Chapter 19: The Broom

The next morning my brother carried me to Plant 4 again.

He had a split lip and a stiff jaw, and he did not say much.

My mother had set up a folding table at the dock door.

She had a pen, a stack of forms and a pot of coffee.

The line outside it went around the building.

Every worker with a bad back, a cast or a hidden bandage had come.

She wrote down each name herself.

I stood by the urn on the table and watched her take a man's torn hand in both of hers and look at it.

"Take him to the clinic on Alder Street," she said to Dale. "The company pays. Tell them I said so."

"Yes, ma'am."

"Paula."

"Paula," Dale said.

He almost smiled.

At nine o'clock a taxi stopped at the gate.

My father got out of it.

He wore the same navy overcoat as the day before, and it was wrinkled. His tie was gone.

He had not shaved.

The workers in line went quiet, one by one, as he walked up the drive on foot.

I had never seen him walk anywhere.

He stopped at the edge of the lot.

"Paula," he said.

My mother did not stand.

"I came to apologize," he said. "To them, and to you."

"To the people on the line?"

"To everyone."

Dale put down his clipboard and walked out to meet him.

They were the same height. My father was thinner, and Dale was twice as wide.

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