The Brick People

by Alejandro Morales

  Arturo carried the neatly folded zoot suit tucked carefully in a brown shopping bag. At home he placed it under his bed. He would don it on Saturday when he went to the show with his cousins Albert and Luis Pino who had sold him the entire ensemble. Arturo had bought the suit two weeks after he left Montebello Junior High, having been in a fight with an Anglo student who had called him derogatory names.

  “Mexican greasers do not deserve to walk on the same cement with loyal patriotic white boys,” the boy said as he pushed Arturo to the street.

  Arturo was forced to defend himself with his fists and in so doing opened a long and deep laceration over the boy’s eye. In the scuffle, the boy also suffered deep cuts across his left cheek, the bridge of his nose, and his right cheek when he hit the sharp edge of the sidewalk.

  The five witnesses to the fight supported Arturo’s testimony. The board of education reinstated Arturo and asked him to return to school, at which time the fourteen-year-old Arturo stated that he had no interest in returning to a school that did not want him.

  Octavio and Nana wanted Arturo to continue, but their son had made his final decision to drop out. A few weeks later Octavio offered his oldest son an ultimatum: “Return to school or get a job!” and gave him money to buy clothes.

  “Oh God, Arturo! Take those clothes off!” Nana exclaimed when her son strutted into the living room dressed in the latest zoot suit attire.

  “Mama, sharp this is!” Arturo showed off the newly learned language of zoot suitism. He was proud to wear the zoot suit that Saturday night.

  “God forbid your father to see you! Take that clown suit off immediately,” Nana said with a look which meant no more argument. “Your father does not like those pachuco suits. And you know how dangerous it is to wear them.”

  Arturo walked to the mirror in the portable closet in his parents’ bedroom. Nana followed.

  “Return the suit. If your father sees you wearing it, he’ll hit you. He gave you money to buy clothes for work.” Nana waited for Arturo who admired his pleated pants.

  “I spent almost all my money on this suit, Mama,” Arturo pleaded for her to understand. Nana turned from her chest of drawers.

  “Here, take this money. Buy work clothes and shoes. And show the clothes to your father. Arturo, son, please do this. And take that ridiculous suit off. Your father will be home soon.” Nana handed Arturo the money.

  That evening after dinner, carrying a brown shopping bag, Arturo went to Luis Pino’s home and returned the zoot suit. Luis refused to return the money. Night gradually caught Arturo on his walk back to his house. A silent Simons Brickyard lay before him in the red sunset, and the bluish-black of the silver-studded sky pushed the horizon down far away. The brick-making machines were silent. There were no big orders like the ones long ago that he had heard the men talk about. There would be no work for him at the yard. His father could not help. Arturo knew that Octavio was one of the men marked to be released as soon as the war ended. He wondered how it was in those far-off countries. A truck drove by slowly. The night watchman flashed a light and waved.

  “Go home, Arturo!” The night watchman’s shout drifted in the December evening.

  The truck slowly moved away. Arturo found himself walking alone in silence and darkness. He passed the drying racks. Their constant murmur did not frighten him. The light at the main entrance on Vail revealed the red barren clay, earth that required men like his father to transform it into building brick. His father had worked there a lifetime, Arturo’s lifetime, and he had stained his lungs red, like his grandfather. Simons: crown of red brick companies, creator of material to rebuild the crumbling world. Arturo saw the thousands of men and their families with crowns of bricks on their heads, burdens of unrecognized labor carried forever by the Mexicans who worked, lived and called Simons home. His father’s face guided him through the night. His mother came to help. His brother Javier and his sisters Micaela and Flor now ran along with him. They all moved effortlessly through the night. He ran with two bricks, one in each hand, when he found himself before his father amidst Nana’s garden.

  “What’s wrong, son?” Octavio asked as Nana neared.

  Arturo stood silently and lifted up to his father and mother two red bricks with the name of Simons deeply stamped on each. Octavio took them and, like Nana, puzzled, followed Arturo into the house.

  Chapter 19

  The March winds cleared the Southern California skies. The sun broke through the persistent clouds and enveloped Nana in a cozy warmth as she fought the wind for the laundry she struggled to fold and place in a basket. A strong gust made her hold the clean sheet to her breasts which felt larger. Soon they would prepare for milk. As they enlarged, Octavio would kiss and lick them and make her nipples rise and he would run his hands over the firmness of her body and she would make him smile. Nana watched the clouds traverse the firmament and thought of her time, woman time, Mexican time, and how nothing had been fulfilled yet, because life was a constant search for Eden. And always, when Eden was thought to be found, Eden became subverted. Life was transformed into a chain of subverted Edens which she wished simultaneously to re-visit and to forget.

  She dropped the sheet and felt her breasts. Pride overcame her and gave her strength. She figured that she would have the baby during the first part of October. Nana was thirty-eight and when her fifth child arrived she would be thirty-nine. She was embarrassed by the thought of what other women would say about her having a child at thirty-nine. Having babies was for young girls, certainly not older women of thirty-nine, forty. Nana folded the sheet and reached for the pillowcases flapping in the wind. The economics of the family worried her, especially now when the government had announced that rationing would be expanded to include shoes, meat, cheese, fats and canned foods. How would they be able to feed five of their children? Nana had never before concerned herself with food. Octavio always provided. She and the children had never gone hungry, nor anyone else in the Revueltas family because Octavio never failed to provide whatever was needed. But within a matter of weeks Octavio would be out of a job. He would not work for the Simons Brick Company.

  The rumors that had been circulated about Walter Simons wanting to cut back on the number of employees had become a self-fulfilling prophecy. Walter had indicated that the war effort provided enough jobs so that his workers could find other employment. Convinced that the time offered a good opportunity to shorten his payroll, the patron prepared a short list of five names to be fired within a month of the time Nana collected her laundry and a long list of twenty-five names to be announced within a year. The third name on the short list was Octavio Revueltas.

  Nana, aware of the social, economical and political problems of Simons, Montebello, California, the United States and the world, would still have this child. During these past months there seemed to have begun a waiting, a period of expecting something to happen. Time moved slowly in the places where she existed. It seemed that the hatred towards Mexicans would never end, that the war was eternal. The child would be born into a terrible world of violence. Nana picked up the basket of laundry and headed to the entrance of her home. She had made the same turn, approached the same door uncountable times before. She stopped to check her plants. She would miss the house if she had to move.

  As the war grew more violent, Walter’s Mexicans went out to work in factories producing arms and other war materials. The Mexicans did not wait for Simons to announce who was on the list. Many families left. As it was, Walter, it was rumored, suffered from a gradual incapacitating illness that would soon force him to sell the business. The workers knew that Helen and Drusilla Simons had absolutely no interest in taking over the administration of the brickyard, nor did Edit express a strong resolve to continue her husband’s business.

  Time advanced through the lives of millions of people and the months passed. By June, Nana was five months pregnant and as strong as she had ever felt. She felt as if she were prepared to give birth to a new world w
hen the news circulated that Allied forces had accomplished a cross-channel invasion of German-occupied Normandy. Simons youth pushed onto the beaches with no complaints and never looked back. Like the soldiers, Nana pushed forward.

  For the first two weeks of August, the heat had been unbearable and made life difficult for Milagros, who had gained an abnormal amount of weight. The doctors had diagnosed cancer of the stomach complicated by high blood pressure and a heart condition. She would have to be operated on and hospitalized for two weeks and spend a month or more recuperating at home.

  Octavio brought the family together and polled them about who was able to donate funds to Milagros’ doctor and hospital expenses. Federico stepped forward and offered what he could. No one else volunteered money. Octavio, Damian and Federico would cover the costs. Rogaciana, Felicitas and their husbands volunteered time and space but because of their growing families they could not afford to contribute funds. The family gathering took place in Milagros’ house but the meeting of the brothers and sisters was called at Octavio and Nana’s home. Throughout the evening it became clear that Octavio and Nana would be the people responsible for the major financial obligations. ... Como siempre, Nana thought as she sat with her two hands resting on a full womb. By seven that evening both houses were filled with family. Nana and Milagros had prepared the usual excellent meal, delicious, with more than enough for everyone. Ignacio and Guadalupe Sandoval promised that they would help pay for their sister’s medical bills and reassured Octavio not to worry. They had faith in Octavio’s ability to come up with the necessary money.

  Milagros entered the hospital in mid-August and one week later returned home to recuperate from the surgery. Regaining strength was a slow process. Milagros, the doctors discovered, had cancer of the uterus and a hysterectomy had to be performed. By September, Milagros and Nana sat to enjoy a cup of tea. As Milagros poured, Nana grimaced with pain. The baby had kicked.

  “That one is going to cause you problems.” Milagros stirred a teaspoon of sugar.

  “I’m so tired of carrying him. Look at how big I am,” Nana said softly, embarrassed.

  “Don’t worry. You’ll have the child soon. I’ll be here to help you.” Milagros smiled and wiped a tear from Nana’s cheek. “Haven’t seen Octavio.”

  “He’s out looking for a job. This morning he went with Jacobo Ramos. Octavio was very happy because where Mr. Ramos works they are going to offer Octavio a job.” Nana looked toward the brickyard.

  Milagros crossed her hands on her stomach. “He’s not burning a kiln.”

  “Yes, he starts at three in the afternoon. He hasn’t quit his job here.” Nana pushed her black hair away from her forehead. Both women sat comfortably in a common space and enjoyed one another in silence.

  Octavio reached into his coat pocket to reassure himself that he still had three hundred dollars in cash to pay for the delivery of their fifth child in the antiseptic white delivery room of Beverly Hospital in Montebello. The money was not gambling money, but savings accumulated from salary drawn from Phelps Dodge Cooper Corporation where he had been employed since September. Nana would be upset if she knew that he paid for their baby with gambling booty. Whatever way she wanted him to pay was agreeable, although he carried more gambling earnings than salary. Since he had started to work at Phelps Dodge, he had saved all of his salary. It seemed that upon acquiring the new job his good luck at the card games he enjoyed had been boosted to such a degree that in the past month he had won more money than in the previous five years of his gambling career. This productive streak of luck had been costly in his relationship with Nana. To make this money required time away from home.

  As Octavio waited for the nurse to return with identification papers for the baby, he tried to recall the nights he had spent with Nana during her last month of pregnancy. He worked the swing shift from three in the afternoon to twelve at night. He usually left at two to arrive on time. By a quarter to one in the morning, after a shower and a bite to eat, Octavio found that he was wide awake and not tired. It began in that way. After work he would go into Los Angeles, Barrio Margarito, or East Los Angeles to dangerous and mysterious places where he found highly profitable card games. Octavio won and won. It was as if he had been cursed with winning. He would return home at about eight in the morning, sleep four hours until twelve, get ready for work and leave at two. He gambled almost up to the day of the birth. He felt that this child was born an orphan.

  To Nana’s surprise, Octavio came home the night of the fourteenth of October. The next morning, from one-thirty on, he observed Nana prepare herself psychologically and physically for the imminent birth. At twelve in the afternoon, Ignacio and Tati Sandoval drove Nana to the hospital. Octavio stayed with Nana until two, when he left for work. At about the time he started the powerful machine he operated, Nana gave birth to a son.

  Octavio was anxious when the friendly nurse walked into the waiting room and called out his name. Immediately after, Micaela and Arturo entered the room and sat next to their father. The nurse approached Octavio.

  “Mr. Revueltas, your wife is sleeping comfortably. I need to know the name of your beautiful son.” The nurse smiled.

  “Quiere saber el nombre del bebe.” Micaela translated, although Octavio understood.

  “Gregorio,” Octavio answered. Nana and he had chosen the name the morning she entered the hospital.

  “Gregory,” the nurse translated and wrote. “And the middle name?”

  Micaela shrugged her shoulders and looked at Arturo who turned to his father.

  “Well, how about Alexander? Alexander is a fine middle name,” Octavio finally said. The nurse wrote it down.

  “Good, your son’s birth certificate is complete. Your son’s name is Gregory Alexander Revueltas. Please sign here.” The nurse handed Octavio a pen. He signed and the woman in white quickly left the room.

  Two days later, Octavio and Nana bundled up Gregorio, all paid for, left Beverly Hospital and took their fifth-born home to Simons, his cultural cradle.

  Nana prepared Octavio’s lunch while he shaved and washed in the brick basin outside the kitchen door. Four hours’ sleep, a mild hangover and fatigue quickened Octavio’s irritability. Nana, mad at his nine A. M. arrival, was in a bad mood and slammed cupboards, pots and dishes. They both understood the other’s mental state. Octavio and Nana made a superior effort to avoid a confrontation. Octavio dried his hands with a towel by the kitchen table.

  “There’s your lunch.” Nana threw the bag onto the table.

  “Why did you throw it at me?” Octavio shouted.

  “I can hear you, Octavio. You don’t have to yell!” Nana moved to the stove and flipped several tortillas.

  Within another minute, Nana would have screamed about what she considered to be Octavio’s lack of consideration and understanding of twenty-four-hour toil as housewife, mother, counselor and companion to Milagros and as instant hot lover to Octavio to satisfy his sexual desire. In turn, Octavio waited for Nana’s next aggressive outburst so that he could respond to her total insensitivity to and lack of appreciation for his hard and dangerous work to provide a good life for her and the children. They both felt in the right and at any moment would explode to defend their position. Suddenly, a knock at the front door interrupted the tense atmosphere. They expected no one. Nana went to the entrance and reached for the door. Beyond the screen door stood two familiar men. Nana’s heart fluttered while William Melone and Gonzalo Pedroza politely removed their hats.

  “We want to speak to Octavio,” Gonzalo said in a firm, raspy voice.

  “Is he in?” William moved next to his colleague and peered through the screen to observe Octavio emerge from the kitchen.

  “Here I am, Mr. Melone. How can I help you?” Octavio asked as if he knew nothing about why they wanted to speak to him. He opened the door, stepped between Gonzalo and William and went to the fence where he invited them to join him.

  Nana, surrounded by flowers to her left and
right from the small porch, nervously observed her husband. She too knew why they had come.

  “Octavio, you know why we’re here. You don’t work here but you’re still living here,” Gonzalo said.

  “We have orders to ask you to leave. You must leave the house, Octavio,” William said tersely.

  Octavio looked at Nana and decided to play a polite hand for more time. “I understand. I’ll leave, but I would like to ask a favor. I need some time to find a house. About four or five months.”

  “Four, five months!” William laughed. “We’ll give you three more months and no more. You’re to be out of here by the end of February. If not, you know what must be done.”

  Gonzalo moved slowly through the open gate. He struggled with his body, which now had become a terrible monstrosity of a disfigured, deformed, perverted man and sat in William’s truck. Octavio went to Nana’s side in the center of her garden.

  “Don’t worry. In three months we can find a house, or we’ll build a new one.” Octavio went inside, returned with his lunch, kissed Nana and left for work. From the fence he waved.

  “And don’t come home at nine in the morning!” Nana yelled.

  Now, more than before, Octavio’s gambling winnings were a crucial economic factor for the future. Nana saw Octavio slowly disappear from her sight.

  By six o’clock on a spring morning five months later, Arturo had left to work at the slaughterhouse. By seven-thirty, Micaela and Javier had walked to meet the bus that would take them to school. Micaela was in her senior year and would graduate in June. Javier was in the eighth grade and was doing excellent work. By seven forty-five, Flor had walked to Vail Elementary with her neighborhood friends. Flor was in the first grade and enjoyed school. Gregorio and Octavio slept. Nana sat quietly drinking coffee. She stole a few minutes from the busy day to rest peacefully, in silence. But rest did not come. The month was April, the year 1945 and still Octavio had not found a home for the family. Everywhere he went in the north of Montebello he had been refused. They did not want Mexicans in those areas. The threats which had been made by William and Gonzalo were not executed. During the previous Christmas holidays, Walter Simons had fallen seriously ill from some kind of lung congestion. Throughout Walter’s convalescent period, William’s and Gonzalo’s concerns were concentrated faithfully on the patron and the operation of the Simons brickyard. By April, Walter’s health had stabilized and he recuperated at the Simons retreat on the Balboa Peninsula.