Free Broken Ground by Karen Halvorsen Schreck Page A

I’m almost there when one of the officials spots me. He rushes over, blocks my way. “What do you think you’re doing, Miss?”
    Mrs., I almost say. Or ma’am, if you prefer . But then I remember what I want and consider my best plan: Make him a certain ally. I smile at the man. Beneath the brim of his snappy hat, his features reveal themselves as those I’ve come to think of as particularly Californian, handsome yet generic, like the Hollywood stars I’ve seen on cinema posters throughout the years. His face has the broad appeal of buttered bread or vanilla ice cream—deliciously palatable, easily digested. Still smiling, but suddenly aware of my disheveled state, I pass my hands over my hair, gone lank from the long trip. “My suitcase might be on that train. I need to find it.”
    â€œWell.” The man flashes what I suppose is his winning smile. “There’s government work going on here. Can’t let you interrupt that.” To my amazement, he chucks me under the chin. “FDR wouldn’t like it, see. I’d have to tell him about you, and he’d take real offense.” As proof of his connection to the president, he flashes a document bearing a government seal. “So take your basket, Little Red Riding Hood, and hurry on back to your seat. I’ll rustle up your suitcase if it’s there. But we got to get these people boarded. They’re going back to where they belong, courtesy of the United States government. Back to Mexico.”
    â€œWhy?” It’s risky to ask—I might irritate him. But I’m curious.
    â€œRepatriation, that’s why. It’s what these people have wanted and needed for a long time—a free ride back to their Mother Country. We’re giving it to them. And we’re making more jobs for Americans to boot.”
    I think of all those people in the Hoovervilles, U.S. citizens with nowhere else to go. The old man sprawled on the train platform. Edna Faye. “Oh. Well, that’s good, then, but . . . you won’t forget my suitcase?” I try not to sound pushy. Needy, maybe. But not pushy.
    The man glances at something behind me. “Looks like you’re missing something other than a suitcase. You might want to scoot on back there before you lose that, too.”
    I whirl around. My pocketbook. I sat on it to keep it safe—the insurance check inside, along with my earnings and Alice Everly’s address—and then I left it right out in the open for anyone to steal. You can’t tell from looking. Anyone might need extra loot. Anyone might be desperate enough. Any of the Mexicans. I bolt back to the bench.
    That’s where I’m waiting some twenty minutes later when the Mexicans begin to board the train, and the man, handsome as a movie star, friend by proxy of FDR, swaggers toward me, my suitcase in his hand.

PART II
September 1934–April 1935

FOUR
    M y dorm room door bangs open and my roommate bursts in, her soft blond curls a tangle of leaves and twigs, her suntanned arms filled with flowers. Helen St. Pierre inclines toward theatrical entrances, and exits, too; makes sense, as she’s a member of the drama club. Like me, she has declared herself an education major, and she hails from Oklahoma (albeit Heritage Hills, a posh Oklahoma City neighborhood). Our home state is where the similarities between us end. Just look at us now. I’m in my nightgown, working at my desk, which faces Helen’s by our turret window, hot tea gone cold in my cup. The room and I smell of nothing so much as dusty books and stuffy air. Dazed and bleary, I’ve been studying all morning. I’ve forgotten to eat lunch again; I may have forgotten to wash my face and brush my teeth. My hair, raked by my fingers as I work, is most certainly a frizzy brown mess. Helen, decked out from head to toe in blue and gold (school colors, down to her saddle shoes), smells of