Curbside Collection

Curbside Collection

Henry took in the interior of the kitchen. The melamine slathered cabinet faces regarded him dumbly. Their circa-1950, painted-over brass handles resembled ivory bones glued to reminders of his childhood, the upper cupboards once far beyond his reach.

The seafoam green, original enamel sink looked new as the day it had left the foundry, steam rising from the sudsy water within. Cast plaster mallard ducks were arranged on the wall above, flew progressively further South to winter.

It was the first time he had been in a black person’s house.

Marlon, seated opposite him at the chrome-legged table, shifted awkwardly in his still crisp orange coveralls.

“Hasn’t changed much,” Henry observed.

*

Henry, Hank to his coworkers, was eager to escape the motor pool. The countdown to superannuation, pension collection-time, the cashing in on the proverbial golden handcuffs was nigh.

“More like brass handcuffs,” he’d observed to Reo. “I never traded up, and Shirley gets to take half.” Henry sipped his draft and nodded in agreement with himself, “Say what you will, the most unbreakable bond is a single link of chain. Never again.”

“Amen,” Reo echoed, the bartender a confirmed reborn bachelor, too.

In the dispatch, the morning walkaround, Hank’s head buzzed. Rumor was they rarely cleaned the tap-lines at Reo’s, but gout be damned, he was never one to turn down a beer on the house.

“Hank. This is Jones. He’ll be riding along with you to learn the ropes.”

Hank regarded the corn-rows as he met the young man’s shake, firm, self-assured, maybe even cocky.

“Henry,” Hank said. “Truck’s this way.”

*

The newly minted nametag proclaimed him Marlon.

Hank’s long-faded embroidered patch was in cursive, the looped letters of Henry (Henry Aitken the Third, really) curled up where threads had started to give way.

Yes, a fresh set of coveralls was available quarterly, but when you were good at your job, took pride in your work, and didn’t grease-monkey weekends in company wear your issued garments might last you a lifetime.

Hank thumbed the worn patch, his badge, his name. Shirley had always sewn his things up, but she’d left years ago.

“Boots and saddles,” he announced in the cab of the truck.

Peering over to Marlon’s fresh-faced steel toes, he saw no way he could send him packing day one. Jones, Marlon, Marlon Jones, pulled an orange knit beanie over his braids, a personal addition to company attire. Hank checked the outside temperature, 62 degrees, and frowned. It was not the dead of winter. Marlon clapped his hands together, grinned ear to ear, and pissed Hank right off the pot.

Hank piloted the hook-truck out from the terminal. Marlon rode shotgun or bitch depending who you asked.

*

The duty roster had Hank bounce routes all week, Marlon the greenhorn in tow.

“I haven’t drove this zone in years,” Hank explained, eyes darting from side-views to back up cam to side-views as he craned his head out the cab window. At some point some moron from planning had turned the alley into bike lanes, Hank now painted into a corner. A scowling cyclist recorded Hank’s slow retreat to the laneway from the saddle of their e-bike. Hank had no desire to be Internet famous.

“Want me to spot you?” Marlon offered.

“Stay in the truck,” Hank instructed.

Flung into old terrain, sent back to routes he had graduated from decades before felt like a demotion. But those were his orders, “Show Marlon the ropes,” and “stay in the truck” was Hank’s go-to chorus. He was a pro, rarely mis-tipped. The newer hook-trucks did the bulk of the work. It saved your back not having to fling bags and furniture in the back of the unit. The new drivers had it easy, “sanitation workers” in place of garbage men.

“The routes, the layouts are all on GPS now,” Marlon pointed to the dash as they exited the scene. “Thanks for your patience!” he waved to the bicycles and stroller set.

“I don’t use those do-dads.”

“I can show you how-”

“I said I don’t need them,” Hank scowled.

They carried on in silence for blocks. It had been days and Hank hadn’t yet put Marlon on wheel or controls.

“You don’t get a feel of things ‘til you have a hold of things, understand?”

Marlon had nodded, full grin. Stainless steel mug in hand, he had dragged Hank to some hip coffee bar where they offered a discount if you had your own cup. Hank held his to-go cup awkwardly, the heat of the over-pour (what the Hell was that?) cooking his palm through the coffee bra.

*

“I been at this forty five years, I know a thing or two. For one, there’s drivers and there’s operators. I’m an operator. You’ll be a driver at first, but if you stick with it you might be an operator someday.”

Their fourth day together, day one of Marlon at the wheel.

“Aye-aye, Captain.”

“No, that’s- Okay, you drive after lunch,” Hank shook his head.

“Henry, I can do this.”

“No, it’s your attitude, it’s all wrong,” Hank explained. “Look, it’s… do you watch movies?”

“Sure I watch movies.”

“I like old movies, okay, and… Lethal Weapon. That’s what you’re driving, it’s a lethal weapon, alright?”

“I thought Mel Gibson was the Lethal Weapon,” Marlon laughed, “In one, two and three.”

“That’s not what I’m saying, you and me are like-“

“Partners?”

“No-”

“I’m like Danny Glover cuz I’m..?”

“No, no, listen, that’s not what I’m saying-“

“But you’re more like Danny Glover, officer Murtagh, because he kept talking about retiring and being “too old for this shi-””

“Stop right there. That’s disrespectful.”

“Okay.”

Marlon and Hank, stopped curbside on Laverne Ave, stared up the street at the weather-beaten homes, the wheeled tall-boy bins in the gutter. Decaled lifted pick-ups and flags used as drapes reminded Hank who ought to be driving.

“You say respect,” Marlon nodded, “So let me drive this block.”

Hank sighed, then relented, “If you tip a bin or something goes sideways, stay in the truck.”

*

They had approached Hank, still Henry, at eighteen. Campbell Watt, the local fixer held a notebook out.

“We want you to fill this. You got a rare insight, eyes on the ground to where people live, how many are there. Their disposition.”

Henry did not want the book. Campbell talked out Henry’s origin.

“Your Daddy died in the mill. No insurance. Your Mama lost the house, foreclosed. Almost gave you and your sister up to her folks to raise in Kentucky. But we helped her out. I helped her out. Your Daddy and I was friends.”

Henry took the black book.

“Might take some time,” Campbell observed. “So many of ‘em moved in now. Your old house, for chrissake! Yeh.”

Spit on the ground.

“I know folks don’t stand out with their garbage, but you’ll figure it out. Get that back to me, understand?”

Henry understood, black bags, white hoods, the book.

*

“What’s the coolest thing you ever found?” Marlon asked.

“Oh, I don’t know. Everyone always asks if I find anything good. It’s not like that. Put it in a bag, it’s as good as gone. It’s the guys at the landfill find all the good stuff.”

“End of the line, huh?”

“Oh yeah, they got the picking and the time there. Like crows, Heckle and… crows. They got coyotes there, too.”

“Uh-huh.”

“So, think you’ve got it now?”

“I’m a work in progress,” Marlon laughed, “It’s important to see where the boots hit the ground.”

“Hm?”

“Henry, I’m not taking your job! This is for my diploma.”

“High-school..?”

“Henry, I’m twenty-six years old! I’m finishing a diploma in resource recovery management.”

Henry shifted his weight uncomfortably. It was the last day of the training.

“Like, recycle stuff?”

“Diversion technologies, yeah, reduce, reuse, recycle. Then landfilling the residual stuff we can’t divert. I just wanted to see what front-line workers gotta deal with. What you had to deal with.”

“Oh.” Henry looked up and down the street, his old street, his former family home at the end of the road. He hadn’t been here in years. His mouth was dry, and he coughed. Marlon watched him.

“I had to ask for this co-op placement, had to really sell them on it because I don’t want to write policy without seeing close up, you know?”

“Well… I never drank the recycling Kool Aid. Garbage is fine by me and I’ve done alright by it.”

“Henry- You’ve done a lot of good.”

“No, I done my job is all.”

“Henry- I asked to work with you- not just anybody. You.”

Henry felt ill.

“I need some water.”

*

Campbell Watt slapped shoulders and passed cigarettes to his pals.

“Henry,” he yelled across the garage, “How’s that book coming?”

“Yeah Rudyard, how’s Ivanhoe going?”

Henry nodded, moved to his locker in the personnel room and retrieved his coveralls, his boots, the book.

“Check out your old house when you’re flingin’ today. Left something on the lawn for ya!”

*

Henry watched the steam curl from the wash water in the sink.

“Need some more water?” Marlon asked.

“I faint?”

“Almost I think. Henry, I’m sorry, I didn’t know you’d-”

“This is my old house. I lived here ‘til I was ten.”

Marlon sat up in his chair, pulled his hat back as if it had been blown off with a gust.

“Oh, that is messed up. Henry. This is my Gramma’s house.”

“Why am I here?”

Marlon looked over his shoulder, down the front hallway to the parlor.

“I told Gramms I was working with you, that you’re retiring. She wanted me to bring you to lunch.”

*

Henry stared down the boulevard, squinted at his childhood home. It was still standing, so that was something. He hopped from the tailgate of the truck to the bags at curbside, flung them into the back end of the garbage truck, counted six more loads between his position and the old house. His mouth was dry and he dawdled, slowed down with dread as he neared the property.

“Pick up the pace,” the driver yelled over the idling engine.

Henry dug his hands into his pockets, felt the book and his spare work-gloves, the pencil stab him between the fingers. He didn’t climb back aboard the truck, walked slowly beside it as he plodded along the gutter, threw trash-can loads as he went. Five, four, three, two.

*

“Thank you for throwing that awful thing away, Mr. Aitken.”

Dorothy Jones sat beside her grandson.

“Gramms, you knew he lived here?”

“We made it our business to find out. He gave us this.”

Campbell Watt’s notebook. The one Henry had filled.

*

“What the Hell you doin’?” the driver yelled.

Henry had blazed up the lawn of the house, seized the black-faced lawn jockey ornament someone had left in the night. It was heavier than expected. He struggled with the weight, dropped it on his way to the garbage truck. The head busted off. Henry cursed and looked up to the second storey window. A little black boy waved at him. A woman appeared behind. She looked stern, or sad, or something.

Henry threw the broken statue in the compactor, ran the manual hydraulic compactor to crush it. He felt for his spare work gloves, but they were gone.

Henry clutched the railing and fled.

*

“Mr. Watt disappeared,” Dorothy nodded.

She opened the front cover of the notebook, the notebook filled with the addresses of the growing community forty-five years previous. The notebook Henry had dropped.

IF FOUND, RETURN TO C. WATT/KNIGHTS OF THE KKK

“You left this for us, and we want to thank you properly. Some of us older folks passed the hat ‘round, and this is what we come up with. For retirement.”

Henry examined the wad of cash in front of him. He slid it to Marlon and walked out down the block.