Torvold - A Story by Charles Coombs

As the cage of 13 miners decended into the dark mine shaft and the square of daylight above grew dimmer and smaller second by second, Torvold dropped his head before the light disappeared. He caught a glimpse of the the smudged tan workboots of a new miner. The cage of men was mostly silent as it slipped noisily into the dark. Coughing, muttering, a short burst of laughter over some remark as the platform sunk deeper and deeper into the cold earth. The cold air rushed up his brown jumpsuit and filled his nostrils and lungs. He coughed. Others coughed. The men shuffled and gripped the handles of their lunch pails. They had entered the Zone. The Zone. The descent was always the same for Torvold. A closing off of all that was precious to him. It was not right that humans should toil in the deep earth. The resigned look on all of their faces told him that every day of his life. The men burst out of the cage like released pigeons and paired off or walked towards the transporter alone. Torvold looked down the long stretch of track for the transporter returning a shift of men. This was his body standing beneath the earth. No sun. No wind. Hard sounds only. His wife's sweet smell and softness gathered around him. The finished shift of men ascended to the earth's surface less silent then when they arrived, while the new shift joined in with jokes and and chatter as the transporter ground the tracks beneath them slowly pulling them into the veins of the earth. At twenty-five he didn't think of himself as a miner. He needed to earn money. His wife and two girls were counting on him. Mining was temporary work. His small frame was not suited to the demands of pushing, pulling, and lifting. Love had delivered him to the cold wet smelly tunnels deep beneath a land that was dead and stripped of its life-giving meaning. The bodies around him were sour smelling and too close. The transporter was worse than the cage that brought him there. There was a certainty about the transporter while the cage seemed to hold the possibility of arriving someplace other than the Zone. It was a brief daily phantasy of Torvold's broken by the thud of arrival and the cage door screeching open, but it was not possible on the transporter. The older men on his shift seemed to belong to the work. The younger men denied any ownership by a job. "The money was good." "The money was good." "The money was good." Water trickled down his neck from above wetness. Torvold tightened his neck cloth and dropped his hard hat on his silky clean black hair. He worked the loader. The huge chunks of black coal falling into the empty containers from the hydraulic shovel were not connected to any meaning for Torvold. It was as if he had to do this work as punishment for something he had done. What was it? He had seen chain gang prisoners breaking up rocks, but they had committed a crime. What had he done? What had they all done working beneath the earth's surface in a wet, cold,and and foul place?. What was his heart doing in the coal mine? The empty life of this work, his body, his lungs, his muscles, belonged to someone else. His mind and heart were his, but his body belonged to someone else. He could not stop thinking about this at work. It made him a stranger amongst the others. They knew his thoughts. They could see it in his eyes. They preferred not be reminded. Torvold understood what could not be said and did not say it. "The money was good." "The money was good." The miners breaks were the only times Torvold felt human. Food seemed to lift the spirits briefly and the body welcomed it. It was still a conspiracy of the body to make more empty work possible. The weight of the earth above him. The deep beneath him. The black thickness around him was suffocating him. Christmas had just passed through the little village Torvold lived in. It's brevity was not noticed by the villagers because of its enormous impact on the the lives of everyone. The drudgery of everyday life vanished and and a veil was lifted from all that remained hidden the rest of the year. Food, dance, music, families, neighbors, song,and laughter rolled out across town and filled their empty coffers with hope however unlikely to last. The pleasures of Christmas engaged the miners for days after during their breaks. The mine was completely shut down for three days at Christmas. The peace of the village reflected the absence of the tangle of daily living and work. Torvold noted this change and brought it into the mine with him each day as a guiding thought. Could he have this large slice of life all the time? Two days after Christmas when life returned to necessary routines and the mine resumed its operation, everyone returning to work noticed a slight change in the air quality. It was brought to the attention of the company officials and an air quality test proved to be acceptable. "The money is good." "The money is good." The explosion sent a wave of air that hit everyone in Torvold's unit like ice shattering across their faces and then vanished. The dreaded stillness following the blast made every miner freeze in place. Then they immedately engaged their oxygen masks and waited again for more of what was unknown to come. It did not come. They immediately stuffed the opening into their unit with plastic sheets to prevent gases and smoke from entering should there be any. Noone spoke for some time. Water dripping from the ceiling punctuated the silence. Torvold began to feel lost. What good is the money if I lose my life? He began to cry and controlled it. The other men where beginning to move and speak though their oxygen masks. Angry men. Frightened men. Regret. Fear. Loneliness. Dread. Acute listening to all of the sounds in the mine became heightend. With each passing hour the sounds changed from big sounds to ticking sounds, sliding sounds, and imagined voices. As the oxygen tanks emptied, some men wanted to leave their unit and take their chances with the gases loose in the tunnels. Quarrels developed and when the plastic was ripped off the deadly gases and smoke rapidly moved in. Panic circled Torvold and fighting broke out without reason. The men were cursing and tearing at their clothes. Their oxygen masks transformed the 13 men into unrecognizable creatures threatened and afraid. Some standing. Some sitting. Some crawling on all fours. Were they God's children? Wouild a kind God put men beneath the earth to die alone? Torvold saw the moon rise full and white as snow. How could this be? He saw shadows running across a field. Dogs were chasing each other or something. The church doors were open. He couldn't tell if people were coming or going. His dead mother was sitting on a log looking at photograph she had removed from her purse. His wife was standing in an open field holding his daughters close. Men were walking around and stopping to talk briefly and move on. Torvold felt his body. He was alive, but this was happening. The other miners seemed to have become smaller. They were all sitting. They were all silent. They were all dying. He looked at them and they looked away. Noone spoke. Some men were sharing small pieces of paper and writing notes. One man called out "fuck" a few times and stopped. Torvold breathed as shallowly as he could. He did not move. He did not speak. They could not eat in fear of the gases. It was silent. The miner who broke through the plastic seal did not come back. The mine lighting flickered. Torvold became drowsy. He dreamed of his church minister in the pulpit when he was a boy. The preacher was waving his arm and yelling at him. The congregation was looking at him as he shrunk down in the pew. His mother was sitting across in a different pew with his brother. He was alone. Suddenly a flock of twelve sparrows rose up from the alter and silently flew over the congregation,the beating of their wings filling the church with a gentle fluttering sound. He woke up and another man had plunged into the mine shaft puncturing the plastic cover again. The few men who had any strength to move crawled over and tried to seal the hole. Most of the men were lying close to the ground. Several were silent and still. The warmth of a small hand stirred him into semi-consciousness. He did not open his eyes. He was in bed. It was warm. He heard voices. Was he dead or alive? The full moon rose again and moved towards him. As it came closer he wanted to run away, but it pulled him towards it as it advanced finally surrounding him. The warm hand on his wrist remained as he drifted off into a deep sleep. Fide et amore