The checks were in the trailer by nine.
Delvin was laying rebar when the first truck pulled up. Two guys from the north section crossed the lot and went into the trailer and came out with white envelopes in their back pockets and the way they walked back was different. One of them stopped to talk to a guy on the water line and the conversation went on long enough that the guy on the water line set his shovel against the pipe and stood there with his hands on his hips.
Delvin kept laying rebar. He set the bar in the channel and bent the tie wire around it and twisted the ends with his pliers and moved to the next one. The sun was already high and the metal was warm under his gloves.
By ten-thirty the trailer had a line. Four men standing outside the door with their hats in their hands, talking.
DeLuca came out of the trailer at one point and stood on the steps with his coffee and looked at the line and didn’t say anything. He went back inside. The air conditioner hummed through the open door.
Delvin finished his section and walked to the trailer. The line was gone by then. He went in and DeLuca was at the desk with the fan on and the radio going. He didn’t look up. He pulled an envelope from the stack and slid it across the desk.
“Sign,” he said.
Delvin signed. He put the envelope in his back pocket and went out.
The lot was quieter now. Most of the guys had their envelopes and the work had slowed to the pace it always slowed to on Fridays after the checks came. Two men were sitting on the tailgate of a flatbed with their legs hanging.
Delvin went back to his section. He picked up the pliers and started on the next row.
His eyes drifted to the far end of the site where Jace and his crew were working. The section was almost done. The forms were up and the rebar was in and they were starting on the pour. Jace was at the mixer with his shirt off, his back dark with sweat, and he was talking to one of the younger guys, who had just graduated last May, while the mixer turned. The younger guy was nodding.
Delvin looked at the section for a moment longer. Then he went back to his ties.
Three more Fridays and the work would be done and the trailers would come down and the equipment would get loaded and the lot would go back to dirt. He twisted another tie and moved down the row.
By noon the sun was straight overhead and the rebar was hot enough that he could feel it through his gloves. He set the pliers down and walked to the cooler near the water station. He squatted next to it and pulled the lid off and reached in and the ice water came up to his wrist. He pulled out a bottle and closed the lid and set the bottle against the back of his neck.
The water ran down his spine. He let it.
He looked up. The sky was white at the edges and blue at the center and there wasn’t a cloud in it. The kind of sky that went on past where you could see. He closed his eyes.
The sun was on his face. The bottle was cold against his neck. The lot was quiet behind him, the sound of the mixer and the sound of someone’s radio and the sound of a truck idling somewhere, all of it far away and none of it asking anything of him.
He kept his eyes closed.
…
The Dodge Dakota bounced over the last rut in the dirt lot and Delvin put it in park. The engine idled for a second before he killed it.
Kelvin and Lena were still going in the back of the truck. He could hear them over the tick of the engine. Valerie leaned across the console and kissed him on the mouth. Her hand was on his thigh.
“They can’t have all the fun,” she said.
She was out of the truck before he’d pulled the keys from the ignition. The door slammed and he watched her walk toward the lake, her sandals kicking up dust, her hair pulled up off her neck.
Kelvin and Lena came up for air. Kelvin jumped over the side of the truck and Lena came with him as he guided her down, following Valerie’s path down to the water.
Delvin sat for a moment. The cab was warm and the windows were down and the air coming in carried the smell of the lake. He pulled the keys out and dropped them in the cupholder and opened the door.
The bank was crowded. High school kids and college kids spread out on towels and blankets and sitting on coolers and standing in clusters near the water’s edge. The last weekend of the summer and everyone had the same idea at the same time.
A few Brown people were scattered through the crowd. He wasn’t sure if they were Mexican or Native. A group of them had a grill going near the trees. Another group was sitting on the tailgate of an old truck. He looked at them and then his eyes moved past.
The White people were fishing off the far bank. Two of them in waders standing in the shallows with their rods. A couple in a kayak near the middle of the lake, paddling slow. And then the speedboat came around the bend.
It was loud. The engine cut across the water and the sound hit the bank and the people on the boat were standing up, holding onto the rail, whooping. One of them had a beer in his hand. They were going fast enough to throw a wake that rolled toward the shore and broke against the bank where a kid was wading. The kid stumbled and laughed and the people on the boat whooped again.
Delvin grunted.
“Delvin.”
Valerie was at the water’s edge. She had her shirt off and was down to her bikini and she was smiling at him. Lena was next to her, already pulling her own shirt over her head. Kelvin was stepping out of his shorts, revealing his boxers underneath.
Valerie turned and ran into the water. Lena followed. Kelvin went in after them, splashing, and the sound of them hitting the water carried over the bank.
Delvin pulled his shirt off. The sun was on his chest and his shoulders and he looked up at the sky. It was blue at the center and white at the edges, going on past where he could see.
…
The cooler lid came down hard beside him and Delvin opened his eyes.
Virgil was sitting on the ground with his back against the cooler, his legs stretched out in front of him. He had a bottle of water in one hand and his hat in the other. He set the hat on his knee.
“You going to the game tonight?” Virgil said.
Delvin shook his head.
“I’m going to try and make it. Hopefully Dustin get in that end zone,” Virgil took a drink. He set the bottle between his legs and looked out at the lot. “What you got lined up after this? Once they shut it down.”
Delvin shrugged. “ADOT should hold us over until the winter. We’ve been picking up jobs here and there. Saving it all.”
Virgil nodded. He turned the bottle in his hands. “Let me know if any of them require an extra body.”
“I will.”
Virgil pushed himself up. He stood for a moment with his hand on the cooler, looking down at Delvin. “Hopefully Micah has a good game tonight.”
He walked back toward the north section. Delvin watched him go. The sun was still high and the bottle was still cold against his neck and the lot was still quiet behind him. He closed his eyes again.
…
The tape came off in strips. Micah worked it with his thumb, peeling it back from the skin, and the adhesive left a pale residue on his wrist that he didn’t bother wiping off. His ankles were next. He bent forward and started on the left one, pulling the wrap free from around the bone.
Coach Sau was standing in the middle of the locker room with his hands on his hips. The speech had been going for a while. Micah caught pieces of it.
“—competed tonight. That’s the first thing. You competed. You fought. You showed resilience when things got tough in the second half—”
The tape on the left ankle came loose and he dropped it on the floor between his feet. He started on the right.
“—composure in crucial moments. That’s the difference between a game like tonight and a game we win. When the play is there to be made, we have to make it. That’s on all of us. That’s on me. That’s on you. We’ll look at the film on Monday and we’ll see where those moments were and we’ll get better at them—”
The right ankle tape was tighter. The adhesive pulled at the hair on his calf and he didn’t flinch.
Fourth down. Third quarter. He’d come off the edge clean and the quarterback had seen him late and thrown it high and wide and the receiver had jumped and come down with nothing. Incomplete. Turnover on downs.
Third down in the second quarter. Window Rock had been driving. The back had taken the handoff and cut left and Micah had come off his block and met him in the hole and wrapped him up and brought him down a yard short. They’d kicked the field goal and the kicker had pushed it wide right. The sideline had erupted.
Dustin’s bootleg in the fourth. Micah had pulled from his end spot and come around the edge and put his shoulder into the linebacker and driven him three yards off the ball. Dustin had kept it and cut behind him and picked up eleven before the safety got him down. First down. The only first down they’d gotten in the fourth quarter.
He dropped the last strip of tape on the floor.
Third and seven. Their second-to-last possession. The ball had come to him on a quick out as Micah had bent down as far as he could but all he saw was the sight of the ball bouncing on the turf and back up towards his facemask.
Third and five. Window Rock’s last possession. The back had taken the handoff and gone off tackle and Micah had beaten the guard and gotten to the edge and the tackle had reached out and grabbed his jersey and held on. He’d felt the pull. He’d felt the jersey stretch across his chest. He’d gotten a hand on the back’s hip but the tackle had ridden him past the hole and the back had cut inside and picked up six. First down. Clock kept running. Game over.
He could have said something to the ref. Argued for a call. He hadn’t said anything. He’d been too tired to open his mouth.
“—we’re going to build on this. We’re going to take what we did well tonight and we’re going to take what we didn’t do well and we’re going to come back on Monday ready to work. That’s it. That’s all I’ve got.”
Kele stood up from his locker. He walked to the middle of the room and put his fist out.
“Bring it in.”
Micah got up. His legs were heavy. He walked into the huddle and put his hand on someone’s shoulder. The hands stacked. Kele said something about next week. Micah didn’t catch it. The huddle broke and the sound filled the room and then faded and the guys started moving toward the showers and the doors.
Micah sat back down. The tape was on the floor between his feet. He looked at it for a moment. Then he picked it up and put it in the trash can by the door and walked to the showers.
