Empty Pockets

by Dale Herd

  “That’s them,” Reeves said.

  Down the highway under some trees some people stood by a white mailbox. The little girl was standing behind the woman. A boy in a T-shirt stood next to the girl. They both looked small, babies, really.

  I looked at Reeves. His alcoholic’s face was up over the wheel with his eyes squinted, trying to see through the dirty windshield and glare off the highway. Fine veins branched redly under his cheeks. He was excited for sure.

  We went off the road and along the shoulder.

  “Becca’ll ride up here with us,” he said. “You’ll see what I mean.”

  We came alongside and he stopped the car.

  “Well,” he said out my window, “I made it after all.”

  “I knew you would,” the woman said. “I wasn’t worried.”

  “That’s good,” Reeves said.

  The woman smiled at me and pulled the children forward. Her hair was bleached, the roots showing dark. Her eyebrows were painted on, like those I had seen in photographs of Mexican whores in boxes outside Mexico City around the turn of the century.

  “C’mon, Paul,” she said, tugging at the boy. He resisted, apparently scared of me. His face was dirty and he wore thick spectacles, his eyes large and milky-blue behind the glass. The woman pushed him forward, then the little girl.

  “This here’s a Washington boy,” Reeves said. “Picked him up outside Lassiter.”

  “Pleased to meet you,” the woman said. She pushed the boy again, and I reached over and opened the back door.

  Reeves leaned over the seat and as the little girl got in he lifted her up over and stood her between us.

  The woman then the boy got in and I closed their door.

  “This sure is good of you, Pat,” the woman said.

  “How’s my ol’ Becca?” Reeves said. He laid his arm around the child’s waist. “Can you give your ol’ Uncle Pat a kiss? Hmmm? Can you?”

  The girl was looking at me, her head slightly above mine, her eyes clear child’s eyes. She was a beautiful little girl.

  Reeves put his hand on her leg.

  I shook my head at her.

  “The bank closes at three, don’t it?” the woman asked.

  Reeves pulled Becca to him. She put her arm around his neck.

  “Ain’t she somethin’,” he said.

  Becca gave him a kiss. Reeves moved his hand up under her dress. She kissed again and started to bounce up and down on the seat, the cushion gently moving beneath me.

  “Well, Pat,” I said, “I believe you. I think I’ll get out here if you don’t mind. I’d like to walk a bit.”

  “Out here?” Reeves said, looking over Becca’s shoulder. He had a perplexed look on his face.

  “Right,” I said. I opened the door and got out. In back the woman was looking in her purse. She looked up, startled.

  “Sure,” Reeves said. He reached around Becca and closed the door.

  I stepped back.

  Becca didn’t look, watching Reeves as he took the wheel. Then the car moved off, bouncing as it hit the pavement, sun flashing sharply off its dusty flanks. The boy’s face appeared at the rear window, soon vanishing into shadow.

  I watched them for a moment and then turned around and walked over to the mailbox.

  Leona Pride, it read. “A widow woman,” Reeves had said. “Yes, sir, really honest to God in love, the both of us. No, she don’t know. She thinks it’s her I’m interested in.”

  War Songs

  I’ve been thinking of you and hope you have a Happy Birthday tomorrow. Hope the day is correct. I told Gloria how we used to have mental telepathy in Spokane, ha, ha.

  Hope Jay is well and I have wondered if you got over the ulcer trouble. Hope Dave is well and happy. Do they have children? Excuse the mistakes. My glasses need changing as I don’t see too good. I remember Martha’s daughter Lynn and what caused her to die so young? That must have been very hard on Martha and family.

  Mother and Melissa have been fine. Fred is about the same (bedridden), he is up a little each day. I told you about his broken neck and he never walked again. Donna gets pretty tired from the care. She had to train about like a nurse to care for him. Rena Jean lives in Tacoma. She has two girls. Diane lives at Skyway has two boys and one girl. Betty and Lora had some nerve trouble. Betty is fine but Lora isn’t too well yet. Think Tom is a lot to blame. David (their boy) just twenty-one eloped with a Japanese girl and the dad and other grandma disowned him. Lora and Tom bought a new model home at Bothell and Tom won’t let him bring her there at all. The rest of us will be kind to her if that’s what he wants. Lora is a Christian and will be good to her. I don’t approve of mixed marriages but will always be good to her. He met her at the University of Wash.

  I was very sad about the middle of November. John’s brother Ralph had a heart attack. He lived just a few days and passed away. We got two cute cards to send him at the Veterans’ Hospital in Walla Walla and had some pictures for him too but he died before I got them there. He was still Catholic so they had a rosary and mass. I couldn’t go as I was low on money. He was like a brother to me all these years. He was up to Davenport in August and helped Walter do some painting. He got diabetes and I know that he had been doctoring. Walter and Helen and families went to Walla Walla for the funeral. On the way home they got about twenty miles from Walla Walla and Walter had a heart attack at the wheel. Mike took over (he is eighteen now) and they took Walter to the hospital. He didn’t have any heart damage. The electric card-o-graph showed the old arteries ruptured and the new ones took over. I told you he had heart surgery a year ago, I believe. Had he not had the operation he would have died on the spot. We had two heart attacks within two weeks in the family and you can imagine how upset I was—after going through it with John. The Walla Walla heart doctors who did the surgery seem to think he is getting along okay Doris (John’s sister) isn’t very well her blood pressure went high and she had chest pains from the strain of it all. Wish I could go visit them. I haven’t been to Walla Walla for six years or Davenport.

  Guess you think this is some letter with all the bad news. I am just getting over a virus. It started in my stomach and then I got a sore throat I lost my voice and it hit my lungs and I nearly had pneumonia for a week or two. I have been several weeks getting over the bronchial cough and cold. I had been planning to write for several weeks. I felt pretty bum.

  Donald took Gloria on a long trip in August she was gone all month. She was in Wash., Idaho, Montana, Yellowstone, S. Dakota, Nebraska, Missouri, Arkansas, Tennessee (saw Elvis Presley’s home in Memphis), New Orleans, Texas, Dallas, New Mexico (saw the Carlsbad Caverns), Nevada, Las Vegas, Reno, Northern Calif., Ore., and home. They stayed at motels with pools and TV and she had the time of her life. We sure missed her though. She and Julie both had mumps this summer.

  Do you ever hear from any of the Bureau of Reclamation people or from the Corps of Engineers? Think of some often. Heard “If I Loved You” and “Stranger in Paradise” yesterday, war songs. Thought of Mitch. I have never got over that.

  Wish you could come over sometime would love to see you. Don’t think I thanked you for the lovely fruitcake. It sure was nice to have and I use the tin for a cookie jar.

  Love,

  Klamath Falls

  Mark stood up and held out his hand. The car was a pickup, dull red with a camper on the back. An old man was driving, no one else with him. Bill sat down and watched. Mark was waving his arm up and down. The pickup went past, then slowed, the red brake lights flashing on, off.

  “Let’s go, man,” Mark said, grabbing his pack. He started running.

  Bill got up, taking his pack through one of the loops. He ran halfway, then slowed to a walk. Nosed over on the shoulder, the pickup was running, its tail end sticking out on the highway. Mark was at the cab opening the door.

  “Morning,” Bill heard Mark say. “How far you going?”

  “Morning,” came the answer.

  Bill walked up b
ehind Mark. The driver looked at him.

  “Where you boys going?”

  “K. Falls,” Mark said.

  “The both of you?”

  “Right,” Mark said.

  “Well, that’s just fine. Hop on in.”

  “You going up there?” Bill said.

  “Up near there.”

  “Great,” Mark said. He stepped on the running board and swung in, sliding across the seat.

  “C’mon, man,” he said to Bill.

  Bill climbed up and got in, keeping his pack on his lap. He closed the door. The inside of the cab had a sour smell, a mixture of gasoline and rust and old food.

  “All set?” asked the driver.

  “Yep,” Mark answered.

  “Good. Here we go.”

  He let out the clutch and the pickup lurched ahead, starting for the ditch then cutting sharply for the highway.

  “Man,” Bill said.

  “Been waiting long?” asked the driver.

  “All night,” said Mark. “We’re going back to school. We’ve been out on spring vacation.”

  “Is that so?” the driver said. “My name’s Billy. Billy Wetzel.”

  “Mark,” Mark said, “and that’s Bill.”

  “Pleased to meet you. It’s a privilege to meet such nice-looking boys.”

  Bill looked at him. Underneath that blue baseball cap he was fruity looking, all right, weak, his mouth crumpled in without any teeth.

  “Thank you,” Mark said.

  Bill said nothing. He took off his coat, wadded it up, put it against the window. He slumped over against it and closed his eyes, listening to the sound of the engine pulling them steadily on.

  “You boys ever do any posing?” It was the old man’s voice.

  “Posing?” Mark asked. “You mean modeling?”

  “No,” said the old man, “posing.”

  “Artists?”

  “No, people.”

  “How’s that?”

  “Tables, you see, you walk—”

  “Tables.” Mark laughed. “You mean walk around with no clothes on—”

  “That’s it.”

  “. . . in front of a bunch of people?”

  “That’s it.”

  “Ha,” Mark laughed. “How about you, Bill?”

  “Shit,” Bill said. He closed his eyes again. He knew it. He knew it all along. He could tell by the way the pickup had approached.

  Mark laughed again.

  “It ain’t so hard,” the old man said. “Pays good money too.”

  “Tell me about it,” Mark said. “I mean, what do you do?”

  “You walk around these tables—”

  “Who’s there? I mean, is it just men or women or what?”

  “Everybody. All kinds of people.”

  “Shoot.” Mark laughed. “Don’t you feel kind of funny?”

  “Oh no,” the old man said. “Why should you? They pay you. It’s just work.”

  “Yeah, but I mean, well, what do they do? Just look at you?”

  “Some of them.”

  “Jesus,” Bill said, “that’s sick.”

  “Why, hell,” the old man said, “I’ve even had guys pay me ten dollars jus’ so’s they could kiss my belly. You ever had your belly kissed?”

  He was looking at Bill.

  “Fuck, no,” Bill said, “and I’d kill any son of a bitch that tried.”

  Mark laughed.

  The old man looked away. Bill stared at him, then sat back. He expected Mark to say something. Mark would. Mark would say or do anything.

  “You know, son,” the old man said, “you’re a lucky boy.”

  “Why?” Mark asked.

  “No, not you. The other fellow.”

  “How’s that?” Bill sat up. The old man was looking out at the road, both hands on the wheel.

  “You’ve got a lovely set of teeth, sir—”

  “Ha,” Mark laughed.

  “A blessing, you bet your life it is.”

  Bill looked at him, then sat back again, closing his eyes.

  “Why is that?” Mark said.

  “No taste,” said the old man. “You can’t taste a damn thing.”

  “Is that right?” Mark said.

  “That’s true,” the old man said. “Makes you like a little baby again.”

  “I see,” Mark said.

  “Can’t eat anything solid.”

  Mark didn’t answer that and the voices stopped. There wasn’t any talking for some time. Bill felt himself almost go to sleep. He opened his eyes. They were going up a long, slow grade with huge pines lining the sides. Up ahead, pools of light formed mirages on the blacktop.

  “Yes, sir,” the old man said, “pretty country up here.”

  “It is,” Mark agreed.

  “I always enjoy it. I come up here all the time.”

  “Where you from?”

  “Mission Beach, down in San Diego.”

  “That’s a long ways,” Mark said.

  “I’m always on the road, one time or another.”

  “You pick up many hitchhikers?”

  “Always do,” the old man said. “Last summer I picked up a fellow from Harvard. Spent six weeks together.”

  “No kidding,” Mark said.

  “Nice fellow. Just graduated. Went all the way to Canada with me. You ever been up there? Most of it’s still virgin country, you know.”

  “That’s what I understand,” Mark said.

  “You boys drink beer?”

  They crested the grade and started around a curve. The right front wheel went off the pavement.

  “Jesus,” Bill said.

  The old man let off the gas and slowed the truck. The curves fed into one another and then they were going down a long, sloping straight and then onto a long, white concrete bridge. Far below was a creek, brown-green between its banks.

  “Sure,” Mark said. “That’s really pretty down there.”

  “It is,” the old man answered. “Not good for much, though. Too many people use it.”

  “Yeah, I suppose so,” Mark said.

  “You’ve got to pack back into the mountains to get real country.”

  “I guess that’s so,” said Mark. “I’d like to do that. So would Bill.”

  “By myself,” Bill said.

  “What?”

  “By myself,” Bill repeated.

  “Hey,” Mark said, “I thought you were asleep. Sorry, man.”

  “No,” Bill said.

  “You boys got sleeping bags? You’d need sleeping bags to do that.”

  “No, not this trip,” Mark said. “We’ve been visiting friends down in Berkeley. We didn’t expect to have to sleep out.”

  “Couldn’t go back in the mountains without good bags.”

  They went along another curve, the road well shadowed by the trees, only a narrow swath of blue sky over them.

  “You boys ever been to San Francisco?”

  “Sure,” Mark said. “How about it, Bill?”

  “Ever go into bars there?”

  “We’re not old enough to drink,” Bill said.

  “There’s one place there you should see,” the old man said, “just one big room.”

  “What for?” Mark asked.

  “Couples,” the old man said, “ten couples every night. All’s they have in there is one light and a rug, a nice thick rug, nothing else . . .”

  “Nothing else?”

  “. . . just one tiny light on, way down at the end, and a few cushions. No chairs, no tables, nothing . . .”

  “Wow,” Mark said, “what happens?”

  “You name it.”

  “You mean balling?”

  “Everything,” the old man said, “sucking, fucking, switching . . .”

  “I see,” Mark said.

  “Doors open at ten and stay open till there’s ten couples then they close till six in the morning. No one can get in or get out until six.”

  “What’s it cost?”

&
nbsp; “Ten bucks a person.”

  “Two hundred bucks a night,” Mark said.

  “Every night,” said the old man.

  “That’s a lot of dough.”

  “It’s a lot of fun.”

  “I bet,” Mark said. “I bet it is.”

  “You boys have to stop?”

  Bill looked away from him. Coming toward them on the right was a clearing in the trees and a service station.

  “Not me,” Bill said.

  “Sure,” Mark said. “I could stand to wash up.”

  “I’ve got to,” said the old man. He pumped the brakes and turned the wheel. They went off the highway into the station lot. He stopped at the side of the building.

  “Coming?” He shut off the engine.

  “Right,” Mark answered.

  The old man opened his door and got out. As he walked around the front of the truck he looked in at them. He was a lot bigger than Bill had thought he was. From a distance he didn’t look so old. Bill watched him go over to the men’s room at the back of the building.

  “Well?” Mark said.

  “Fuck you,” Bill said. He opened his door.

  “What the hell’s wrong?”

  “You figure it out,” Bill said.

  “Okay, man, that’s all right with me.”

  “Okay.” Bill lifted his pack and stepped down.

  “I kind of feel sorry for the old coot, you know.”

  “Well, you know what to do.” Bill put on his pack.

  “What does that mean?”

  “Go on in there.”

  “Where?”

  “In the head, man, in the head.”

  “Look, Bill . . .”

  “Look, nothing, Mark. All you have to do is split for the head. That’ll cinch it for you. He’ll take you to the moon.”

  “You’re really an asshole, Bill, you know that?”

  “Me!” Bill said. “Ha!”

  “I said I was sorry, man. I am. It was a mistake.”

  Bill looked at him.

  “You know, man,” said Mark, “you don’t know shit. You don’t know the first goddamned thing about people.”

  “I’m learning pretty fast,” Bill said, “I know that.”

  “You’ve got a lot more to learn, man.”

  “We’ll see,” Bill said. “We’ll fucking see.”

  “Okay, take off.”