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Authors: Dennis Lehane
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his life.
Never cut himself on the job neither. Never mashed no thumb working the drill press, never sliced his flesh on a propeller blade by gripping the wrong edge when he went to lift it. And all the while, his eyes remained somewhere else, looking at the tin walls, smelling the world on the other side, knowing someday he'd be out in it, way out in it, and it would be wide.
The yellow slip of paper said "See Bill," and that was all, but Luther felt something in those words that made him reach below his bench and pick up the beat-on leather tool bag and carry it with him as he crossed the work floor toward the shift supervisor's office. He was holding it in his hand when he stood before Bill Hackman's desk, and Bill, sad-eyed and sighing all the time, and not so bad for white folk, said, "Luther, we got to let you go."
Luther felt himself vanish, go so damn small inside of himself that he could feel himself as a needlepoint with no rest of the needle behind it, a dot of almost-air that hung far back in his skull, and him watching his own body stand in front of Bill's desk, and he waited for that needlepoint to tell it to move again.
It's what you had to do with white folk when they talked to you directly, with their eyes on yours. Because they never did that unless they were pretending to ask you for something they planned to just take anyway or, like now, when they were delivering bad news.
"All right," Luther said.
"Wasn't my decision," Bill explained. "All these boys are going to be coming back from the war soon, and they'll need jobs."
"War's still going on," Luther said.
Bill gave him a sad smile, the kind you'd give a dog you were fond of but couldn't teach to sit or roll over. "War's as good as over. Trust me, we know."
By "we," Luther knew he meant the company, and Luther figured if anyone knew, it was the company, because they'd been giving Luther a steady paycheck for helping them make weapons since '15, long before America was supposed to have anything to do with this war.
"All right," Luther said.
"And, yeah, you did fine work here, and we sure tried to find you a place, a way you could stay on, but them boys'll be coming back in buckets, and they fought hard over there, and Uncle Sam, he'll want to say thanks."
"All right."
"Look," Bill said, sounding a bit frustrated, as if Luther were pitching a fight, "you understand, don't you? You wouldn't want us to put those boys, those patriots, out on the street. I mean, how would that look, Luther? Wouldn't look right, I'll tell you right now. Why you yourself would be unable to hold your head high if you walked the street and saw one of them boys pass you by looking for work while you got a fat paycheck in your pocket."
Luther didn't say anything. Didn't mention that a lot of those patriotic boys who risked their lives for their country were colored boys, but he'd sure bet that wasn't who was taking his job. Hell, he'd bet if he came back to the factory a year from now, the only colored faces he'd see would belong to the men working the cleanup shift, emptying the office wastebaskets and sweeping the metal shavings off the work floors. And he didn't wonder aloud how many of those white boys who'd replace all these here coloreds had actually served overseas or got their ribbons for typing or some such in posts down in Georgia or around Kansas way.
Luther didn't open his mouth, just kept it as closed as the rest of him until Bill got tired of arguing with himself and told Luther where he'd need to go to collect his pay.
So there was Luther, his ear to the ground, hearing there might, just might maybe be some work in Youngstown, and someone else had heard tell of hirings in a mine outside of Ravenswood, just over the other side of the river in West Virginia. Economy was getting tight again, though, they all said. White-tight.
And then Lila start talking about an aunt she had in Greenwood. Luther said, "Never heard of that place."
"Ain't in Ohio, baby.
Never cut himself on the job neither. Never mashed no thumb working the drill press, never sliced his flesh on a propeller blade by gripping the wrong edge when he went to lift it. And all the while, his eyes remained somewhere else, looking at the tin walls, smelling the world on the other side, knowing someday he'd be out in it, way out in it, and it would be wide.
The yellow slip of paper said "See Bill," and that was all, but Luther felt something in those words that made him reach below his bench and pick up the beat-on leather tool bag and carry it with him as he crossed the work floor toward the shift supervisor's office. He was holding it in his hand when he stood before Bill Hackman's desk, and Bill, sad-eyed and sighing all the time, and not so bad for white folk, said, "Luther, we got to let you go."
Luther felt himself vanish, go so damn small inside of himself that he could feel himself as a needlepoint with no rest of the needle behind it, a dot of almost-air that hung far back in his skull, and him watching his own body stand in front of Bill's desk, and he waited for that needlepoint to tell it to move again.
It's what you had to do with white folk when they talked to you directly, with their eyes on yours. Because they never did that unless they were pretending to ask you for something they planned to just take anyway or, like now, when they were delivering bad news.
"All right," Luther said.
"Wasn't my decision," Bill explained. "All these boys are going to be coming back from the war soon, and they'll need jobs."
"War's still going on," Luther said.
Bill gave him a sad smile, the kind you'd give a dog you were fond of but couldn't teach to sit or roll over. "War's as good as over. Trust me, we know."
By "we," Luther knew he meant the company, and Luther figured if anyone knew, it was the company, because they'd been giving Luther a steady paycheck for helping them make weapons since '15, long before America was supposed to have anything to do with this war.
"All right," Luther said.
"And, yeah, you did fine work here, and we sure tried to find you a place, a way you could stay on, but them boys'll be coming back in buckets, and they fought hard over there, and Uncle Sam, he'll want to say thanks."
"All right."
"Look," Bill said, sounding a bit frustrated, as if Luther were pitching a fight, "you understand, don't you? You wouldn't want us to put those boys, those patriots, out on the street. I mean, how would that look, Luther? Wouldn't look right, I'll tell you right now. Why you yourself would be unable to hold your head high if you walked the street and saw one of them boys pass you by looking for work while you got a fat paycheck in your pocket."
Luther didn't say anything. Didn't mention that a lot of those patriotic boys who risked their lives for their country were colored boys, but he'd sure bet that wasn't who was taking his job. Hell, he'd bet if he came back to the factory a year from now, the only colored faces he'd see would belong to the men working the cleanup shift, emptying the office wastebaskets and sweeping the metal shavings off the work floors. And he didn't wonder aloud how many of those white boys who'd replace all these here coloreds had actually served overseas or got their ribbons for typing or some such in posts down in Georgia or around Kansas way.
Luther didn't open his mouth, just kept it as closed as the rest of him until Bill got tired of arguing with himself and told Luther where he'd need to go to collect his pay.
So there was Luther, his ear to the ground, hearing there might, just might maybe be some work in Youngstown, and someone else had heard tell of hirings in a mine outside of Ravenswood, just over the other side of the river in West Virginia. Economy was getting tight again, though, they all said. White-tight.
And then Lila start talking about an aunt she had in Greenwood. Luther said, "Never heard of that place."
"Ain't in Ohio, baby.
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