Iron River

by Daniel Acosta

  I sat down next to him. Grandma served me a small plate of stew. “I don’t want you to spoil your appetite for supper, so just have one tortilla.”

  We ate without talking for a few minutes. Maybe Rudy was trying to think of something to say to me. The quiet didn’t feel good.

  “I’m going into seventh grade in September,” I said.

  “That’s real nice.” High, sick voice. “You any good in school?”

  “I do okay. Not as good as Marco. That kid’s really smart. He always gets way better report cards than me.”

  “Your dad was pretty good in school. You look a lot like him when he was your age.” He kind of barked out his words like he was mad, but he couldn’t already be mad at me. Maybe that’s how people talk in prison. I didn’t ask. I wanted to tell him that he looked like Dad too, but I didn’t.

  “Grandma says you’re going to live with us,” I told him. “You get to have my room. I’m going to sleep on the couch.” By now Grandma had joined us at the table with her caldillo and coffee.

  “Just until he finds his own place, right, mijo?” she said.

  Rudy looked around the kitchen. “So. Has Sangra changed much?”

  “I don’t think so,” Grandma said, “but you’ll know better when you get out and about.”

  I liked the way that sounded. Out and about. I need to remember that. Out and about. Odds and ends. Rudy put one more piece of tortilla in his mouth. His dish was clean. He must have been hungry. He caught me looking at his plate.

  “Home cooking. Nothing like it.” He made that clicking sound with his mouth people do when they liked what they ate. When I looked at him, he winked at me. He shook a toothpick out of the little jar on the table and put it behind his ear, then he pushed his chair back and stood up.

  “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to get some shut eye.” He said that like they do in the cowboy movies. I wondered if he got to see TV in prison. I wondered what prison was like, but I didn’t ask. Rudy moved slow when he went over and kissed Grandma on the top of her head. I looked at her face. She was smiling but worry was standing right behind her smile.

  Me and Grandma watched him walk to my old room. He looked shorter than Dad, but he was bent over so I couldn’t be sure. And he walked kind of sideways, like those dogs you see walking down the street that got hit by a car but lived. You can’t see any cuts or blood, but you know their insides are messed up, and they walk like Rudy.

  “Prison has worn him down, so be nice to him,” Grandma said and patted my hand.

  I was watching cartoons when my mom and dad got home. Dad went to talk to Rudy right away. I thought he was going to hug and kiss him, but instead he told him to go out with him to the front porch. I could see them talking through the screen door.

  Actually, I saw Dad talking. Rudy was sitting in the hobo chair and Dad was standing over him. I went to turn down the TV so I could listen, but Dad saw me. He opened the screen door and looked at me hard. Then he grabbed the big door and shut it.

  I left the TV on, but I went to my old room. I looked out the front window. I could see Dad’s face better from here, but all I could see of Rudy was the back of his head. He was staring down at the porch floor. He never looked up at Dad.

  Dad walked back and forth and pointed his finger at Rudy or at the warehouses and mountains across the street. I could hear his voice through the window glass, but I couldn’t tell what he was saying. It was the same voice he used when he told me Grandpa died. After a while, he stopped talking and started to walk to the door. I got up real fast and went back to the front room and pretended I was going into the kitchen so he wouldn’t know where I’d been. He walked past me to his room without saying a word.

  I went back to sitting on the couch facing the TV. In a minute Rudy came in. He winked at me again. Then he went into his room and shut the door soft-like.

  Suppertime was weird. Grandma was quieter than usual. Her and Mom and Dad and Rudy ate in the kitchen. Me and Dorothy had to eat on TV trays in the front room, which was no fun because Mom didn’t let us watch TV with supper.

  “I think Daddy’s mad at Uncle Rudy,” Dorothy whispered.

  “I don’t think he’s mad. He’s just not happy Rudy’s here.”

  “Why? If you were gone for a long time, I would be glad to see you.”

  I looked at Dorothy, and she gave me a quick little smile.

  “Eat your supper,” I told her. “I don’t know what’s going on, but Dad isn’t mad.”

  I didn’t want Dorothy to know that I was just as mixed up as she was.

  8

  Fourth of July was the best I ever had mainly because Dad let me set off fireworks. It was my first time lighting them and it made me feel big like Cruz. But it was good even before that.

  In the morning the gang rode our bikes to Main Street in Alhambra to watch the parade. The parade itself was just pickup trucks with white girls waving flags in the back and a couple of high school bands that didn’t sound very good and didn’t march in straight lines.

  When the Mission High band went by, I looked for Cruz who plays the saxophone and Danny’s brother Rafa who plays trumpet. They also sing in the Casual Tones, the group Cruz started. There’s four of them in the Tones. Cruz, Rafa, Big, and this negro who’s named Brody who has a real low voice and sings the bass parts. Brody’s the shortest guy in the group, but he has the biggest and deepest voice.

  I know all their songs, all fifteen of them, because when they practice in Grandpa’s garage, I go outside and watch them. Their songs all sound the same, mostly sad love songs. Rafa sings the main parts and Cruz plays the piano and sings backup.

  Rafa marched by first. His face was red because it was a hot day and his uniform was heavy wool. He would take a breath just before he blew the trumpet and when he blew his cheeks would puff out like he had a tortilla stuffed in each one.

  Then Cruz came past. The Mission High band wears green uniforms with a black satin sash that says Mission going across their chest with white fancy lines on their sleeves that look like the pin-striping on custom cars and those weird green hats with a big black feather on the top and white gloves and shoes.

  Cruz hates those shoes. They’re white like nurse shoes or baby shoes. On the third of July, I went over Cruz’ house and watched him paint them with that white baby shoe polish and brush his uniform and shine his sax.

  Cruz looked funny and he knew it. He tries to be so cool at school and around the neighborhood, but that day he didn’t look very cool, and he knew all the girls from Sangra and Mission High would be at the parade and would see him trying to play his horn and march in step and walk in a straight line in those baby shoes.

  The gang made fun of Rafa and Cruz. Little stood up and puffed out his cheeks playing a pretend trumpet. We made faces and acted like monkeys to try and get Cruz and Rafa to mess up.

  In the afternoon Sangra had a block party on Main Street, the first time the neighborhood ever got together to celebrate the Fourth of July. It was Ted’s idea. The men set up tables in the street under the big oak tree in front of Danny’s house, and the ladies decorated them with red, white, and blue tablecloths. Mr. Marín, Elvira’s dad from next door, cooked a goat in a hole the night before, and somebody else brought a roasted pig. Ladies brought beans and rice and salad and tortillas and cakes and pies and flán. Somebody in a pickup truck dropped off two kegs of beer, and somebody else brought two tinas filled with ice and bottles of Coke and gallons of Mother’s Pride which is the cheapest soda you can buy.

  About 6:30, everybody showed up to eat. Supper was supposed to start at 5 to leave time for the fireworks, but to Mexicans 5 is 6:30 so everybody was late at the same time. I skipped breakfast to go to the parade and didn’t eat anything all day, so I was starving.

  Before we could eat, three boy scouts—the Godinez brothers from Pearl Street—marched to a spot under the oak tree. The one in the middle, Andy, was carrying the American flag and they marched real sharp�
�not like the Mission High band. Men took off their hats and the ones in uniform saluted. Real loud, a man wearing an American Legion cap said, “I pledge allegiance to the flag…” and everybody joined him.

  Then my Grandma shocked me. She started saying the “Our Father” in Spanish and Sangra joined in again.

  After the prayer, people started laughing and talking. The same people who always do, ran to the front of the food line. I grabbed a Coke out of one of the washtubs and drank it while I waited in line with Danny.

  We did some people-watching. Some of the men wore their old army uniforms even though they were too tight for them anymore. Ted didn’t wear his. Some of the grandpas and grandmas wore their Sunday clothes. I saw Sonia in the middle of a group of guys. She looked fine. She was wearing a short skirt and a tight blouse and those tiny black shoes they call flats.

  Rudy stood leaning against the oak tree. I watched different men go up to him and offer him a beer. He smiled and shook his head. Parole board rules.

  By the time it was dark enough for fireworks, I was stuffed. I ate goat and chicken and beef and pork ribs and coleslaw and beans and rice and about eight tortillas and drank five Cokes. I thought my stomach was going to bust.

  Me and Danny sat on my front porch wall and watched Sonia on their front porch. She was holding hands with some guy from the neighborhood I’ve seen before, except I didn’t know his name or who his family was.

  A rocket went off, and me and Danny watched it climb way up before it exploded and came down in a million little diamonds. The women clapped, and the men drank their beer.

  “That’s Rafa,” Danny told me. “Him and my uncle Robert went down to T.J. and snuck back some Mexican cuetes.” He lifted his chin at the sky. “There’s more where that came from.”

  The illegal firework show lasted about an hour. I got bored. Danny had to go home because the older guys were getting fresh with Sonia, and her dad didn’t want her alone with them at home even though the block party was right in front of their house.

  I lost track of Marco when he went to get another Coke from the tina. I knew Little wasn’t there because his mom got into a fight with Big’s mom, so the El Monte Street Gutis went home and the Sunset Avenue Gutis got to stay. They always fight at parties and funerals and weddings: one leaves and the other stays.

  I went to where my mom and dad were sitting on a blanket in the front yard. Mom was holding Dorothy in her lap. My sister was asleep even though the firecrackers sounded like machine guns. I yawned and leaned against my dad’s shoulder.

  In a minute I must’ve knocked out.

  When I woke up, I was on the couch under my blanket. I could feel the rubber sheet squeak under me. It was still hot because the front door was open. Through the screen door, I could hear far-away firecrackers go off once in a while. I guess the block party ended and everybody went home.

  I looked at the open door of Rudy’s room. He usually keeps it closed when he’s inside. I felt thirsty so I got up and went to the kitchen for a glass of water. My teeth felt like there was a blanket on them from all the Cokes I drank at the block party. I was still in my clothes, and they had that stinky-nice firework smell.

  I filled a glass with water from the sink and took a drink and looked at the clock on the stove through the bottom of the glass. It said 4 in the morning, still dark out the kitchen window. I put my glass in the sink and went back to the couch. I took off my clothes and covered myself and fell asleep again as soon as my head hit the pillow.

  I woke up with a headache and wet sheets. The front room was filled with light, and I could feel my soaked underpants. I felt with my hand under the rubber sheet. The rough material of the couch was still dry.

  I looked over at Rudy’s door. It was still wide open. I got up and dug a clean pair of underwear out of my clothes box and went to the bathroom. The house was empty except for Dorothy who was working on a bowl of Frosted Flakes at the kitchen table.

  “Where’s everybody?” I asked her.

  “Mom and Dad went to work, and Grandma’s cleaning the sidewalk.” A drip of milk leaked out the corner of her mouth and ran down her chin. “You smell like pee.”

  I moved away from her. “Where’s Uncle Rudy?” She wiggled her shoulders and went back to her cereal.

  I went into the bathroom to take a shower. Then I got dressed and pulled the wet things off the couch. While I was taking the stuff to the cuartito, Grandma came up the driveway holding an old broom and a dustpan.

  “¿Has visto a tu tío?” she asked me. I shook my head. “He didn’t come home last night.” She put the broom and dustpan in the garage and took the peed things out of my hands. “I’ll do this. You go eat breakfast.”

  Halfway through my Frosted Flakes, I heard meowing through the front screen door. I unlatched it and Danny followed me back to the kitchen.

  “You want coffee?” I asked him. Grandma lets me drink coffee with milk and sugar when Mom’s not home.

  “No.”

  “What do you want to do?”

  Danny just sat there.

  “So, what do you want to do?” He moved his shoulders like Dorothy did when I asked her about Rudy. I finished my coffee and cereal and put the cup and bowls in the sink and wiped my mouth with a dishrag.

  “Let’s look for duds,” I told him. Cruz told me him and Rafa used to find firecrackers that fizzled out, and they would put them all in a can and then throw a match in the can and they would explode. That sounded like fun.

  We only found one dud.

  We were looking for more on the rightaway when we heard the horn of the 10:15 train. That’s my favorite because it’s really long and usually comes by slow on an east current. We backed off the rightaway all the way to the street because we were both still scared from when we did the dare. The 10:15 usually has cars from different train lines and the boxcars are different colors. Burlington Northern and Reading cars are green and Southern Pacific are kind of rusty red. Cotton Belts are bright red and Erie Westerns are blue.

  I like the Great Northern cars best—bright orange with a white mountain goat painted on the side. Danny’s favorite are the ugly brown Lackawannas. He likes the name, not the color.

  The 10:15 was extra slow. It surprised us when the train stopped right in front of us. We got back on the rightaway and looked down the tracks to see why, but the tracks curve by Marco’s house so we couldn’t see to tell.

  “Accident?” Danny asked.

  The train goes above grade on a trestle over Rosemead Boulevard so an accident wouldn’t happen there. It had to be down the tracks in El Monte because it was a strong current. There’s been bad accidents where the tracks cross Del Mar Avenue. Cruz told me about one where the train hit a car on Del Mar and pushed it four blocks before the wreck stopped in front of Marco’s house.

  Cruz said it happened at night and Sangra was like an anthill when you pee on it, everybody running around all over the place trying to help the people inside the car. Police and ambulances came, but there was nothing they could do because the four teenagers inside were crushed to death. He said the wrecked car sat on the rightaway for three days until a tow truck finally hauled it away. Cruz said when him and Rafa went to see the wreck on the rightaway the day after, it reeked from booze.

  Anyway, this train’s caboose was about half a block up the tracks. We decided that if it was unlocked, we would look inside for flares. We walked to the back end of the train, but the bottom step of the caboose was over my head, so I boosted Danny up with my hands under his foot. When he was on the step, he pulled me up. We got on the porch and Danny tried the door. It opened so we went in.

  I never been inside a caboose before. It smelled like oily smoke and stinky sweat. There were tools everywhere and a water jug hanging from a wall next to pictures of naked ladies and a smelly camping stove in one corner. I looked up at the part of the caboose that sticks out the top. I remembered Melinda Collison’s train report said that was called a coopala.


  Danny opened doors and lids and looked inside. I climbed up in the coop and looked down at my neighborhood and up the tracks at the Mission church through the dirty back windows and wondered what it would be like to be a crewman on a train.

  “Bingo!” Danny said. Danny looked tiny from up where I was. He held up two flares in each hand. Suddenly a big jolt hit us. Danny fell on the floor, and the flares jumped out of his hands. I almost flew off the coop bench. The train started moving, and Danny looked up at me. His eyes were big like at the dare. With each breath I took, the train moved a little faster. I climbed down from the coop and ran to the open door and out to the porch where we got on. The Mission was getting farther and farther away. The ballast shoulder was far down and moving faster now and making me dizzy.

  Before I knew it, we were passing Marco’s house. I saw his mom in her back yard hanging sheets on the clothesline. And before I knew it again, I heard bells and saw a line of cars stopped behind the crossing arms on San Gabriel Boulevard. Me and Danny went inside and climbed back up to the coop bench.

  “What are we going to do?” Danny yelled at me. His voice sounded like he wanted to cry. I wanted to cry too.

  “What can we do?” I yelled back. Danny looked at me, then out the window. He turned his body and pulled up his knees so he could face front. I did the same, but faced back and the toes of our tennis shoes touched. We stayed that way for a long time.

  9

  All we could do was wait until the train stopped. Then we’d get off and try to find our way home. So we leaned back in the coop and stared out the windows. We could feel the train speed up across open spaces and slow down through towns on the east current. We watched farms pass us and factories and warehouses with broken windows and neighborhoods like ours. We went by trains stopped on side-outs waiting for us to go by, and we passed trains on the second tracks headed to where we were coming from and moving so fast they would’ve sucked us off the porch if we would’ve been out back.