Still standing, Thomas slathers a piece of toast with jelly, wolfs it down, and drains the coffee from his cup. Next moment, he brushes past me on his crutches, his broad shoulders and muscled arms straining against the thin white cotton of his shirt. He bears weight only on his left leg; he keeps his right leg slightly bent so that his foot skims the floor. As he moves, the cuff of his right trouser leg hitches up an inch or so, and I see the reason for the crutches. Where Thomas’s ankle should be, there’s a narrow column of smooth, pale wood; bolts secure his black shoe in place. I’d never have guessed he wore a prosthetic. Broken bone—that’s what I assumed from his bold, unencumbered movements. A missing limb hasn’t slowed him down in any way; rather, it seems to have encouraged inhibition, lending a madcap quality to his otherwise graceful movements. Crutches pounding against the floor in a fast, uneven clip, Thomas swings himself through the kitchen doorway and into the front room.
I quickly eat, and in a matter of minutes, the Everlys and I are on our way to church. Thomas leads the way; Talmadge, Alice, and I have to hurry to keep up with him. Alice is, as usual, talkative—so much so that it’s hard to get a word in edgewise. Then again, I’m the only one who makes an attempt, my manners kicking in as I try to respond to what she says. “Oh, my,” I manage at one point. And “Really?” at another. Otherwise Alice chatters on, filling Thomas in on the canning factory, the acquaintances she and his father have made there, the nature of their work, and their plans for the future (in a nutshell: put every extra penny aside and retire one day with just enough to live out their lives and pay for their funerals). “You could get a job at the canning factory, too, Thomas!” Alice exclaims, only to be met with grim silence from her son and husband. Thomas and Talmadge stay a good distance from each other and avoid eye contact altogether. Complete strangers, that’s what they appear to be. If it weren’t for the fact that their expressions are set to the same degree of stubbornness, and that Talmadge, too, has a widow’s peak, silvery though it may be, I might assume these two men had never met. Without Alice’s verbosity, this walk would be strained to the point of excruciating.
Church is a small white clapboard building with a narrow bell tower that reverberates with clanging as we approach. There are steps up to the sanctuary door, and Thomas takes them two at a time. Only at the entrance does he finally come to a full stop. He follows me inside, the last of us to enter, and as he does, he sucks in a long breath, as if storing up oxygen for a deep dive.
The church is crowded and warm. Alice manages to find enough space for us to sit together in a pew near the back. Alice sits down first, then Talmadge, then me, and finally, Thomas, who occupies the aisle seat, carefully laying his crutches on the floor, well out of the way of any passersby. While Thomas seems uncomfortable, constantly shifting in his seat, I relax into the wooden pew. This is familiar. I know what I have to do, or if I don’t, I will be told. I can listen, and if the sermon proves dull, who knows? I might hear a word from God.
The white-haired pastor preaches on Luke 2:1–20, that beautiful passage about Jesus’ birth and the shepherds’ arrival at the stable. I anticipated the baby wrapped in swaddling cloth and laid in a manger, the angel’s message on the hillside, the things that Mary treasured, and pondered in her heart. But the pastor never gets to that. Instead, he focuses on the first two verses of the chapter—the description of Caesar Augustus, his decree of a census, and Joseph’s willingness to take Mary from Nazareth to Bethlehem to be registered as a member of the house and line of David.
“Here is yet another biblical example in which governmental orders are followed by godly people,” the pastor says. “We must take this as our model. If we are asked to obey, we must do so, especially in such difficult times. Pay your taxes. Give your landlords, farm owners, and bosses their due. Report those who do otherwise. We’ve elected our political leaders. Now let’s help them keep the peace.”
Talmadge sits straight, shoulders back, fists clenched on thighs. Except for the fact that he’s nodding in agreement, he might as well be carved from stone. On the other side of him, Alice shifts uneasily, her expression tight with anxiety. As for Thomas, his nervous system might as well be constructed of frayed electrical wires; sitting close to him like this, I believe I can feel his fury emanating in sharp jolts. Though he’s given to silence, it’s clear he wants to speak; his mouth works as he bites back words.
“Are you all right?” I whisper as Alice leans over, trying to reach her son. “Your mother,” I whisper when Alice fails to catch hold of his sleeve. “She wants you.”
At this, Thomas grabs his crutches and rises from the pew. The pastor looks up from his notes and the congregation turns to see the cause of the commotion. Thomas doesn’t linger. He launches himself down the aisle and out the door.
“Well.” The pastor nods knowingly. “Guess someone doesn’t see things the way I do.”
He continues with his sermon. Though I try to listen, I find I can’t. I bow my head slightly, so no one will notice, and begin to pray. Mother, Daddy, Miss Berger, Edna Faye, the boy beneath the bleachers—this litany of names comes to me as always. But now I lift up Alice, Talmadge, and Thomas, too.
AS SOON AS the service ends, Alice prods Talmadge and me to leave the sanctuary, and quickly. Outside, where few have yet to gather, there’s no sign of Thomas.
Without a word, Talmadge and Alice start home. The whole way, they don’t exchange a word, so I am quiet as well. The walk seems longer now, and I yearn for Alice’s banter. Clouds scud across the sun, casting a pall over the slapped-together duplexes. Any illusion of Christmas in paradise—blue sky, warm temperature, palm trees and poinsettias basking in the sun—has vanished. There’s a raw chill in the air. A burst of wind spits down cold rain, and soon enough, we are drenched. When we finally arrive at the Everlys’ home, we find Thomas sitting on the couch in the living room, reading a tattered newspaper. He doesn’t look up at our entrance.
“So it’s going to be like this,” Talmadge says.
Thomas turns a page. Talmadge swoops down on his son, yanks the paper from his hands, and throws it to the floor. The pages scatter.
“Please,” Alice says.
Neither of the men looks at her. Thomas trains his gaze on his father, who is shouting. “In my house, my church, you show some respect. You can have your opinions. I can’t stop you. But you keep them to yourself, you hear me, or you can damn well leave.”
Alice claps her hands over her ears. I go to her and slip my arm around her shoulders. She is shivering in her wet clothes. As I draw her into the hallway, she begins a strangled apology.
“Hush, now,” I say. Though Mother would blanch, I tell Alice that I’m more than a little familiar with family disagreements. A flicker of relief passes over her pained expression. “Why don’t you go put on some dry clothes,” I say. “I’ll make some hot coffee. We can sip it while we cook Christmas dinner.”
Alice nods and stumbles off to change. My own dress, I’ve realized, clings wetly to my every curve. I make a few adjustments, pulling at the fabric here and there. Then, before I can reconsider, I march into the living room and suggest that Talmadge, who fell silent soon after our retreat to the kitchen, find us a good radio station. Now I turn to Thomas, who is holding that blamed newspaper again. I place my hands squarely on my hips. If only briefly, I once ran my own little household. I know how to set things straight. I set Professor Tobias’s office straight time and again, and I set straight students who ask smart-mouthed questions, and foolish ones, too, and, come to think of it, long before I shared a home with Charlie, I set straight entire sections of the Alba Public Library. I can set this situation straight. I can also delegate chores.
“There are potatoes to be peeled.” When Thomas doesn’t lower the newspaper—an act of further resistance, I suppose—I stride over to him and flick the pages down so he has to meet my eyes. “Out on the back porch might be a good place to do the peeling, if it’s not raining too hard.” I lift
my chin and frown down at him. “Tempus fugit.”
Am I seeing correctly? Do the corners of his eyes faintly crinkle with humor? Do I strike him as funny?
Before I have time to decide whether I’ve offended him or not, Thomas hoists himself from the couch and maneuvers his way into the kitchen. Talmadge busies himself at the radio. He finds a bright Christmas carol, and then he, too, leaves the room—to change, I presume. I steal away as well. In the bedroom, I shed my wet dress, strip off my underthings and put on dry ones, then consider the skirts and blouses I have left to wear. Though it might be deemed inappropriate, I slip into my well-worn, comfortable housedress, yellow accented with violets and green leaves. I would have worn it to cook Christmas dinner with Charlie. Talmadge, Alice, and Thomas have revealed their less than decorous selves. I might as well do the same.
As an afterthought, I turn to the mirror and brush out my wet hair.
JACK BENNY IS joking on the radio.
I start toward the kitchen, but on second thought, I retrieve Thomas’s newspaper. Out of sight, out of mind. I’ll return it to him when I’m sure things have settled down.
The little desk in my bedroom seems the best place to hide the newspaper. I open the top drawer and start to tuck it inside. It’s only then that I notice the headline.
Mexicans Leave for Home—
Another Lot of About 1200 Repatriates
Accept Offer of L.A. County
I read on.
In light of the concern expressed in a recent editorial in these pages, this reporter has interviewed both local and state government authorities to determine the willingness of members of the Mexican population to be repatriated to their original home. Also interviewed are leaders of Los Angeles’s Mexican community, who work to maintain a decent and law-abiding district in the area north of the Olvera Street Plaza. Below are their collected statements.
A string of quotes follows the introduction. I skim them. It is no surprise that I don’t recognize the names of those quoted—I know nothing about California politics—but each person confirms, in various ways, that the repatriates, all citizens of Mexico, are relief recipients or charity cases who are taking a further toll on the already struggling economy, and putting the larger community at risk due to their tendency toward contagious disease. All those quoted confirm that the illegals are more than willing to return to their home across the border.
Home. The word is repeated time and again, as is the fact that the people are being offered their return to Mexico and rewarded for it in the form of transportation payment, be it by train, bus, or truck. The United States government both supports and funds repatriation, as it is the result of a federal act put in place by the Hoover administration in 1930, and supported by the Roosevelt administration today.
Repatriation appears to be exactly as I’ve been told it is: necessary and justifiable, with positive repercussions for all. The article concludes:
The ongoing rumor that forced raids have been conducted without due process in public settings, including that which was purported to occur in the Plaza at Olvera Street, also known as La Placita, in February 1931, is simply that: a rumor, insidious and destructive in its intent. This particular incident of repatriation, like every other, was in fact a government-sponsored undertaking, duly enacted by the Immigration and Naturalization Service.
No surprises here, really. Things are as I’ve been told. I fold the newspaper and shut it away in the desk drawer.
The kitchen is warm; Alice, also in dry clothes, has gotten the oven going. She’s poured us two cups. Already, she’s preparing the chicken. She may be a little more subdued than usual, but with tasks at hand, she seems fairly steady. I take a sip of coffee, then set to work mixing up a batch of dumplings. The sack of potatoes has gone missing from its place on the counter; Alice confirms that Thomas is peeling away on the porch. We don’t mention the rain, still falling hard, but as soon as Alice sees I’ve finished the dough, she snatches an umbrella from the line of coat hooks on the wall and presses it into my hands. “There’s an eave and gutters, so he won’t drown. But will you see how he’s doing?” She wants to know more than the number of potatoes peeled, it’s clear from her furrowed brow.
I slip out the back door, letting it close behind me. Thomas sits on the top step, his upper half sheltered, as I am, by the eave. But his legs—he’s carelessly stretched them out on the steps below. They’re soaked, his trousers clinging below his knees as my dress recently did. The difference between his legs is so clear now that he might as well have his trousers rolled up. His left calf is lean and strong, the shinbone and muscles clearly defined; his right, while shaped like its counterpart, is noticeably thinner, with unnaturally smooth contours.
I open the umbrella. Stretching out my arm, I shield his legs from the rain as much as I’m able. “You’re going to catch a cold if you’re not careful.”
He shrugs. He has yet to look up at me. He holds a half-peeled potato in one hand; the peeler rests in the palm of the other. Only two potatoes of the entire large sack lie peeled in the bowl beside him.
I prop the umbrella on the porch railing so that it continues to provide partial shelter for his legs, and then, taking the peeler from his hand and a potato from the sack, I sit down beside him, careful to keep my legs tucked in close. At least one of us will stay dry. Thomas acknowledges my new perch by shifting slightly away from me. Otherwise he stares out at the narrow, weed-ridden backyard, which serves both the Everly family and the people who inhabit the other half of the duplex. There’s an overturned tricycle beside the dilapidated picket fence, and a wooden sandbox. Any hollows in the sand and yard are now puddles, rapidly expanding.
“We need this rain,” I say, for something to say. “It’s a godsend, really.”
A man of few words, now as ever, apparently. I start peeling the potato.
The neighbors’ back door bangs open, and a man carrying an umbrella and a wailing baby hurries into the yard. The baby is swaddled in a red blanket, and is red faced, too, from the crying. The man wears a brown suit. He joggles the baby up and down, trying to soothe it.
“We have to go!” the man yells at his back door. “My parents are waiting dinner!” He sees Thomas and me then, makes a sheepish face, and nods at the baby. “She won’t quiet down. Colic, we think. Thought some fresh air might help.”
A woman appears on the porch, holding a brimming spoon and a glass filled with amber-colored liquid. “Whiskey and honey,” she calls to the man. “Tilda across the street said to try it.” She dashes through the rain to join her little family beneath the umbrella and, there, mixes the spoonful of honey into the glass. Together, fumbling and cooing, the man and woman spoon the solution into the baby’s mouth. The wails crescendo to howls. “It’ll calm her, Tilda promised. Just give it a minute.” The woman raises her voice to be heard.
It takes a few minutes, but the baby’s wails do diminish to fretful squalls. “See?” the woman says, taking the baby from the man’s arms. The family goes back inside, woman and child first, then the man, who hesitates at the door to apologize for the noise. “Didn’t mean to disrupt your peace and quiet.” His smile is rueful. “But don’t worry. We’ll be on the road momentarily. You know how it is. Babies.” And with that, he goes inside.
A knot forms in my throat as I stare at the empty backyard. Charlie and I had hoped for our own version of this. If our baby had been colicky, my Tilda might have been Edna Faye’s mother. I might have asked her for a remedy if things had been different.
“My mother told me about your husband.”
I look at Thomas, startled. With his thumbnail, he digs at a potato eye, then flicks it to the patchy grass at the bottom of the porch steps. “I’m sorry. I lost someone, too.” He nods to where the woman and man just stood with their baby. “I loved the girl who used to live next door. Sounds like a song, doesn’t it? I guess it’s kind of your song, too, as Ma said you all but grew up with your husband.”
I
swallow hard against the lump rising in my throat. There are black-eyed Susans I hadn’t noticed before, planted in a patch at the back of the yard. The storm has stripped away their yellow petals, leaving only the brown, brittle centers. “No all but about it,” I say. “Charlie and I did grow up together.”
Thomas nods. “The girl I loved was—is—named Guadalupe. She had to leave with her family.” He is soft-spoken, but the words tumble from him as if pent up too long. “This is the first time I’ve been home since she left, so her ghost is everywhere. Yes, she’s alive, but the living can haunt the people they leave behind, too. Losing a person—” He glances disdainfully at his prosthesis. “It’s worse than losing a limb. Phantom limb, that’s what it’s called when you feel like your leg is still there. There’s a tingling sometimes, or a feeling of—I don’t know—wholeness, like I’m the person I used to be. Then I remember I’m not. Sometimes the pain of the injury returns, too. I lost my leg in a so-called farming accident, but you want to know what really happened? What really happened was the boss didn’t want to pay to have a tractor blade repaired. And when the phantom limb hurts like it’s still flesh, well, God help me, sometimes I have to bite on something, a stick or a rag, to keep from making a ruckus. But being haunted by Lupe is worse than any of that, I promise you. A dark-haired woman will pass me by, wearing a dress Lupe might have worn, and for a moment I’ll think she’s returned. Once I ran after such a woman. I caught her by the arm and spun her around only to see that she was a stranger. I frightened her. I frightened myself.”
The rain drums on the eave that covers our heads, on the umbrella and the weed-ridden grass, and what’s left of the black-eyed Susans.
“Lupe and her family had to leave.” I keep my voice soft, almost a whisper. If he doesn’t want to respond, he can pretend he didn’t hear me. “Were they repatriated?”
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