Ticket Home

by James Michael Pratt

  But he stood there, contemplating more than her beauty. What should he do … follow Lucian? Where would that get him? He pondered. How could he meet her?

  “No, Lucian. This isn’t right,” he whispered back. He was excited, a normal testosterone-driven eighteen-year-old as he supposed, but …

  He watched a moment longer. She was turning to the side. The sight of the pale-skinned and innocent blonde bather dropping down into the water caused him to tremble. He recognized her now! He had seen her in town earlier that day and had sworn he would find a way to meet her. He hadn’t shared that with Lucian—yet. Oddly, she sparked something else in him he couldn’t quite finger.

  No! Courtesy. Privacy … it wouldn’t do for her to see him gawking like this. He had to give her respect or he’d never get anywhere with her. He’d never heard her voice, knew nothing of her life, but this must be love, he mused silently to himself.

  “Naw, Lucian. This isn’t fair. We can’t stay.”

  “Are you nuts? We’re not hurting a thing.”

  “Yes we are.”

  “No, we’re not. Now stop. You’re ruining this.”

  “It’s not right.”

  “Well wait then. Just wait ’til she gets out of the water!”

  “We’ve come here on business for Pa. The land is priced the lowest ever in decades, people are just givin’ up and walkin’ away and there is a county bid for it … we got to hustle, not let Pa down. Suppose some other bidder gets theirs in and we get back too late?” Norman answered.

  “You ain’t sane Norman. Now hush!” Lucian urged.

  “Who’s there?” the girl screamed, startled at the sound of men’s voices on the far side of the pond.

  “There you go, Norman. Now look what you’ve done,” Lucian spit out, disgust in his voice.

  Norman stood frozen, unable to move, apologies written on every crease of his face. Lucian stayed put.

  The pretty girl submerged herself up to her neck in protest … and Norman could tell, fear. She glared at him. “You boys just get on out of here. Go on! Leave me be! Go on! You know the rules, or don’t ya?”

  “What rules?” Lucian called back from his hiding place.

  “Don’t give me that. You know what I’m talking about,” she called back angrily.

  Norman turned two shades of red and walked toward the truck parked on the dirt road, certain he had never seen anything more lovely in all his days. His heart raced, wondering how to make up for the embarrassment and meet her.

  Lucian remained content to have some fun. “You didn’t answer my question,” he called back from the bushes.

  “I’ll scream,” she said.

  “No need, ma’am. But I have just got to say we were innocent of any bad intent. You’re just so pretty. Guess we couldn’t help ourselves.”

  “You have a smart mouth. Now go on! Leave me be! The rules are rules and you know darned well everybody gets their privacy.”

  “Very well, ma’am.” Lucian grinned as he stood and bowed. “I humbly apologize.”

  She couldn’t make out the distinct features of the young man but he was almost a double for the other man who walked off. She froze her gaze, momentarily confused. “Humph,” she snorted. “You aren’t sorry. And your teasing, walking away, then hiding down like that. You’re not bein’ a gentleman neither.”

  “Well then. Let’s leave it at that,” he laughed as he turned to follow Norman.

  Norman sat on a tree stump away from the hot springs pondering that face … and more. But it was her face, eyes, something he recalled from his youth—from years before.

  They had lived in Redemption as boys. Their father had brought Mother there and they had eyes on making this part of Oklahoma home. Working for the Santa Fe, his father had been the youngest country station manager this side of the Texas border. That was until the 1920s roared into 1930 and then whimpered into the Great Depression of 1931.

  Norman had gone to school with the prettiest blond-haired girl he had ever known. When he first laid eyes on her in 1930, his nine-year-old heart had fallen hard for the little girl from Warm Springs. For the entire year they attended school together he sought ways to be near her, fantasizing about carrying her books, holding her hand. He even wrote love notes, undelivered, and looked for ways to get noticed in the school yard during recess and lunch.

  Lucian was less stealthy in his ways. More direct. He had a teasing way. And Norman had noticed how it worked on her. He suspected Lucian had fallen just as hard but was showing it in a different way. They were twins, as close as two brothers could be, but Norman could never bring himself to pull pranks, tease, or be as carefree as Lucian.

  He thought his young heart would break when his pa was forced to go into the big city in Oklahoma to look for work on the rails. About the same time he heard the blond-girl, two years his junior, had moved with her family in the great “Okie” migration to the farmlands of central California. Seemed everyone was moving somewhere else which made Warm Springs and Redemption darn near ghost towns for all these years since.

  Now he smiled at this turn of fate. His heart picked up the sprinter’s pace he had formerly known, as if time had been erased, and it was 1930 again. In his mind he was there, gazing across the country school classroom totally hypnotized by the prettiest seven-year-old girl in Oklahoma.

  “Hey Norm!” Lucian called laughingly as he stumbled from the wooded glen out of breath. “Did you get a load of that? Wow! I never seen anything like that before. Whew!” he roared, happy with himself. “‘You boys know the rules or don’t ya,’ she says.” He laughed gleefully. “Well I know one thing. I’m coming back tomorrow and this time with Pa’s binoculars!” He snickered.

  “You’ve got no shame, Lucian,” Norm scolded. “It isn’t right to do that. She’s not an object to—”

  “Oh, hush, Norm! What’s wrong with you? Don’t you think she’s the prettiest thing you ever laid eyes on? You need your head examined, brother,” Lucian added as they both made their way down the path to the parked truck.

  “She’s pretty, that’s for sure. But it isn’t fair and I just can’t take advantage of a woman like that … even if … even though I’d kind of like to sneak a peek too.”

  “Now there you go. You are human,” Lucian chuckled as they both hopped into the old Dodge pickup and started down the road.

  “There’s the house,” Norman pointed out. “Must be hers.”

  “Looks abandoned,” Lucian observed.

  Norman’s head turned against the progress of the truck as he drove. He was memorizing this road and how to get back here.

  “For gosh sakes, look out, Norman,” Lucian demanded and tugged at the steering wheel to get the truck back on the road. “Watch the road,” he added.

  Norman could tell that Lucian wasn’t taking stock in who this girl was. He was too interested in the fun. He hadn’t put two and two together. Didn’t place her face in the past like he, Norman, had. Typical for lighthearted Lucian, he thought to himself. That’s why he can’t see who she is. He’s always looking at the wrong things, he mused silently.

  “Well this land is for sale by government auction for back taxes and we definitely are going to get that bid in,” Lucian offered cheerfully, finally breaking the silence as they entered the small town. “I didn’t think I’d like Warm Springs. Missed the city life too much. But I could really get used to this swimming hole.” He smiled.

  Before Lucian figured out who the blonde was, Norman would have to make his move, or he’d be out in the cold when his brother used his slick ways to dazzle the young lady.

  Norman gazed over at his grinning twin whose mind was obviously at work, but differently from how he was thinking. He’d find a way to meet that girl, apologize, and make things right. He’d have to sneak back, break away from Lucian and his pa—who was waiting down at the depot. Before Lucian figured things out he’d find the pretty blonde … today.

  CHAPTER 2

  “The stat
ion manager just up and left for California, the Santa Fe man said. Says all we got to do is sign this here contract and we got ourselves a steam engine, two flat cars, one boxcar, and a depot on a ten-year lease, renewable after that. The house is ours at the end of the lease. What do you boys think?”

  They looked at each other. Norman could read Lucian’s mind. He wasn’t ready to become a hick. They all sensed the Depression was turning a corner. City life, college was on Lucian’s mind. Not to mention the girls.

  Lucian smiled at Norman. He knew his brother was a country yokel at heart. Except for that pretty blonde and the interesting idea of a daily visit to the hot springs, this dusty one-horse town was going to be in his rearview mirror if he could get a ride out of here soon enough.

  “Well?” Jason Parker, their father, prompted again.

  “Well, Pa, there ain’t much in the way of farmin’ goin’ on. And with no product to ship, how do we pay those Santa Fe folks?” Lucian drawled as he stuffed chewing tobacco in his cheek.

  “Norman, what do you think?” Jason turned to his other son.

  “Lucian’s got a point, Pa. All the folks are leavin’. Why? The land here looks good. There’s water down at the springs. It don’t look so bad. It isn’t any dust bowl like further on north and west in the panhandle. Why they all left for California them eight years back or so I can’t figure.”

  “Big promises, son. The prices don’t pay good here. The yields were down. A man can only take so much. A couple bad years in farming and you’re all done. The government don’t pay ya to grow low yields or high. Nothin’ they can do. This damnable depression doesn’t offer men the work it used to. Men are paid less for the same work they used to do. It’s not just Oklahoma. California may seem like a dream, but those wages out there are just survival wages, like everywhere else.

  “It’s land, this train, a business such as this that gives a family roots, stays with ya, becomes part of the heritage and good name. I swear, I do feel sorry for all these folks. It ain’t been easy for us, boys, but we’ve made do. We are luckier than most. Come on over here, Lucian. Got somethin’ to show ya.”

  Norman kicked at the old steamer and held back, leaving the two to do some talking, him to do some thinking.

  Iron beast, this locomotive was a good solid workhorse. He’d loved trains as much as his pa, as much as any child ever did. He grinned watching his pa take Lucian on a guided tour of every working part inside the engineer’s compartment and outside. Lucian was bored. Not that he wasn’t a good trainman, just that his heart wasn’t and never had been in it.

  His pa was doing a sales job on Lucian. Trying to convince him what a grand life country train-working could be. Surely trying to sell him on the greatest opportunity to ever come to this family of two children—owning their own steam engine. Running their own train depot! He smiled overhearing his pa’s country drawl as enthusiastic as a revival preacher proclaiming salvation in Jesus.

  His pa was a work of art. His mama too. He thought of her now. She was down in Albuquerque, New Mexico, at her widowed Spanish-speaking mother’s, Grandma Violeta. Grandma “Leta” as everyone called her, was of Mexican-American and Native American stock. And with that mix, as pretty in her old age as many women could ever hope to be in their youth. A real looker, his Eastern born-and-bred granddad Lawrence Mead used to say.

  His mama, the sparkle of his pa’s life, was a princess to him. He treated her royally, yes sir. Pretty pitch-black hair common to mixed blood Mexican-Americans. Green eyes from the Irish blood in her. High cheekbones, characteristic of her Pueblo Indian grandparents on her mother’s side. Ivory skin inherited from her father’s crimson-haired and fair-skinned Irish mother. A mix that the universe had blessed and his pa had fallen madly in love with when he started working on the rails in 1915.

  She was wheelchair bound now. Polio struck her hard just the year before. But she was spunky and loved life … she was the kind of woman Norman imagined he’d marry, with one exception. His woman was a blonde. In his mind she’d always been a blond girl. And he found her again today.

  Norman couldn’t help having his daydream shattered by the loud banter going back and forth between his pa and Lucian now that they had cranked the steam engine up.

  “If everyone packs up and goes, who’s gonna be supplyin’ the goods to make this train-run worth operatin’? If Santa Fe is pullin’ out, how are we to make it work out?” Lucian countered.

  “I got contacts up north a ways,” Jason Parker loudly answered above the noise. “Oklahoma City, Tulsa, even Kansas City,” he yelled. “There are still folks who will never give up. We just got to stick it out, stick together, that’s all. This depression, this weather—these things change. God won’t punish a people forever. He just likes to wake ’em up now and then.

  “Besides, we got the land and nobody can take it from us. I’m sorry for them who sold out, but they are gone West and aren’t comin’ back. Might as well farm and ranch it best we can.”

  “Norman always wanted to be a cowboy,” Lucian grumbled, so low his brother could barely hear it.

  “Santa Fe is still movin’ out, Pa. Aren’t ya a bit concerned we could lose everything here?” Lucian prodded.

  Jason studied his boy’s responses by gazing at his feet as he walked, as if the wood planks they stood on held the answer. “Santa Fe is just cuttin’ their losses. These shortlines don’t have the value. Just the mainlines. But they got value to me, to us. Your mother will be proud when she sees what we’ve done. Those are my thoughts on the subject.

  “I’m thinkin’ we could offer cheaper shippin’ if we line up with a trucking outfit from here to Oklahoma City north and to Fort Worth south. Plus now I got this side deal cookin’ over in Albuquerque with old man Monroe. You remember him?”

  “The old codger who nearly fired you for the mistake that no-good-for-nothin’ warehouse manager made up in Oklahoma City last year?” Lucian spit tobacco juice disdainfully on the ground when he finished.

  “The same.” Jason nodded. “Wish you wouldn’t chew that stuff, son,” he added.

  Lucian nodded and turned away. “That man isn’t honest,” Lucian added. “It wasn’t fair dockin’ your pay neither.”

  “It wasn’t that, son. He’s just a hard man—fair but hard. I should’ve caught on to the warehouse tricks being played. He thought I had run them cars empty to Wichita without checkin’ on the bill of lading first. He found out what caused it. He even apologized, sort of. Knows it wasn’t my fault. Knows that warehouse manager, Calhoon, was skimmin’ off the top—takin’ goods each load.

  “It don’t pay—dishonesty don’t. He got his due for that. I hear he’s lost his home and packed up headin’ out West. Old man Monroe, he’s hard but fair. He has a couple runs a month I could make from Albuquerque to El Paso way. He says the Santa Fe won’t even charge for them, if we piggyback on some of their runs. He says it’s government work, that it’ll pay four hundred dollars a run on top of expenses. Too small for the Santa Fe to handle, just right for us.

  “With a little bit of work from the small farm here—if we get that land on the bid—we’ll make the six month payment and have some cash to spare. You and Norman got that bid in to the county man, didn’t ya?”

  “Just got back from the office that county fella set up next to the barber shop. Pa … not much social life around here,” Lucian complained and spit again.

  “Not like it was in Kansas or Oklahoma City when you two were just little scrappers. A dream come true for your mother and me.”

  “I like it fine, Pa,” Norman offered. “We’ll make a go of it,” he announced, rounding the corner.

  Jason smiled approving of what lay before him. “Your mother needs this, she deserves this. It’ll bring her peace of mind to be out here in clean fresh country air.”

  “Yes, sir,” Lucian answered, resigned to his fate of becoming a country hick in a one-buggy town. “There’s always the springs.” He brightened and poked Nor
man with a raised eyebrow.

  “Yeah,” Norman smiled. He was thinking of the pretty blonde now. She’s mine, he whispered under his breath. She’s mine.

  CHAPTER 3

  Jason Parker was off walking the depot grounds, inspecting the turn-of-the-century loading dock and train station, savoring this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.

  “Great day in the mornin’! We got us a railway station!” he turned with a triumphant grin and thrust his fist in the air.

  “We got to do this, Norman,” Lucian whispered. “Look how happy he is. With Mama in that wheelchair, polio gotten to her the way it has, it’s like he’s got hope again.” He spit his tobacco chew out, a sore look on his face.

  “We’ll make this place purr like a kitten, Lucian. Come on. Let’s get on over to the drug store. Get us a cold Coke and check this town out some.”

  “You go along. I’ll stay here with Pa. I’ll be by later. I want to figure out what he’s thinkin’ on this farming stuff—I’m not a farmer. I got plans for college next year. Maybe I can work something out to do both. You go ahead.”

  Norman jumped off the wooden platform and into the dusty unpaved road that led up to the main street. His mind was heavy with the vision of the girl. He’d never seen anything lovelier.

  Main Street was two blocks long and ran east and west and then to a small town square with a general store, one room post office, and a half dozen other shops. The drug store and one-pump gasoline stop was on the east edge of town. All a ten minute walk one end to the other.

  “You one of them train boys?” the old man sitting in a rocker called from the porch of a small cottage off the main street. He spit tobacco juice, hitting just next to Norman’s feet.

  “Yes, sir,” he answered politely. “Norman Parker is my name.”

  “Well, it means a lot for us to see new blood comin’ to rescue this old station. Worked it for forty years myself,” the aged man said as he rocked and whittled on a stick of spruce, spitting and hitting the same spot with no apparent effort.