The Kerr Construction Company Read Free Page A

lived in the back of a panel truck in Houston for two years?”
    “Oh no.” I grinned. “I had an apartment. But I never bought a bed. I slept on the floor the whole time. Afraid to commit. Then went back to college to get my degree.”
    “You have a college degree and you live in the back of a panel truck in Gallup, New Mexico?”
    “Yep. Home’s where I hang my hat.”
    “Do you know your way around Gallup yet?” she chirped.
    “I suppose.”
    “I can show you around.”
    I almost heard myself swallow.
    “I’d like that.” I hoped I wasn’t blushing. “Nobody has, yet.”
    “Sure, I’d love to.” Her bright smile returned. “How about tonight?”
    “Yeah. Yes. Yeah.”
    “Hey, why don’t we just go to a movie?” she asked, her smile even broader now. “There’s a movie on about Woody Guthrie, at the cinema. He’s like you except he didn’t have any college.”
    I looked at her quizzically. “How am I like him?”
    “He hopped freight trains, you live in a van…I don’t know.” She laughed.
    I’d seen the movie the previous night, to tell the truth, but wanted to see it with her. “Yeah, let’s go.”
    “You don’t have a date or anything?” she asked shyly.
    “Me? No.” I’d get rid of her for you anyway, I thought to myself wickedly.
    I didn’t meditate when I got home from the movie, thinking of her. I barely slept the whole night. At the movie and on the drive to her mom’s house I behaved myself and wondered why. I wanted to pounce, every second with her, and the only reason I didn’t wasn’t because I was a gentleman. It was because I felt so shy and so vulnerable. So cowardly. But how was I not going to pounce the next time? And there was going to be a next time. We both knew it. Neither one of us made plans for a next time, but I was going back to that same restaurant, and we were going back to the same movie, or whatever else happened.
    All night long until time to get up, even in my sleep, that’s all I thought about. Seeing her in the restaurant after work and going somewhere afterwards. And probably pouncing. Except I was also a gentleman, so I wasn’t sure I’d really pounce. But I wasn’t going to be shy anymore, for sure. Amen.
    ****
    “We got us a new guy,” the one that hired me said to Doug the next day as he walked beside a short, skinny guy. “He’ll be working with us as a laborer.”
    Somehow I inherited this guy. I had to teach him things I didn’t know, and he was dumber than me about them.
    “That pole is bent, McIlhenny,” Doug yelled as he drove by where we were building a fence. “I know I said I wanted them in line, but I didn’t mean bend them to get them lined up. Didn’t you use the level?”
    “They’re straight, Doug. I used the level.”
    “They’re not straight,” he sneered, “they’re bent. I’m glad you’re big and strong, but don’t bend the poles to get them in line with one another. I thought you went to college. I thought you grew up on a farm. Did you bend the poles on your farm?”
    “Probably.” I laughed. I hated being stupid, but it was funny, too. I had been through such with my daddy.
    Doug looked to see if I was being a smart ass. I put on my guilty face for him, which made me look even more like a smart ass. But I knew he wasn’t going to fire me. He liked me, I could tell. The huge guy that was field foreman stood next to him and scoped me out. His name was Ira Hays Moonseeker. One of the few Navajos with position. He lit up a cigar and grinned my way, then followed Doug back to the pickup.
    I thought work would never end. I was anxious to see Carmen again. I didn’t have a watch, which irritated me because I was dying to know the time. I didn’t ask anyone with a watch either, afraid I’d end up telling them why I was so impatient to finish work today. I was tempted to ask the time every five minutes, but managed not too. Somehow. The sun was the only clue I had. It seemed like the Old Testament at