Page 90 of The Homewreckers
“Yeah, bring her back! But this time, let’s take it slow.”
Trae motioned for the driver to begin backing. “Straighten it out some,” he called, walking alongside the driver. “A little to the left. That’s good. All right. Now, straight back.”
The trailer with the new dumpster inched backward, past the charred patch of land where the previous dumpster had stood.
“Keep coming,” Hattie called, waving her arms over her head. “You’ve got another fifty feet.”
“You’re good,” Trae told the driver.
“Ten more feet,” Hattie called.
The trailer kept backing.
“Almost there,” Trae coached.
“Whoa!” Hattie waved her arms over her head and stepped out of the way. The truck’s brakes squealed as it halted. Hydraulic arms began lifting the container.
A sickening crack sounded as the earth beneath the trailer’s wheels seemed to cave inward.
BOOM!
The container began to slide down the ramp and into a deepening pit in the grassy ground.
At first, Hattie was too shocked to move or speak. She took a few faltering steps forward, afraid that the earth beneath her feet would also collapse. The dumpster had come to rest, nose down, in some kind of concrete pit in the ground.
The truck driver was out of the cab now, and he and Trae stared at the scene in disbelief.
Mo’s cameraman moved forward, too, capturing the scene as it unfolded.
“What the hell is that?” Trae yelled, pointing at the pit.
“That,” the truck driver said, gingerly walking up to the edge, both hands clamped over his nose and mouth as he stared down into the abyss, “is a septic tank.”
42Buried Secrets
Hattie gagged and staggered away as an overwhelming stench filled the air.
“Oh, hell no,” Leetha said loudly. “Momo, you know I did not sign up for this.”
“Oh my God,” Mo muttered. “And I thought this day couldn’t get any worse.”
The cameraman looked at him for direction and he signaled for him to keep filming. “Get in there, man. It doesn’t get any grittier than this.”
Mo pointed at Hattie, who’d pulled her shirttail up to cover her nose. “Talk.”
Hattie dropped her shirttail and followed his direction. “That has to be the original septic tank on this property. I think the city ran sewer lines down Chatham Avenue years and years ago. At least we know it’s not, uh, active.” She turned to Cass.
“What do we do now?”
“Who knows? We’ve uncovered all kinds of weird, uh, shit, I mean, stuff, over the years, but I think this is the first time we’ve crashed a dumpster into an old septic tank.”
She walked out of camera range and began working the contacts in her phone. In the meantime, the driver went back to the cab of his truck and retrieved his own phone and proceeded to walk slowly around the dumpster, documenting the carnage. “My boss ain’t gonna believe this.”
The trucking company supervisor’s name was Milt. Hattie knew this because his name was embroidered on the breast pocket of his work shirt. He’d arrived at the scene prepared with a rolled-up T-shirt fastened around the lower half of his face, and now he was assessing the situation.
“Here’s what happened,” Milt said, turning, as Mo requested, toward the camera. “There was an old manhole cover right here.” He stomped his foot on the ground to emphasize the point. “It was covered up with probably twenty years of dirt and leaves and what have you.” He pointed to the dumpster driver, who stood uneasily at his side. “You managed to back the trailer with that dumpster over just this exact spot, and damn if the whole thing didn’t collapse, manhole, rebar, concrete, and all.”
Hattie had also been coached. “How are you going to get the dumpster out of there? And what do we do with the old septic tank once it’s out?”
