Jailbird Kid Read online

  “Hey, that was before! I’m on the right side of the law now.” Uncle Al stepped down from his seat on the verandah railing. “You think it over while we see what other jobs Nick can get. My bet is he’ll be begging to come to work for me. I’ll be happy to take him on, but I’ll need a little family assistance myself.”

  Uncle Al’s voice sounded smooth like a lullaby. My tears dried. What a good thing that our family helped each other. Maybe Grandma was being too hard on Uncle Al. I decided not to tell her that he had been coming around when Mom was at work.

  “He’s upset with me,” Grandma told us after Uncle Al said goodbye and headed to his car, “and he’ll find some way to get even. Maybe I should have just given him the money. That Cadillac’s fifteen years old. He got it for a song, but it can’t last forever. Maybe he does need another car.”

  Hank patted her on the shoulder. “No, you did the right thing. You’re the first person I’ve ever seen stand up to Al. Maybe this family is finally getting smart.”

  Hank, Grandma, and I stood on the porch and watched Uncle Al talk on his cellphone as he backed down the dusty driveway onto the main road. Then he stepped on the gas, and pretty soon all we could see was a puff of dust as the black Cadillac disappeared toward the lights of the city.

  15

  Beets

  On Sunday, Grandma, Hank, and I met Mom and Dad at church. All right! After the service, Hank treated us to lunch at a restaurant, and Dad announced that he had a surprise. He’d found a job!

  “I saw this ad tacked up in the lobby of the Winchester Hotel,” he said, “so I phoned the guy and he hired me just like that!”

  “What’s the job?” I asked. I noticed that Mom wasn’t saying anything, and her face didn’t reveal any excitement about this news.

  “Well, it’s not much, but it’s a start,” Dad said. “It’ll get me back in shape. I need to be out in the sun more, anyway.”

  “What’s the job?” Grandma asked.

  “The pay’s not too good, but if I put in lots of hours, I should be able to rake in some dough,” Dad said.

  “What’s the job?” I asked for the second time.

  “Hoeing sugar beets,” Dad said.

  We’d all seen the beet fields — rows and rows stretching for mile after mile. And we’d seen people working in the fields, backs bent in the hot sun, the wind blowing dust all over. Many families came from far away, even from other countries, and so the farmers provided them with little cabins to live in for the season. When their work here was done, they went back home. Others, hired locally, got a ride to the fields on a special bus.

  “I have to be in front of the hotel at five o’clock tomorrow morning,” Dad said. “Guy picks us up, takes us out to the field.”

  I didn’t hear Dad leave Monday morning. The next time I saw him he was in the hospital. When he could talk, he told us the story. I later typed it out on Ryan’s computer and then printed it for a keepsake, so I would never forget how hard Dad had tried and how difficult it was for him to get a break.

  THE BEETS

  Dad stands in front of the hotel, waiting for the ride. The sun is up, the sky is pink, and he feels pretty good. Other men are also waiting for the van. Some are wandering labourers who follow crops being harvested, but most are First Nations men from the nearby reserve. Dad has met one of them before, a big guy named Gerald Crow. Gerald nods and moves over to stand beside Dad.

  “Got a smoke on you?”

  “Yeah, sure.” Dad takes a pack from his pocket.

  “Thanks.” Gerald lights up. “You know these guys don’t pay us until the end of the week. They figure we won’t come back if we’re paid at the end of the shift.” Gerald blows out smoke. “They’re right,” he adds with a crooked smile.

  Dad says nothing.

  “You ever worked the beets?” Gerald asks.

  “Nope.”

  “Then you’ve got a lesson coming.”

  The van arrives, and the men pile in, sitting on benches along the sides.

  The minute they arrive at the field the foreman treats them like slaves. “Okay, let’s move it!” he shouts. He sticks a hoe into Dad’s hand.

  Dad follows Gerald. The heavy green foliage of the beet plants sprout above their large white turnip-like roots. The plants sit solidly in the hard-packed earth like squat little kings. Weeds have to be hoed out and smaller plants thinned. Flies and bees buzz around, especially as the sun climbs into the sky.

  “There’s a way to do this,” Gerald says. “Watch.”

  He bends at an angle, swinging the narrow hoe down a row, striking out weeds by their roots, moving easily to thin and hoe, thin and hoe.

  “You’ve got to get in stride,” Gerald says. “Don’t go too fast.”

  Dad starts hacking around his first beet. His hoe doesn’t move smoothly like Gerald’s. It digs deep at the weeds, and his movements are choppy. The sun crawls over the eastern horizon. It must be just after six in the morning. Normal people are still sleeping. He thinks of his family still asleep. He slashes quickly, carelessly, trying to catch up to Gerald.

  “What the heck do you think you’re doing?” The foreman strides up, his eyes angry. He grabs Dad’s hoe and swings it in expert arcs. “This is how you go, like this! And where’s your hat? I suppose you didn’t bring one. You’ll be fainting by noon.” He glances at Dad’s black high-top running shoes, his black jeans and open shirt. A look of disgust comes over his face. “I’ll be carrying you out of here tonight in a basket.” He spits into the dust.

  Dad bends again, swing, chop, swing, chop, looking only at the beet plant in front of him. By ten o’clock he is wringing wet with sweat and has a sharp pain across his shoulders. Sweat streaks his face and runs into his eyes. His hands are blistered and starting to bleed because he hasn’t thought to bring gloves. A blister has bubbled up on his heel from his thin socks rubbing inside his shoes.

  A truck horn sounds, and the men walk to the side of the field where the driver gives them coffee. But Dad just wants water. He gulps three cups full.

  “You’ll kill your stupid self!” the foreman yells. “You don’t down water quick like that!”

  When Dad tells this part, I feel so sad. I brush his bandaged hand. Poor Dad — doesn’t even know how to drink water correctly.

  He trudges back to his place on the beet row.

  Noon. His lunch is now a flattened warm slab. The white bread has turned yellow from mustard, and his baloney slice looks slightly green. He eats it, anyway.

  Gerald comes up to him. “Nick, I’ve got to tell you something. You’re not going to last. Take my advice. Go slowly. Move just enough so the foreman knows you’re alive. Then at home tonight, rub yourself down with liniment. Tomorrow, if you can get out of bed, wear loose canvas shoes, gloves, and a hat.”

  “How come you don’t need a hat?” Dad asks.

  Gerald laughs. “Hey, we were under this sun long before these guys came and planted their little beets.” He stands. “Well, back to it.”

  Gerald says Dad could do nearly an acre a day if he was in shape, but most people do a half-acre. And they’re paid by the acre.

  “I thought we’d be paid by the hour,” Dad says.

  “No, no. This way, if you take a break, they don’t have to pay you for it.”

  Dad starts hoeing again, but the pain in his shoulders and back is so intense that he can’t straighten up anymore. They take another break at three o’clock in the afternoon. Two more hours to work before the foreman blows the whistle. An eleven-hour workday! In over thirty degrees Celsius!

  By four o’clock, Dad can no longer straighten his back, and his arms feel as if they’ve doubled in length. His feet are curled up in his shoes to prevent the blisters from rubbing. His head is splitting, and strange images start to swim in front of
his eyes. He can barely see the plants.

  Dad grabs the hoe, bends to make a stroke, and everything turns black. He wakes up on the ground in the shade of the van with Gerald staring down at him.

  “Good, you’re alive,” Gerald says. “I thought you were done for. You’re burning up. Look, you’re not even sweating anymore.”

  Dad’s skin is warm and dry like a rattlesnake’s. His head throbs until he thinks his skull will burst. He tries to raise his head, but his vision swirls, and he falls back onto the dusty ground.

  “Just lie still,” Gerald says. “We’re leaving in a minute. We’ve got to get you to a hospital.”

  “No!” Dad yells, but he feels himself being lifted in Gerald’s big arms and propped up on the bench in the van. The men buzz around like bees. Dad thinks he might vomit, and does. The men swear and scream, falling over him to get out.

  Dad wakes up in a white room, with Mom and me sitting on each side of his bed. Gerald Crow is standing at the end of the bed like an anxious father.

  “Doc said it was the worst case of sunstroke he’s ever seen,” Gerald says. “Well, pal, guess you’re over the worst of it.” He nods to Mom and me. “Look after him!” And he’s gone.

  Dad stays in the hospital for three days, getting over his sunstroke and back muscle spasms.

  I visit him every day. So do Mom, Grandma, and Gemma. And so, I find out, do Uncle Al, Mike, and Jerry.

  And that was the story of my dad’s first job.

  16

  Sports

  The day of my school sports day and picnic the clouds formed black puffs in the sky and rain threatened constantly. But I didn’t care. It was cool enough, so I was able to do my best.

  I won four firsts, three seconds, and a third. The third was for the relay race, which we should have won, but Hannah dropped the stick just as she was running toward me.

  After the race, I looked over and saw she was crying. I wanted to give her a blast. I hate losing. But Mrs. Marsden trotted over to comfort her, saying, “It’s all right. Don’t worry. It’s only a race.”

  I saw someone else coming toward us, too — Hannah’s mother. And walking beside her was my dad. My heart pounded. I turned away and ran to the far side of the field to wait until the ribbons were handed out.

  I’d always known Hannah’s family was rich and her dad was a bank manager. She knew we weren’t rich but that didn’t seem to matter before. To me it wasn’t important who our dads were or what they did. It wasn’t the kids’ fault if their parents weren’t perfect. But families of bankers and thieves didn’t mix, apparently.

  As I walked onto the raised platform to get my track ribbons, Dad and Mrs. Singer were edging through the crowd toward me. I couldn’t believe they’d gotten together.

  Hannah sidled up to me on the platform. I wouldn’t look at her.

  “My mom and your dad have met,” she said. “Maybe they’ll like each other and everything will be okay.”

  I stared straight ahead.

  “They must have met while they were watching the relay race,” Hannah said.

  “Good. I hope they saw what you did.”

  She was silent for a moment. I felt awful.

  Later I discovered Dad and Mrs. Singer had started talking about art. Dad had said he loved the necklace she’d made that Hannah had given me for my birthday. He’d even asked her to come to our house to see his artwork sometime.

  “You didn’t tell me your dad was an artist,” Hannah said.

  “Since when did you care about con artists?” I said sarcastically.

  I wished that a big mine shaft would suddenly cave in and I’d drop down like Alice in Wonderland. Except the world above ground was weirder than Wonderland.

  Dad took a couple of weeks off to rest up after his sugar beet job. By then it was into July. He told Mom he wanted to stay home and look after me now that school was out and I’d be “on the loose” all day. What a laugh.

  I generally got up around nine o’clock, made my breakfast, did the dishes, and tidied up the house. Dad slept until noon. When he did get up, he made a big mess, so I did housework twice. In the afternoon I usually went over to Ryan’s house for a couple of hours and we played games on the computer. It was fun. His mom was glad he’d finally found a normal friend.

  One morning I was leaving for Ryan’s when Dad asked if I could press his good pants and a white shirt.

  “I’m checking out the Employment Centre,” he announced.

  “Can I come with you?” I asked, intrigued.

  “What for?”

  “Why not?” Actually, I had a feeling he might need some guidance.

  “Well, okay.”

  We walked down the street together. I’d gotten used to the way Dad looked, but I forgot how other people regarded him. His hair had grown out some and he brushed it back, but it was still in between any kind of style. I asked him why he’d had it cut so short in the first place. “I liked it that way. Clean-cut, like me.”

  He always had a cigarette going. In the long-sleeved shirt he was wearing today, you couldn’t see his tattoos, but his tie was out-of-date. It didn’t seem right — nothing like the type Hannah’s father wore. His black pants were okay. He wanted to wear his black boots with the chains, but I said, “No, you should wear dress shoes,” so he did to please me. Dad hadn’t worn them for two years, and by the way he was walking I think they were too tight.

  When we got to the office, I went with Dad up to the counter.

  “What can I do for you?” the man asked.

  “Need a job,” Dad said. “Either that or pogey.”

  “Pogey?” I said.

  “EI.”

  “Employment insurance,” the man explained for my benefit. Then he asked Dad, “You got a claim?”

  “Huh?”

  The man sighed. “You work, you build up weeks. When you’re out of a job, you get a record of employment stating how long you worked and why you aren’t there anymore, whether you were laid off, or fired, or quit. You bring that form in here and file your claim. You get benefits while you look for a new job.”

  “Well, I ain’t had work. That’s why I need these benefits right now.”

  “Where was your last job?”

  “Hoeing beets.”

  “For how long?”

  “One day.”

  “That all?”

  “Yeah.”

  “I mean, is that the only place you’ve worked in the past year?”

  “That’s about it.”

  “Education? Training?”

  Dad shrugged. “Finished grade ten, is all. Then did odd jobs.”

  “The only job we’ve got for a man with not much education or job skills is at the packing plant on the kill floor. You want to see about it?”

  “Never!” Dad slapped his hand on the counter.

  The man frowned. “Fine, I can’t force you. Go find something better yourself.”

  Dad grabbed my arm. “Come on. We’re going to City Hall.”

  I sniffed the air like a society lady and accompanied Dad down the stairs and out to the street. “What’s at City Hall, Dad? Do you have an appointment with the mayor?”

  He smiled. “No, we won’t exactly be going to the City Hall downtown. We’ll go to city’s public works yard. I got an in there, fella who knows me. I’ll get my old job back before you can say ‘Bob’s your uncle.’”

  It took us a half-hour to walk. I didn’t mind. We went slowly, but Dad was limping pretty badly by the time we got there.

  “I wanna see the foreman,” Dad said. “I worked here before. Tell him Nick Wroboski’s back.”

  I wondered if anybody here would really care. It wasn’t as if he was a celebrity or anything.

  In
a few minutes a man came out of a back room. He took a package of tobacco out of his shirt pocket along with some cigarette papers and hand-rolled a smoke. “I don’t remember you,” he said as he licked the paper and closed it, “and I’ve been here seventeen years. Don’t recall your name at all.”

  “I dug graves,” Dad said. “Six months. I ... I liked it here. It was a real good job.”

  My heart lurched.

  The foreman arched an eyebrow. “Yeah? Who you work with?”

  “Guy named Willie Frank.”

  “That thief!” the foreman snapped. “I run him off. Caught him stealing parts from the shop. You got anyone else who can vouch for you?”

  “He’s the only one I got to know real well. I’d come in, get the map, be told where to dig the grave, and I’d go dig it.”

  “We use backhoes now. Excavators. You run one of them?”

  “Huh?”

  “Backhoes, man! The machine out there.” We walked outside, and he pointed at a yellow tractor with a scoop on one end. “Those things. You run one?”

  “Nope.”

  “No? You just worked with a shovel and pick? That must have taken forever. The city’s growing — got no time for custom-made graves. We can do a dozen graves a day with this equipment.”

  Dad squinted up at the foreman. The sun was in his eyes, and he blinked like a mole. “You need that many graves now? Someone killing off our citizens?”

  His attempt to make a joke fell flat, and I felt scared and kind of ashamed again — and also ashamed of feeling ashamed. I was so mixed up. Why couldn’t we have a normal family like Hannah’s? A dad who worked, a mom who volunteered on committees, brothers who studied with plans to go to university, all living in a big comfy house?

  “The ground’s frozen in the winter,” the foreman said in reply to Dad’s goofy comment, “so we get ahead of the orders when the ground’s soft. Well, we can’t use you if you don’t know how to operate heavy equipment.”