Alvin on Waterloo Road

Alvin Handback paused at the edge of Waterloo Road and watched a possum scurry down the side of a cotton field. It was late September 1935 and the cotton bolls were starting to open. With the Depression still ongoing, picking cotton would be one of the few jobs available in the next few weeks. Soon the fields would be covered with pickers, gleaning that precious commodity that had kept the South alive through the years. The scrubby little animal crossed the road and held Alvin's attention until it disappeared through the tall grass. He stood and watched, as the possum made its way toward a nearby persimmon tree. Alvin was jarred awake from his reverie by a crow squawking overhead, allowing him to recall why he had stopped. A few feet from where he stood was the spot his father's body had been discovered two years earlier. It had become a ritual for Alvin to stop and say a prayer and reflect on the days that he and his father spent together. The coroner’s ruling that his father, Louis Handback, had taken his own life was too much for Alvin to bear. The Sheriff’s Deputy had been quick to agree with the coroner, so the incident was ruled a suicide. Alvin refused to believe that his father would take his own life. Yet, when they found him there was a gun in his hand and a bullet hole in his right temple. As hard as Alvin tried, he couldn't think of anyone who would want to harm his father. Louis never mistreated anyone and didn't have any enemies. It was six years into the Depression, and the Handbacks had lost the pillar of their existence. Alvin lived with his mother, Hazel, in a modest home built by her father, Buford Stephens. The house sat on a twenty-acre strip of land bordering Waterloo Road, a short distance from where Louis had been killed. The year Hazel was born her father bought forty acres, six miles west of Florence, Alabama, and willed twenty acres to Hazel and twenty to her sister, Elizabeth. The Waterloo Road is a twenty-two mile stretch of county road between Florence and Waterloo, Alabama. It’s a peaceful stretch of highway, but has seen a few troubling occurrences. The most noteworthy was the removal of the Indian nations from East Tennessee and the Carolinas, out to Oklahoma, by way of Waterloo. While on route to their destination many suffered from exposure, disease, and starvation. A few families managed to abandon the march and blend in with established settlers. Some settled in Northwest Alabama before reaching Waterloo. The Route the Indians took, would become known as, ”The Trail of Tears." **************** In May of that year (1935), the Works Progress Administration (WPA) was formed as part of President Roosevelt’s New Deal. The goal was to create jobs and help stabilize the economy. By September the nation had achieved some measure of recovery, and Alvin was working on a WPA job near Florence. He was assigned to a crew building stone retainer walls, mixing mortar and unloading rocks from overburdened wagons. It was hard work, but Alvin was a strong 27-year-old just happy to have a job. He watched the men working on the walls and after a few weeks he was given a chance to try his hand at laying the stone. Things were starting to look up and he was beginning to feel better about his future. Since Louis’s death, Alvin’s paycheck had been Hazel's only source of income. Still she carried her own weight, working hard to make ends meet. Her chickens laid more eggs than they could use, giving her a few extras to sell. Her cow supplied them with milk, butter and cheese and the garden produced enough extra vegetables for her to can, so they could make it through the winter. Alvin put meat on the table by hunting, trapping, and fishing. Food was never a problem for the Handbacks, but money was another thing. They just never seemed to have enough to meet their needs. Alvin talked to everyone that would listen, thinking that someone would know the truth about his father's death. Most accepted the coroner’s decision, that it had been a suicide, but Alvin refused to believe it. His co-workers grew tired of hearing him talk about it and started voicing their opinion about what happened. One of the men suggested that Louis might've been caught with another man’s wife. Alvin ignored the remark, knowing the man was just trying to be funny. But when another man suggest his father could have been shot for stealing, that was the breaking point. Alvin flew into the man, and they swapped blows until the other workers separated them. Both men were fired and told they would never work on a WPA job again. It was a long walk home for Alvin. It started raining, and the five-mile trip started to seem more like ten. He saw a house up ahead and planned to ask for shelter, but when he saw two dogs on the porch eyeing him curiously, he changed his mind. He continued walking and when he reached Cypress Creek he was soaked to the skin. The steel framed bridge crossing the creek offered little to no protection from the rain, so he stopped halfway across and leaned over the rail. The water was flowing fast beneath the bridge and Alvin cursed himself for starting the fight. He was thinking, If I had the nerve I would jump and end it all right there. Fall was in full swing with a light breeze coming out of the North. Alvin stood shivering in the afternoon air, craving a cigarette but knew his tobacco and papers must already be wet. He pushed his hair back and looked up, letting the rain bathe his swollen knuckles and bruised face. He opened his mouth and took rainwater in, then rinsed. When he spit he noticed traces of blood in the spittle.