by N. C. Reed
“Have Tandi call me on the radio when you're ready to go back and I 'll walk you over. Just wait here inside the door until I can get here, okay?”
“Okay,” she smiled. “I…it's not too much trouble?”
“No trouble at all, I promise,” he assured her. “See you later.”
“Okay.”
-
“ARRGH!”
“One more big push Christina!” Patricia called. “One more and that should do it! That's it. . .push. Push!”
“I am pushing dammit!” Christina yelled. “Oh my God I'm going to die!”
“No, you're not,” Kaitlin promised. “You're doing great, Chris. Just. . .keep. . .okay, I got. . .there!”
Christina collapsed on the bed as the source of the constant pressure on her stopped. Nate looked down the bed to his sister who was holding a bundle of towels in her hand. A sudden cry from the bundle assured everyone that the child was breathing and had good lungs.
“It's a boy!” Kaitlin told them, grinning. “Say hello to your son, Christina,” she smiled gently as she took the baby and settled him in the mother's arms.
“My son,” Christina smiled tiredly, exhaustion evident on her face. “My beautiful boy.”
“Hold him for a minute and then I 'll take him back and clean him better,” Kaitlin told her. “Once I've checked him out I 'll give him back. We already move a baby bed in here so he can sleep near you. I 'll be here with you tonight as well.”
“Thank you so much,” Christina's eyes welled with tears. “I'm so lucky to have you.”
“You're welcome dear,” Kaitlin took Baby Boy Caudell to clean him.
“Hey, you're lucky to have me too, right?” Nate asked, his eyes following Kaitlin and his son. “Right? Chris?” He looked down at his wife to see her sleeping, her features relaxed for the first time in hours.
“She 'll be awake again in a few minutes,” Patricia told him. “We still have a little work to do so why don't you take a walk and I 'll call you when we're finished. If anyone else is waiting around out there, have them go and get a cot from storage. I assume you 'll want to stay down here tonight,” she grinned.
“Yeah,” Nate was looking back at his wife even as Patricia spoke. “Yeah, I do.”
“Good,” she nodded. “Now go ahead. We 'll deal with what's left and then you can come back.”
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
-
As dawn made itself known the next morning, many friendly faces gathered to celebrate the arrival of Baby Caudell.
“Gotta come up with a name,” Clay told the happy couple. “Can't keep calling him 'Baby Caudell' forever.”
“Actually,” Christina looked up from her newborn, “we're going to call him John.”
“Johnathon Nathaniel Caudell,” Nate nodded.
“I think that's fine,” Clay said softly into the silence. “I think he would have been honored.”
“It's a beautiful baby,” Tully smiled, maybe a little wistfully but no one took notice.
“Thank you,” Christina replied.
“He is adorable,” Samantha and Lainie both said almost in unison. Sam smiled weakly at the redhead but nodded. Lainie returned it.
“First baby born here,” Clay declared, looking around.
“But hopefully not the last,” Patricia smiled.
“Excuse me,” Alicia said suddenly, hurrying from the room and into the nearby restroom.
“She sick?” Patricia asked Ronny.
“But she'd felt bad since yesterday,” he replied. “She may have something.”
“If she's not better in a couple days, try to get her to come see me,” Patricia asked.
“I will,” Ronny promised.
“All right, bad as I hate break this up, today ain't a holiday except for Nate. Let’s be about it.” Clay gave the order as he started out himself, the others saying goodbyes and following. There was always work to do.
-
“As balmy as it is right now, there's no way winter is over,” Gordon said as he, Robert and Clay gathered on the back porch of Gordon's home. 'Balmy' in this instance meant thirty-nine degrees Fahrenheit.
“February usually sees the most bitter winter weather on average,” Robert nodded his agreement.
“Don't look at me,” said Clay. “I spent the last three winters in Africa.”
“Point is we need to make whatever changes that need made while the weather ain't bad,” Gordon noted. “What worked when we had that snow a while back, what didn't, and what didn't we think of? We won't get any more warning than what we had last time, so that's one thing that won't change for sure.”
“I thought last time went pretty well,” Clay shrugged. “We managed to get everyone warned and inside and everything done. The main thing is catching signs early and getting the word out. We did that last time.”
“We need to rearrange the radios,” Robert noted. “We need one short range radio at the cabins, another probably at Dad's house or mine, one at the Troy place, and probably one in the apartments. We can use the small handhelds to communicate between houses in a group, like ours or the cabins, and the slightly more powerful ones to talk to other areas. So long as we use smaller antenna and dial the power down, it should be okay.”
“Anything else?” Gordon asked.
“Just make sure we finish the rifle training,” Clay reminded them. “We need everyone set and ready come spring. By then I think we 'll see things picking up. We can expect people raiding the cattle for a start, and we can expect stronger groups to just ride right up and demand what they want. We need to be ready for that.”
“Soon as one group finishes we 'll get the others,” Gordon nodded. “I hope we don't need them, not like that, but last few weeks have proven the need to be prepared.”
“We 'll be going after a tanker trailer tomorrow,” Clay leaned back. “If we can find one then Jake had a lot of fuel left at his place. We can store it in that tanker for a short while. That diesel will come in handy at planting time.”
“That it will,” Robert nodded. “Clay, Abby-”
“Got fired,” Clay finished for him and Robert nodded slowly.
“She walked off her job and left Sam alone with all the kids, and Christina went into labor. If that wasn't bad enough, she stood around showing her ass while Christina was doubled over in pain. She's not welcome anywhere on the place over there and if she gets near any of the children. . .well, I won't be responsible for her safety, Robert,” Clay finished up. “She's pissed off everybody over there with the way she has manhandled the children and with her attitude. Kaitlin flat out promised that if she saw Abby near any of their children, she would kill her.”
“I don't know what it's going to take to straighten her out, but you need to find it, Robert, before she ends up dead.”
“I don't know where to look, Clay,” Robert said helplessly. “I really don't. And I don't know what's brought all this on. I wish I did.”
“Can't help you there,” Clay admitted. “But it better happen soon.”
-
It had been a long day. Tomorrow would likely be another. Clay got home tired, dirty and hungry. Lainie already had supper nearly ready, bless her, so he took a cool shower and dressed hurriedly, getting back to the kitchen just as she was putting supper on the table.
“Rough day, Cowboy?” Lainie asked sympathetically.
“Long,” he nodded. “You?”
“Same old, same,” Lainie replied. “After I left the clinic I visited with Maria and the others a bit then came home and cleaned, made supper and sewed.”
“What are you sewing?” he asked.
“Baby things,” she smiled. “For John Nathan,” she said the name in a fake deep voice.
“Yeah,” Clay smiled. “Never thought of seeing Nate with a kid,” he shook his head a bit. “Never saw any of us with any kind of family,” he admitted.
“Well, I think they 'll be good parents,” Lainie said. “And that baby is adorable,�
� she said almost dreamily.
“He's a cute little tyke,” Clay nodded.
The two ate and then adjourned to the living room. Before the storm they would have watched television perhaps, or listened to the radio. Maybe watched a movie, even gone out somewhere. Now, after an exhausting day of hard work, they simply sat down and leaned on each other, enjoying the silence.
Across the farm others did much the same as they came to the end of their day as well. Couples placed children in bed, stoked fires, set back logs. Those on watch climbed into cupolas or dressed for ground patrol around the farms and hoped it would be a quiet night. Dogs were called and came running to get pans of warm cornbread and rice, fighting over bowls behind Josh Webb's house. Bruce, clean and well behaved, stayed inside for the most part, using a pet door Jake had made him to get in and out to do his business. During the storm Jake had set a home-made puppy pad for him to use on the lower floor and made him a bed near the clinic.
One by one, lights began to blink out as lanterns and lamps were turned low or blown out altogether. Soft words murmured in the dark as couples talked softly in the dark. About tomorrow, about today. About hopes and fears. About dreams that were now unobtainable.
About new dreams that might be.
There was hope in them. Things hadn't been that well but neither had they been horrible, at least not for them. A few felt guilty that somewhere tonight others were no doubt doing without, but the simple truth was there wasn't much they could do about it. They could help a few people, and would, but. . .there wasn't enough to be overly benevolent.
It was a terrible decision, but Leon had been right. It was either protect their children or let them suffer. No one was going to allow their children to suffer if it could be stopped.
This was the decision that was reached tonight, just as it was every night in almost every house across the farm. We will do what we can, but we won't take away from our children to make it happen. That same discussion would like as not take place again tomorrow night, if not sooner.
But for now, they rested.
THE END
A MESSAGE FROM AUTHOR
N.C. REED
I hope you enjoyed “Brotherhood of Fire”, the second in the series about the Sanders clan. For more information about my books, including release dates and projected length of any series I work on, visit my blog at https://badkarma00.wordpress.com/. There's also some content there you won't find anywhere else, including so very old fanfiction that never got put up and a few original works that aren't available anywhere else for the moment.
Also, please visit my publisher’s website at www.creativetexts.com for links to purchase all of my books, both digitally and in print.
Thanks for reading!!!
N.C. Reed
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