as the family got settled and she and Bobby enrolled in school. She was faster and stronger than the other girls on the team. This didn’t make her any friends. They called her “hobo” behind her back or sometimes to her face. She decked the best girl on the team when they both fought for a header. The other girl slammed down on the ground and let out a groan and rolled over on her side and tried to get air back in her lungs and the girls on the team shut up. She walked home after that practice instead of taking the bus so she could calm down before she saw her brother and mother. She got home and helped Bobby sweep the house of the dirt and dust that couldn’t be kept outside. She helped him with his homework and he helped her do the same. They sat side by side and finished their homework and waited for their mother to get home.

  Donna and Bobby slept in the same bedroom. He was in bed when Donna finished her shower. She took a wet face cloth and put it on Bobby’s forehead to keep him cool. She climbed onto her bed and pushed off the worn blanket and draped a face cloth over her eyes. Silver light from a full moon lit the Bakersfield night. A tiny sliver shined in through the lone window of their bedroom. They closed their eyes and listened to the sound coyotes made when they fought in the desert. Sometimes Bobby woke up from a terrible dream and Donna rocked her brother until he fell back to sleep. She held him and thought of Ohio and her dad and broken furniture and leaving on a bus she knew she and her brother and her mother had to take.

  Chapter 4

  Bigger and Stronger

  Andy was bigger and stronger than Tim when they were in elementary school. But that changed miraculously the summer before Tim entered seventh grade and junior high. The coach of the West Beaumont Pop Warner football team was Coach Lou Sanoonian. He told Tim that he planned on turning him into a running back.

  “You’d be good at it. Really good.” He spat between chews on his old cigar. “It’d make your old man proud.”

  But Tim had no intention of playing Pop Warner again. His body began to change. The squeak in his voice was rep
laced by a deep rumble like a bass guitar. His legs and arms grew from skinny sinew to unexpected muscle. A couple years of weight lifting made an impact. Tim could no longer play baseball in his West Beaumont neighborhood. The second broken window of the neighbor’s house proved that. And when he did play touch football with his pals, their hands throbbed after trying to catch Tim’s bullet passes. When Tim ran the ball, no one could catch him. The few times Tim was cut off, he juked his buddies and raced away. Even though he loved Coach Sanoonian, Tim was going to make the West Junior High School seventh and eighth grade team. He was going to be their quarterback. And that was that.

  Chapter 5

  Hidden Bruises

  Gwen Wilson sat in the employee lounge and drank water from a dented thermos. She opened a paper bag and took out a liverwurst sandwich. She took small bites between sips of water. She unbuttoned the top of her canvas overalls and let cool air flow in over her shoulders. Other workers sat about. Most had bag lunches. A few had lunch pails. A small, dark-skinned young woman sat alone on top of a pallet of pistachios. She ate some nuts and tried to be invisible. Gwen saw her each day, but the young woman spoke to no one. She unbuttoned her overalls and Gwen could see dark marks around the woman’s neck and blue bruises on her left cheek.

  The bruises on Gwen’s neck and arms were mostly faded after a few months in Bakersfield, but she recognized the same marks on the dark-skinned young woman, and she recognized the way she pulled herself in and away from all the other workers at the pistachio plant.

  Gwen remembered how she used to cover her swollen eyes with sunglasses and wore cheap scarves to hide the bruises on her neck. She remembered when she lived in Ohio and how sometimes coworkers stared because they didn’t know what to say or do and they’d go back to work and keep their backs turned until Gwen left the room. She remembered how she came home many times after work and put her kids in their bedrooms and waited for her husband and hoped his day at the Chevy plant went well. It seldom went well, and he’d come home, drink, get angry and push her or slap her. Sometimes he put his hands around her neck and shook her and pushed her and she’d crash into the kitchen table and Bobby would run out of his room and stand over his mother. His father would slap Bobby with the back of his hand or hit him with his heavy leather belt. Bobby stood like a stone and took the hits meant for his mother until his father got sick of beating him and went off and found a whiskey bottle and sat in his chair and drank and watched the game until he fell asleep.

  Gwen took her sandwich and wrapped it back up. She walked over to the woman and squatted down so the two were at eye level. Gwen rested her hand on the dark woman’s knee. It startled the woman and she recoiled. She pulled her legs up to her chest and wrapped her arms around her knees and squeezed herself in until she was a tiny ball.

  “Honey? I’m sorry I startled you. I’ve seen you eat by yourself so I wanted to come over and share lunch. Would you mind if I sit with you?”

  Gwen looked into the woman’s eyes. The dark woman pulled her knees closer and gave a slight nod for Gwen to sit down.

  Gwen sat and took out her sandwich and broke a piece off, offering her some. The dark woman slowly reached out and took the piece of the sandwich and took a small bite and then a bigger one until the sandwich disappeared. Gwen took out two apples and gave one to the woman.

  “What’s your name, honey? “

  “Callista,” the dark woman whispered and turned her head slowly to face Gwen.

  She had jet black hair pulled back tight in a bun and smooth, dark skin that looked like the skin from a fifteen-year-old girl. Her eyes were deep brown chestnuts and her nose was small and bent a little bit to the left and her tiny fingers barely wrapped around the apple. Gwen watched the woman eat. She offered some water from her thermos and the woman took it and drank it until it was empty and she handed it back to Gwen.

  “Gracias.”

  The dark, tiny woman pulled her feet under her knees. The sleeves of her overalls ran up her arms. Deep, black bruises showed against her brown skin and there were older scars on her forearms. Gwen took her hand and gently rubbed the dark woman’s skin below the biggest bruise.

  “Callista? What happened to you honey?”

  Callista pulled down her sleeves and slid away a bit on the pistachio pallet. Gwen sat for a while and then slid closer. She pulled up her own sleeves and put out her arms and showed Callista the deep, blue green welt that had not fully healed from a night just a few months ago in Ohio. Callista let out a quick breath and looked back at Gwen.

  “I do not know you. Why you show me this?”

  “I have the same bruises as you. I’m safe here. So are my children. Are you safe? Do you live with someone, Callista?”

  “Si. His name is Oscar. He pick pistachios.”

  Gwen sat closer and took Callista’s other hand and gently pulled her close and looked into her eyes.

  “Does Oscar hit you?”

  Callista’s chin dropped to her chest and a tear flowed down her dark face. It glowed from the lights high above her head in the rafters that held up the thin, metal roof of the factory. The dark woman shivered and tightened her overalls close to her chest and shoulders and took another bite of the apple and looked away and whispered to Gwen.

  “Si. After work. He drink with his friends and come home late and he say he love me and then push me and hit me. I don’t fight back. He too big and fat.”

  Gwen put down her sandwich bag and sat close to Callista and put her arm around her and rocked her back and forth and Callista tried to cry but could not do it anymore and workers picked up their lunch pails and shuffled back to work, and they left them alone.

  “Do you have anywhere else to stay? Do you have any friends here?”

  “No. Just Oscar.”

  The dark woman wiggled close to Gwen and tucked her head under Gwen’s arm and used both tiny arms to pull Gwen in close. Gwen looked up at the lights in the rafters. She just found a job in Beaumont, Massachusetts and she was just about packed and would be leaving tomorrow with her twins. She looked at Callista and knew she probably had no other place to go and she knew Oscar would hit her again. She knew she could not save her. She leaned over and kissed Callista on the forehead and stood up and picked up her empty sandwich bag and the thermos and the old apple core. She buttoned her own overalls very tight and went back into the factory and put pistachios in bags and wondered if Callista would still be alive this time next year.

  Chapter 6

  The Jones Boys

  The Beaumont High School Warriors played their first game of the season. Coach Joe was silent on the sideline as his team dismantled a very talented Lawrence High School Lancer team. The Lancers lost in the state semifinals last year. They returned half of their starters on offense and defense. They were the team to beat. Yet, here was Coach Joe and his Warriors knocking off the Lancers, 42-14. Coach Joe and the Lancer coach shook hands after the game.

  “Fine game. You played well.”

  “Thanks, Coach Joe. I didn’t think we’d lose tonight. Your team played better than we thought you could. Good luck the rest of the season.”

  The Lancer coach joined his team and they left the field. Beaumont was destined for another state title game. There was no team in the league that could stop the Warrior title train.

  Andy and Tim waited at the gate as the victorious Warriors made their exit. They were immense in their mud-stained uniforms. They tousled Andy and Tim’s hair and laughed with each other and jostled each other to get into the locker room. Andy and Tim dreamed of eye black smudged on their faces and bloody hands from fierce tackles and long, victorious battles in front of thousands. They dreamed of pride and honor and blue and gold uniforms and glory that would last forever.

  Zeke and Alex appeared at the gate and stood next to their little brother. Both were stars of the Beaumont East Junior High team. The Jones boys’ dad passed from a sudden heart attack a year ago. Coach Joe came to the Jones’ house every nigh
t for weeks after the funeral. He’d climb the porch stairs and open the door and sit in the living room with the Jones boys and their mother, Mary. He’d talk about his day and they’d tell him about theirs. Sometimes he brought dinner and other times Mary and the Jones boys cooked. They’d clean up the table and wash the dishes and dry them and put them away together. He’d sit with Mary and hold her hand if she needed it or let her be if that was what she needed. He’d help Andy with writing assignments and Zeke with Algebra and Alex with a Chemistry. When it was bedtime, Coach Joe let himself out. He’d come back the next evening for dinner, and every evening after that, until the three boys and their mother got back on their feet.

  When all the players left the locker area, when all the parents and friends, the fans, the band and cheerleaders, when they all left, Coach Joe made his way toward his car. His son waited. Even the custodians had long since departed.

  “Great game, Dad. Lawrence was a tough team. You handled them.”

  “The boys handled them.”

  That was all Coach Joe had to say, and he got in the car and so did Tim and Tim began to understand what humility looked like.

  Chapter 7

  East and West

  The next Thursday, the two junior highs, Beaumont West and Beaumont East, faced tough competition. East faced a very good Chelmsford squad. Early in the game, it was clear that Chelmsford was just too big and just too fast for Andy’s East team. Although Chelmsford was clearly the better team, Andy and his teammates battled right to the end. On fourth and goal from the three-yard line, with East down 18-14, their quarterback tossed the ball to Andy. He was met immediately by two Chelmsford tacklers. Andy drove his knee high and extended a concrete stiff arm that sent both Chelmsford players crashing. The pylon was in sight. He dipped his shoulder and lunged for the goal line. An iron wall of Chelmsford defenders slammed Andy and drove him back just before he was about to score. Andy let out a grunt and his body was driven into the turf. The Chelmsford sideline leaped in celebration when the official marked the ball just short of the end zone. Andy lay on the ground. The ball rolled away from his grip. He stared into the sky and tried to focus his eyes. A few teammates helped their groggy star to the team bus.