hit the floor at seven sharp. Seven in the morning. Christ,
I oughtta be having a cup of coffee down at McCafferty’s, or loungin’ in
my PJ’s looking at CBS, or ABC, or NBC, or any other initials that
rule my sixty-nine dollar Wal-Mart special. But no, I’m here in
this slow-killin’ soul vault.
I pull my apron on. I slip into rubber boots. I strip my heart
and make it blank. Here in the factory, you gotta wipe that shit
away ‘cause
don’t nobody wanna look at your face and see their own hearts
starin’ back at em. They only wanna get through the day without
faintin’ from the heat. My ears are full of foam with yellow
wires hangin’ down my cheeks like a mastiff’s drool.
But he don’t work in no shit factory, I’ll tell you
that for nothing.
Margie watches me pass. She spits a stream of goo from the corner
of her mouth. It lands near my left boot and I sneer at her, but
I don’t say nothin’. I don’t say nothin’ at
all; I just haul out the sheets, spread out my quota call, fire that
mother up and pump out rubber. That’s all. Just hot, black
lumps of rubber. It burns my nose. Still, after all this time, it
burns. For ten hours every day, Monday through Friday, it burns till
I can’t smell nothin’ by Saturday.
I used to dream of better. I’d walk up all tough and scary
and stare that Margie right in her black eyes. I’d stare at
her hard. Used to, she’d back away from me. She used to back
away.
“I’m getting the fuck outta here,” I’d say, right
in her face.
I never knew why, but she always laughed at me. “Outta here?
And where the hell you gonna go?”
She didn’t scare me none. I’d thump my Lucky Strike in
her ugly face, thrust my tits out, and I’d tell her real loud
so’s all the girls’d hear me. “I am getting’ out
of here. I am goin’ to New York. I will be…somebody.
Then, I’m gonna come back here and buy this factory. I’m
gonna smash all the walls down, open up the sewer, and sweep this
fucker in there where it belongs. That’s what I’m gonna
do.”
She always laughed ‘cause she always knew. “You ain’t
goin’ nowhere, Sally. You ain’t got no horse to ride, ‘less
you count that Phantom 4000 that spits rubber atcha all day.” She’d
turn her face away and stare at her fuckin’ clipboard, her
dirty stinkin’ head rag flappin’ in my face. “That’s
the only horse for you Sally. And you gonna ride it till you die.” Sometimes
she’d look back at me and every now and then I thought I saw
somethin’ in her eyes, but I bet it was just a heat devil
rising up off the 90-degree floor.
I was good back then. I looked good, I talked big, and I laughed
loud. Now, I got burn scars on my arms clear to the elbows, and
lungs that hack up shit as brown as the goo Margie spits. I got
scorched
hair, cracked lips, and $12.15 in my front pocket. I got Salvation
Army clothes, a leaking roof, and a beat up Plymouth Valiant. I
got hot checks, bad credit, and slow-dying parents who are already
gone.
The factory killed em; their bodies just ain’t figured it out
yet. I got twelve old boyfriends, three old girlfriends, and a lonely
double bed. I got one gold chain, my Grandma’s locket, and
potpies in the freezer.
But I got a job.
Every morning I tell myself this might be the day; the day I leap
up on the conveyer belt, shoutin’ like Norma Rae and holdin’ up
a sign…turnin’ round and round like a tumbleweed in a
twister. But my sign won’t say nothin’ bout no union, ‘cause
can’t no union clear the shit outta this factory. My sign will
say ‘I’m raising up and leaving this hell flat out’.
My sign will say all the things that are burned along my insides.
Things I can’t even think about, much less say. My sign will
show the girls who look like me, and live like me, and don’t
get to love… just like me… how to get clear of here.
I’ll show ‘em how to walk away from this shit factory
forever, tearin’ off their old skin and steppin’ into
new. Yeah. That’s what my sign’ll say. Pretty much.
Yeah, pretty much.
So, I walk in today. I see Florence, with her hair tied back. It
used to be blonde, but the fumes from the rubber made it go all
orange. She kissed me once, I remember that real good. She was
all soft and
sweet, like White Shoulders perfume. Made me shiver, and my legs
were loose as jelly the whole day. She was better than any man
I ever knew. And I see Sue, eyes red and tired. She slips a bottle
up, tips it back, and throws down a quick drink once every hour.
I know ‘cause she’s stationed across from me. And I see
Roberta, the newest. She still smiles. Still nods. But I don’t
nod back at her. I think I might today, but I don’t. I just
walk on by and I don’t say nothin’.
The bell rings at 7:02 and the watchers come out. They been hidin’ in
the back where it’s 70 degrees instead of 100. They look cool
in white shirts, shiny loafers, and hard hats. Most of ‘em
are men and they just watch. You can feel ‘em get under your
skin and that look they give you is just about the only thing that
can clear the rubber from your veins. The look that says ‘you
ain’t worth fuckin’ even with the lights off’.
They make sure we meet quota. They make sure we don’t ever
talk or even look at each other. They make sure we get outta the
lunchroom five minutes before break is over.
The men who work hard have it worse than we do. They’re stuck
back in the section where you can’t hear nothin’ for
an hour even if you just get too close to the walls that keep ‘em
separate from us. When you do meet up with ‘em, say in the
hall, or when they move out of the lunchroom to give it up for the
girls, they don’t got nothing in their eyes but sorrow. Not
even pain ‘cause they can’t feel it no more. They got
the sorrow. though. It’s there forever, like it will be for
all of us of we don’t get up outta the shit that runs on
the floor and merges with the rubber like some kinda soul soup.
I finish at five—quota met—job secured. I head down
the drive and leave the shit factory, but the smell stays in my
nose. I cruise down the street, window down, AM radio blaring.
A red light
catches me at Fourth and Wells. Sick engine idling, I glance over
to the right where a group of girls play on a stoop. They’re
eight, maybe ten years old. They wear too-small jeans, t-shirts
with holes in ‘em, and something like hope on their Popsicle
smile faces.
…ring around the rosies…
As their laughter and easy talk reach my ears, I can hear ‘em
plan their future out, slick and straight. All tied up neat-like
with a ribbon of disillusion to keep it caught. These girls ain’t
stupid. They know their lives, the path they’ll take, the road
they’ll cruise. It’s the factory that’s got ‘em
see? They’re too damn close to escape. It’s a fairy tale
to them. Just a ticket to a paycheck. Maybe their mamas told ‘em
that cause their lives were stolen by the factory so many years
ago. Or maybe it was their grandpas who knew the power of the factory
a long time ago and were too beaten to offer up anything better.
One thing I know as I press the accelerator and coax the Plymouth
home just one more time. One day, I’ll be Margie, spittin’ brown
goo and hatin’ so hard that no other feeling can ever live
again. And those little girls? Well, they’ll be me, sloshing
through the shit factory every day and dreaming. Yeah, I’m
still dreaming. Not about white picket fences, or pretty pink flowers.
Not even about a man comin home to me every day with a full wallet
and a bag of take out. No, I dream of rest. I’m so fuckin’ tired.
I feel my nose burn again, strong and painful, just like I was
still at work. My eyes hurt too, funny-like. I reach up to wipe ‘em
with the sleeve of my shirt. What comes away is clear, fresh, and
even sweet. It’s tears, I think. I think it’s tears for
the young I see playing in the streets who can’t escape their
fate.
[END]
© 2004 Stacy Taylor - Contributor's
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