by A. American
“What’s up?” Mark asked with a look of confusion.
“There’s trouble at your house, go, go, go!” Billy said, backing away from the truck.
I didn’t wait to hear any more. I took off down the road toward Mark’s house. As his house came into view, we could see a crowd of people in front, and his wife (who I barely knew at all) was standing in the front door with a shotgun leveled at the people in her yard. She was shouting at someone in the front of the group. Some in the group heard the truck coming down the road and turned to look as I swung it through his gate. The truck hadn’t even stopped when Mark jumped out, AR up and at the ready.
The crowd parted as he ran toward them. Rick was hot on his heels and both of them were screaming. I stepped out of the truck and stood beside it, waiting to see what was going to unfold. Most of the people did as they were told and moved out of the way of the two deputies as they ran forward, except for three. At the front of the crowd was Pat, with her husband and son. The two men both held rifles pointed at Mark’s wife, who had scratches on her face and a bruise beginning under one eye. As Mark came running up, Pat turned to meet him. She looked like a wild animal. Her hair was sticking out all over, the hair bands doing shit to hold it together, her face was red and she was dirty. It was clear she and Mark’s wife had been at each other.
Pat’s eyes grew wide at Mark’s approach. He was running for all he was worth. Without saying a word, he slammed the butt of the AR down onto the back of the husband’s head, and before the son could react, Rick did likewise to him. Both men landed on the ground in a heap. Rick leaned down to grab their weapons, and when he did, Pat jumped on his back, screaming like a banshee. She wasn’t there long, however; Rick brought his right elbow around and caught her in the jaw, knocking her out cold. She fell straight back onto the ground.
Some in the crowd started to shout and they closed in. Mark was trying to talk to his wife while keeping an eye on the crowd. She was shouting at him, and he back over his shoulder at her. With all the commotion, other folks from our little neighborhood were running up to see what was going on. It was getting out of hand damn fast. It wasn’t long before Pat was on her feet, screeching at Mark. She was accusing him of hoarding food that the county was providing and not giving it out. He said he didn’t know what she was talking about, to which she replied that she had seen the food this morning on his four-wheeler. What happened next wasn’t really his fault, it was just reaction. He screamed back at her that I had given him the food, not the other way around.
This brought the argument to a halt. The group just looked at Mark, and he back at them. Then one of them turned and looked at me and the truck. Trying to bring down the tension, Mark then said we had picked up food today and everyone would get some. That’s when they all turned. First one of them broke into a run, then the rest of them, all straight toward me.
At first I just stood there dumbfounded. Their mouths were agape, eyes wild, people that lived down the road from me looking at me like wild animals. My stupor didn’t last long though, and I brought my rifle over the hood and flipped off the safety. A shot rang out. Everyone, including me, instinctively ducked, some diving for the ground. Two more shots quickly followed, and this stopped the stampede entirely.
“That’s fucking enough!” Mark yelled, his rifle resting on the top of his shoulder pointing straight up. The crowd turned.
“What the hell is wrong with you people? I just told you we had food to distribute, and you think you’re going to run over there and take it?” Mark screamed at the top of his lungs. His eyes now had a wild look too. His mouth was open, the corners pulled down, exposing his teeth.
“Any one of you try and take anything from that truck will be shot, do you understand me? I am the law here. The sheriff gave me the authority today to deal with things as I see fit, and I will be the final say, got it?”
Pat was sitting on the ground alongside her husband and son, but it didn’t stop her mouth. “Oh, you’re the law now, huh? You decide who gets what? What are you going to do, start shooting people?” Her husband, Leland, struggled to his feet. Rick stepped up behind him.
“I ain’t going anywhere, diputy,” he sneered.
An ATV sounded behind me and Danny came riding up, his M4 over his shoulder.
“What the hell’s going on?” he asked as he shut down the machine.
“Mark told them we got food from the county today, and they thought they would rush the truck and take it,” I said, still lying over the hood with the rifle pointed at the crowd.
Leland said, “You folks know me, we’re friends with almost all of you.” He looked in my direction and continued. “All of you worth a damn, that is. If there’s food around here, it needs to be shared out evenly amongst everyone here. Why in the hell do we need to take orders from some shithead with a tin star?”
The crowd muttered and looked at Mark and then at me.
Mark said, “Because I am the law around here. There is no more 911. No one is coming to help you out except Rick and me, that’s it.”
Leland shouted, “There ain’t no more law!”
“You stupid fucking redneck, even if you took the food in that truck, where do you think you will get any more when it’s gone? Can you go to Tavares and get more?” Mark asked.
“I ain’t worried about that. I’m worried about what’s in that truck, and who’s gonna get it. I know you have your favorites around here,” Leland spit, looking over at Danny and me.
“What in the hell did I ever do to those people?” I asked Danny.
“I don’t know, I ain’t never had any trouble out of them. Bobbie and Pat talk all the time,” Danny said.
Leland said, “There’s more of us than there are of them! He thinks he’s going to run herd on us, tell us what to do, who gets what and when, but I ain’t gonna be beholden to no man!”
The people in the yard began muttering again, but it seemed they were divided. Leland’s son, Randal, finally got to his feet, standing behind his father. Randal had been in trouble with the law his whole life: drunken fights, theft, maybe even dealing drugs, but he had never been picked up for that. No one much cared for him, but his parents had always been happy to make excuses for him. To them, the law had it out for Randal and always had. Nothing was ever their fault, and someone was always keeping them from getting what they deserved.
“I guarantee you one thing, you will look over your shoulder for the rest of your days. You and anyone with you,” Leland said.
I looked over at Danny and said, “I’ve had enough of this shit.” I slung my AR and started walking toward Mark. That was a risk, but it looked like the crowd had calmed down, and I didn’t want to get them riled up again. I was hoping Mark would take control of the situation, but he looked unsure of what his next move was.
Mark was stuck in the old days; he was a lawman. He was used to arresting people who got out of line and taking them to jail and let the judicial system sort them out. He just wasn’t coming to terms with the new reality. I walked up to Mark, Leland giving me the mean mug the whole time.
“What are you going to do with these guys?” I asked Mark.
He looked at me for a moment and said, “I don’t know.”
“You going to take them to Tavares and put ’em in the jail?” I asked.
“You ain’t taking us no-fucking-where!” Randal shouted and he started to move toward me, but a tug on his collar by Rick brought him back in line.
Mark said, “You know as well as I do there’s no way to lock people up. Who’s gonna watch them? We’re stretched thin as it is.”
“I hear you,” I said.
Randal surged forward again and when Rick grabbed at him, he slapped his hand away, but he stopped short of charging me.
“What are you going to do? Really. I’m curious,” I said to Randal.
Randal was just like
the troglodytes that had spawned him; his mouth worked faster than his brain. “I’m gonna fucking kill you!”
From where she was sitting on the ground, Pat spoke up, “You think you’re some big shit, Morgan. Just ’cause you got power and water. You won’t share it with no one, and now we all know you have food too. All those girls of yours don’t look hungry.” She looked back at the crowd. “His kids aren’t hungry, are yours?”
I shook my head and looked at the crowd. “So you people are ready to take what you think I have, is that it?”
“We’re all hungry! We’re having to get water out of the damn pond!” someone from the crowd shouted out.
“Have any one of you people ever come to me to ask for water?”
All I got was blank stares in return, so I continued. “Has anyone here asked me for anything? I know Pat thinks I’m sitting on some mountain of food, but I’m not, and even if I were, it’s mine. I bought and paid for everything I have. You people could have bought food for your families. Your situation isn’t my fault. So what’s going to happen? Are you going to come to my house and threaten my family like you did here? Which one of you is going to shoot my wife?” I pointed at a man in the crowd. “You?”
The man looked away.
“We’ll deal with you soon enough,” Pat said from where she sat slumped on the ground.
“Damn straight,” Leland added.
I looked at Mark and asked him again, “What are you going to do with these people?”
Again, he just looked back at me. “I don’t know.”
“So you’re gonna kill me?” I asked Leland and Randal.
Leland glared at me. “Damn straight, asshole,” he replied.
“Big talk,” I said.
Leland lunged for me. I stepped back and kicked him in the nuts as hard as I could. He dropped to his knees with a groan. Randal bolted for me next. I drew the XD and brought it up level with his face and pulled the trigger. The round went into his left eye and blasted out the back of his head. As his body hit the ground, Pat began to shriek. Leland looked at the body of his son lying in the dirt, dark red blood oozing from the crater in his head. When he looked back toward me, the muzzle was already lowered at him. I pulled the trigger again and he collapsed. Mark rushed over and grabbed my arm. Rick was standing there with a look of shock on his face.
“What in the hell are you doing?” Mark screamed into my face.
“What you should have. I’m not spending the rest of my life looking over my shoulder. They clearly stated they would kill me, and they threatened my family. Everyone heard it. Now it’s over,” I yelled back at him and jerked my arm from his grip.
Pat screeched and tried to tackle me. I jerked away and looked down at her, then looked at Mark. I was looking right into his eyes and there wasn’t anything there, really: no malice, no approval, nothing. I raised the muzzle slightly and shot Pat in the top of the head.
Looking back up at Mark, I wasn’t sure what to expect. He stared back at me. The lights were on, but no one was home. I looked over at Rick, and he was still standing there slack-jawed, so I turned back to the crowd gathered behind. The first person I saw was Reggie. He was grim-faced but nodded his head at me. My knees were starting to feel a little weak.
The crowd displayed a mix of expressions: shock, revulsion, and even a kind of approval. No one spoke, no one moved. I slowly holstered the XD, then looked back at them.
“I know some of you think what I just did was wrong, but these people just threatened me. They came here to Mark’s house and threatened to shoot his wife. They came to try and take what they felt they were owed. They weren’t owed anything, and Mark’s the last person anyone should be trying to steal from. Mark went to the county today for you people. What did you do while he was trying to make sure you could feed your families? You came here with people who pointed guns at his wife.”
The crowd shuffled in shame.
“I know most of you haven’t been outside of here since things went down, but I have. I walked over two hundred miles to get here. One night my friends and I tried to help some people, a family with kids. Turns out they wanted what we had and were willing to kill for it. I ended up getting shot in the head as a result of it.” I turned my head to show them the scar.
“We were hunted like animals, and all we were carrying was a pack and a little canned food. What you need to think about is what kind of person you want to be. Sure, lots of you are going to say you just showed up here today to see what was going on, but who spoke up when Leland and Randal threatened Mark’s wife?” No one in the crowd said a word.
“That’s right: nobody. And which one of you was going to go home empty-handed after you looted Mark’s home? Today’s the day you have to decide what kind of person you’re going to be. And I’m telling you, if you make the wrong choice, chances are you’ll end up like them.” I nodded at the bodies on the ground. “I know damn well most of you are good people, moral people. But for those of you who aren’t, this is the chance for you to understand why you want to respect people’s property and their rights.
“It’s a new world now. There was a time back in the past where people handled their own business. If you mouthed off to someone, you might end up getting your nose broke. Or, like happened here, you threaten someone’s life, you might end up dead.”
A woman from the crowd, another of those neighbors that I barely recognized from my trips to the bus stop, stepped forward. She stretched out a finger and jabbed it in my direction. “Those people were no threat to you, and you ain’t the law! You said Mark and Rick are, but you aren’t! You can’t be the judge, jury and executioner. Mark, you need to arrest him for murder!”
I shook my head and said, “You weren’t too concerned about the law when your friends were threatening to shoot Mark’s wife.” I looked over at Mark. “What’s it gonna be?” He was on the spot now; he had to make a decision.
Mark stood there for a minute looking at the crowd, then back at me. He shot a quick glance at Rick, who just shrugged his shoulders. Mark looked back at me, then to the crowd. He cleared his voice and started into it: “Today in my meeting with the sheriff, I was given the power to enforce law in my area of control as I see fit. That doesn’t make me the supreme lord of the land; I still have to follow the law. But things are different now.
“There is no more going to jail for some minor bullshit”—he gave me a quick glance—“or major bullshit, for that matter. While I do not agree with what just happened here, it was bound to happen. Things are different now. If you commit a crime against someone, you better damn well expect to pay for it. And what you all don’t know is, Morgan has already been deputized, so he is a deputy, as is Danny back there.” Mark pointed to Danny, whose head popped up. I don’t think either of us thought that was a real deal that day at the barricade.
The woman spoke up again. “It still ain’t right. You gonna kill the rest of us soon too?”
Mark stood there for a moment, and I broke in, “If you try and come take what you want from someone else, then yes. You threaten another’s life or their family, then yes.”
She said, “Well, I don’t like it. I don’t want to live here.” She looked at her husband standing beside her.
I said, “Then you’re free to leave. Look people, we need to work together. What I saw out there—most of you don’t know how good we have it. If we don’t hold together as a community, I guarantee you someone from outside’s going to show up and take everything we have. We have each other or we don’t have anything. I know I don’t know many of you, but I can be the best friend you ever had, or the worst enemy you ever come up against.” I looked over at Mark and said, loud enough for the crowd to hear, “Don’t we have some food to distribute now?”
Mark looked over at Rick and said, “Can you go help pass out the food?”
Danny climbed off the quad and met Ri
ck at the back of the truck. The folks in the crowd slowly began to move over to form a line, where the two men started handing out MREs. Mark came over to me, and he did not look happy.
Through clenched teeth, he started in on me. “If you ever try any shit like that again, you can bet your ass I will shoot you down, you got me?”
“I do, but this little issue is now dead, pun intended. If they had walked away from here, I—you got that? Me—I would have had to deal with them. They would choose when and where, and what fucking good am I to my family if I’m dead? Or what if they came after you again, or picked someone else to go after?” I fired back at him.
“Well, you damn well picked a fucked up way to do it,” Mark replied.
“Mark, you’re a good guy, but you need to open your eyes. What were you gonna do to those assholes, the guys who pointed guns at your wife? Arrest them? It’s like you said: there’s no jail time anymore. Fear of being arrested isn’t going to keep anyone safe nowadays. The only thing that’s gonna keep the assholes in line is knowing that they might end up dead. You’re damn lucky something worse didn’t happen here, and I’ll tell you what: what I did here just made your family safer.
“It was done in public; everyone saw it, heard it and can’t argue with it. It’s done,” I said, then added, “I think we should go and check out their house, and everyone who wants to be there should come.”
Mark looked at me, confused, “Why?”
“I have a feeling is all, just a feeling,” I said.
“’Bout what?” Mark asked.
“Let’s all just go and have a look,” I said.
Chapter 7
Thad went home and told Anita what had happened. She cried angrily for a while and then Thad went outside to the barn and started pulling boards off. Once he had what he thought was enough in the bed of the truck, he told his wife he was going back over to Mr. Jackson’s house. He hadn’t yet told her that they would soon be moving there and decided to wait a little before doing so.
