2022 Fiction Winner: "On the Settling of Dust" by Tyson Doll
Photo Credit: Austin Ban, obtained and licensed through Unsplash
On the Settling of Dust
I tried to close my eyes, but couldn’t manage. It was only a split second, after all, and I’d done this before. The seventy-odd feet between my eyes and the ground beneath them sent such a visceral chill through my spine that my feet forgot to brace for our landing. Luckily, they buckled and rolled toward the bin’s manhole cover and away from the edge. I hadn’t known I was afraid of heights until I’d taken this job only a few weeks earlier. It wasn’t listed in the job description, of course, that we’d jump from bin to bin, shortening our route to the furthest east-facing edge where we’d watch our wheaten country welcome the sun’s warmth.
“Hey, Split,” Rocket said, landing behind me, breathless, “you reckon animals understand cars?”
“Like, how they work?” I asked.
“No. Jesus. I’m not an idiot. Like, do you think they get it? That we drive them? Or do they think they’re another species? Like, apex predators?”
“Well, I imagine deer may be a little suspicious, but you know damn well that dogs get it,” I said, thinking of Rudy the Dog, who sometimes rested on the bed of Ellis’s pickup.
“So, it’s sort of like when you see turtles on the backs of alligators, then. Right? Like, dogs might just think they’re hitching a ride,” he said. I chose not to reply.
Just then, the pink sun began to peak over the horizon, dabbing the few houses in a red-ochre hue, and washing the wheat fields in an all-too-welcome golden light. If you squinted, you could witness a wall of sunlight rolling down those mile-marked roads, waiting to splash light on the walls of our workplace. Rocket hung his feet, his oil-stained work boots, over the bin’s edge, his face growing pinker by the second. I grabbed the folding chair that I’d hidden from Ellis in the headhouse, unfolded its creaky aluminum legs, and sat behind Rocket’s shoulder, feeling the fraying wicker fray more yet. As the sun continued its yellowing, I heard a vehicle turn from the road into the lot. In the still of the morning, I recognized the hum of Ellis’s truck: a dual-exhaust two-and-a-half-ton Ford; an old red farm truck whose standard bed had been replaced with a grated flat bed and a sizable toolbox. The truck was widely regarded as Red.
“Better head on down,” Rocket said. Ellis didn’t appreciate our altitudinal escapades; the way he saw it: everything deserved a sure footing.
I took the ladder down, while Rocket loaded himself into the one-man lift in the headhouse; we’d race each other up and down, taking turns, mechanical and manual. As I reached ground-level first, I grabbed the keys from Ellis’s office and began opening the garage door to ready the indoor pit for incoming trucks. In the meantime, Rocket wished Ava a good morning on his way to uncover the outdoor pit. I started up the belt, equipped with all-new buckets for the upheaval of freshly harvested grains, and flipped on the ventilation systems in the first couple of bins. All bins were simply referred to by the large number which Ellis painted in a high-gloss, black spray paint at his eye-level at the beginning of that summer’s working season.
In the hotter hours of the day, I found shade near the cool, concrete walls of bin one, standing a hundred and ten feet tall and thirty-three feet in diameter, with a capacity of seventy-some thousand bushels of wheat.
“Dawson says it’ll be a busy one today,” Rocket said. “Two hundred and eleven trucks expected. Granted, thirty-two are outgoings.”
“Your turn?” I asked. We’d take turns loading the outgoing trucks: a respite from the dusty pit, although a lengthy exposure to the late-July sun. This system was one of the few which helped to pass the time throughout our otherwise monotonous days.
“Yeah. Dawson’s back inside today. Guess he likes the shade.”
I, too, liked the shade, though I’d just as soon take the wind-channeling of the outdoor pit, located in the small alleyway between bins one and two and three through eighteen. In the hotter hours of the day, I found shade near the cool, concrete walls of bin one, standing a hundred and ten feet tall and thirty-three feet in diameter, with a capacity of seventy-some thousand bushels of wheat. Inside, Dawson was also afforded control of the belt’s distribution to each bin; his years of experience informed his intuition in the area. At the beginnings of busier days, or on the rare occasion that he’d be unsure of bin one’s remaining capacity, he’d send up whichever of the two of us was most available to drop a weighted tape measurer down its manhole to get a better idea.
“Seventeen feet, Dawson,” I said, knowing this would allow for another ten thousand bushels—twenty-or-so trucks.
“Let me go ahead and switch us over to bin two,” he said. “There’s only a few thousand bushels in there right yet. You guys go ahead and take these ones,” he said, nodding toward the front lot, whose horizon just let in two trucks.
I walked to the office in still-abundant shade. “Ava, could you send these guys outside? Dawson’s not ready yet,” I said.
Without looking up from the newspaper crossword, she nodded. “Big one, today,” she said. “Bet Marsha’ll bring pie.”
Marsha was the sweet wife of Ellis. She didn’t come around the office often, but when she did, it’d be a good day. On cold evenings, she’d bring hot pizza; on hot days, she’d bring popsicles; and on long days, she’d apparently bring pies. That was my first summer there, and I’d not yet finished learning the rules.
“Oh, yeah?” I said, opening the door on my way back out to the pit.
“Yeah,” she said, smiling, her dark hair still shielding her eyes from my own. “Sort of Ellis’s thing. I prefer pizza, myself.”
“Oh, yeah?” I said, tripping over the swinging door’s metal threshold out onto the small, cracked concrete slab that functioned as the office’s front porch, where Ava would discuss the weather, this year’s crop, or both, with farmhands while measuring the weight and moisture of each load’s contents. (“They’re easy on the eyes,” Ellis would say. “Keeps those old farmers coming back.”)
I returned to the pit, finding Rocket balanced on one of the grate’s many railings, arms outstretched like the crucifix, passing the time.
“She’s still out there,” he said. “I’m worried about all these trucks. Dawson’s expecting Gallaghers today.”
Despite his careful avoidance of the yellowed stone, the killdeer grew frantic, distorting her tan, pointed wing and escaping southward into the taller grasses, from which she finally emerged overhead, keeping her curious eye out for any disturbance at the site of her nest.
Gallagher was an Irish-owned trucking service that hired out seasonal laborers—most often young, South African men—willing to follow the grain harvest south-to-north as the season called. When they’d finished their Oklahoman harvest, they would arrive in their shining Peterbilts, pulling fifty-five feet of trailer, toting up to a thousand bushels a load. Needless to say: Gallaghers turned widely. This, of course, wouldn’t be a problem if Rocket hadn’t recently discovered the small, three-egged nest of an anxious killdeer in a grassy patch of gravel no further than a hundred feet east of the outdoor pit, not far from the circular drive trucks would take to weigh their recently emptied trailers.
“Think we can move them?” I asked.
“I read that human pheromones can scare them off. We can’t touch them. I’ll grab some gloves later on and see what we can do.” I saw that he’d pulled a large stone in front of the nest and painted it a pale yellow.
The day’s first truck was driven by Milky Cravens: a rusted eighties Ford dumper with the hydraulic lifting bed. I rolled my hand, motioning Milky to pull on forward until we’d catch most of his wheat in the pit, though his faulted brakes sent him out past the grate’s opening.
“That’ll do, Milk,” Rocket said. We’d sweep the remaining wheat and chaff into the pit manually.
“See the old man hasn’t shook you yet,” Milky said, hanging out of the truck’s window. His nickname was said to honor the pale color of his skin, always visible in his cut-off, pearl-buttoned plaid shirts, but I thought it better honored the light-whiteness of his wide grin.
Rocket’s “guess not” was lost to the screaming hydraulics; I grabbed a push broom and began pushing; Milky’s truck rolled away in neutral, freeing the transmission to lower the bed. Despite his careful avoidance of the yellowed stone, the killdeer grew frantic, distorting her tan, pointed wing and escaping southward into the taller grasses, from which she finally emerged overhead, keeping her curious eye out for any disturbance at the site of her nest.
We took lunch in shifts starting around ten; I’d taken only three outgoings, so I ate first. Most often, Ava would leave the day’s half-finished crossword in the break room where Rocket collected his favorite comic strips every Sunday: in the drawer under the always-full coffee pot. I sat in Ellis’s retired desk chair and unwrapped my ham sandwich, mulling over Flannery O’Connor’s cause of death, which was five letters, intersected by a poisonous seed, which Ava had presumed to be a poppy.
Under the full weight of seven hundred bushels of wheat, the belt screamed, threatening to break again this year. Dawson’s oversized tee shirt was soaked in sweat. Wordlessly, I handed over Ava’s report, to which he raised his thumb.
“Getting hot out there yet?” Ellis asked.
“Oh, a little,” I said, folding the newspaper. He grabbed a small styrofoam cup and filled it with coffee.
“You take some?”
“No, Ellis,” I said, “not in this heat.”
“Need a little arab air conditioning out there?” he asked. I balled the plastic wrap, swept my crumbs from the table, and dropped it all in the trash bucket. “Know what I mean?”
“Hey, you got any extra pairs of work gloves laying around?” I asked, searching drawer and cabinet.
“Just wet a towel, wrap it around your head. Keep you cool out there,” he said. “Problem is, one of them farmers will run you over or shoot you or kill you otherwise.” He chuckled a little, fingers resting in his belt loops.
“Even used is fine, Ellis. I’m working a blister into my thumb here.”
In the break room closet, I found a medical kit: gauze, bandages, hydrogen peroxide and, finally, blue rubber gloves. I stepped out of the break room and into the office, where Ava sat alone, penciling an updated total of bin two’s holdings.
“Run this out to Dawson, will you?” she asked, her hand extended.
“No problem,” I said. I took the small piece of legal paper and stepped over the door’s threshold, out into the sun.
Under the full weight of seven hundred bushels of wheat, the belt screamed, threatening to break again this year. Dawson’s oversized tee shirt was soaked in sweat. Wordlessly, I handed over Ava’s report, to which he raised his thumb. Outside, I handed the gloves over to Rocket.
“These smell like plastic,” he said.
“Toss them in some chaff,” I said, “rub some dirt on them.” He did just that.
I brought another truck on—a forty-foot Kenworth—stopping him a little early, correctly anticipating his rolling brake. I loosed the crank handle from the back end of the cab, latched it into place, and slowly opened the gate from which he’d release hundreds of bushels into the pit beneath. With the sliding door open and the grain falling now I watched Rocket from afar. The killdeer, frantic, folded her wing as he followed her. She limped further yet and broke into anxious flight, her necklace of white blurring and blending with the clouds above. He located her three eggs in the high sun and slipped those dusty gloves over his fingers. I cranked the door closed, much easier now under the weight of no wheat, returned the handle and waved the Kenworth on. Rocket, having just placed those eggs in a safer plot of grassed gravel, raised a gloved hand to the passing truck and walked back under the thinning, cool shade of bin one.
Those three small eggs, despite bluestem camouflage, faced great danger under no brooding mother.
“Go on and grab lunch,” I said. “Dawson’ll take those outgoings. Have them send all the trucks out here.”
“Be back in a bit, then,” he said. “Need anything?” I shook my head.
Four trucks—one Ford dumper, the rest hopper trailers—came through, unloading two-and-some thousand bushels into bin two, the same bin which Dawson drained four thousand bushels from into two outgoing freighters. Belt and bucket yet intact, the elevator ran altogether smoothly. In the settling dust over the outdoor pit, I pulled my hat up, removed my goggles, and, with my forearm, wiped muddied beads of sweat from my brow. Dawson limped his way around the back end of bin two, sun beating over his thin shoulders, smiling through an otherwise strained expression.
“See that?” he said, pointing toward the grain distributor, almost a hundred and thirty feet above our heads.
“Something wrong?” I asked. In the case that something was wrong, I’d take incomings and outgoings while he fetched Rocket and a harness to troubleshoot.
Silently, I watched his upcast finger drift around and away from the elevator. Instead, I realized, it was following the killdeer, circling, diving low, retreating, and circling again; she was looking for her eggs, no longer marked by that yellow stone. Those three small eggs, despite bluestem camouflage, faced great danger under no brooding mother.
“What do you reckon she’s trying?” Dawson asked me.
“Suppose she’s looking for her kids.”
“Tell you, if this lull keeps up, I might have you upstairs sweeping,” he said before ambling back through the lot toward Ellis’s office. It wasn’t totally uncommon that an expectedly busy day ran slow: farmers so desired their harvest crop’s moisture below fifteen percent that they’d spend a day baking in the sun waiting for it. Any chance to sweep the headhouse Dawson saw as a chance to prevent ignition, and ignition prevention was especially important in the light of his smoking habit. Combustible sediment floated up off of the distribution belt and came to rest on any surface still enough to let it be, passing the time until it might become something bigger.
“It’s lupus,” Rocket said. “She died of lupus. Marsha brought pies, too.” He handed over a small paper plate heaped with cherry pie and no fork, already collecting dust. I slid the pie to the plate’s edge and bit at it.
“She can’t find them,” I said, nodding eastward.
“Momma?”
Through the window, I watched as Rocket gathered the killdeer’s eggs: he placed them neatly in the palm of his hand and walked them closer to their home. From above, her flighted, watchful rounds were gentler and somehow quieter than before; her feather coat faintly contrasted the sand and stone of the lot.
“Reckon we move them back?”
“Somebody’ll hit them. Can’t do that. Maybe move them on a little closer today and further on tomorrow.”
“Alright, then. I don’t much guess she’ll like us for it.”
“Well, we’ll try it, and then we’ll wait and see,” he said, fingering his way back into those blue gloves as Dawson made his way around bin one, shaking the dust from his shirt downwind.
“You boys feel like sweeping up there? I’m running around back to help Ellis with the mower,” Dawson said, euphemistically; we knew he’d be smoking.
“No problem,” I said to his back as he spat into the pit.
A push broom, a dry mop, a few small rags, and a scoop shovel occupied one of the headhouse’s corners. I pushed open the wired, metal door and stepped from the lift into the concrete room, pulling a large, empty bucket behind me. The belt’s wheatless whistle was that of a light breeze. I cracked the window and let the sun’s unbridled light beam through, illuminating dust in suspension and dust in rest. Through the window, I watched as Rocket gathered the killdeer’s eggs: he placed them neatly in the palm of his hand and walked them closer to their home. From above, her flighted, watchful rounds were gentler and somehow quieter than before; her feather coat faintly contrasted the sand and stone of the lot. Rocket sat the eggs in a small heap near her nest, positioning them carefully as before, and moved the yellowed stone in their path. With the broom, I pushed the dust and loose wheat kernels into a pile in the center of the room and scooped it all into the bucket. Rocket, from below, manually lowered the lift. Near the exit door at the end of the hall rested another broom and another bucket; these were Rocket’s. I leaned the broom against the wall and stepped through the door, out into the wind. With one hand tightly latched around the safety rail, I stepped on toward the edge, lowered my zipper, and began to relieve myself. Most often, the channeled wind would warp the stream immediately, where it would then spatter the bin’s wall. I heard the door swing open behind me.
“I got them back home. Momma found them,” Rocket said.
I zipped my pants up and stepped back over the handrail. “Probably alright, then, huh?”
“Reckon so. We’ve got cleaning yet,” he said, holding the door for me.
Seeing that the pit itself had been overfilled, I ran back into the workroom to heighten the speed of the belt; an overfull pit would likely split it. Under Dawson’s guidance, the Gallagher’s young driver finally pinched through the alley and into the circle drive.
At the end of the hallway, we took post on either side of the belt and began sweeping grainy dust into our buckets, racing toward the headhouse, passing the time. The winner won no more than rights to the manlift, which, full up with two buckets, wasn’t a terribly comfortable ride anyway. Some way down the hall, the room filled with dust as the patter from the headhouse grew to a roar and grain barreled down the belt. Either Dawson had taken a truck downstairs or had begun redistributing grain to the eastern bins. Uncarefully, we finished sweeping our way back to the headhouse and I took the manlift down, sitting on one bucket with another on my thighs. I dumped them out back near the garage and made my way through to the indoor pit, and, finding neither a truck nor Dawson, walked on around to the outdoor pit. Dawson stood out front of the Gallagher, guiding him through the pit while Rocket stood between the long trailer and bin one, stopping him any time he reversed too close to the wall. Having cut too sharp a turn into the alleyway, the double-doored hopper truck pulled dangerously close to the elevator. Seeing that the pit itself had been overfilled, I ran back into the workroom to heighten the speed of the belt; an overfull pit would likely split it. Under Dawson’s guidance, the Gallagher’s young driver finally pinched through the alley and into the circle drive. I made my way back to the pit and saw Rocket’s eyes watching the killdeer in distress. Her wing folded in on itself, flaying feathers, playing injured; she retreated into the swaying grasses and finally emerged in fretful flight, turning spirals over that great truck. Under his wide turn, the yellow, protective stone dug a little deeper into the sandy drive while the killdeer dove again. She landed, desperate, while Dawson raised a calloused hand to the truck, dusted his shirt to the wind, and limped on back into the shade, thoughtless or unaware of the suffering behind him.
T. A. Doll is a student of English Literature at Kansas State University. He enjoys reading and being out of doors (or indoors, really. He’s not too picky). He adores the work of John Irving, Louise Erdrich, Jeffrey Eugenides and too many more to name.