The Train Jumper

Chapter 1

CHAPTER ONE

I always understood my dad's irritation with people like George Jackson. Jake's dad had graduated from high school and had completed two years of college education at Purdue, thanks to some money left to him by his own father. He owned the biggest car dealership in Wabash (also inherited), and a "mighty fine house with custom-made furniture covers," according to evaluations often overheard at Chet and Bea's Barbershop (secretly referred to as the "Chop-n-Bleed"). Dad, however, worked long, tedious shifts at the Wabash Paper Company over on Factory Street. He shuffled like a man who had been beaten. He had a constant cough from breathing in paper fiber, and he often gagged from his futile attempts to push the sputum back down his ragged throat.

My mom died when I was two - or so I was told at the time. At the end of each day, Dad found solace from his loneliness and troubles in foul whiskey and the Camel cigarettes he dragged on as though sucking in his last breath of air on earth. I swear there was less action in an accordion. We often sat out on the weather-beaten porch in silence (save for his occasional gagging and subsequent spitting) before he finally grunted a word of good night before shuffling into the house. One time he even stumbled right through the screen door. We never fixed it. It remained torn until Dad died - his own story imprinted on a house of emptiness.

Nothing much ever excited Dad, who wore defeat like an ox yoke, but that summer the appearance of the Sunliner in our neighborhood was probably the biggest event we had experienced in the past four years. Even my dad got off the porch to run down to see the Ford convertible, which would later become known as simply "Marilyn." My dad's presence made the event even more unforgettable to me. His arrival was an awkward moment, but the unexpected smile on his face is etched deep in my memory.

The neighbors were also surprised to see my dad, who had avoided most people since the great chicken incident of 1948. Unfortunately, the embarrassing fiasco was still brought up in conversation at public events such as church pancake dinners and basketball games. As time passed, the recounting of the events became even more detailed and colorful, resulting in abject humiliation that clung to my memories and never let go.

One night my dad had decided it was better to polish off the whiskey than to save the fumes, so while fully inebriated, he set our old wood shed ablaze. No one knows how he did it, or even if he intended to do it, but the flames burst into the air like arthritic orange fingers clawing at the nighttime sky. The shed was small and would have burned out quickly - save for the maple tree that sheltered it. Soon the tree was also aflame. It was truly shocking … and it was downright mesmerizing as well. It reminded me of the Olympic torch destined for glory, albeit heading towards Sam Goodwin's house, where no glory awaited.

The noise was so loud that a deaf person would have thought the Horsemen of the Apocalypse had arrived in Wabash, Indiana, to wreak their havoc. The sound of the collapsing shed and blistering fire was simply a backdrop to the ear-splitting ruckus of panicked chickens. Yes, chickens. We didn't have a working farm, but my dad always had chickens. He loved the dang things, and he always proclaimed that an egg would cure anything. That summer, however, he discovered that eggs are no cure for a fire. The chickens, smelling smoke and no doubt fraught with visions of becoming someone's dinner, scattered across the yard like buckshot, lifting several feet off the ground in a flurry of feathers.

Neighbors came running from every direction, as Hoosiers are wont to do. In their efforts to be helpful, they frantically dashed about in an attempt to corral the hysterical chickens, who continued to scream and wrest themselves from the clutches of all would-be rescuers. The neighbors were squawking as loudly as the chickens. At one point, Mr. Jackson, one of the enthusiastic fire-fighting volunteers, ran head first into the side of our house in a race with a panicked chicken who was clever enough to stop just short of contact. It was a sight to behold.

By then, my dad was in a heap on the porch steps, his head hanging down while he talked to his empty whiskey bottle. Finally, he yelled to no one in particular, "Somebody save Marie." If there could be a silent moment in the middle of chaos, that moment was it. Everyone who heard his comment was dumbfounded … including me. Marie was my mother's name.

We all stared at my father while his plea hung in the night sky like a discarded appendix. No one wanted to touch it, but it was impossible to ignore.

Sam Goodwin was the first to gather his wits. He dropped his frantic chicken captive, and then he walked over to my father and placed a tender hand on his shoulder. "Take it easy, Frank. Calm down. Marie passed away - remember?"

Out of the blue, my dad popped up like a maniacal clown in a carnival game. "I know my wife is dead, Goodwin. I’m not daft!" he growled, "I'm talking about Marie, my rooster - the fat cowardly one over there that is molting so fast he looks like a bowling ball."

Everyone was taken aback – even me. No one had ever heard my usually laconic father put so many words together at one time.

"The rooster? Don’t you mean the hen?”

“No, I mean the damn half-naked rooster, Goodwin. ‘You deaf? That’s Marie!”

“Marie? I think you're a little confused, buddy. Roosters are male. You know that, don't you?"

"Of course I know roosters are male. But not that stinkin’ bird. No, sir - that rooster was castrated, or whatever you do to foul to neuter them. A man’s name don’t suit that bird. I found out he’s sterile after I got him. He’s as worthless as a turd hat. All he does is make noise and eat nonstop. He’s costing me a fortune. He’s so blubbery I could use him as a footstool.”

“I agree he’s unusually large. And balder than a Thanksgiving turkey.”

“He ain’t normal! That rooster can hardly move. I shoulda named him ‘Doorstop.’”

"So why in the heck do you keep a capon with the mange, Frank?"

"Sam Goodwin, I may be more confusin’ to you than a Sunday preacher, but even I know this here situation is not the best occasion to be discussin' my choice of foul. But for your information, I keep that useless bird so he can wake up the neighborhood every damn morning just like he always has. Y'all need something to keep on bitchin’ about."

Sam shook his head, shrugged, and then headed back to help wrangle Marie, who continued to leave piles of feathers all over the yard. After the chickens were lured into the basement and the fire was put out, I went upstairs and buried myself as deep into my bed as the mattress would allow.

I was overcome with humiliation and guilt. I knew I should have kept a better watch on my dad, and I also knew I should have quietly disposed of the can of gasoline he always kept in the shed. Shame kept eating at my conscience during a long and restless night … until Marie woke me up with a crowing volume that verged on sonic.

Marie had escaped from the basement and was standing in my dad's room. That rooster had about two feathers left and was out for revenge. Marie was there to make the old man with the monstrous hangover pay the devil his due. Fortunately I was able to hide my dad’s shotgun before he was able to roll out of bed onto the floor. Which he promptly did.

After the chicken fiasco, as if it wasn’t embarrassing enough that my inebriated father had set fire to the shed, the piles of feathers left in our yard then blew throughout the neighborhood with every breeze. I winced when I overheard Sam Goodwin complaining down at the Chop-n-Bleed one afternoon. “My house reeks of smoke, and I can’t even open my windows or I wake up with feathers in my mouth. Damn that Frank Caswell and his bald ass capon!” Much to my humiliation, the jokes circulated faster than the feathers. No doubt fat Marie secretly enjoyed his/her revenge.