by C. S. Starr
Connor leaned in. “If this goes wrong, we’re likely to end up dead, and whatever vultures are circling in West waiting for us to fail, would love to swoop in and drag your smoking hot cousin off to some Chino brothel and whore her out to whoever’s got something mediocre to trade, that is if East doesn’t get there first.”
Tal resisted an overwhelming urge to punch Connor in the face, but clenched his teeth instead. “Fine. We’ll see what we can do, but don’t get your hopes up.”
The morning crawled by and anticipation of the meeting they’d planned began to develop in Tal’s gut. He watched Connor for a while, amazed by how calm he was about the fact that they were sitting ducks a million miles from home, and so far, nothing had gone according to plan.
Connor’s cell phone, not surprisingly, didn’t work in Campbell. They waited with the plane until nearly noon and had begun to discuss walking in the direction that an old Chevette that flew by twenty minutes earlier had gone, when a beat-up Ford pickup truck with more rust than green paint approached them from the east. As the truck came closer, it slowed down and eventually stopped inches from the plane. Two men, one obese and one bone thin, almost bowling ball and pin-like in their appearance, got out dressed in their finest farm attire, reeking like pot. The skinny driver had a joint tucked behind his ear, and the larger passenger had his in his mouth half smoked, but not lit.
“Lucy said to come get you,” the driver, the skinny one with a nest of dirty blond hair said, lighting up his joint. “You’ll have to sit in the back if there’s more than two of you.”
Connor and Tal exchanged a look. “In the back of the truck?” Tal said, more curious than anything. “Is there even a back of the truck?”
“Truck’s fine,” the larger one with the ruddy complexion said, running his fingers through his dark, greasy hair. “Rust is mostly on the surface. We aren’t going far.”
Tal, Connor, and Juan locked up the plane, after reassurances that it would be fine where it was, and climbed into the back of the truck with their bags. They’d brought gifts for the Campbells, mostly luxury items that they didn’t imagine anyone would be able to get there, but, as they drove through miles and miles of fields, Tal realized that these gifts were probably the last things anyone living here would have an interest in.
They would have been better bringing denim, or baseball hats.
Or rust paint.
“This town smells like shit!” Tal shouted, wrinkling up his nose as the agricultural smells consumed his nostrils.
“These guys drive like shit!” Connor replied, rolling his eyes, his voice faint over the rattling truck and wind whistling around them. “And they were hours late.”
“She’s fucking with us,” Tal shouted back. “That’s exactly what this is about.”
“Maybe so,” he replied tersely. “But we’re here now.”
The drive took about half an hour, eventually turning from fields to sporadically-placed farm houses, and then to a small town, made up of some older, original houses, and some haphazardly slapped together shacks. If this was Campbell’s base, Tal decided maybe this wasn’t as much of a problem as he’d originally anticipated. He felt encouraged by this.
That was until he started seeing the vast numbers of people that lived in the town they were driving through. They seemed to crawl out of every possible hole in the wall. They looked happy. Well fed, with rosy cheeks. Just like he’d heard.
The truck slowed at the far end of the town and drove up a long driveway to a large blue farmhouse covered in weathered cedar shingles. There were a few cars out front; a much nicer truck, an SUV, and a blue hatchback. The fact that they’d arrived in a rusty pickup was not lost on Tal.
“Nothing to write home about,” Connor said, rolling his eyes at the scene. “We’ve got this.”
A petite blonde girl approached the truck first, and peered up at the visitors, her hand shadowing her eyes from the sun.
“You boys missed breakfast,” she said, shaking her head, a slight grin twitching across her mouth. “Too bad. We made something special.”
She was pretty, the girl, in a long black dress that showed off her shapely figure and a pair of cowboy boots, her face dashed with a healthy dose of freckles from the sun. Connor and Tal looked at her appreciatively, before shooting each other a glare.
“Are you Lucy?” Connor asked graciously, extending a hand once they’d climbed off the truck. “It’s great to be here—”
The girl chuckled and shook her head, refusing the hand. “No. I’m Zoey. I’m Lucy’s girlfriend. Lucy’s out, taking care of some things.”
The three of them exchanged another look. Tal chuckled to himself as he watched Connor’s seduction fantasy evaporate into thin air as his face dropped at the realization that he was really and truly not Lucy Campbell’s type.
Not that Tal imagined Connor would have been even if the queen of wheat fields liked men.
They followed the girl inside, flanked by their drivers from the truck, who made themselves at home in a large, modern kitchen, rummaging through the cupboards and the fridge until they found some bread and what looked to be peanut butter. Nothing was offered to the West envoy.
A long silence followed, with Zoey watching them all, arms crossed from a seat at the head of the table. Finally, she spoke.
“I hope you boys have some sort of plan. Lucy doesn’t think you do and she doesn’t like having her time wasted.”
“We’re just here to figure out what’s best for everyone,” Connor said, doing his best to keep a smile on his face. “That’s all.”
“So you’re signing everything over?” Zoey looked up at him, batting her eyelashes. “See, that’s what I thought might happen, but I’m not much of a strategist. Good for you guys,” she said, beaming. “Better to just work something out now.”
“Oh, I don’t think that’s why we’re here,” Connor muttered, leaning against the stove. “We’re here to talk though. I hope she’ll take that seriously.”
“Lucy’s pretty serious,” Zoey replied, glancing at Tal. “About everything. I won’t tell you about what happened to the last person who came here and wasted her time.”
After what felt like hours, heavy footsteps from the front porch drew everyone’s attention, and the woman they'd been waiting for walked through the doorway to the kitchen, her male doppelgänger at her side. There was no mistaking the leader of Campbell.
Lucy Campbell was tallish, with dark hair pulled off her face in a ponytail. She was pretty, with a soft mouth and high cheekbones but her grey eyes flashed intimidatingly around the room, set off by a smattering of freckles across her nose. Tal couldn’t help stare at her firm curves in a pair of tight worn jeans, beat up black leather boots and a fitted navy blue t-shirt that shouldn’t have drawn as much attention to her breasts as it did. The boy at her side was taller than her, but had a certain gentleness to his expression which didn’t command respect or attention—Lucy was quite the opposite. Her body language was designed to be ferocious.
They had to be twins. Tal felt ill-informed about a lot of things.
“Sorry to keep you waiting,” the boy Campbell said, a small grin on his face. “We had some problems with a calf stuck back in the woods.”
Connor scurried to his feet and approached the male Campbell first, which Tal immediately knew was a grave mistake. “It’s great to meet you—”
“Cole. Cole Campbell,” he replied, almost shyly.
“Cole.” Connor nodded, shaking his hand heartily. “Connor. And you must be—”
“Lucille. Lucy,” she replied flatly, glancing at Tal, and then Juan, but not offering her hand. “Zoey, did you get them something?”
“I thought I’d wait for you,” she said quietly, a knowing grin on her face. “Since I knew you’d need to eat too. There’s leftovers in the fridge.”
Lucy smiled back at her. “Thanks, you. We’ll eat at the picnic table.”
Tal decided Lucy Campbell was not conventi
onally beautiful, as they took their seats at the picnic table behind her home and he’d had a little longer to look at her. It was the kind of beauty that took a few minutes to absorb, he decided, the complete opposite of most of the women he knew through the movies. What was more interesting to him was the way the others looked at her. Rough, strong, manly men watched her with the most profound respect he’d ever witnessed.
“You look at all women like that?” she suddenly said, raising her eyebrows as she caught him staring. “Because we don’t here.”
“And especially not that one,” the blond guy that had picked them up on the runway said. “You should see what she does to people that look at her like that. You want a goat kick to the balls, California?”
“Shut it, Pete,” Lucy snapped, before turning her attention to Connor, Tal, and Juan. “Listen. I’m not exactly sure why you’re here. I don’t really do social visits. I’m busy.”
Connor cleared his throat and Tal knew she intimidated him in a way he’d never been before. It wasn’t that he hadn’t had reason to be, Connor just wasn’t very smart sometimes. “Well, I thought we could work something out, since you seem to be looking to expand, and—”
“What could we work out?” She shrugged. “I could stop, you mean. Leave your sandbox alone.”
Cole glanced at his sister, then looked at Tal sympathetically. “Ce, come on. We should hear them out.”
“You’re lucky our other brother isn’t here. He’s got the temper.” She shifted in her seat and smiled at Zoey, as she spread out sandwich fixings on the table, followed by a pot of chilli . “I don’t know what you boys want from us. We’re good with what we’re doing.”
Tal finally asked the question that he’d been curious about for months. “What are you doing, exactly?”
Her eyes gleamed. “And give away all my secrets? Who are you?”
Tal held his hand out. “Tal Bauman. I’m Second in West.”
“The Jew Vice,” Lucy nodded thoughtfully, ignoring his hand. “Okay, well, since you asked so nicely, here’s what’s happening, since you’ll be living it someday, and it’ll probably take neanderthals like you longer to adjust. Social democracy.”
“So you’re a communist,” Connor snapped. “And you expect us to buy into that.”
Lucy glanced around at her companions, who mostly looked amused. “If you think socialism and communism are the same thing, then I suggest you go back to California, do some reading, and come back in a few months when you’re better educated, and we’ll talk again.”
Tal put his hand up, willing Connor to keep his mouth shut. “So what are you offering them?”
“Higher taxes for greater returns. Like Canada used to do.” She nonchalantly slathered some mayonnaise on her bread. It all looked fresh and delicious, and although Tal had a hard time resisting, he didn’t want to seem too eager, so he decided he’d wait until everyone had eaten. “Technically, they’re getting what looks like a worse deal, which is probably why they’ve been hesitant to tell you too much.”
“What are you offering in return?”
She smiled. “Tal, right? Bauman? I’m offering an alternative to you. They don’t like you. They don’t like making you richer, while they struggle.” She waved around her house. “See, they come here, and they see something they’ll never see with you.”
“A run down farmhouse and piss poor cell reception?” Connor snapped. “That makes a lot of sense—”
“They see themselves, and the potential to be a part of something better. There’s only room for you in your system. A lot of us grew up without much. This life, all we’ve been through, it’s got to be for something, right?” She smiled, in a way that was almost innocent, and certainly idealistic. “So that’s it. That’s what we’re selling. Potential for happiness on one’s own terms, without the everyday stress of surviving.”
Juan stood and wandered off into the large, lush back yard with his sandwich, seemingly disinterested in the conversation and Tal wished he could do the same and check out her lush garden, which he knew Leah would be all over. Their conversation was going nowhere fast, and from the expression on Connor’s face, he knew he was seconds away from saying something insulting that there would be no stepping back from. He’d call her a whore, or a bitch, or imply something completely out of turn. Sometimes Connor’s bluntness was effective, and sometimes, like a bad night in Dallas they both would have preferred to forget, it got him a black eye, a broken nose, and a fairly sincere death threat.
“I’m not just going to let you undo everything I’ve worked for,” Connor hissed. “No fucking way.
“Okay,” Lucy said with a nonchalant shrug, slurping her chilli . “That’s up to you.
“We can’t reach some agreement?” Tal asked, rubbing his temples, desperately wishing that Connor would walk off his anger and let the situation diffuse.
“We could do that too,” she replied, beaming at him. “Here’s what I’m proposing. You go back to West, and do your thing, and I’ll stay here and do mine, and we’ll see, in ten years, who’s more popular. The assholes that got rich off their backs, or the ones that offered them a chance to make themselves, no matter where they started out, the ones that helped them when they needed it, no matter what they had. We’ll do a West/Campbell potluck or something cute. Connor, Tal, do you know where Cole and I started out?”
They looked at each other and then shook their heads. They really should have done more research, but information on the Campbells was hard to come by. Tal wished he’d made more of an effort.
Cole and Lucy exchanged an amused glance and Cole spoke. “Our mother was a waitress at a coffee shop in Toronto with three kids that had two different fathers who didn’t pay child support no matter how often the court asked them to. We all shared a room, until—”
Lucy cut her twin off. “Needless to say, we didn’t grow up with actor and lawyer parents who spoiled us rotten and left us with mansions and trust funds. We’ve worked hard to get here, and that’s that.” She stood and narrowed her eyes at them. “I don’t know what else you want from us. I’m not going to back off, and I’m not going to just let things be because that’s the way it’s been for ten years. Sorry, but I’m not. Ten years is nothing.”
“So you’d start a war,” Conner said, standing as well, which was less than impressive since she was a couple of inches taller than him in her boots.
“Are you declaring one?” she asked, cocking her head at him. “You know how things ended for Napoleon, right? You look like him.”
“He had a lot of victories,” Connor snapped. “He was a great general. A leader.”
“He was arrogant, and was defeated at Waterloo. You’ve had your victories. This battle, if you choose to make one, will be your Waterloo, because as soon as you’re weakened, you’re going to be fighting a war on two fronts with us, and with East, and we’ll divide your spoils.”
“How do you know East won’t start a war with you?”
“I don’t,” she said simply. “But I doubt they’re going to start a war they don’t think they can win, and they’re smart enough to know I’m not the one to attack first if and when they make a play for the continent. I’m Siberia. Not worth the hassle until I’m a problem for them.”
Tal had to admit, he was impressed with her knowledge of war history, but decided her negotiating skills left a lot to be desired. “Instead, you’ve decided to be a problem for us,” he replied.
“I’m liberating you. Please,” she said, condescendingly. “Don’t take it personally. I’m sure you’re lovely people, but you’re in my way. I want the coast.”
“You have the north coast in Vancouver,” Tal replied. “You’ve got a route to Asia.”
She nodded. “You’re right. I do. But I want all the coast.”
“You don’t need it all.”
“You don’t know what anyone needs, Tal. That’s why you’re in this situation.” She glanced at Zoey. “I’ll help you with the dishes
later.” Zoey winked back at her, and they exchanged an affectionate smile, before Lucy turned back to them, her mouth drawn.
Connor, Lucy, and he all stared at each other, in a moment Tal would remember as one of the tensest of his life.
Lucy broke first, so she could get the last word. “Boys, if you’re staying the night, there’s a trailer about a ten minute walk east. I wouldn’t want you telling everyone I’m a poor hostess.”
Abruptly, Lucy gathered up her sandwich and headed inside.
Tal reaffirmed what he’d felt in his gut all along.
They were in trouble.
Chapter 3
July 2001
Los Angeles California
“Oh, you guys,” Joe Bauman said, tears streaming down his tired face, which these days looked far older than its forty-five years. “I don’t know why we’re tested like this, but there has to be a reason—“
“For fuck’s sake, Joe,” his sister Alex muttered. “They just lost their mother. I just lost my husband. Let’s not try and push make-believe and fairy tales about God on them now. Look at the world.”
The last thing Joe wanted to do was look at the rest of the world. Looking at his small part of it was painful enough. He couldn’t put on a brave face anymore. He knew there was a good chance he’d be dead in a few days.
There was no reason to believe he wouldn’t be.
“I’m going to go out and pick up some supplies,” he said quietly to Alex after they’d put their collective six kids to bed. “We can’t leave them with nothing.”
She nodded, her face drawn. “And I was always the pessimist.”
“Not much left to feel optimistic about. This doesn’t seem to be stopping.”
“At least they’ll all be together,” Alex replied, wiping an errant tear. “At least there’s a bunch of them, and a few of them are older, and maybe the state will let them—”
“There’s no state anymore. No one’s going to come in here and split them up, because there’s nowhere for them to go. You’ve seen the news.”
