The Hocatown Factory

By Xlibris US

Charlene lived a quiet country life in a farmhouse with her three adorable cocker spaniels until her husband, the Old Man, forced her into a job at the local factory.

The factory was a sweatshop, using illegal workers and child labor. Could Charlene endure the long hours, manual labor, and poor working conditions? She felt so worthless as she accepted her meager paycheck as her value as a person. Could she survive on a minimum-wage job?

The Old Man made it clear that he did not want Charlene in his life. Did he want to divorce her? Or to kill her?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Jul 9, 2014
• ISBN: 9781499044508

Book preview

1

THE HOCATOWN FACTORY

Oh my God! Charlene watched in amazement as four Mexicans with squeegees plied the water between rows of welders at work. The Mexicans who were welding seemed oblivious to the danger.

Do you see that? a skinny old man asked as the group of temps stood in front of the supervisors’ desk awaiting their job assignments.

Of course, they were all staring. Didn’t the Mexicans understand that water and electricity don’t mix well, or did they simply not have a better option? Charlene wondered what she would do if they ordered her into the flooded area.

I’m not working in this dump, the skinny old man announced as he turned around and headed for the door. Five other temps followed him. That was half their little group of new hires. Everybody within two hundred miles of Hocatown (Ho-CHEE-town), Kentucky, had heard of this place, but she had never believed the stories.

A supervisor in an orange prison shirt lifted his eyes from his checklist and pointed at Charlene and an older woman with long gray hair. You two. Grab mops and buckets and clean up the water by the restrooms.

Mopping wasn’t exactly what Charlene had expected in the factory, but she didn’t have high expectations of this job. Her husband would soon come to his senses and she would be back at home.

There was a stench as they approached the restrooms, and it got worse. The double doors to the room with the water source stood open. It had gray metal panels on the wall and nothing else. They both worked quickly and silently to mop up the water. Charlene tried not to breathe the foul air.

What is that smell? she managed to gasp.

The sewer, the older woman said. It rained all weekend, and nobody turned on the sump pumps.

It certainly had rained over the long Fourth of July weekend. One of those tropical systems had blown up from the Gulf, not quite a hurricane, but a real gully washer.

When they finished and closed the doors, she read the warning sign on the outside of the door: high voltage.

The woman supervisor took Charlene to her job, operating a press. Put each piece in, one at a time. Push the green buttons. Any moron can do this.

If she still held any illusions about the place, they evaporated when she overheard a huge mountain of a man, about 250 pounds and over six feet, in a shirt with the company logo threatening a relatively smaller man, If any of these parts come back, I’m coming down here to shove them up your ass.

She endured eight hours of the factory and then drove home.

The tall hydrangea loaded with enormous pale-green blossoms came into view, then the rest of the farmhouse with the glorious pink and yellow English roses in full bloom. Her flowers barely registered as she contemplated how to talk to her husband. The first five minutes on the new job, she had known it was a dead end. There was no need for her to work.

Charlene drove her Cadillac up the driveway and turned off the engine. She leaned back in the smooth tan leather seat and closed her eyes for a moment. The tension melted away. It felt so good to be back at home after the first day at the factory. She flipped down the sun visor and gently pulled the rubber band from her long dark hair. Her husband loathed ponytails. She added a touch of red lipstick, which contrasted perfectly with her grass-green eyes, and she was ready to face the Old Man.

Her front door was open, and she stepped inside the storm door. The staccato beat of rapid gunfire and screech of tires blasted from the TV. All three dogs were yapping. Lady and Donna, her red and blonde cocker spaniels, jumped on her legs to greet her.

She stopped in the doorway and said, cautiously, Hello. How was your day?

The Old Man held up a finger. Just a minute. This is the good part. He remained where he was, stretched out in his recliner, with the top of his bald head toward her. Keiser, the beautiful black dog, was growling at her on the Old Man’s lap, his front feet on the Old Man’s shoulders.

It irritated her that the Old Man did not have time to greet her, but she brushed the thought away. He was basically a good man, and he provided well for her. She focused on the Queen Anne sofa with its high curved back and the deep tucks in the pink-and-purple floral print on a beige background. In front of the sofa was the traditional oval coffee table with its custom-made glass top, solid cherry with graceful curved legs that perfectly matched the sofa legs. The coffee table had been the Old Man’s first present to her. The living room was so peaceful with the little accents of white doves and angels.

She carefully eased past the back of the recliner. Keiser went wild. He barked and snarled and threatened her every step.

The Old Man gently patted the dog and soothingly talked to him. You don’t need to do that. Mama loves you. You should be nice to Mama. The words were meant to deceive her. The dog was precisely following the Old Man’s subtle commands.

She did love the dog. Keiser could be so sweet and loving. He was definitely show dog quality with his wonderful long ears and swirling black curls. It wasn’t his fault that he was so badly behaved. The Old Man encouraged and rewarded his misbehavior. He was trained.

She breathed a sigh of relief as she went past Keiser. She knelt down to greet Donna and Lady. She put her arms around the squirming dogs and patted them. They missed her after the long day of separation. She missed them too. They were her friends. Donna was a sweet blonde cocker spaniel, a Valentine’s Day present from the Old Man, an eight-hundred-dollar present. She had an impressive pedigree and came from a good kennel in Kansas, but her ears were a bit short and her nose was rather round. Lady was a fat red miniature cocker spaniel with a cute band of white around her nose. Lady was a native Kentucky dog with common CKC registration; she was always easy going and even-tempered.

Keiser jumped down from the recliner and came around to be petted. She petted him too. He nudged the little girl dogs out of the way and got her full attention. Keiser basked in her attention for a few seconds and turned his head to stare at the leash on the wall.

Yes, she had missed walking the dogs. She was tired, but she told the Old Man, I’m taking the dog for a walk.

Okay, he answered. I cooked supper. When the movie is over, we will eat. That was her reward for behaving as commanded. He was not the affectionate type.

Keiser was leaping four feet in the air in wild abandoned joy before she could snap the leash on him. They made it out the front door and started down the driveway, then on a whim, she made a right turn toward her garden. She admired the rambling vines of the Mexican gherkins, tiny, bite-sized cucumbers with full flavor. She walked closer to the tall, staked tomatoes, Italian heirloom beefsteak Constoluto Genovese. The juicy red tomatoes wouldn’t be called pretty by anyone with their deep wrinkles, but the flavor was unbeatable. A light dusting of white flour and black pepper kept most of the bugs away. She gave Keiser’s leash a short jerk as he lifted a leg. The heirloom Yellow Pear tomatoes held lots of bright yellow little tomatoes ready to be picked.

Satisfied with her garden, she took Keiser down the old country road as usual. Keiser pranced ahead of her at the end of his leash. He did not pull at the leash or sniff at the sides of the road. He walked straight in the road with his head held high. He watched the trees and the birds and occasionally wagged his short stubby tail. He was a proud dog. This was the best part of his day, and it was the best part of Charlene’s day too.

She took Keiser back into the house. Donna and Lady jumped up on her and begged to be walked. Not now, babies.

She glanced at the clock. She had just enough time to take a fast shower before the movie was finished.

A shower never felt so good. She washed away all the sweat and grime from the factory. She dressed in a pink tank top and white shorts.

The Old Man had set the table with plain white china. Dinner was pork roast with mashed potatoes and gravy and a big bowl of white beans and ham. The aroma of fresh baked cornbread filled the house.

It looks delicious. She sat at the cherry dining table with the blue damask tablecloth. The table with six chairs was too big for the two of them, and they never used the china on display in the hutch.

Don’t lie to me, Charlene. He lowered himself into the captain’s chair. You don’t like to eat, and you don’t like to cook either. Probably a good thing. Everybody knows skinny women can’t cook.

She had never been skinny. She preferred to think of herself as curvaceous because men certainly noticed her. Another ten pounds would put her in the fat zone, and she couldn’t allow that to happen.

She had no answer for him. She knew he judged women by their appearances. His first wife had cooked all his favorite foods, and she had eaten them too. She had grown to over three hundred pounds and had endured two stomach stapling operations at his insistence.

The Old Man carved a couple of slices of roast pork for himself. He certainly didn’t worry about weight with his toothpick arms and legs. A lack of gall bladder and half of his intestines combined with his see-food diet gave him a permanent case of indigestion and a bloated belly. He ignored all ill effects with a roll of antacids in his pants pocket and a pack of cigarettes in his shirt pocket.

I didn’t bake any chicken thighs for the dogs today, he informed her. The dogs can eat pork tonight. There is going to be plenty of leftovers. The Old Man insisted that she bake chicken thighs for the dogs; it was his rule.

Sounds reasonable to me, Charlene agreed.

When the Old Man had been on the road, Charlene had given each dog one baked chicken thigh, deboned, for their dinners. Most of the time, they helped themselves to a big bowl of dry dog food sitting in a corner of the kitchen. They liked a few of her carrot and celery sticks with peanut butter for treats.

The Old Man set down the platter of roast pork and he reached for the bowl of mashed potatoes. The Old Man had not eaten potatoes when he was watching his blood sugar, but he was retired now. He scooped out a big heap of them for himself and passed the bowl to her.

She took the bowl and put one tiny spoonful of mashed potatoes on her plate.

The Old Man poured on the gravy and passed it to her.

She drizzled a bit of gravy over her potatoes. Yes, he could cook. He made fantastic gravy. The rich aroma made her mouth water; she knew it would taste as good as it smelled. She also knew it was almost pure fat, the drippings from the pork roast.

A bite of real food isn’t going to hurt you, the Old Man said, smiling. I would love you just as much if you were fat.

The sly warning made her exercise restraint. He had married her for her appearance. The cocker spaniels had pedigrees. The car was a Cadillac El Dorado. He appreciated the finer things of life.

She smiled back at him. Yes, you make perfect gravy. No lumps, the same texture every time. Everybody loves it.

He dipped out some white beans on his plate and handed her the bowl. There was more ham than beans, big chunks of ham. You can pick out the meat. You always do. I cooked it the way I like it.

He always cooked things the way he liked them.

Thank you, she said. She put a lot of beans of her plate, leaving as much of the ham in the bowl as possible. She did like beans, all kinds of beans.

He slathered a slice of cornbread with real butter—no margarine in this house. You could eat some bread, you know, he scolded.

She hesitated.

I used your special white flour, unbleached. You aren’t diabetic. Why do you care?

Maybe an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure?

They drank their coffee black. No self-respecting truck driver would ever dump sugar or those fancy-flavored creams in his coffee. Although he had recently retired, he would always be a truck driver in his heart.

How was your first day at work? he asked her.

All right, she answered. She had to find the right time to tell him.

Keiser sat beside the Old Man’s chair and gave one sharp bark. He was waiting for a speak