
Rebecca Gayle Howell (ed.)
et al.
Published online:
18 May 2023
Published in print:
07 March 2023
Online ISBN:
9780813197418
Print ISBN:
9780813182438
Contents
Cite
Pennington, Seth, 'Armory', in Rebecca Gayle Howell, Ashley M. Jones, and Emily J. Jalloul (eds), What Things Cost: an anthology for the people (Lexington, KY , 2023; online edn, Kentucky Scholarship Online, 18 May 2023), https://doi.org/10.5810/kentucky/9780813182438.003.0015, accessed 29 Apr. 2025.
Extract
The boy got out of the Marines to give himselfto God, to his wife, to the bullet factory eleven milesoutside a town outgrowing its one stoplight. Carspile up at shift change, block the highway. The ambulance drivesthe shoulder when there is one, wails like something tied up, hungry.The boy makes more than his Pa ever has. His Pa raisedenough kids to become tax exempt, all the kids his wife couldbear. The boy was first-born, brought up the rest. Taught them tofish, trap, hunt; then clean, cook, freeze what’s left. In Walmart,there would be this end-of-the-month chain of them: carts loadedto the gills, three of them pushing along behindlike a locomotive, what they know as that dead relic, that monumentoutside the town square, rusting—the caboosemade more of beer cans and marijuana smoke than any dreamof solid work it once was. At 16 the boy startedlifting. In shoes, he was 5' 6". His arms were tanks: biceps as big asother men’s thighs, big enough they hid his pawnshopguitar he played at the Baptist church. He was so ripped, the explosiondidn’t kill him, but shattered his arms, gave him a slight severance, no work,a “disability” check in the mail after “not meeting the requirements”three times. He listens for a time when his hands mademusic, remembers skinning a buck clean into pelt and meat.He’s full of stories about other people’s lives; he’s a walking radio,bored and tuned to the weather. Three months along, now, his wife isthe one carrying. The boy’s a bundle of nerves and can’t lift a bowl of soup beans.He flicks his fingers like a lighter, like he wants to start something.Outside, dogs bark at the storm rolling in off the soy.He turns off the light to watch it.
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