by K. M. Fawkes
Anna was finishing her second bowl of oatmeal. After not eating in several days, and undergoing a painful surgery, her hunger was ravenous. “What about Garcia’s place in Ashland?”
“I’ve thought about it, but it doesn’t seem likely,” he said. “Why go back there with the kids in tow? It was too dangerous when it was just me and him.”
“He could have gone to Vanessa’s,” Anna offered.
Now this was a real possibility. At least there, Lee and the kids would have had a safe place to stay without much risk of being found by the militant types that now seemed to have overrun northern Maine. Lee had the same basic needs as any other person—walls to protect against the December snows and a clean bed to sleep on—and like anyone else he would be drawn to the place where he could most easily get them.
“It’s not a given,” said Brad, nudging his plate away, “but it’s the most likely. I think we should start there before going anywhere else.”
Some of the color seemed to be coming back into Anna’s face. She seemed to have been invigorated by the prospect of finding her son.
“What are we going to do when we find them?” she asked.
Brad shrugged, feeling a stiffness in his shoulders. “Hadn’t thought that far yet. We don’t even know if he’s there, and I’d always sort of assumed finding him would be the hardest part.”
Anna frowned. “How are we going to get there?”
“That’s what I’m about to find out.”
On entering the dining hall that morning Brad had spent about ten minutes quietly examining a map of the area that had been pinned to the wall above the condiments table. Now, with a better idea of where they were located, he approached Marley after breakfast. She and Emma were standing together beneath a gilded framed painting of a scientist in a long coat and sweater, whispering and laughing. They stopped talking abruptly as Brad approached.
“I don’t want it to seem like I’m abusing my privileges,” he said, “especially since we only just arrived. But I do have a request, and it’s not a small one.”
Emma raised a brow in suspicion, but Marley smiled, her face inscrutable, and asked, “What do you need?”
“We need to borrow one of your vehicles. Or at least I do.” Brad still hadn’t made up his mind whether he wanted Anna to come with him or not; it might be safer if she stayed here. “The place I’m headed is about two days’ hike away. I’d get there a lot faster if I had a truck.”
Marley frowned uncertainly. “I assume this is in reference to the situation we discussed last night.”
“Yes. Only a fool would leave the safety of the dam unless it was urgent; you know that.” He threw a glance at Emma, sensing her frustration at being left out of the conversation. “You know I wouldn’t be asking for a truck unless I thought lives were at stake.”
“I can vouch for his character,” said Emma, “if that helps.”
“I’m not worried about your intentions,” said Marley. “I might have only known you for about twelve hours, but you don’t seem like the sort of person who would lie to me for the sake of absconding with our property.” She paused, hesitation and worry apparent in the lines of her face.
“What, then?”
“It’s just that I’m not sure I want anyone associated with the Renaissance getting involved in trouble out there,” Marley said. “I understand the nature of the mission you’re going on, or think I do. You want your kids back. Getting them back may require physical violence, even bloodshed. I don’t see how you can avoid that.”
“And you don’t want to be part of it,” said Brad. “I get that—”
“We’ve lived here peacefully since the collapse, living mostly unnoticed,” Marley said. “A search-and-rescue mission that may end in murder risks drawing unwanted attention from the worst elements, and some of those elements are likely to be armed. If they marched on the dam, we would have only limited power to defend ourselves. Our whole project—and, potentially, the future of the human race—depends on our ability to live and work here unnoticed.”
Brad understood the importance of maintaining a low profile; he didn’t want her to think he didn’t. It was one of those occasions where he had to weigh his own needs—or rather, the needs of the children under his care—against the needs of a larger community. For him, the needs of Sammy and Martha would always come first.
Marley seemed to sense this, for she added in a more conciliatory tone, “Look, I know how important this is to you, but it’s the group’s decision to make, since their resources are at stake. We’ll put it to a vote.”
By now the clatter of silverware and clinking of glasses was beginning to subside as community members rose from the table and placed their empty plates in the receptacles to be washed. As Marley strode from table to table, Emma turned to him and said, “I’ll be honest: you were the last person I ever expected to turn up here.” She still retained that posh trans-Atlantic accent and that air of being perfectly poised that he had once found so charming.
“I’m as surprised as you, believe me,” Brad replied. “The entire past five months have felt like an unending nightmare,” he said. “I don’t think this is the life any of us wanted for ourselves.”
It was the subtlest of gestures, but Brad noticed that Emma moved a fraction of an inch closer, as if worried she was going to lose him again. “Maybe it is a dream, and we should be devoting our resources to figuring out how to wake up.”
By now Marley was returning, leading as many members of the community as weren’t otherwise occupied. Anna emerged from the crowd and walked—with apparent ease, he noticed—over to Brad’s side.
“What are we going to do if they won’t let us borrow one of their cars?” she asked in a low voice.
“We’d have to go on foot,” Brad replied. “I’m not worried, though. I think they’ll let us.”
“You have more faith in them than I do. I don’t think they trust us.”
“They saved your life last night, so that would surprise me.”
Marley raised a hand to motion for silence, addressing the group at large. “Here’s the situation: Brad and Anna are wanting to borrow one of the vehicles so that they can find Anna’s son and another little girl who were kidnapped. As a community, do we have a moral responsibility to assist them, or do we risk provoking a larger conflict that could endanger the Renaissance?”
This was a lot to consider, and for a minute or two the group stood in silence as though weighing the given options. William was the first to speak.
“I think the question is what kind of community do we want to be?” he said. “It seems to me we have a mandate to help the poor and children and enslaved, whenever possible. I don’t think borrowing one of our vehicles is asking too much.”
“No,” said Gregory, the dishwasher, a portly man with bronze skin and a full head of thick, curly hair, “and I would gladly go with them if the community permitted. Granted, I don’t know the whole situation or how dangerous these people are, but I worry that if you try to take them alone you’ll end up getting yourselves killed. It would make more sense if we formed a unit.”
There were loud murmurs of agreement. This wasn’t the sort of response Brad had been expecting; he had imagined himself having to persuade them just to let him take the truck.
“We can talk about that later,” said Marley. “For now I want to see a show of hands: how many of you agree that we should grant them the use of one of our vehicles?”
This time, the response was immediate and unanimous: with the exception of Marley, every single person in the room raised a hand.
“It’s settled, then,” said Marley. “We’ll grant you the use of the truck—”
“And some limited ammunition, if you need it,” said Gregory loudly. Seeing the bemused look on Marley’s face, he added, “It couldn’t hurt. No way will it be traced back to us.”
“I still think it would make more sense if a few of us went with them,” said William. “We could f
orm a raiding party, recover the kids and bring them here.”
Again, most of the room murmured enthusiastic agreement. Brad felt a flood of emotions he wasn’t entirely sure how to process. He had almost given up having any faith in the goodness of his fellow humans, but the amount of support they were showing for two kids they had never met couldn’t fail to move him. Incredulous, he stole a glance over at Anna, who was fighting back tears.
“I’m sure your support is appreciated,” said Marley, “but in the end it’s up to them whether or not they want company.”
“I wish we could load up the truck and take all of you with us.” Brad’s voice rose over the din of conversation and everyone fell silent. “But I don’t want anyone else risking their lives for our sakes. I can’t speak for Anna, but I think it would be better for everyone involved if we went in alone.”
“I don’t care if I die,” said Anna, “but I’ll be damned if I let the rest of you sacrifice yourselves. And beyond that, if we do manage to make it back alive, I want the kids to have a place they can come back to. I don’t want to have to explain to them that there were a lot of really lovely people here until they died trying to rescue them.”
There was a smattering of macabre laughter: one of the more surprising side effects of the pandemic was that people were willing to laugh about death in a way they hadn’t been before.
Turning to Marley, Brad added, “Not that we would want to intrude for very long on your hospitality. I would like the kids to meet you, though. I want them to grow up knowing that there are still good people in the world.”
“Tell them they can always flee here if they need to,” said Emma. “I hope they’ll find this a place of refuge.”
Anna’s mood had certainly improved since the night before. With an exuberant gesture she reached back behind her neck and unclasped a necklace on a slender silver chain. Brad had never looked too closely at it, but now he could see there was a small medal attached. The medal bore the image of a man holding a child. Both man and child wore what appeared to be haloes around their heads.
“Here,” she said to Marley, “I want you to hold onto this for me. Let it serve as our guarantee that we plan to return.”
“It’s lovely,” said Marley. “What is it?”
“It’s a medal commemorating St. Anthony of Padua, who fled into the desert after the fall of Rome along with a few followers. They hoped to rebuild civilization through prayer and writing. My sister, Emily, gave it to me for my sixteenth birthday.”
Looking genuinely moved by the gesture, Marley placed the necklace in her coat pocket. “I’ll hold onto it until you get back. I actually wanted to give you something, as well.” She paused.
Brad waited, half-expecting her to offer him one of her high-powered rifles or the map that he had been impatiently analyzing from a distance for much of the conversation.
“I’m making an executive decision here,” Marley said, “but I expect it to have the community’s full support. When the four of you return, I would like to offer you a permanent place in the Renaissance. Anyone who comes to us looking for help, we offer them food and clothing and sometimes medical care, if they need it. But sometimes it’s obvious that they wouldn’t be a good fit here. Some of them we’ve had to send away. And I know I haven’t known the two of you for very long, but you’ve more than proven yourselves worthy of living with us. Everyone will benefit from having you here.”
The crowd voiced its approval, Emma adding above the clamor, “And as someone who’s known Brad for ten years now, I would be lobbying for his inclusion even if Marley was against it. He’s good people and we need him.”
As William led a spirited cheer and the rest of the group joined in before surging forward to hug them, Brad and Anna exchanged glances. The look they shared seemed to say that no, they weren’t dreaming anymore. They were really here.
Chapter 14
Brad and Anna spent much of the rest of the day preparing to head out the following morning. After a vociferous debate with some of the other members of the group, they decided to approach the lake house via a disused and overgrown road that had been built twenty years before for a planned subdivision that was never built. True to his word, William loaned Brad one of their hunting rifles and a supply of ammunition. “This ought to be enough to take out a single guy,” William said, and Brad thanked him, though he worried that William was underestimating his father’s persistence.
After changing into fresh clothes, provided by Gregory, for dinner that night they were served sweet potato casserole and a slab of ham from a pig that had recently been butchered, and toward the end of the meal Emma emerged from the kitchen carrying a freshly baked pound cake.
Because the supply of eggs was running low, she had substituted apple sauce, which gave the cake an unexpected flavor that took some getting used to. But it had been so long since anyone had eaten cake that no one complained, and both Brad and Anna retired to bed that night with full stomachs and full hearts.
“I still can’t figure out what we did to deserve this,” Brad said as he laid the set of keys Marley had given him on the nightstand. “Friends and food and a warm place to sleep?” Brad shook his head incredulously. “All it took was the world ending for me to appreciate the little things.”
Laughing, Anna pulled off her shirt in a swift motion and kicked it across the room. The two of them had been living and sleeping together for long enough that Anna apparently no longer thought twice about removing her clothes in front of him. Still, this was the first time she had ever done it and the gesture surprised Brad, who let out an involuntary gasp and turned away.
“Sorry,” said Anna, slipping into a clean button-down emblazoned with colorful penguins. “I guess I should’ve warned you before I stripped in front of you.”
“It’s fine,” Brad replied, a little too loudly.
Anna eyed him regretfully for a minute, as though wanting to have a conversation she knew they were both too tired to have. “I’ll change in the bathroom next time,” she said finally, before turning the light out.
“Thanks.” Brad rolled over on his side and counted to twenty, then thirty, then forty, waiting for the awkwardness to subside. By the time he finished counting, Anna was already asleep.
Chapter 15
When they awoke the next morning, the sun hadn’t yet risen over the fir-dotted hills to the east. It was just after 5:00am and from the narrow window Brad could see that a cold fog had descended over the river, while the woods lay dark and silent. “Is there a particular reason we had to leave before sunrise?” asked Anna, rising stiffly.
“Three hours from now everyone else will be up,” said Brad. “You don’t want to be trapped here for the rest of the day saying goodbyes, answering questions, telling them you’ll see them again.”
“Point taken.” Picking up her shirt off the floor, she strode to the door. “Any other reasons?”
“We’ve got a better chance of surprising Lee if we show up early. He talks a lot of guff about waking up with the dawn but I’ve never seen him out of bed before 8:00am. If we’re lucky we might even be able to get the kids and get out of there before he rolls out of bed.”
Murmuring thoughtfully, Anna left the room to get dressed.
For a tense minute Brad wavered in hesitation, staring from the keys on the desk to the rifle that stood in the corner. He could leave now while she was getting ready and set off on the rescue mission without her. If she came with him, she risked slowing him down or (God forbid) getting shot again. But he knew realistically there was no chance of keeping her out of the truck; she was coming with him regardless.
Truly, he found her commitment impressive, not least because she was still recovering from a serious leg wound—despite the painkillers Marley’s crew had provided her with, she had to still be in deep discomfort. It looked like her desperation to get the kids back was overriding it, for now at least, and Brad reflected that perhaps that primal desire to get her son bac
k could come in useful.
Six minutes later the door opened again and Anna came back in, looking freshly showered. Brad, who had showered the night before, had changed into cargo pants and a white camo shirt that William had given him.
“You about ready?” she asked, looking serenely unaware of his inner conflict.
“The sooner we leave, the better.”
With a renewed sense of resolve Brad reached for the keys on the nightstand. Outside, the first birds were beginning to sing.
“Say goodbye to your room and let’s hope to God this isn’t the last time we see it,” Brad said. “We’ll come back in triumph tonight, bringing the kids with us.”
Driving a few miles below the now-defunct speed limit and following the route that they had chosen the day before, the two reached the wood surrounding the lake within half an hour. Bringing the car to a halt about a quarter-mile from Vanessa’s lakeside home, Brad emerged from the car and motioned with rifle in hand for Anna to follow him on foot. A dirt path lined with hornbeams and cedars curved broadly in the direction of Vanessa’s house, and as they reached the end of the trail Brad was pleased to find Lee’s truck parked in an overgrown yard outside.
Blood pounded in his ears as they strode soundlessly up the walk onto the front patio, his anxiety vastly outweighed by the hope of getting to see the two kids again. Still, his hands shook unsteadily as he clutched the rifle and reached for the doorknob, which turned out to be locked. If Lee really was here, as he appeared to be, what could they possibly have to say to each other? It was bizarre to think that a lifetime of mutual hostility could be culminating in these next few moments.
“We can’t get in through the front door,” he said in a hushed voice. “We’ll have to try some other way.”
“What about climbing in through a window?” Anna didn’t look remotely nervous; maybe being shot at point-blank range did that to you. “Or breaking one.”
