Written in the Scars(73)

No one says a word, not that we could hear it anyway. With every foot we fall below the surface of the ground, my chest tightens a little more. The air gets a little damper. The darkness more suffocating. The sound of the equipment below louder.

The shaft is narrow and low, just big enough for equipment to get in and out. It feels like it shrinks as we sink farther into the Earth.

I close my eyes and picture Elin, wondering what she’s doing. In my mind, she’s curled up on our bed, her reading glasses covering her eyes, a stack of papers on her lap. She looks up at me and smiles, her hair falling over her shoulders.

The equipment is still running, barking and howling, a hellish sound that makes perfect sense for the setting, once we hit bottom. Reluctantly, I part my eyes and let them adjust to the absence of light.

Climbing out of the cart, I nod to the next four to leave from the first shift, my boots sinking in the mud. It squishes around my weight, sliding up the bottom of my bibs.

“Fuck,” I hiss, looking up to the Yoder, the foreman just getting off. “It’s wetter than fuck down here.”

“Yeah,” he says, his face so black from the soot and mud that I can only see the whites of his eyes. “It’s really fuckin’ damp. I called up a few hours ago because I’ve not seen a hole this damn wet in my whole life.”

I pick up a boot and the mud falls off in globs. “This is gonna be fun.”

“But hey,” Yoder says, smacking me on the back, “we’re back to work.”

“Yeah,” I say, letting out a half-laugh, “we’re back to fuckin’ work.”

Yoder goes off to wait for the buggy to come back down to pick up him and the last three guys. I find the Dinner Shack—a picnic table on a sled—and lay out my report. Ignoring the shrill of the machines and the dim light and the putrid smell of coal, I study our objective.

“It’s gonna be hell,” Jiggs says, clasping my shoulder with his hand. “You ready for this, Bossman?”

I just nod. Because there’s no other way to put it: four-hundred feet below ground is a hell all of its own.





ELIN

Forty-eight.

Forty-nine.

Fifty.

I watch as each minute ticks by, the clock primed to roll over to four a.m. My lids are heavy, my eyes burn, but they refuse to close.

It’s adrenaline, I’m sure. Ty didn’t call once he left the house, although I was sure he would. He’d usually send a text from the Bath House before they went down. But tonight, he didn’t.

I went to Lindsay’s earlier in the evening and she made nachos and we ate them in the nursery while we chose a paint color. I was surprised she is going to do a nursery with the way she’s been talking about Florida. But I needed the distraction so I didn’t ask questions. Jiggs has no opinion on decoration, only that the baby has a framed photo of his baseball hero, Lincoln Landry, on the wall somewhere in the room.

We chose a really pretty dove grey and a pale yellow that will be beautiful whether it’s a boy or a girl and easily accented with blue or pink, as required.

“I love this,” I say, holding the winning color sample against the wall. “It’s going to be perfect.”

“I love it too.” She brushes a strand of hair off her shoulder. “I know I’ve been a little crazy about moving and stuff.”

“Yeah, you have. Why, Linds?”

She shrugs, her lips dipping. “I just want what’s best for this baby. I don’t want to leave you . . .” Tears well in her eyes. “I don’t want to leave Blown or Ty or Cord. But I’m afraid we’ll stay here and not be able to put food on the table and we can’t afford to take risks like that. Not anymore.”

“Will you just think about it? For my brother?”

She smiles through the tears glittering down her cheeks. “I will. I just feel like this is what I have to do. You understand, don’t you?”

I smile back, but don’t answer because even though I get it, I don’t.

A smile touches my lips as I think of how Lindsay’s belly is beginning to round. She’s slathering on cocoa butter and praying for no stretch marks and I just laughed. But, in reality, I’d give anything for them.

I think to how Ty and I might’ve done our nursey and how big my belly would’ve been. I wonder what names we’d choose and if Ty would’ve rubbed my feet every night the way Jiggs does Lindsay’s, even when they’re fighting.

“Maybe someday,” I whisper, rolling onto my side and closing my eyes.





TY

“You don’t know half the shit you think you know,” I laugh, tipping my beer at Jiggs.