Poor Boy

When the trains rolled by and the passengers looked out their windows at the countryside and saw the little cabin home a stone’s throw from the tracks, they didn’t think much of the people who lived there. If they passed by at night, they might see smoke coming from the chimney and a glow from the window, but no one ever thought that that was the only way the family could stay warm on a cold night. If they passed by at dawn, they might see the silhouettes of a man mending a wooden fence and a woman hanging clothes on a line, and they might think it to be a peaceful, unobtrusive way to live, unaware of the endless exhaustion and monotony of it. If they came when the sun started to set, they might see a boy in dirty overalls watching the train go by, just close enough for them to see the whites in his eyes. They might think, “What a hard working boy he is,” but no one ever thought that he may dream of being one of them on the train. They might see him leaning on the handle of a shovel or axe, and they might nudge their spouses to look out the window and see how interesting this boy in the field is, but no one has ever thought enough of him to even guess his name.

Eli was eleven when the tracks were first laid. At the time, he was excited, though his father felt differently.

“I wonder where the tracks lead to,” Eli said at dinner one night.

“The smoke will kill the cattle,” his father replied without looking up.

Eli continued cautiously. “Maybe we can ride one day.”

His father sighed heavily and rested his chin on his hand. “No,” he said.  “We can’t.” With another sigh, he picked up his fork again and sifted through his dinner. Finally, he repeated, “The smoke will kill the cattle.”

From the dinner table, Eli looked out the window and saw the faint lines of the iron running alongside the hills and tried but could see nothing wrong with it.

“Well, I’m gonna ride it someday,” he said.

“Eli, hush,” his mother said softly.

“Why? I am. I’m gonna ride it someday. I bet it goes out to California. That’s what my friend, Henry, says—that it goes out to California. He says that it drops you off right at the ocean. He says he’s going with his ma and pa over the summer. We should go, too—”

“Eli,” his mother snapped. “Hush.”

Eli looked to his father who stared at the table with a look of defeat about him. His forehead was still sweaty from working the land and his shirt had dark patches where the straps of his overalls had rested on his shoulders. He looked as if his head was too heavy to keep upright.

“Well, I’m gonna,” Eli mumbled as he got up from the table and walked to the door. “I’m gonna ride it someday.”

Eli sat at the edge of the property and waited. The night was as dark as it was going to get, but the moon lit up the pasture enough for him to see the silhouettes of the clothesline, the cattle sleeping in the field, and a portion of fence his father intended to mend the next morning.

A throaty whistle sounded and Eli turned to see a faint cloud of smoke just above the hills and a train coming from around the bend. As the unlit cars passed in front of him, he felt their thunder deep in his chest. An undulating wind came across him as each car passed and the odor of combustion followed. He closed his eyes and pretended he was one of the sleeping passengers on his way out to California or wherever it was that the tracks led.

He had no way of knowing what people even did out there, but he knew it must be exciting. He knew from the folklore of his classmates that the West was a land of unimaginable adventure. It was a place where one could sleep till noon and wake up without a worry because there was never any work to be done. A place where bad things seldom happened and the little things figured themselves out. But most of all, it was a place far away from home.

A touch on his shoulder took him out of his reverie. His mother stood above him, shouting for him to come inside, but the train made it impossible for Eli to make out the words. Finally, she motioned toward their home and he walked beside her, looking over his shoulder the whole time.

Eli lay in bed while his mother folded and put away his clothes by candlelight.

“I don’t want you sitting so close to the train tracks again,” she said. “All that whistling and screeching’ll hurt your ears.”

“I can hear just fine,” Eli said, though his ears did ring.

“And I don’t want you talking about riding that train to your father again. Y’hear?”

“What’s Pa got against riding trains?”

“Eli,” his mother said solemnly. She had no intention of explaining further, but saw in Eli that he wouldn’t sleep without an answer. She stopped putting his clothes away and sat on the edge of his bed. “It ain’t about the trains.”

“What then?”

She looked at him with tired eyes and touched his cheek. “Your father works hard for you, Eli,” she said. “Lord knows that when you go to school, he could use your help here. But he don’t want you to be doing what he’s doing when you’re as old as him, so he sends you off to school to learn. He bears the load for the both of you so you’ll never have to do that for your own family someday.”

Eli looked away from her out of embarrassment and guilt.

“Eli,” she said again, and he reluctantly looked at her heavy eyes. “You’re just a boy, so you ain’t going to understand all this. But just know your father wants what’s best for you. Do you hear me?”

Eli tucked his chin into his chest and looked away again.

“Hey,” his mother said, gently patting him on the leg.  “Do you hear me?”

He nodded.

“Say you hear me.”

“I hear you,” he said. The words came out in an empty, broken way.

His mother cupped his cheek in her hand again and smiled. “Now, get some sleep,” she said. “I don’t want you to be tired for school tomorrow.”

But Eli had no intention of going to school in the morning. He lay awake in bed and pitied his father that his life was so unfulfilling that he dedicated it to ensuring his son’s would not be the same. Eli felt indebted to his father, and so after a sleepless night, at the first glimpse of sunlight, he put on his overalls and boots and went out to the pasture.

The sun was just beginning to rise, and the dew hadn’t burned off yet. It tinted the toecaps of his shoes as he trudged through the grass and soaked his hands as he rolled hay bales towards the cattle. The morning was still cold, but Eli already had sweat rolling down his forehead and cheeks.

He rolled one particularly large hay bale toward the grazing area, but struggled to push it up a small hill. He got halfway up before the weight of it drove him back, so he backed up some and tried rolling it faster to get it up, but he slipped on the wet grass and again the hay bale rolled away. Now frustrated, Eli dug the edges of his boots into the ground and squeezed his eyes shut as he tried to push it up. Somehow, and in disbelief to him, Eli felt the hay was lighter this time and managed to get to the top of the hill. When he got there and opened his eyes, however, he saw another set of arms giving the bale a final thrust into the pasture.

“Eli,” his father said. “You should be getting ready for school.” His father looked composed even after pushing the hay while Eli was panting and red in the face.

“I ain’t going to school today, Pa,” Eli said, lifting his chin.

“Why’s that?”

“I’m gonna stay here and help you out with the land.” Eli spoke with certainty, but his father was unaffected by his obstinate stance. He put his hand on Eli’s back to guide him back to the house to get cleaned up and ready for school.

“Come,” he said, but Eli ducked below his arm and stayed put.

“No, Pa. I’m stayin’ here with you.”

“Don’t cause trouble. Just come inside and your mother will make you breakfast before you leave.”

Eli didn’t move. “I ain’t goin’ to school,” he said, and he turned to continue pushing the hay bale across the pasture. He heard the sound of a train whistle blowing from beyond the hills, but he looked forward and kept pushing.

“Eli,” his father said, but Eli kept on. The whistling got louder. “Eli,” his father said, but Eli didn’t respond. The sun was beating down now and the dew had dried up. The louder the whistle sounded, the more Eli lost track of how hard he was panting. “Eli,” his father shouted, competing with the train. He grabbed Eli by the arm and turned him around. Holding him by the shoulders, he shouted over the train, “Go inside.”

“No.”  Eli shook off his father’s grip and went back to pushing the hay bale.

“Why not?”  The train had come out from behind the hills and roared as it rolled by.

“Because I owe it to you,” Eli shouted back to him. He saw the train passing by behind his father. “I owe it to you to stay and help.”

His father grabbed and turned Eli again and knelt in front of him with a look of confusion. He swallowed and shook his head, but said nothing. Finally, with a look of vulnerability that Eli had never seen before on him, he said, “You don’t owe me anything. Go inside.” But Eli couldn’t hear him over the train.

Eli looked to the train again and in a fit of anger he ran over to the tracks and threw handfuls of pebbles at the passing cars. He began crying as he threw them, but that sound and the sound of the rocks hitting the cars was overpowered by the whistle and roar of the train. His father grabbed his dirt-covered hand before he could throw again and pulled him away from the track.

He knelt down and asked, “What in God’s name are you doing, Eli?”

“The smoke will kill the cattle,” Eli cried. “It’s gonna kill the cattle.” He threw another handful of rocks over his father’s shoulder. His arm landed on his father’s back and he collapsed into him and sobbed. His father picked him up and carried him toward the house. As he was carried away, Eli saw the last car pass by their land and disappear again into the hills.

“What’s this about, Eli?” his father asked him as he sat him down at the kitchen table.

Eli stared at the floor and refused to look up. “The smoke’ll kill—”

“What’s this really about? Why did you say you owe it to me to stay?”

Eli shrugged.

“I know you said it for a reason. Tell me.”

“Ma told me you could use the help.”

“Did she tell you to skip school and stay here?”

“Well, no.  But—”

“Then why did you?”

Eli looked out the window where the sun glared off the iron near the hills. “Ma told me you make me go to school so I won’t have to work the land all day the way you do. But that ain’t fair. You shouldn’t have to do it alone.”

His father sighed and sat back in his chair. “It might not be fair,” he said. “But that’s the way it is.” He tapped Eli’s knee to get him to look him in the eye. “But here’s the thing,” he continued. “I’m okay with it. When I was a kid like you, my Pa didn’t give me or my brothers the chance to go to school because he was never given that chance himself. Even then, I knew that if I had a boy, I wouldn’t want him working that way.  Someone was going to have to break the cycle or it would never end.”

Eli’s eyes moved about the room. His chest felt tight and his stomach hollow.

“Hey,” his father said, patting him again on the knee. “Look at me.” Eli looked toward him then quickly away again. His father leaned in close to him. “Look,” he said, and Eli looked. “You don’t owe me anything. I chose this.”

Eli still looked unsettled and his father saw this. He saw on Eli’s face the guilt he felt and the shame that followed from not being able to say it outright.

“You’re just a boy,” his father continued. “I don’t expect you to understand all that I’m saying—it’s a lot, I know. But try to understand this, sometimes people have to sacrifice something of their own for the good of another. But if that person is grateful for the sacrifice and makes something of it, then it’s all worth it.” Eli’s sobbing let up and he seemed to take in what his father had said to him. His father stood up and smiled reassuringly. “Listen,” he said. “Since you’re already late for school, why don’t you stay here with me for today. But tomorrow, you’re going.  Okay?”

Eli nodded and followed his father back into the pasture. While Eli started lugging slabs of wood for the fence, his father walked to the clothesline where Eli’s mother was to assure her it would just be one day home. She looked over and tried to smile. They always tried.

At night, as Eli lay in bed, his body sore and hands hard from lifting, he wondered what his father was like at his age. He wondered what he would have been like had tracks been laid by his own home as a child. He wondered if he, too, would have wanted to ride.

Eli heard the distant wailing of an incoming train and thought about what his father wanted of him. The thought made him sad, but Eli felt his father wanted him to leave his home one day and never think of it again. He couldn’t bare the thought of abandoning his mother and father and their pasture, but he knew it was the only way to make good on his father’s sacrifice. The whistle grew louder as the train came around the bend and Eli’s throat got tight and his breathing heavy. He understood full well what his father expected of him, but it didn’t make the thought any easier. The whistle blew louder, and then the sound lowered. Then it was gone around the bend.