Edward Jackson 150

Edward Jackson

Factory Workers Fighting in the Dance Halls

Thomas O’Tolski did not allow anyone in the household to touch the dial. It stayed on 880 AM, WCBS. He placed tiny pieces of tape just to see if his daughters or wife had turned the station when he wasn’t around, which wasn’t all that often. He rarely worked and lived off his wife’s and daughters’ wages. They cleaned the tenement building and took in washing. Bainbridge was full of men just like Thomas. They drank, fought, stole, and spread disease. His fist wasn’t a stranger to the women in his house, especially if that dial had been moved. Milly, his eldest, usually took the blame, and the fist, for the movement of the dial.

On December 29th, Roosevelt came on the radio declaring Detroit The Great Arsenal of Democracy. Thomas was no lover of the Jews or the war effort, but he played the numbers and was in the hole. When the reporter declared unemployment no longer existed in the city of Detroit and that the factories were running round the clock and over 300,000 new jobs were being created, he figured it was time to leave the Bronx and move his girls. Without a good-by to anyone the O’Tolskis boarded a train to Detroit in the middle of the night leaving all their possessions behind, eliminating any suspicion he was reneging on his debt. Just like that, they were gone.

Milly was the oldest of the Irish twins born to Thomas and Ester. Ten months after Milly came Maire. Thomas was known to turn his attentions to the daughters, but as was the case with many men who did in Bainbridge, most turned a blind eye to it. He promised his girls things would be better in Detroit and within an hour on the train, he told them to give them their money they’d been keeping in a sock.

The girls looked at each other as their father then took the last of their money and headed to the bar car for another shot of whiskey with a beer chaser. Ester followed him as she had taken to the drink to avoid the realization that Thomas had moved his attention to their daughters.

When they arrived in Detroit, they made their way to Most Holy Trinity in Corktown. Word of mouth spread on the train that this was a charitable Irish congregation. The O’Tolskis slept on the rectory floor and the girls cleaned and washed Father Patrick’s house and clothes. Father Patrick was no stranger to a heavy night of drinking and after exposing himself to Maire, Milly knew things would be no different in Detroit.

The church secretary, taking pity on the girl’s predicament, gave Milly the address of a factory hiring women. Taking her sister in tow, she secured 2nd shift jobs for them. Within a month of working Milly proved herself capable of the responsibility of shift supervisor and found a boarding house that would allow the sisters to share one room; all they could afford. The O’Tolski sisters were quite popular at the boarding house as they were accustomed to cleaning and willingly did it for free. The other women offered them advice on navigating the Irish scene in Detroit.

“If you want an extra buck or a free meal, hit the dance halls,” Sabine the landlady offered. “I’ll take you, but you got to know some rules. No handsy. If they touch you, slap them quick to let them know. If they hit you back, then you know he don’t come back to the house. Got it?”

They got it and nodded.

Sabine took them to The Grand. It was one of Detroit’s most popular spots and was open 24 hours now that the factories were running round the clock. Barely there thirty minutes Milly was dancing with a handsome man from Dublin and before she could slap him when he got handsy, a fist struck her dance partner across the face knocking him to the floor.

“That’s not how you treat an Irish beauty,” a brute of a man with black hair yelled.

Albert Sullivan practically spit the words with a large amount of saliva foaming around his drunk dry mouth. Milly looked past the foam and before long she was going steady with him. He was always fighting in the dance halls, but Milly looked past it.

Albert owned a butcher shop. Soon she worked there on mornings when he had drunk too much the night before. It was unnerving for the customers to be served by a butcher with black eyes and the smell of cheap whisky pouring out his pores. She was not paid, but she felt a duty to do this if she were to be his wife. Albert had one worker at the butcher shop that he called slanty. Fred Cho was from China and it was not known how he ended up in Detroit, but Albert would call him a dumb Jap from time to time believing Fred barely knew English. Fred saw and heard everything clearly and knew it was in his best interest to pretend otherwise. He had heard of other Chinese people being mistakenly interned with the Japanese in camps and this job would hopefully keep from that fate. Fred was a far better butcher than Albert, skilled in the knife like no other.

Milly and Marie worked on the assembly line of the B-26 Martin Bombers. This was an important job. The factory girls would often put on heavy red lipstick and kiss the bombs being placed in the bombers. How this tradition began was not known but Milly and Marie joined in although they were not fully in support of the war effort. Albert was not fond of Jews and wasn’t fully convinced it was in the best interest of his business that a war was going on with all the rationing, but he enjoyed the money that Milly made at the plant.

They continued to make their ways to the dancehalls and the fighting wasn’t solely for the men. Marie grabbed the attention of a handsome postal worker and by their third dance, a female fist so powerful came to the back of her head and right ear, causing her to lose all hearing in it permanently. That didn’t stop Albert from stepping in and knocking the sucker puncher to the ground as it was not uncommon for a man to knock a woman down at The Grand. Milly noticed that Albert’s severe reaction to lay out a woman wasn’t one that a soon to be brother-in-law would do, but rather the reaction of a jealous lover. Milly suppressed those feelings deeply.

Soon Milly was three months in and showing in the belly so they married. Albert insisted on a church wedding, and the man who turned his attention to her at the age of seven walked her down the aisle and the man who exposed himself to her at nineteen officiated the wedding.

Albert continued spending time drinking, fighting, and cavorting with ladies at the dance halls with Maire and Milly took over running the butcher shop. She kept her job on the assembly line and worked her body to the bone. Albert was of no help and while he was sleeping off the booze in the mornings, Fred became more than a worker to Milly; he became her friend.

The days began to take their toll on Milly. One morning while she and Fred were working through a few slabs of cow in the meat locker her father walked in. He’d been on an all-nighter, or many all-nighters. He was slurry, foaming, and enraged. He called Milly a whore and told her she was going to hell. He gut punched Milly who fell to the floor. He lifted his leg to stomp on the belly when a knife plunged into his chest. Milly stopped while time stood still, but she didn’t gasp with shock. There was Fred holding the knife, while her father started to slowly bleed out.

“He was killing the baby,” Fred said. Fred worried that he’d crossed over a line.

“Grab his legs, drag him to the freezer,” Milly said.

Thomas O’Tolski didn’t die easily and after regaining consciousness he banged on the door and yelled to get out of the freezer. Fred looked at Milly and something changed in her. She grabbed the boning knife from Fred’s hand and went to the meat locker and finished the job on her father. This was when her butchering education began. This was when she got her revenge to the man who’d been raping her since she was seven.

Fred showed Milly the difference in the slab of a cow and slab of a man and the two chopped Thomas into little parts, ground up the flesh and bone, packaged it, and put him back in the cooler.

Over the course of the next few weeks Milly carried pieces of Thomas to the plant in her lunch box and the man who hated the Jews was placed into the bombers that were dropped on the Germans who shared his sentiments and politics. Each time she placed a grounded part of Thomas into a bomber, she’d pause, put on an abundance of lipstick, and kiss the man’s meat and bone good riddance.

After a few days Ester started asking around about Thomas. She came by the butcher shop inquiring if she’d seen him where Milly replied no and pulled out some of the ground Thomas and gifted it to her mother and told her not to worry. After a full week Ester was growing frantic as he was not to be found in any bar or working girl room. Ester came back with Marie in tow.

“He said he was going to make his way here the last I saw him. Did you see him? What happened” she asked accusingly.

“Go away, you're drunk, I don’t know nothing,” Milly said.

“I know you know something. He got another girl?”

“I don’t know,” Milly said as she was overcome with anger. “What I know is you let him do that to us for all those years. Hitting us, coming into our rooms at night. That much I know.”

“I didn’t know anything. If he did it’s because of you. Always primping and acting like you do. If he did something you asked for it.”

With that Milly grabbed a knife and sliced her mother across the face. Maire, still unknowing of anything, was in shock.

“Milly, what have you done?” she screamed.

Their mother screamed in pain. Maire tried to grab the knife from Milly. Milly however was one step ahead, and had already plunged another knife from the counter into her mother’s chest. While she did this, the baby inside kicked with force, helping its mother along the way.

“Fred. We need you,” she said.

He came up front and saw the body. Without a word he dragged it to the meat locker and turned on the bone saw and went to work while Milly prepared the grinder.

“My god, what have you two done?” Maire yelled.

“What we should’ve done when he was doing what he did to us and what she let happen to us then,” Milly said. “Shut up and help us.”

Over the next week, both Milly and Marie stuffed parts of the mother into the bombers. This time Milly didn’t waste her lipstick kissing the bombers.

Noo one really missed Thomas and Ester. They were not regulars at church, the only work was the washing Ester was taking in and Maire went to her customers and told them that her parents moved back to Bainbridge and she’d take over the work.

Thomas only had two places he frequented, the barber shop and the bar. Milly went to retrieve his cup from the barber shop and stopped by the bar to tell the bartender her father sends his regards from back east and she would not be settling his debt. It was as simple as that. They were forgettable people.

After a long Friday shift at the factory, one where Maire had left early to meet up with Sabine to get gussied up for The Grand, she tried to get Milly to come out with her. Milly, her feet too swollen to even entertain the thought of the dancehalls, went home to the apartment above the butcher shop. Albert had already started his drinking around noon that day and when she arrived she asked him to stay home, but he refused and made his way to The Grand. Something inside told Milly to go and check on Milly and Albert. She needed to see with her eyes to confirm what her gut had been telling her.

When she got there Maire was dancing with Albert, kissing Albert deeply, and Albert’s hands were on her ass. She went up to Maire and clocked her across the face and beat her in her one good ear with the hope of deafening her totally. With each blow, the baby kicked, helping its mom. Albert instinctively struck Milly back but his drinking buddies pulled him back and Milly pounced on Maire, straddled her on the floor and pummeled her face. The bouncers grabbed both girls and Maire gave Sabine a look of helplessness. Milly rushed out, if a pregnant woman could rush, got in a cab and went home.

Sabine came out and lit a cigarette and handed it to Maire.

“I told you this wouldn’t be good. You gotta make right with your sister Maire. Men come and go, sisters not so much.”

So, Maire made her way to Milly’s.

“If you know what’s best for you, leave,” Milly warned.

“Let me explain.”

“Leave.”

“Not until I explain.”

She should have left. Milly in a rage took a knife and soon Maire’s dead body was dragged into the freezer. The next morning Fred and Milly got to work using the bone saw and grinder, and Maire was packed into the bombers.

The bloodshed didn’t end there. There was one more score to settle. Albert came back after a few days and started with his fist. Pregnancy hindered Milly and her ability to try to hold her own was compromised. Knocked down, Albert kicked her belly. Arriving to the butcher shop early, Fred swiftly took the curved boning knife and sliced Albert up from the groin. While they went to work carving Albert up, Milly felt something the labor starting and hurried to help Fred finish the job. Albert and Maire were ground up with bone in and packaged as dog food.

While it was unusual that a Chinese man would be visiting a married woman at the nursery unit of the Grace Hospital, these were wartime days and the unusual was often overlooked.

“What do we tell people?” Milly asked.

“Tell them he enlisted. That he joined the war effort,” Fred said.

“No one will believe that,” Milly said.

“They will believe because it will be easier to believe that than the truth.”

Milly and Fred patriotically decorated the butcher shop and hung a big picture of Albert in the window proclaiming him a hero. They told the people at the factory, who all had witnessed the fiasco at The Grand that night, that Maire was full of shame and went back to Bainbridge to live with her parents.

It would be easy to say that after all they’d been through that Fred and Milly would’ve fallen in love. They did fall in love. But not with each other. They fell in love with the justice they’d discovered. After the baby was born, and the butcher job flourished, Milly took in a young girl from the factory who was willing to babysit and she spent her evenings back at The Grand, back in the dancehalls watching the factory workers dance, drink, and fight. Occasionally joining in herself.

Edward Jackson writes: DM du Jour published my very first short story back in 2015. Since then I have quit my day job I hated, earned and MFA from the Northeast Ohio consortium program and have published around two dozen stories, essays, articles, and book reviews in a variety of publications including Coffin Bell, Misery Tourism, Salmon Creek Review, and The Gay & Lesbian Review. That first story in DM du Jour was a shot in the dark and since then, my writing life has taken a turn I never saw coming.