“And listen, Michael,” Larry warned, “lay off the booze! Someone might smell you.”
Paul turned to Michael and raised his eyebrows but didn’t look directly at him. “He makes a good point, Mikey. Work has to come first. By the way, go see Ma today, will you? Eat something, take a nap, and go see her.”
Michael pulled the GTO up behind the old man’s Rambler, across the street from the house, a small brown bungalow with a screened porch. A strip of sidewalk and a patch of grass separated the house from the street. If an eighteen-year-old kid who stood six feet tall tripped in the gutter and fell forward, his head would bounce off the bottom cement step. The morning after the night that Michael proved that, his father had thrown him out.
Paul leaned against the kitchen sink holding a glass of water, while their father sat in his chair at the same spot at the same table they’d had since Michael was a small boy.
“Here he is, Dad,” Paul said. “I’ll go slay the fatted calf.”
“Michael. How’ve you been?” His father stood and offered his hand.
“Hey, Dad.” They shook. “You say that like you haven’t seen me in years. I was here, what, two weeks ago?”
“Yeah? Seems longer.”
“How’s Ma?”
“Go up and see. She’s awake, we just put her in the chair.”
Upstairs in the front bedroom, their mother was propped up in her wheelchair looking out at the street. While on chemo for breast cancer, she had a stroke, or a shock, as his aunts called it. Her left hand had curled into a claw, and her whole left arm was as rigid as the left side of her face was slack.
“Hi, Ma.” He kissed her forehead and put his chin on the top of her head. His eyes stung, and he squeezed the bridge of his nose until it hurt enough to stop the tears. He kissed her cheek and sat at the foot of the bed, hunched forward, his elbows on his knees, as they both peered out the window.
“Michael?” Her voice sounded like she’d swallowed shards of glass, and the way she said his name broke his heart. “When will it stop?”
Michael stared down at his feet. “Pretty soon, Ma.”
It was a warm day and the windows were up as life passed by on the street below. Kids on Sting-Ray bikes with towels draped around their necks hollered at each other on their way to Wollaston Beach; young mothers pushed strollers carrying big-headed toddlers; cars rolled by, windows down, volume up, sharing the thump with one and all, like it or not.
It was hard for Ma to speak, but his three sisters were here every day, and their kids visited several times a week, so she had more family news than he did. The result was Michael stretched out sideways on the bed with his hands folded on his stomach, talking to her about his softball team, which was just fine. What he said didn’t matter, she just needed the comfort of his voice.
He heard the steps squeak and a few seconds later his father came into the bedroom. He sat in an armchair and they talked about Yaz and the Red Sox. If Michael wanted to avoid the AA jive he had to stay on his toes. When the conversation began to slow, he moved rapidly to other safe topics, like politics, war, and religion. Yet the old man could spot the smallest opening and race through it, turning an innocent remark about the weather into a tale of winos in winter. Many were the trolls pulled from under a bridge and into a meeting by a hazy memory of free donuts-but not all who were called by the pastry were chosen by the higher power to live clean, dry lives, and those who were gave thanks to the program, the program, the program.
His mother was snoring softly in her chair. She’d sleep on and off until late evening. Most nights she’d lie awake in the dark, listening to Larry Glick on the radio.
“She’s been asking me if I think you’re going to stop soon,” his father said.
“Yeah, I’ll stop by again soon.” Michael looked at his watch and stood up. “Now I gotta scoot. I’ll be back in the next few days, okay?”
“Yeah,” his foiled father said, a note of resignation in his voice. “Okay.”
Paul was still downstairs and he walked out with his brother.
“Did you ever deliver to Pat’s Vending down in Providence?” Paul asked.
Michael looked up to his mother’s window as they walked across the street to his car. “A number of times. New candy and tonic machines, mostly.”
“They own a ton of cigarette machines too, in bars and strip joints. The owner’s son is going to take the Blue Ribbon load. He’ll get top dollar in the machines.”
“This won’t do your new boss Salezzi any good, will it?”
“Probably not.” Paul smiled and shrugged. “It’s a tough game.”
At 6 a.m. on Wednesday, Rosie the dispatcher handed Michael the BPM delivery papers. “You get our first load from this shipper, Mosely. Try not to screw it up.”
Michael walked out of the terminal into the truck yard and climbed up into his tractor, a spotless red U-model Mack. He turned the key to the on position and pushed in the black rubber nipple on the dash, kicking the diesel to life. At the top of the long sideview mirror he saw dull gray smoke roll out of the stack. He fed the noisy beast some fuel, and the smoke, now thinned by heat, shot out of the pipe. He pushed in the clutch, wiggled the stick into second, and, with the heel of his hand, whacked the pentagonal red button on the dash. With a sharp whoosh, the tractor brake was off and so was he, over to the trailer pad, searching for the right trailer, number 5432. There were five rows of trailers, about a hundred in all, but the high-value load would be in the first row. He found it, turned the truck away from it, and stopped fast, skidding the eight tires on the rear axles. He looked at the three mirrors while he wiggled the stick into reverse, took a bead on the trailer, and rushed the tractor backwards at the box. He stopped when the fifth wheel was about an inch from the bottom of the trailer. He pulled out the red pentagon to lock the air brake, slipped the vehicle into neutral, opened the door, and swung himself out.
Standing on the grate at the back of the tractor, between the tractor and trailer, he unhooked the hoses for the trailer brakes and the light cord that hung on the back of the Mack, then coupled them with the connections on the trailer, swung back into the cab, popped it in reverse, and rammed the fifth wheel under the trailer. The box lifted as the Mack wedged underneath, the kingpin locked, and Michael put the stick in first gear, left the trailer brake on, and tried to pull back out from beneath the box. He rocked the coupled unit violently, trying to break the grip. The last thing he wanted was to make a turn out on the road and see the trailer uncouple and go zipping off alone. The trailer felt light, but he was used to pulling loads out of P &G; a full load of soap could weigh forty-two thousand pounds.
He switched on the lights and flashers and got out to do a series of visual checks, along with bopping the tires with a mallet, checking for flats. At the back of the trailer, he checked the security seal on the doors. To open the doors, the skinny metal strip had to be cut. It was stamped with a unique number that had already been called in to BPM security. The guard at BPM was supposed to come out to verify the seal number, but he wouldn’t have to today.
Michael walked toward the front of the box and rolled up the landing gear. He climbed into the Mack, slammed the stick into second, and punched the brake buttons. The brakes released with a great hiss, then he popped the clutch and the tractor roared and jumped ahead, slamming the driver’s door closed with a metallic bang, as the trailer slid out of its hole. He was in fourth gear by the time he swept around the corner of the building. At the far end of the yard the security gate was closed. He aimed at it, building speed and pulling on the air horn cord, and the gate seemed to jump before it rolled aside.