Cemetery Strike

  Cemetery Strike

  Christopher Orza

  Chapter One

  I’m the one who invented body huffing. I’m the reason why people go around bagging up old ladies and dragging them to dark places. That shift in the economy. The kilos that no one can move anymore. That was me. And it was me who got the entire world thinking about death and thinking about life.

  And I can make it all go away. The killing, anyway. The living zombies chasing death with their stuffed lungs. I can make it stop, if you listen.

  Body huffing started a little after I got the job at Woods Edge Cemetery. Yeah, Woods Edge. Bells should already be flicking your balls. I’d gotten hired as a groundskeeper. My job should’ve been simple. Drive around in a golf cart emptying trash, fixing lights, picking up fallen branches. I never got to do any of that, though, because on my first day, right after me and the other new guy finished filling out paperwork, the union suits came in to organize the strike. Yeah. The strike of Woods Edge Cemetery. Makes sense, right? It wasn’t just a coincidence that huffing and the cemetery strikes started around the same time, in the same city. Huffing started because of the cemetery strikes. Think about it. All those bodies piled up like fish at the market. Only without the ice.

  Sonny, a no bullshit old time guy, ran the place. He was having a hand-to-balls with me and the other new guy, Armando, about how working in the cemetery was a public service. “There are two things you need to know about how this cemetery is run,” Sonny said. “First, we keep it immaculate. You can’t find so much as a cigarette butt in the dirt. The grass never reaches more than five inches tall. A crack in the path or anywhere else is repaired the same day it’s found. If you don’t believe me, look around. The place is spotless.” Sonny scanned the grounds to show us what to do. He said, “Second, and even more important, is that people burying their loved ones deserve respect, even when they don’t give it. You two look old enough to know what I mean. That’s why we––the workers––stay out of the families’ way. We don’t park the cart anywhere near their vehicles. We don’t wave hi to them. We don’t even talk to them, unless they address us first.”

  Sonny’s phone interrupted. He looked at it to check the caller, turned around, answered it. Me and Armando were stuck there smiling at each other and holding ourselves. I didn’t have anything to say to him. I actually wanted to not meet people like him, people who would help me fail a drug test when my PO got silly enough to spring one on me.

  After a long silence, Sonny said, “Is that possible? Are you sure?” Then, after another long stretch of him being told news he didn’t want to hear, he said, “Alright. We’ll be waiting.”

  With the phone back in its holster, Sonny turned around and said to me and Armando, “We need to round up the boys.”

  I asked, “Can we use the golf cart?” I really wanted to drive the thing. Growing up in the city, I never got around to getting a license. I thought the cart would be something I could at least mess around with.

  But Sonny said, “No, we have time.”

  So we walked around the cemetery collecting the other workers, Sonny introducing us, Armando always flexing his jaw like a bicep and saying “No entiendo,” me doing basically the same.

  Outside the trailer Sonny addressed the group to let everyone know the union was coming and that it would affect us all. He never said it was about the strike, but the men started whispering right away.

  “They couldn’t pick a better time than fall to start a strike? We’re gonna freeze our dingdongs off.”

  “It’s them union dues they’re coming for.”

  “Why are you worried? You think the city’ll let us strike, even if the union finally does go through with it?”

  The workers went on. I tried not to listen. Wish I had, though. I wish a lot of things, now.

  Eventually, five union Moes––real fucking Moes––walked up dressed in the same navy blue suits. The shortest one, Head Slippery Dick, did all the talking while the other men lined up on both sides of him and grabbed their crotches. He wore his tie too long, like it compensated for his height, like some kind of sign pointing to the fun stuff. When he spoke, he even did that politician point with his fist, so he could point at you without it seeming like he’s pointing. He even used a headstone as a podium, standing behind it, leaning toward us while he sold us on something we had no choice but to buy. That’s how much of a Moe he was.

  Mr. Slippery Dick said, “It is a sad day for us, for our families, and for the entire city.” He paused there, letting his words ring out, locking eyes with as many guys as he could. “We have met with the board this morning,” he said. “After long negotiations, cordial disagreements, and outright arguments, they stand firmly with their decision to not give us the raise that we so rightfully deserve.” Here, he pounded his fist on the headstone. He looked all around, nodding at us. “That is why I’m here today to tell you that we workers will not be rendering our services until the demands have been met.” He paused here, too. I think for applause, but everyone just stood there dumbfounded. “That means we will not maintain the yards, we will not unlock the gate to the public, and we will not continue to carry out any burials, scheduled or not.”

  The Moe dragged it out forever after that, but basically it meant all we had to do was exist as bodies on a picket line.

  Before finally being done, Mr. Dick said, “The most work you’ll be doing is brewing a pot of coffee in the trailer. Maybe mixing in a shot of Sambuca since you won’t be operating heavy machinery.” The Moe winked at us when he suggested the Sambuca just to show us that yeah, he was on our side.

  The Moe would’ve went on forever, but Sonny stepped forward, excused himself for interrupting, and asked, “What will they do with the departed? The morgues won’t keep them. The funeral homes don’t have the facilities to hold more than their share. In a city this size, one day of striking will cause a backlog.”

  Slippery stood there smiling. He pointed at us with his fist like an impotent gun, looked at each and every one of us, and he said, “It’s irrelevant.”

  A burst of disagreement came from the workers, causing Mr. Fun Dick to raise his arms to shush us all. But the men were riled. I didn’t know enough then to know why.

  Mr. Slippery Dick tried to gain control. He leaned on his headstone podium, tie swinging back and forth. “Gentlemen, please. Gentlemen. Listen up.” The brazen disapproval turned to low whispers. Slippery said, “The city thinks they can push us around. They don’t see how hard we work. Even worse, they think the sanitation department is a more vital part of the city than we are. That’s why they pay those guys more than us. And all while we keep God up in the air, the Devil down under the ground, and the rats in the sewers. Now, I don’t know about you, but I think that our jobs should be celebrated instead of buried along with everything else the city tries to hide. But that means we need to work together: to get that respect, and to get the higher paycheck.”

  When Mr. Fun Stuff was done, Sonny brought me and Armando up to him to introduce us.

  “These are our new hires,” Sonny said.

  “I told you to hire as many as you could,” Slippery told him.

  “I did,” Sonny said. “And here we are. Two fine men, ready to work.”

  “This is it? For all the sites?”

  “I put the advertisements out last night when you contacted me. Only two applied.”

  Until then my life had been so messed up that none of this struck me as being wrong enough to walk away. Once you live in apartments where roommates wake up in bloody bathtubs with syringes in their body like acupuncture, getting hired specifically for a cemetery strike isn’t very dishonorable. Not much is, really.

  By midday we were all lined up o
utside the gates holding picket signs that said some real classy shit.

  Let the dead bury the dead

  I shovel dirt all day and I’m still dirt poor

  Raise our wages, not the dead

  Be redeemed from the power of death!

  The Moe that crafted them did it in red paint with the boards standing upright so it dripped tears as it dried. With the way the signs looked, the strike had blood on its hands from the very beginning.

  ––––––

  After an hour of picketing up and down the outside walkway, the dude-angel in front of me stopped to take off his shoe and rub his foot. I bumped into him from behind, groping his ass with my crotch.

  “Watch it,” he said.

  He was a grown man massaging his foot with a perfectly clean sock in his hand. This Hole of a Bitch had been in the trailer doing paperwork when I first came in to apply for the job. He wasn’t a manual labor kind of guy. More like an accountant, or a receptionist.

  When I didn’t say anything, The Hole of a Bitch continued, his voice whining. “Why don’t you watch where you’re going? Now my dang back and feet hurt to all hell.”

  “You want me to call a doctor?” I asked. “I know a good gynecologist.”

  “Fuck you.”

  “You got a plastic bag and I will. You’re pretty enough. And I wouldn’t want to give you any sores.”

  “You’re disgusting.”

  Once you’re an addict, you’re either addicted to getting high or addicted to staying sober. One habit gives you absurd sex, swinging moods, and a reason to dance for no reason. The other gives you a steady paycheck, a clean face, and an itch in your brain that fingers can’t dig into. You can choose the one that’s better for you, or you can choose the one that’s better. At that point, I’d been addicted to sobriety for four months. A miracle. Four miracles, times thirty. Sex helped. Looking forward to it. Fantasizing about it. Talking about it. It. People didn’t help. That’s why I stepped off the picket line and away from the Bitch so I could order Chinese food.

  I leaned against the locked gate, lit a cigarette, inhaled. I was on my second one when a hearse pulled up with a train of cars behind it. I guess they didn’t get the news beforehand. The driver waited in the car watching me. I stared back until he struggled to pull himself out of the driver’s seat.

  “Hello sir. We have a funeral scheduled for today. Can you open the gate?”

  The way he said it, he knew what the protest was all about.

  I said, “The gate’s locked, Moe.”

  “Can you unlock it?”

  “I don’t know if you haven’t noticed, or if you just want me to say it out loud, but there’s a strike going on behind you.”

  The Moe looked at me like he was trying hard not to turn around, like he could make the picket line not be there by not looking. He said, “Sir, I have the grieving family of a hit and run victim in the car behind me. A very important, very influential family. The deceased is a boy who only wished to ride his bike to a friend’s house. The father has expressed a deep concern with putting this tragedy to rest. Waiting to reschedule at another cemetery isn’t an option.”

  Sonny stepped in and said, “Actually, the union controls all the cemeteries in the city. Same thing’s going on all over.”

  The driver sighed. If he had a cowboy hat on, he would’ve taken it off and wiped his brow. But all he did was look back at the cars inching forward.

  “Don’t worry,” Sonny said. “Someone’s gotta step in soon. They can’t keep people from being buried for too long.”

  Of course you know Sonny was dead wrong.

  The man in the town car behind the hearse, the boy’s father, finally got out and came up to us. He stood close enough to the driver to rub shoulders, and he talked with quiet urgency. “You said everything was set. I made it clear that we needed to have this resolved today.”

  “Yes sir. I’m speaking to these gentlemen about it. It seems that an unforeseen circumstance has come up.”

  The father, Mr. City, looked at the picket line long enough to read each sign. When he turned back to us, he said, “You went through with it,” like it made sense.

  “We’re on strike,” Sonny said uncertainly. “The union came in. Organized the whole thing. Can’t last long though. Probably be another day or so until someone figures out how crazy this actually is.”

  Mr. City rubbed his clean-shaven face. He said, “You need money?”

  It took me a long time to realize he was talking to me and Sonny.

  “Don’t we all?” I said.

  “How much?”

  I put up my hands. “I can’t open this gate for you, Moe. I barely even work here.” As for Sonny, he just put his head down and looked away.

  The eight or so guys on the picket line still walked with their signs, but they listened and watched the whole time. The father of the boy turned to them and said loud, like he was delivering a speech, “I need to bury my son. He’s lost enough dignity as it is, having been struck down at such a young age, and having no one to blame. Please. Don’t stop me from giving my son the respect that every human deserves.” Mr. City looked at us to see if we felt anything. I know I didn’t.

  Sonny said, “Mister, if we could talk about this quietly, I’d appreciate it. Truth is, either the board or the union is gonna have to break soon. If not, I’m sure the city’ll step in. We should be up and running by tomorrow, the end of the week the latest. Have your kid brought back to the funeral home. They should still have a spot for him until this is all resolved.”

  Then the Moe said something really strange. Remember this. It’s important. Mr. City, the dead kid’s father, said, “The board will never give in.”

  Other members of the funeral procession began dipping their heads out of their windows, wondering what was taking so long.

  “If you could just turn your cars around,” Sonny said,” I’d appreciate it. I really do apologize. I know it’s a terrible thing to ask of you.”

  “I own a plot of land here that is paid in full.” Mr. City pointed to the gate. “There’s an empty hole registered to my eleven year old son. The paperwork is in my car. I can show you.”

  Sonny said, “We’ve been given orders from the union. At this point, we aren’t even licensed to use the equipment. If something goes wrong, I could lose my benefits, my pension, even face jail time. I got a sick wife at home. There’s no way––”

  “Have you researched the legalities of what you’re doing?” Mr. City asked with a crunched up face. “You think it’s legal to refuse a patron who has scheduled a funeral before the decision was made to strike? If you refuse my son a little common decency, my lawyers will tear your whole cemetery up and leave nothing left for benefits or pensions or anything else you think you’re doing this for.” Again, Mr. City rubbed his clean face. “Do you even know who I am?”

  “This wasn’t my decision,” Sonny said. “In all honesty, I’d much rather be working right now than standing here talking.”

  Mr. City waited for a final decision, didn’t get one, and turned to leave. Then, with his back to us, he said, “That son of a bitch is going to ask if I came.”

  “Who?” Sonny asked.

  “Your gracious union leader,” Mr. City said. “Be sure to tell him it was me who sent the lawyers and the congressmen and the news teams.

  And he did send those people, but it was the cameramen and reporters that showed up first.

  Chapter Two

  After Mr. City left all the workers started asking themselves what they hell they were doing. That’s when the Chinese delivery guy rode up on his bike with my food.

  “Thirteen dollar fifty cent. Tip, rye? Tip?”

  “Yeah. Keep the change.”

  “Party, rye? This party.”

  “This ain’t a party, Moe.” At least it wasn’t yet.

  The Chinese delivery guy just bobbled his head with the money sticking out of his hand. He looked around, trying to underst
and why grown men were gathered outside a cemetery yelling like a bunch of fat cheerleaders. His anxious smile searched for anyone who would answer. No one would look at him, though.

  “No more work,” I told him. “On strike.”

  “People stop dying?” he said, worried like his joke might be true.

  I sat against the gate and opened my styrofoam cup. The egg drop soup was warm and filling. I could feel it in my stomach, which was a good thing.

  Then the real audience arrived. A Channel Twelve News van with a huge picture of the newscasters larger than life, their arms crossed and eyes bright, plastered on the side. The cameraman got out first to set up across the street so he could get a good shot of the locked gate and the picket line. When he was ready, he called out to the van. The reporter that opened the door was that yoga bitch, Alyssa Alliano. She had her ass skirt on with that tight blazer she wears.

  A local celebrity, and it was that dead boy’s father that got her there in less than the time it took to order Chinese. Have you figured out the name of that father yet? Think about it. The power, the money, the resources that went into fighting the strike.

  Alyssa Alliano stood with her round ass to us. She straightened herself, tightened her cheeks, nodded to the cameraman. I got close enough so I could hear.

  “We’re live at Woods Edge Cemetery, just one of a dozen gravesites where cemetery workers are striking for higher wages. As you can see behind me, the gates into the cemetery are locked, reinforced with thick chains. In front of that, a string of protesters are brandishing signs that demand more money and make it clear that no one will be buried here anytime soon. Already one family has been turned away from burying their young child, causing outrage and confusion all across the community.” Alyssa Alliano touched her earpiece, nodded into the camera. “Let’s get a closer look to see what’s going on.”

  She crossed the street. Of course I was the closest to her, standing there, slipping my imaginary hand up her skirt.