Thin Gray Lines

by Mark Hazard

  The hawk changed course and lowered altitude, then flew off over the stand of poplars to the east. They bordered a narrow dirt road edging Tanner property and had been casting long shadows over a section of the land. Now that the sun had risen, those shadows had retreated, offering Corus a fresh hunting ground.

  He was scanning through the scope for any visible squirrel holes, when something larger caught his eye.

  A patch of ground appeared pockmarked. Nothing too obvious, just places where compacted earth took on a different shade than the tilled soil. If he looked at any one spot too long, it lost shape, but when he beheld them all together, there was indeed an unmistakable difference from the rest of the field. Not only that, but they all seemed to streak in the same direction.

  Scouring the surrounding area, and desperately wishing he had better optics, he thought he could see faint lines between the dirt road and the pockmarks, only visible because they ran perpendicular to the furrows. Maybe footprints.

  He shimmied off the roof and stowed the .22, then toured the field of fire, collecting his quarry. He gathered the critters by their thin tails in bunches, working his way toward the marks. His eyes hadn’t lied. The earth had been disturbed. The largest and deepest marks were irregular shapes, but curiously more squared than circular, rimmed with displaced soil. He saw at least six or seven distinct craters, but no trace of what had made them. Footprints stood out plainly, walking from and back to the road.

  A whistle pierced the air, emanating from his shooting position. Moses waved him back. Corus trotted over and dropped the squirrels in a heap.

  “What are you doing?” Moses asked.

  “I was gathering these,” Corus said in Spanish. He pointed at the heap with a toe. “There are many more.”

  “Leave them,” Moses said. “Good enough for today. Now, go pick rocks with the others.”

  Corus picked the .22 up where he’d left it and handed it to Moses, then jogged away. A way off, he slowed to a walk and looked back.

  Moses disappeared between the old barns, and for a moment, Corus wondered if he was going inside to see Olive.

  But Moses popped out on the other end, walking briskly toward the tractor barn.

  Randall appeared, walking in the opposite direction toward the old barns. Upon seeing Moses, he tucked a white paper sack into his jacket and held a white coffee cup down by his leg. They conferred for a moment, then passed each other by. Moses stopped and cast a long glance back at Randall, who walked behind the old barn and did not reappear on the other side.

  Corus badly wanted to sneak close and eavesdrop on whatever was happening in that barn, but it wasn’t time to take that sort of risk yet.

  He trudged over tilled ruts toward the other workers and helped pick up rocks.

  TWENTY-ONE

  When Randall stepped into the barn, Olive practically jumped on him. It not only startled him, as his eyes hadn’t adjusted to the dark, but the top came off the coffee he’d brought her and sloshed onto his hand.

  “Ag, kak.”

  He flung steaming hot coffee from his fingers onto thinly strewn hay covering the floor.

  “Ag, that blerrie smarts.” He blew on his scalded skin. “Olive, you shouldn’t jump out at people.”

  She still clung to his sleeve. “Randall, he showed me. Arlo showed me everything.”

  “Hang on. Slow down.”

  “The money. The drugs. How they make the shipping crates with the drugs inside the plastic. No one thinks to look at them, apparently.”

  “What are you—”

  “I know you wanted to protect me. I love you for that and so much else, but I know, now. I’ve always known… something, but now I really know.”

  “Olive, you’re babbling like a gibbon. Slow down. Come here.”

  He pulled her toward the glow of the electric lantern and sat them both down on the hay bale by her cot.

  “I went in the distribution center, snooping around,” she said slower. “I found the panel, the hatch.”

  “What hatch?”

  “The hatch that leads down to the bunker.”

  “What bunker?” Randall asked, exasperated.

  “But it was locked, and I thought no one saw me—”

  Randall set down the coffee and the bag of food and held her by the shoulders. “Breathe. Breathe with me.”

  Olive did as he asked and took a few slow breaths.

  “All right,” Randall said. “You were in the DC.”

  “I was on my way out, and I ran into Arlo. He knew I’d snooped. Must have cameras or something.”

  “What did he do? Did he hurt you? I’ll cut his—”

  “No-no. He threatened as much, but then he did the weirdest thing. Randall, he opened the hatch in the control room and just showed me this pile of cash, which apparently belongs to my parents. And Arlo doesn’t just steal it for some strange reason.”

  “He just showed you?”

  “Then he gave me the perfunctory if anything happens to it, he’ll kill me speech.”

  “He said that to you? I’ll bloody kill him.” Randall stood, but Olive dragged him back down.

  “That’s just it, Randall. At first, I was scared, but once I saw everything I’d been avoiding, I got very calm. That calm hasn’t left me. It’s like nothing scares me anymore. Not even Arlo. I mean, he does — I’m terrified — but I’m more terrified of life just going on the way it has been.”

  His eyes asked what she meant.

  “I don’t mean real estate,” Olive said. “I mean us. I’ve been dead on the inside ever since we ended it. I only eat because I’m afraid I’ll get too skinny and go barren and never be able to have your children. I only get up every day and work hard because I want to be worthy of you.”

  “Worthy? Of me?” Randall choked out.

  “And to be worthy of myself. To stand on my own without my parents. I want you, Randall, and I can’t live without you. Not if you want me, too. And I know you do.” Tears broke in, overwhelming her. “I know you want me.”

  “Olive, calm down.”

  She pounded his chest. “Yes—Or—No?” Fists punctuated each word.

  “Yes!” he yelped. “Olive, ja, I want you. Don’t make me say it. It’s too painful.”

  “So, I want you, and you want me. This is it. This is the whole world.”

  “Skatjie, I wish it were. But it isn’t.”

  “Maybe it wasn’t. But then I found twelve million dollars under the DC.”

  The sum stunned Randall. He pursed his mouth and closed his eyes.

  “With that money, you could buy a divorce from your stupid wife. I know you don’t care about her, and she only cares about the money you send.”

  “I can’t.”

  “You were sixteen, Randall. They forced you to wed. You know your upbringing was psychotically religious. You’ve told me as much. You need to break free from its hold on your mind.”

  Randall swallowed hard, his Adam’s apple dropping like a hammer.

  “Your kids would be set. You wouldn’t have to feel guilty anymore.”

  “It’s not just the money. My wife… there’s no love there. I admit. But the boys… I couldn’t just pretend I didn’t leave them behind.”

  “You left a long time ago, Randall. They barely know you.”

  “Ag, that’s mean. That’s—”

  “You left home for better wages. You left to help their lives. It’s just the heartbreaking reality.”

  “I can’t stay here forever. I couldn’t do that. It’s not just about being their father. It’s about what I owe my home. My community. My pastors. My parents and their friends. I’d shame them all.”

  “That’s how they control you and always have! What’s the real anchor to your home? Your boys, or their control on your mind?”

  She let the question hang between them. The silence was agonizing, as his rational mind latched hands with Olive, pulling him away from the harsh belittlement and severe control of his chu
rch, but another part of his mind formed in childhood was too terrified to let go.

  “Because I’ll promise you this,” Olive said. “I will be a step mom here in America. I’ll even move back to South Africa with you. If it’s about the boys, I’ll do anything, for you and for them. As long as there’s no wars or anything.”

  “No, skatjie, there’s no wars. But, ag, Olive, it won’t work. I can’t openly live in sin. We can’t get divorced in my church.”

  “Then we don’t go to your stupid church. Randall! Wake up. Be the man I know you are. Be free. We can’t be slaves to the people who made us small. I’m talking to me —I have to do this too. I was raised by the most controlling woman on the planet. It’s the control I have a problem with not God.”

  “I… I know you’re right.” Randall shoved his palms into his eyes, fighting back tears. “I know you’re right, but I can’t make my brain free of them.”

  She gripped his face in her hands. “Twelve million dollars can buy a whole heap of therapy. But nothing will free you if you don’t want to be free.”

  He dropped his hands. “You’ve got a mad look in your eye.”

  She launched forward and kissed him. He didn’t pull away. She felt his reticence melt away, lowering the floodgates to his true feelings. For a few precious seconds, their love drew a line between what was true and what were lies.

  He broke away, breathless. “I can’t gain you to lose you again. It gave me an ulcer.”

  “It tore you up because you thought it was wrong. But it’s not. Tell me you’ll help me get that money. Tell me we can run away.”

  Randall shook his head. “No, miss. I can’t tell you that. The money is dirty. It’s drugs.”

  “Then it’s been drug money feeding your kids all along. You make twice what a farm manager should, and that’s for your silence. Everything you have is dirty. Enough moralizing.”

  “I must go. Sorry, love. I have to go.”

  “Randall. No!”

  He bolted to the door and ran outside.

  Olive screamed and kicked over her cot and pounded the hay bale with her fists. At the moment where she would’ve normally fallen to sobbing, she clenched straw in both hands, tore it free and seethed. Rage like tent pegs anchored the lines of her resolve.

  She gave herself the exact medicine she’d offered Randall, growling, “Nothing will free you if you don’t want to be free.”

  But wanting it wasn’t enough.

  It was like Arlo had said about stealing the money. It would be the beginning of problems, not the end. So it would go with her mental freedom.

  She accepted that she had two paths to choose from, both painful and dangerous. She could choose stagnation, or she could choose which set of problems she wanted more.

  And the choice was easy.

  TWENTY-TWO

  The workers’ lunch came in big foil trays, one with sautéed vegetables and meat layered on a bed of fragrant rice, another with stewed beans, and one containing steamed handmade tortillas. The food was warm, pleasantly spicy and deeply satisfying.

  Corus ate across from Miriam and Antonio at one of the folding tables set up outside the door of the bunkhouse. “Is the meal always this good?”

  “The Tanner farm works you hard but treats you right, eh?” Antonio said. “Moses’ grandmother cooks it.”

  “My compliments to the chef.”

  “Careful,” Antonio said. “I usually eat too much and can barely stand up I’m so sleepy.”

  Corus and Miriam laughed.

  “I have a question,” Corus said. “The rocks. Are there more every spring?”

  “The ground forces them to the surface.” Antonio shrugged. “Maybe the freezing? I don’t know. But every year there are hundreds more out there after they till the soil.”

  “That’s incredible. I was reading about the ancient floods that came through here. Must be something to do with that.”

  “One of these days we are going to till up Noah’s ark,” Miriam said.

  They laughed, and Corus took a big bite, not able to slow himself down just yet.

  “Hey,” one of the other workers said.

  Corus didn’t know his name. He was one of the long-term workers, spending most of the day so far in the tractor barn. He was looking at Corus.

  “Where you from, amigo?” the well-muscled man asked with a jutting of his chin.

  “Chihuahua,” Corus said. It was the most fun placename in Mexico to say.

  “You don’t sound like you’re from Chihuahua,” the man said.

  Corus took another big bite and stared at the man while he chewed. “Where are you from? Do they teach manners there?”

  The man smiled. “I’m from Jalisco. These are my cousins. Chito and Oswaldo.” He gestured to two men beside him, one older, one younger than him.

  “Pleasure to meet you, caballeros,” Corus said. “I’m Diego. And you?”

  “I’m called Jorge.”

  Corus gave him a polite nod.

  “But like I said…” Jorge crossed his arms. “You don’t sound like you’re from Chihuahua. You don’t even sound Mexican.”

  He thought his accent was passing. Antonio looked aggrieved on his behalf, but Miriam gave Corus a knowing but kind glance, as if she too had noticed.

  Corus cursed to himself and lowered his head over his food.

  “Where are you from, then?” Jorge asked.

  By now everyone was looking at Corus.

  “Leave him alone,” Miriam said.

  “I have a right to know,” Jorge said. “We all do.”

  Miriam turned around on the bench to face him. “You run your fucking mouth too much.”

  Jorge’s older cousin, the one called Oswaldo, rolled his eyes and mouthed, “Gracias.”

  The younger Chito looked to Jorge as if waiting for him to go off, but Miriam’s retort ended the questioning. Corus was thankful she’d stuck up for him, but it was too late. They’d all have their eye on him now, making reconnaissance about the farm facilities much more difficult.

  For the rest of the day, he put his head down and worked. He didn’t think like a cop looking for clues, but like a worker trying to earn a wage. To pass the arduous hours in his head, he imagined a family back in Mexico. There was his doting wife, Maria Elena, and their nine children. Gustavo, Octavio, Marina, Juliana, Juan, Raul, Conchita, Esteban and Diego Junior, the baby. Instead of toiling for no reason on a fumbled mission, he was laboring to send the older children to good schools and to buy the orthopedic supports Conchita needed to walk correctly.

  He was so occupied with his interior fantasy world, when quitting time came, it surprised him, though it shouldn’t have with the sun sinking toward the horizon.

  They put away their tools then met Moses waiting by the truck to take them back into town. Corus followed automatically and got in line with the others. Moses handed out cash before each one got in the back. Corus was fourth in line. He took his money feeling quite happy to see a tangible benefit from his work but raised an eyebrow at the amount. He held the bills up for Moses to verify.

  “Got a problem?” Moses asked in Spanish.

  “It’s not too much?”

  “You can give some back if you want,” Moses snarked.

  “No, no. Gracias. Very generous.”

  “It’s nothing, Diego. I’m lucky I didn’t have to pay you for every rat you shot. By the end of the week, their species will be extinct.”

  “I can work more?”

  “Por supuesto. You’re a horse.”

  Corus thought fast. “I don’t have anywhere to be in town. Could I stay in the bunkhouse?”

  Deep wrinkles sprouted in Moses’ forehead. “I don’t see why not. Go for it. You have your toothbrush?”

  Corus laughed. “I can take care of that.”

  Moses nodded toward the bunkhouse.

  Corus waved at Antonio and Miriam.

  “Are you going to be okay?” Miriam asked from the bed of the truc
k.

  Her concern warmed him, and he grinned. “See you, tomorrow.”

  Moses got in the driver’s seat, then whistled out the window.

  Corus jogged up.

  “I forgot.” Moses raised a finger. “One rule. No drinking in the bunkhouse. You can do that at the cantina south of town. Not overrun with college kids and pretty safe. It’s three miles walking. Maybe you can convince Jorge to give you a ride. He’s the only one we allow to drive farm vehicles. He and his boys go most nights.”

  Moses drove off.

  Corus stared down at the pair of hundred-dollar bills in his hand and rubbed them together. They were crisp and stiff like starched linen.

  TWENTY-THREE

  Joller was at a fancy doughnut shop, drinking a tea and taking bites of a bacon maple bar. He normally kept a very strict diet rich in protein and whole foods, but today was cheat day. He leafed through his book, The Art of the Rebound: Transforming Failure into Success by Gabriel Fortnight. Chapter Five was entitled, “Failure to Accept,” where Fortnight presented his notion that only by accepting one’s limitations, could one then seek to buttress them. Where most self-help expected the reader to inflate their perception of what they could achieve, Fortnight took a more practical approach. Each human being, he argued, came with a certain amount of biological and hereditary hard-wiring for proclivities, preferences, strengths and weaknesses. He wasn’t arguing against improving weaknesses, per se, rather that life-changing improvement often came when humans accepted their blind spots, without judgment. Acceptance was the precursor to Chapter Six: Failure to Ask for Help.

  Joller inserted the entirety of the last half of the maple bacon bar into his mouth and chewed slowly, pondering Fortnights’ wisdom. He agreed that most self-help appealed only to vanity while cloaking itself in humility. He certainly wasn’t against having a friend or two to help shoulder the load in life. That had been the most gratifying time in his life, having those sorts of compatriots in the Army. But they were dead or in prison. There was no rebound for them. Joller was still shouldering the load, though, because he was that kind of guy.