Louder than Words

Louder than Words

Taylor Skaalrud

Diesel burned steady in the idle of ‘The Dodge.’ He lit a Player’s Light, cracked his window, and then glanced at the map’s live-fire zones for the day before grabbing the radio and hailing in.

“Alberta 0, this is Big County 39.”

“Go ahead Big County 39.” It was Michelle today. Though they’d never actually met, she and Dad would occasionally chat and joke like old friends. Today wasn’t one of those days.

“I’m coming on gate 13 from 7 of 13 and 12 of 17. I’ll be using Pronghorn and Coyote.” There was still some of the coast in him. Who in their right mind would pronounce it with only two syllables—surely not the people who came up with it?

A short pause held before Michelle called back. “Your route is clear Big County 39.

With the day’s bureaucracy taken care of and satellite radio now blasting Black Label Society’s “Stronger than Death,” we roared out of the camp toward home. Like most of his ilk, Dad wasn’t a particularly emotional man, but over the years I came to realize much of his communication came through the music he chose to listen to. He let others speak for him—and it was up to you to both notice and figure it out. Dad blasting metal on the way home was a sure sign of one of two things: either he’s riding the high of a good day at ‘the grind’ and wants something to match his energy—unlikely; or he’s pissed and needs something to match his emotions—bingo. As the song finished he turned it down from blaring to youbetter-have-a-strong-diaphragm-to-hold-a-conversation.

“I talked to Peter and you aren’t gonna be working with Jim anymore.” His tone was commanding. I knew not to argue. He ran a calloused hand back through his growing widow’s peak and scratched the back of his head.

“Uhm… okay.”

He continued, “You’ll be goin’ out with the spread’s boys from now on. Pipefitting. They’re good kids, they’ll show you the ropes out there… but make sure to use your head this time—what in the hell were you thinking back there!?”

“I don’t know, I—”

“You took your safety courses; did that seem like the sort of thing you should be doing?” I knew a rhetorical question from Dad when I heard one. He answered without pause. “No. So why did I find you standing in a pit getting buried by Jim in the hoe? You gotta have some common sense when you’re out in the field. Fuck man!” He paused in contemplation. I patiently awaited the next barrage, not like I had anywhere to go for the next half hour—and to be fair, he wasn’t wrong—this was shit well-deserved to be gotten. I earned it today. He picked back up. “Well I can tell you for a fuckin’ fact I didn’t teach you to pull shit like that—well!?”

“…W-well, what?”

He let out a single hefty smoker’s cough. “Why were you in the pit?” He said curtly; he didn’t like having to repeat himself.

“Well,” my throat stuck between stress and lack of words, “Jim told me to go down and protect the pipe while he filled it in. I guess, I figured he knew better—I don’t know.”

“Jim? He’s fuckin lucky I didn’t kill him for that shit. He was already on Pete’s shit-list and the Brits back on the base don’t fuck around when it comes to safety. He’s not gonna be comin’ back onto the block and he’ll be lucky to get a job anywhere in the patch once word gets out he almost killed Scott’s kid.” Pivoting his hair-trigger rage from Jim back to me, he pressed on. “And what part of you thought it was a good idea to listen to Jim? You’re a smart kid, Taylor, you’re smarter than any of these old guys out here. You don’t gotta take shit from anybody.” I didn’t feel that way, and I seemed to be taking a whole lot of shit from Dad, but I knew arguing would only make it worse. “You got your mother’s brains, man, so just man up and put your foot down. Safety’s got your back, I got your back—so you got nothin’ to worry about. Some of these guys are all coke’d out half the time and I only brought you out here for the summer so you could get a glimpse of what it’s like in the real world and go off to school and not get stuck out here like your old man. So next time, maybe keep your wits about you, eh?”

At 4 p.m., after a ‘short’ eleven-hour day, followed by a near-death experience and subsequent shit-giving. All I could muster was a muttered “Yeah, okay…” barely audible in contrast to the radio.

There was a moment of quiet as the radio host came on and began talking about Zakk Wylde’s transitions between Ozzy and his solo work before Dad capped the conversation off. Considering an elephant could probably perch on my pout, Dad smothered the remains of his smoke and tried to lighten the mood with an impression. “‘Aww man, Dad’s givin’ me shit, this sucks…’—Look man, I’m only giving you shit ‘cuz you scared me is all—besides, your mother’d kill me if she found out I let anything happen to her first-born.” With one hand at twelve o’clock, he reached across the cab of the truck and mussed my hair up. I cracked half a smile to acknowledge his attempt to connect, but we both knew it was a writeoff day and that by the time we got home, we’d have to pretend that it was just another day on ‘the block.’

Clicking over the last kilometer of one hundred and one square, we rolled on through the gate and off ‘the block’ onto asphalt and towards home.

“Do we have anything to drink at home? I could do with a shot of Vodka after today.”

“Not unless your mother picked some up—should have some beer in the fridge, though.”

“It’ll work.” As much as I just wanted to be alone, he was making an effort to connect, and I couldn’t just leave him hanging for that. As hard as he was to be around, sometimes, it wasn’t ever his words that I heard.