by Joel Arnold
Good enough for me.
“Ben?” It was Cal Sellers, the third of our trio of teachers from Lincoln.
“Hey, Cal. How’s it going?”
He bit off the end of a grape Popsicle and looked out at the dust rising in the corral. “Fine,” he said. Then he shook his head. “I hate these days. Wish I could stay home. Call in a sub.”
“Why don’t you?”
He glanced up at me, blinking from the hot sun. “Why don’t I what? Call in a sub?” He squinted at the enthralled faces of his students as they watched the events unfold in the corral. “I’d feel like I’m shirking my responsibility. You know? I mean, I spend one hell of a lot of time gaining their trust, and if I didn’t show up on today of all days…”
Good old Cal. Even on a day like today, he wore a shirt and tie, trousers, good shoes whose polished sheen was already coated with dirt.
As for myself, I’d opted years ago for jeans, a flannel shirt and shit-kicker boots for branding day. This was a farm, not an art museum.
“I better check on Culver,” I said. “Make sure the kids are behaving.”
Cal nodded. “I’ll hold down the fort here.”
Good boy, Cal.
I walked through the children huddled up to the corral fence. A wave of excited chatter arose, and I saw that the first calf had been roped by the hind legs and pulled to the fire. Two cowboys wrestled it to the ground, while a third untied its legs and held onto them. One of the cowboys who’d tackled the calf knelt on its neck, while the other pulled a brand out of the fire and pressed it to the bawling calf’s flank.
I heard groans, cheers and hoots. I heard a child wretch, followed by a slew of voices saying “Eeew!” and “Gross!” but when I looked toward the perpetrator, Cal was already next to her, wiping at the poor girl’s mouth with his handkerchief. I headed over to the barn.
The barn was big and red and had stood for seventy-eight years, raised by Bertrand Culver’s father and a host of neighboring farmers. There’d been a big celebration the day of the raising, and Mrs. Culver proudly showed anyone who cared to look an album brimming with black and white photos of the event.
As I entered, I felt like Jonah being swallowed by the whale as I moved from bright sun to deep shadow. My eyes adjusted quickly, and I sucked in a sweet lungful of hay dust and cattle smells. Soft strands of sunlight spooled from fractures in the roof and walls.
We let in ten children at a time while the branding went on outside. They huddled around Bertrand Culver — current patriarch of the Culver family and all-around head honcho of the farm. He held up a branding iron of cold, black steel, and let the kids inspect, touch and pass it around.
I stopped just outside the circle of children and listened to his soft, gravelly voice.
“Every farm has their different brand,” Culver told them. “Their different mark. Back in the old days, there weren’t the fences like there are today, so we branded cattle in case one of our cows wandered onto someone else’s land. That way, we could tell whose cows belonged to who.”
I got his attention with a nod and a smile. “Mr. Culver, how’s everyone behaving today?”
He winked, the wrinkles around his eyes and mouth stretching. “Just fine, Ben. Haven’t had to whup one, yet.”
Some of the kids giggled.
He passed along another brand. He’d acquired quite a collection over the years from auctions and antique stores. His own mark was a stylized CFF, or C double F, which stood simply for Culver Family Farm.
Jennifer Bately, one of my smartest students, raised her hand.
Culver nodded. “Yes, m’am?”
She pointed to an area behind him. “What are those ones for? Why are they smaller?”
Culver looked over his shoulder and adjusted his black cowboy hat. He smiled at Jennifer. “We’ll talk about those next. But let’s get back to what I was saying.” One of the brands passed around the circle came back to him. He held it like a riding crop. “Another reason we branded was ‘cause of cattle rustlers. It was a lot easier to get our cattle back if they were marked.”
Tow-headed Gary Billings raised his hand. “Are there still cattle rustlers?”
Culver nodded. “Long as cattle are worth something, there’ll be rustlers. Just like there’ll always be bank robbers and muggers and kidnappers. Always someone around who wants to take something that ain’t theirs. Understand?”
Gary nodded, his mouth hanging open around an overbite.
Then Jennifer Bately, her eyes having never left the area behind Culver, gasped and put a hand to her mouth. She stifled a cry, turned and walked outside the tight circle. She gagged, as if about to vomit, so I went over to her while Culver continued his talk. I knelt and put my arm around her.
“You okay?”
She wiped at the tears collecting in her eyes. “I just realized—” She composed herself. Looked up at me.
I patted her back. “It’s all right.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Nothing to be sorry about.”
She nodded.
I wiped at a drop of sweat that hovered on the tip of my nose. “It’s part of life. Something we live with, you know?”
She nodded again, looking up at the hayloft.
“Are you going to be okay?”
“I think so.”
“Do you need to go outside?”
She wiped at her cheek and took a deep breath. “No. I’m okay.”
I stood up and gently guided her back to the circle. The children listened intently as Culver reiterated what I’d already told them in class about the way things are in this day and age.
Once all the students had been through Culver’s lecture and demonstration, Barbara Culver, Bertrand’s wife of forty-some years, rang the dinner bell, and her own children passed out paper plates, cornbread, slices of watermelon, corn on the cob slathered with butter, hot dogs and hamburgers.
We ate our lunch scattered about the property around the corral and under the shade of maple and oak trees and by the side of the barn. The cowhands also ate lunch, and I wondered how many years they’d been doing this — how many classes they’d tended to, how many students. Were they used to it by now, or were some of them still green around the gills? Could you ever get used to it?
A few of the cowhands ate together, leaning back casually against the corral fence, while others sat with the children and let them try on their cowboy hats, feel the leather of their chaps. Some told jokes, or answered questions about what to expect later in the day.
I took my paper plate and lemonade over to Ms. Durphy and Cal, who sat in the shade of the big red barn. I eased down to the ground and spread my legs out.
Cal Seller’s plate sat half-eaten next to him.
“Not hungry?” I asked.
He looked at his plate. Shrugged. “You know — just the day.”
“We’re halfway through it,” I reminded him.
“But that was the easy half.”
“Easy for you,” Ms. Durphy said. “I can’t stand the smell of this place.” She waved a hand over her plate, trying to rid it of the half-dozen flies hovering over her cornbread.
“The smell’s the best part,” I said. “That, and the fresh air.”
“You call this fresh air?” Durphy said. “It turns my sinuses to mush.” She elaborated by blowing her nose into her napkin.
Then Cal said, “Maybe it smells fine now, but every time this day ends, I can’t get rid of the other smell. The smell of the branding.”
I looked over at the students as they finished their lunches. They were brave kids. Taking everything in stride. I was proud of them. Not just my students, but Durphy’s and Cal’s as well. Looking from one child’s face to the other, I didn’t see a frightened one in the bunch. They were excited, yes, and some talked a mile a minute. Others giggled nervously or paced and fidgeted over the grounds, but not one looked like they wanted to turn tail and run.
“We got a good bunch this year,�
� I said.
Ms. Durphy rolled her eyes and stifled a belch.
Cal wiped his chin with a handkerchief and said, “We’ve got a good bunch every year.”
For a moment, I thought he was going to cry. Even Janet Durphy took her eyes off her plate and looked up at Cal with concern. But Cal cleared his throat, stood and dusted off the seat of his trousers.
“Let’s get this over with,” he said. He blew the whistle he wore around his neck and called out to his students, instructing them to line up at the barn door.
Ms. Durphy gathered her students together and made them wait in line behind Cal’s class. “Keep your voices down,” she said, her voice stern. “Stop shouting!”
Why didn’t she just let them play for another half hour? It would take that long for Cal’s class to take their second turn in the barn, this time as one group. I wasn’t about to gather my students yet. Let ’em enjoy this beautiful early summer day. Let ’em play tag and Frisbee. Let ’em explore the farm and look at the animals. This was a rare thing for them to be out of the city.
I sat outside the corral fence. The cowhands had finished lunch and were helping inside the barn now. The corral itself was empty, save for the fire that still burned, and the branding irons stuck in it, waiting to be taken out and cooled down and put away until the next time they were needed.
Again, I heard Durphy telling her kids to behave and stay in line, and how she didn’t want to have to give anyone detention for misbehavior. I wanted to tell her to shut the hell up.
A shadow fell over me and I looked up at Jennifer Bately. She squinted at me. Her hands were behind her back. She moved dirt around with the toe of her sneaker.
“Ben?”
“Jennifer? You okay?”
She nodded, then asked, “You sure it doesn’t hurt?”
The sun shined in my eyes as I looked up at her, so it was hard to see the expression on her face, hard to see whether she was frightened or nervous, but I didn’t hear either of those emotions in her voice. What I heard was an eagerness to hear me tell her that it didn’t hurt, it’s only like a sting, like getting a shot. I knew that’s what she wanted to hear, and I knew she wanted to trust me with all her heart when I told her that.
So I nodded into the sunlight. “I’m sure. It doesn’t hurt. Not much. It’s just like getting a shot is all. No different than that. Okay?”
I guess she nodded. I couldn’t tell in the sun’s glare, but she didn’t say anything else. She turned and walked away.
I wondered if there was anything different I should tell next year’s batch of third-graders. Whether or not I should fine-tune my lecture to make them less afraid or less anxious about branding day. As it was, I tried my best to explain how branding was a way to find something when it got lost or had been taken by someone who shouldn’t have it. Much like Culver explained it to all the kids he talked to. I told them about how their mothers and fathers would want the same kind of thing for them. Their parents wanted the best for them, and would want to find them if anyone ever took them who wasn’t supposed to. And with all the budget cuts, there really wasn’t a better way.
I blew my whistle.
The last of Ms. Durphy’s class disappeared into the deep shadows of the barn.
“Let’s line up,” I said. “A through Z.”
Jennifer Bately was second in line behind Jason Aldritch.
They lined up and I walked down the line to make sure they were all accounted for. I also wanted to be available to answer any last questions they may have had.
I stepped back to the front of the line. “Okay.” I smiled. “Here we go.”
We walked into the smoky expanse of the red barn. A pit of coals glowed at the far end. Squeals and yelps of Ms. Durphy’s students got swallowed up in the hayloft and the old barn wood. A lone cow chewed and shuffled in its pen.
Beyond the hot coals was a table set up with gauze, bandages and ointment. Barbara Culver sat in the hayloft on a bale of hay. She played a fiddle and sang, her sweet voice drifting over us like a soft kiss.
Iron rods protruded from the coals.
The nearer we got, the quieter my students became.
I watched Bertrand pull a rod out from the coals and show the hot end to one of the last of Ms. Durphy’s students, a red-haired boy with wide brown eyes.
“See,” Culver explained, “how the brand is cooling to that ash gray color?”
The boy barely nodded.
“That’s just the right temperature.” He winked at the boy, friendly as could be. “You ready?”
Again, a slight nod.
Culver tilted his head back to two of the cowhands standing at the ready. They wore facemasks to protect them from the smell. One grabbed the boy’s arms, while the other held the boy’s legs steady. Culver pulled up the boy’s shirt.
I put my hand on Jennifer Bately’s shoulder.
At the end of the iron were the initials L.E. Lincoln Elementary. Beneath that was a small set of numbers identifying our city, state and school district.
The hot iron neared the boy’s skin.
I winked at Jennifer.
“Just a sting,” I assured her. “Just a sting.”
Night of the Cold Caller
5:37 pm
“Hello?”
“Mr. Arnold?”
“Yes?”
“How are you this evening?”
“Uh, geez — look, I just sat down to dinner.”
“When’s a more convenient time?”
“How about never?”
click
6:30 pm
“Hello?”
“Mr. Arnold?”
“Yeah?”
“How was dinner?”
“What? Oh. Hey, let’s be honest here. I can’t stand you people, always interrupting meals, T.V., time with my family. Whatever you’re selling, I’m not interested.”
“I apologize, but — “
click
7:15 pm
ring…
click
7:45 pm
“Hello?”
“Mr. Arnold?”
“I thought I told you—”
“Did you listen to the message I left?”
“You mean when you called, what, twenty, thirty minutes ago?”
“Yes.”
“You’re a persistent little prick aren’t you? Calling from a different number so I wouldn’t recognize it on the caller I.D.—”
“Did you listen to the message?”
“No!”
click
9:45 pm
“Hello?”
“Mr. Arnold?”
“Ssshhhit…”
“If I could just take a few minutes of your time.”
“Do the words ‘Do Not Call List’ mean anything to you?”
“Please. It will only take a minute.”
“No. N. O. No. No, no, no!”
click
11:30 pm
“What?”
“Mr. Arnold?”
“Aw, gee-ZUZ!”
click
11:33 pm
11:36 pm
11:39 pm
11:45 pm
11:48 pm
“Listen, you idiot, I’m calling the cops. I’m giving them all the numbers you’ve called from. Then I’m suing your ass, your company’s ass, and if your mother’s still alive, I’ll sue her ass, too. You got that?”
“Got it, but Mr. Arnold, just let me say three words.”
“You’re digging a deeper hole, buddy.”
“Kraaken Zum Tweenz.”
“Excuse you?”
“Kraaken Zum Tweenz.”
“Uh…”
“Do you understand?”
“…”
“Mr. Arnold?”
“…”
“Hello?”
“Shit.”
“Do you understand?”
“Yeah.”
“What?”
“Yes. Yes, I understand. Sir.”
“Be ready in ten minutes.”
“Ten minutes?”
“You should’ve listened to me earlier. Give your mate and spawn a kiss goodbye, then prepare for transport. Our time has come.”
“Sir?”
“Nine minutes. Midnight.”
“Yes, sir.”
click
11:52 pm
“Honey? Who was that?”
“Nobody, dear. Just another phone solicitor. Go back to sleep.”
“…”
“…”
“You haven’t kissed me like that in a long time.”
“I love you. Now go back to sleep.”
Burrow
It was dark and hot, and the smells were those of rot and perspiration. Clay moved with a mechanical precision through the tunnel, the light on his hard hat moving from the bottom of the wall to the top in a sweeping zigzag pattern. If a chunk of glass or metal winked at him, he’d take his dulled pick and dislodge it as best he could. Sometimes, if he was careful, he could remove an entire glass bottle that way without it shattering. He’d place it, along with the plastic containers, aluminum cans, bullets, and other items of value, in his cart. He thought it was best to have a method, best to focus on one’s work. It made it all the easier to get through the day that way. Made it possible not to lose his sanity and try digging his way out to the top like others had. He’d come across more than one miner who tried desperately to dig their way out, all the old bones and debris crushing them in a suffocating avalanche.
He had spent his first fourteen years on the surface. The waters had receded, but what good had that been? There was still not enough room. And the Game had been going on for the last fifty years.
The Game.
The rules were simple. You’re placed deep in the mines, and you have to find your way out. This could take years, and you had to work for your food. You had to mine the precious remnants of past generations. Aluminum. Plastic. Steel.
They called it a game, but it really wasn’t a game at all. How many people had Clay known to make it out alive when he had been above? Had he known any? Even his father never made it out. His father had been a strong man, levelheaded — if anyone could make it out, he could.