by Nancy Isaak
Yet, ironically, it was a deer that turned out to be the most dangerous of all our animal neighbors.
During an early-morning run, a 16-year old from Morro Bay who had joined the Locals two weeks previously, made the mistake of jogging between two antlered males. Apparently, they were rutting, banging their huge heads against each other in an attempt to attract a female. This time, however, they acquired a human—caught between them, skewering his middle with their horns.
That the boy’s vital organs were missed was pure luck.
When he was carried into the Medical Clinic, Jay said that he was spouting blood everywhere. Without a doubt, the kid was extremely lucky to be alive.
* * * *
Because of the big cat sightings and the increase in the coyote population, we moved all of the horses inside of the compound walls. And, during the daytime, when they were grazing outside of the compound, we were always careful to post guards.
It was not unusual now to be riding along and suddenly look over to see something pacing you—a dark shape, hidden in the shadows. Whether mountain lion or coyote, it would definitely be hunting, waiting for that one mistake—when it would strike.
Poor Kanga was also confined to the inside of the compound walls.
Like his wilder cousin, the cat loved to hunt, and could often be seen skulking through the grass after some unfortunate bird or lizard. Still, Xavier would be heart-broken if a coyote got his kitty, so we all knew to keep the doors in the wall firmly shut.
In some ways, Kanga had become our tribe’s mascot. When Xavier was out surfing with his brother, the calico was often known to visit the Medical Clinic. He would jump on the beds of the sick or hurt, nuzzling against them, purring.
Guys even began bringing him treats—small cat chews that they would find scavenging or bits of their own meal, saved just for him. Other Locals would carry him on their shoulders as they moved about the camp, passing him onto someone else when they went outside the walls.
Kanga had come a long way from being the feral calico Nate had rescued from Agoura Hills.
He might have been Xavier’s cat.
But he was the tribe’s as well.
* * * *
Apart from the wild animals, our next big enemy was the weather.
Throughout April and well into May, we battled it every day. Rain fell for hours on end, flooding the Point, and making us wet, cold, and miserable.
As a result, there were mud slides all along the coastline, making travel near to impossible for days at a time. Whether by bike or by horse, movement along the Pacific Coast Highway had ground to a slow crawl. It was difficult to bike through the mud, which—in some places—was over a foot high across the road. And when we rode the horses, their hooves would become so heavy with the goo that we’d be forced to dismount and clean them off every few miles.
Part of me was secretly happy about the rain and the mud and the flooding. My worries for Jacob and his team were intense; knowing that they could have been delayed because of the bad weather was something that I could, at least, hang onto as a possible excuse.
But when April’s weather transitioned into the warmth and sunshine of May and Jacob still didn’t return home—it felt like my heart would break.
* * * *
To keep myself from—frankly—breaking down, I threw myself into the Council and the tribe.
The rain had been hard on the Point and there was a lot that needed fixing. By mid-May we were dealing with a massive growth of vegetation that split roads and cracked sidewalks. There were trees, so heavy with water-soaked branches that they leaned over precariously, separating from the soggy soil.
Meanwhile, many of the Point Dume houses were leaking.
A year and a half without repairs, even the most expensive of mansions was looking weathered. There were holes in roofs, cracks developing in door and window jambs, and plugged eaves collapsing from the weight of water-logged leaves and branches.
Down at Pavilions, meanwhile, standing water on the roof had caused it to collapse. The whole thing had come down one stormy night, folding in on itself as it crashed through to the floor below.
* * * *
It became obvious that—if we didn’t do some maintenance—other collapses across Point Dume would become inevitable. So, a team of kids were chosen—ones who had some understanding of construction. It was to be their job to check over all the houses that we lived in and repair them, where needed. After our homes were secure, the team would then move onto checking the rest of the buildings on the Point.
Each time I saw the construction team going about their business, I was reminded of Jude. No doubt, if she’d been around, she would have been leading the repairs.
I wondered where she was—why she hadn’t come home.
And I hoped that—wherever Jude was—that she was watching over Jacob for me.
* * * *
Frank’s farm also suffered from the constant rain; his fields had become bogs, the water inches high. When the flooding finally receded, much of Frank’s crop was covered in fungus and mildew. As I walked the land with him one day, he pointed out squashes splitting open and cabbage turning black and limp.
“We’ve still got some zucchini over there on that higher piece of ground,” he told me. “And over there—that little patch has tomatoes and cucumbers.”
“But you’ve definitely lost the cabbage?” I asked.
He nodded. “Most of the squash, too. We’re working to bring in what we can, but we’ve lost an awful lot.”
“How are your seed supplies?”
“Not good,” Frank admitted. “We’d planned on harvesting seeds from a lot of the plants, but they weren’t fully developed, yet. Honestly—it makes it even more important for Jacob’s team to bring back the seeds I asked for.”
I looked down at the ground, lifting up a wet piece of sod with my boot. It immediately split apart, splashing down into a large puddle of water. “We’ll find you more seeds. What you’re doing is important to the survival of the tribe.”
“Are you sending out another expedition?”
This was not a question that I wanted to answer just yet. I was saved from doing so by Peyton, who was splashing between rows of squishy tomatoes toward us.
It was bizarre, looking at Peyton now.
Throughout high school, I had known her as a Fox—rich and beautiful, her nails and hair pristine, her skin flawless. Now here she was, coming toward me—wearing a pair of denim overalls, her hair in pigtails, mud on her face and under her fingernails.
The thing she was wearing that was most odd, however—was her smile.
“Hey, Kaylee.”
“Hey, yourself. New kind of mud bath?”
She nodded. “Sucks the impurities right out, but it’s a pain to get out of the crack in your ass.”
Frank leaned over and kissed her forehead. “That’s why you have me.”
Peyton grinned up at him. “Don’t give away our playbook!”
I loved seeing Peyton like this; for the first time since I’d met her, she looked truly happy.
“Where’s Lance?” she asked, turning around.
“Where else? With his harem,” Frank joked.
* * * *
Peyton walked with me across the field; as she did, she pointed toward a pile of wooden boxes off to the side. “We managed to save a few crates of tomatoes. They’re not very big, but Sophia says she’ll be able to can them.”
“It’s amazing what that girl can do in a kitchen, especially when you consider that she doesn’t have any electricity.”
“She has a team working with her now. Mostly guys who go to that religion, Sunday service thing she has down at the Nature Preserve. They’ve canned pretty much everything we brought them.”
“It sounds like you and Sophia are becoming friends.”
Peyton stopped and put her hands on her hips. She had lost a lot of her curves during these last few months. Her boobs were still the same size—
since they were fake—but she’d lost almost all of her baby fat. And I noticed that the tan she wore was actually real for once—and not found in a bottle.
I thought she’d never looked prettier.
“That girl might be able to make a damn good frittata,” Peyton said, “but she’s still a complete whack-job.”
“So, what you’re saying is that you and Sophia are not BFF's,” I teased. “No love lost between you?”
“I stopped loving people when I was 7-years old,” Peyton snorted. “Not worth my time.”
“You don’t love Frank?”
“Not even,” she said, wiping her hands, as if to emphasize her point.
But—I knew she was lying.
* * * *
We found Lance right where Frank had said—with his harem.
The kid was with Lily and Hannah; the three of them were drying off squashes and placing them in a wooden box. As they worked, the two girls kept peeking at Lance—obviously crushing on him.
“That’s pretty much all of the squash we managed to bring in,” Peyton told me. “We dry it off to try and keep the mold away.”
“I didn’t realize that Lily and Hannah were helping out here.”
Peyton sniffed. “Those girls won’t leave Lance alone. They follow him around like puppies.”
“Speaking of puppies, is that dirty mound of mud actually Pugly?!”
The little dog was snuffling around at Lance’s feet. He was up to his belly in mud, his short legs completely immersed.
“That dog’s about as much use as those girls. Chases around the mice and squirrels, but his mouth is too small to actually catch anything.”
Lance chose that moment to look up at me and smile shyly. He was such a fragile-looking kid, with skinny arms and legs and hair like blond silk. In so many ways, he physically reminded me of Peyton. They looked like mother and son, right down to the color of their hair.
Except—of course—Peyton’s color came out of a bottle.
“So,” I whispered to Peyton, “you using that kid, too?”
She looked over at Lance, unable to hide her deep affection.
“Couldn’t care less about him,” she lied.
* * * *
The rest of my afternoon was spent at the Medical Clinic.
“There are so many guys sick right now,” I commented, looking down at the rows of occupied beds. “This reminds me of that bug that hit us up in Agoura.”
I was helping a young kid to sit up, while Jay listened to his heart and lungs with a stethoscope. Satisfied with what she was hearing, Jay put her stethoscope away and turned to me. “You can let him lie back down now.”
Gently, I placed the kid back down on his bed, arranging a blanket around him. He had to have been about ten, a little slip of a boy named Bucky—with dark rings around his eyes and a smile on his face.
“You’re going to be fine,” Jay told him. “It sounds like your lungs are clearing up and your temperature is almost back to normal.”
Porter walked past, glancing down at the kid. “It’s because you’ve got the best doctor in here,” he told the boy. “Not as pretty as me, right Bucky—but definitely, smarter.”
Jay sniffed at Porter, pretending to be offended. “It’s true that I’m smarter than Porter,” she told Bucky. “And he might be prettier, but I have nicer eyes.”
“You have beautiful eyes,” said Bucky.
Laughing, Jay reached down and poked him gently in the shoulder. “Big flirt!”
* * * *
“You like him.”
“Bucky? I adore him,” Jay admitted, a few minutes later. “The kid is really sweet.”
“You know that I’m not talking about Bucky. I’m talking about Porter.”
With a sigh, Jay turned toward me. “We’ve discussed this before. It doesn’t matter if I like Porter. I’m not doing anything that will hurt Jude.”
I grinned. “Seems like only yesterday that we were running for our lives from Jude.”
“Yeah, well…the world has changed and so has Jude.” Jay’s face suddenly fell, obviously thinking about the expedition team. “Any news?”
“Nothing,” I said, sadly. “We’ll keep on sending out teams, but I just don’t know what else to do.”
“They’ll show up,” she said. “I have no doubt.”
“Neither do I.”
So, how come I didn’t sound as certain as Jay?
* * * *
“Get your hand off of my forehead!”
“You seem a little hot.”
“Because it’s hot in here,” I told Jay. “I’m not sick, so leave me alone!”
We had just finished handing out medication to those boys who needed it and were now sitting in the little room that Jay and Porter used as an office. Usually it was bright and cheery, but its many windows were dreary with raindrops today—the sky outside dark and gray.
“Any coughing?” Jay asked.
I pushed her hand away and took a sip of the soda she’d given me. “Just at Frank’s farm—when I got a whiff of the fertilizer they were using.”
Jay sat back in her chair and picked up her own soda. “They’ve got fertilizer?”
“No, they don’t,” I said. “So, you can use your own imagination as to how they’re fertilizing the fields.”
“Eww!”
“Precisely.”
We giggled for a bit at that, before finally turning back to the sickness that was running through the tribe.
“Seriously, Kaylee,” Jay said, “we’re closing in on seventy-five percent of the guys who have been affected in some way or another.”
“But no one’s died.”
“And I want it to stay that way. But some of the guys are really, really sick and we’re definitely running out of meds. If Jacob’s team doesn’t return soon with a new supply, we’re absolutely going to have to find some medicine someplace.”
“It’s weird that none of the girls have gotten sick, don’t you think?” I commented.
She shrugged. “Maybe not. Porter and I were talking about it and we think that it might have something to do with us not living in the compound.”
“You think the sickness is here somewhere?”
“I don’t know. But it could be that by living in your old house, we girls are kind of quarantining ourselves.”
“Do you think that I should make it a real quarantine? Not let any girls come into the compound at all.”
“That’d be pretty difficult,” Jay said. “I mean, I have to be here at the Clinic. Porter is still getting over his own sickness and Connor’s not here. I understand why it was important for him to go on the expedition but—without Connor—it’s really just me left who’s one hundred percent okay, so I really can’t stay away.”
“And I don’t think Sophia would want to stop cooking for the guys,” I added. “That’s her life right now.”
“That and Josh,” grinned Jay.
I giggled. “They’ll wind up married, I have no doubt.”
Making sure that nobody was close by, Jay leaned in and whispered to me. “Do you think they’ve done it?”
“Absolutely not! Sophia’s still way too conservative for something like that,” I whispered back. “But I’ll bet she’s saying rosaries for all the nights she’s placed a pillow between her legs and thought of her Joshie.”
We both burst out into gales of laughter.
“What’s so funny?” Porter came in and sat down in a chair by the window.
“Nothing,” said Jay. “We’ve just got a little cabin fever from being stuck indoors for so long.”
“Roger that,” Porter yawned. “Stupid rain.”
I took another sip of my soda. As I swallowed, some of it went down the wrong way. When I coughed, Porter immediately sat up, peering over at me. “You okay?”
“Stop it—both of you!” I said. “You guys are making me paranoid. Every time I cough now, I’m wondering if it’s going to be my turn.”
“So
rry,” said Porter, sitting back in his chair and reaching for the soda that Jay handed him. “I’m just so tired of all this, you know. Every day more and more guys come in and I—we—can only do so much. I just wish that I had more…”
“…education,” finished Jay.
Porter nodded. “It’s scary to think that this is all that we know. I mean, there’s not anybody older to teach us more medicine. It’s just us now.”
“And you’re doing an amazing job,” I said. “Even with everybody getting sick, nobody has died and most of the guys are back doing normal stuff.”
“I guess,” he muttered, not quite believing it.
“And you heard what Kieran said the last time he came back from the water tower. The same sickness is going through the Crazies in the Valley, except they’ve got guys dying. So, you two must be doing something right.”
Porter yawned. “Whatever.”
* * * *
As I left the Clinic, walking back to the mansion, I thought about everyone who had been sick these last weeks. Without a doubt, we had been very lucky that nobody had died. Some of the guys had come very close—Ethan and Wester included—but, somehow, they had all managed to pull through.
Of the guys who’d been sick, Kieran and Pauly had suffered the most. I had spent hours at both of their bedsides—terrified that they would die.
Kieran had actually been recovering, so much so that Jay had thought he was on the mend. But two days after Jacob’s team had left the Point, Kieran took a turn for the worse. He began vomiting and his temperature rose to a dangerous degree.
Cammie—like the rest of us—had been terrified that he would die. She spent every waking moment in a chair by Kieran’s bedside, helping to feed and clean him—to empty his bedpans and force-feed him meds.
