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The T-shirt clung to Christy's back like a damp rag. The air felt thick and still, the stroller heavy, the pavement sticky and soft. They had gotten up early, but it made no difference.
"Wish momma luck," she whispered to her son.
"Call on Monday." The manager told her the week before.
Every pocket. The bottom of her purse. Her coat in the closet. Still, she was short on solid quarters. Thank God Teena could spare a few - her friend always came through, at least she always did what she could.
The quarters made a lump in her shorts. She didn't mind. She had enough to use the pay phone and wash Angel's clothes. He was on his last clean shirt. He grew out of things so quickly now.
"We'll go to the Thrift Shop next time momma gets her check."
Most everything she owned came from the second hand. She called it her "unique boutique." Clothes. Toys. The toaster. Even a watercolor set someone grew tired of. They sold furniture too, but she had no way to carry that home.
Too big for the stroller, Angel squirmed when mom squeezed him into the seat and sat a small bottle of laundry detergent on his lap. Pillowcases made good laundry bags she discovered. They didn't tear like the plastic sacks the stores gave out. Before they left she filled one and put it in the basket beneath the seat and another behind the seat where there was space to store stuff. She even tied one to the bar that ran between the handles.
Trucks rumbled past, big ones, one after another. Angel smiled and waved. He liked trucks - told his momma he was going to buy one when he was big, so they didn't have to walk everywhere. The trucks scared Christy. A woman and her kids got hit in the crosswalk a while back. The paper said a church was asking for donations to help the family send the bodies back to Mexico.
She turned left on Highland Avenue, the main drag on this end of town. A bus passed every hour on the hour. Eight blocks west stood a strip mall at the intersection of Route 21, the highway that led south, past the cement plant and out to Combi-Brands where they made bacon and hot dogs.
A girl who worked there told Christy "you come home at night with bits of meat and grease in your hair."
"A job was a job," Christy thought. "Besides," she had heard, "if you worked there, you could take stuff home from time to time."
Lever Brothers had a plant on this side of town as well. If the wind was right, the scent of Fresh Country Morning or Sunny Blossoms filled the air for miles around.
Duds-N-Suds opened at nine. The Windmere Village apartments had a laundry room, but she avoided it - the machines were mostly broken, and Teena had been robbed there. Teena said they shoved her around too like they wanted more than just the money. She said they laughed when she started crying and they saw how scared she was.
Eight blocks turned into six, then four. She made a game out of the obstacles that cluttered the sidewalk - telephone poles, fire hydrants, newspaper boxes, signposts. She weaved around them like a police car on a chase.
