Journey drew back the covers, and Junior looked as if he were asleep, although pale, he showed no signs of cyanosis. Journey felt for his pulse and let her hand rest on his face. Gina went to her and pulled her gently away. She led Journey to the now open door. Andy stood watching, and further words were not necessary. Gina turned for one last look around. Gina had heard people saying their stomach dropped before, but this was the first time that she knew what they meant. She felt the air leave her lungs and her heart rate soared. Gina grabbed the door jamb to remain upright. She stood for several seconds with her eyes closed trying to regain her equilibrium. Drawing in a breath, she straightened her shoulders and stepped to the counter.
Chapter Four; Accident or what?
“I don’t understand how they could have done this, or why. He had no right. They took my child,” Mary sobbed.
Lucy rose and took Mary by the hand and led her out of the tent, “Come on honey. Let’s go lay down for a while.” Lucy looked back at them, her eyes like the rest of them were red rimmed and glassy.
No one could believe that Mike had engineered the deaths of his family, by using the gas heat and taping over the windows and vents, but it appeared that he had. What other explanation could there be?
After Mary and Lucy left the adults sat in stunned silence. Sherry and Abby had taken Maggie down to the trailer. Once the crying was over or at least had subsided, Maggie had clammed up. She sat staring at her hands until Abby asked her to go with her and Sherry.
“What do we do now? Do we wait for Sam and John to get back?”
Gina sighed and unfolded the soaked paper towel she had clutched in her hand. She smoothed it out and then wadded it back up. Gina didn’t answer. She didn’t know what to say. Gina knew that Mike had not warmed up to any of them, but Sam had said that they were to give him some time. He and Janice had been through a horrible ordeal with their house and the subsequent rescue, but he would come around eventually.
“We need to get them ready to bury. Gina, you and I can do that. Andy, can you Ben and Lucas dig a grave up beside Carlos? We can’t take any chances right now with decomposition.”
Andy nodded and stood. Lucas and Ben rose and followed him out of the tent, leaving Journey and Gina sitting at the table.
“How did this happen and none of us saw it coming? Mike didn’t seem depressed, and I find it hard to believe that Janice would condone it. My God, they had everything reason to live. I don’t understand why people do this,” Gina smacked her hand on the table top. “This is bullshit!”
“We don’t know this was intentional at all. Accidents happen every day with camp trailers, portable gas heaters when the power is out, and this could be just that.”
“Now what do we do? Telling Mary was hard enough, but we still have to tell John, and I don’t relish that task. Maybe we should leave it up to Sam. After all, it is his family.”
“Are you ready to get this done? As hot as it is in that trailer, the longer we wait, the harder it will be.”
Wiping her eyes, Gina nodded and followed Journey back inside. They used the blankets on the beds to wrap the bodies up in, tears running down both of their faces.
Gina stood looking down at the two babies, “Should we wake Mary? She might want to help get Nathan ready herself.”
“I’ll go ask her. Be right back.”
Looking down into the basket, Gina couldn’t help but wonder if Nathan had been as healthy as Journey had thought. Nathan wasn’t much bigger than Benny and Benny, wasn’t quite a month old yet. While Nathan had gained some weight from Janice nursing him, he was still not much more than skin and bone. There was none of the baby fat that even Benny seemed to have. Unable to help herself Gina reached out and touched his cold face. Her knees gave way, and she collapsed on the floor, hands still gripping the end of the makeshift bassinet, Gina rested her head and cried. She was beginning to wonder just who the lucky ones were. Those that were gone or those left behind who had to take care of them.
Gina realized how hard survival would have been without the help or companionship of the Akins family and Ben and Abby. Now they had Maggie as well as Oliva to think of, and she wondered if they were up to the challenge.
Gina realized just how angry she was when she had to force her body to relax. She had her jaw clamped so tightly, that she felt a headache starting at the base of her neck, and knew it wasn’t going to go away unless she either took something for it or slept and there wasn’t time for that. They had too much to do, and she couldn’t allow Journey to do it alone.
Gina stood up and left the room and the trailer. She found herself walking behind the row of tethered horses until she came to Sailor. To her surprise, Gus was sidled up beside him, minus his halter. He turned his big sad eyes to Gina and came to stand in front of her. He seemed to feel her sadness and pushed his head against her side. One hand on Sailor and the other resting on Gus’s head, she rubbed both of them. She heard the chickens that were roosting above the goat area.
The smell of the hay, the horses and the comfort of listening to all of the noises that accompanied the animals made Gina sleepy. Gina sat on Sailor’s discarded hay and rested her arms and head on her knees. She felt like she should be crying for the loss, but Gina was out of tears. All she felt was the heavy sadness that she had packed around after her own loss, so long ago.
Gina woke when she felt someone sit down beside her and an arm went around her and pulled her to them. She rested her head against Sam’s chest and found she had some tears left after all. They sat in silence long after her tears stopped and Gina wondered if they had both fallen asleep when the sounds of voices jarred her awake.
“It’s okay. Lucas and Abby are feeding the horses.” He sighed, “I guess it’s time we get this done.”
“Sam, I’m so sorry about Nathan. I don’t know what else to say.”
“Not that it matters and it was wrong of Mike to take it upon himself to include Nate in his plans if this was his intended outcome, but John already knew that Nathan wasn’t right. I know this doesn’t mean much now, but Journey had already talked to both John and Mary about his lack of weight gain and poor health a while back. He wasn’t the healthiest child, to begin with, maybe he wasn’t destined to live a long life, I don’t know, but I understand your anger.”
“Do you think Janice knew what he had planned?”
Sam thought for a minute, “No, I don’t. If there was a woman, who loved life and her kids it was her.” Sam stood and helped Gina to her feet. “I sure don’t understand why he did it, and now I guess we’ll never know.”
“He was weak and a coward.”
“Well, it’s not for us to judge him.”
Gina stopped, “How is John?”
“About what you would expect. He’s taking it personally. He felt he didn’t say enough of the right things when Mike was questioning him about our chances of survival.”
“Our chances? I guess he didn’t think about our chances when he took away two of our defenders.”
“We aren’t going to let that stop us. In fact, after the funeral, John has some news that may be beneficial for us.”
“But you’re going to tell me now, right?”
“No, I am not. It’ll give you something to look forward to, but now we better walk on over because Lucas should be back with Mark by now.”
“I’m surprised John let him go alone, or did he?”
Sam laughed, “Nope. Abby went with him.”
“Now that girl would be a force to be reckoned with, and I wish we had a couple more adults with her tenacity. Ben did an excellent job raising her.”
“He did at that. Abby reminds me a lot of you. You’re both stubborn as hell and always ready to take on anything.”
“That’s not true. Today I’ve felt like a hot mess. All I can say is thank God for Journey. They always say I am the strong one, but she is. If not for her I would have never finished nursing school or joined the V.A. I was at loose ends at the tim
e. She has her little subtle ways to make people do what she wants and do it her way.”
“It’s funny, but Andy just told me the same thing, so I guess it must be true.”
Sam and Gina walked across the top of the rise to where they had designated their graveyard would be. Incredibly, the tree they had chosen to bury Carlos at the base of, had not moved, nor had the rock Sam had put there. Almost every tree on the hill above Carlos’s trailer had been uprooted or leaned to one side or the other, but that one. Apparently, it’s roots grew deep and had a firm grasp on the hillside.
“Is that some kind of an omen or what?”
Sam didn’t even ask what Gina was talking about, “It might be.” He squeezed her hand to show that he understood. “That tree has been there as long as John or I have been alive. I expect to be buried there myself someday.”
John held on to Mary’s arm through the service that Mark gave. At times, while listening, Mary had looked ready to collapse. Only John’s firm grip on her kept her upright. Afterward, Evelyn spent some time sitting with Mary beside the fresh dirt of Nathan’s small plot. At Mary’s insistence, they had chosen to bury Mike and his family in one grave, away from the family, giving Nathan his own place beside Carlos.
The young people had carried up some of the folding camp chairs and set them in a semicircle. A feast of sandwiches that Evelyn and Mark had brought lay in plastic-wrapped stacks on a blanket.
Mark sat on an end chair, “I know this doesn’t make any sense to us right now and it probably never will, after spending time with Mike and Janice, for him to do this is unthinkable. I wonder if it wasn’t simply an accident.”
John looked up with a frown, “It never occurred to me that it could have been. I know, he was worried about the drafts in the trailer and keeping the kids warm. It would sit better with me to think that, but I guess we have no way of knowing. Do we?”
“Why were we all so quick to jump on the idea of Mike committing suicide? The thought that it could have been an accident never entered my mind. But, if you think about it, if he was determined to do it and take his family with him, why leave Maggie behind?” Gina looked from one friend’s face to the next. She saw the doubt on every face, followed by relief. Apparently, Gina wasn’t the only one who didn’t want to believe in the suicide.
“Janice was so excited to get the garden started, and I don’t believe she would have let Mike do it. You guys all saw how proud they were of little Benny. I think Mark is right. And now I feel like such an ass for even thinking he could have done this.” Lucy sat and rubbed her knee while she talked. They still hadn’t come up with a way to make her prosthetic fit any better, and Journey had laughingly told her that she needed to gain some weight back and it would fit better.
“Hey Mark, do you and Evelyn still have those bikes?” Sam asked. When Mark nodded, “Would you need them for anything or would you trade them to me for something?”
Mark laughed, “I don’t think we’ll be riding them anywhere, but I won’t trade them either. Come over and pick them up whenever you want.”
“What are you planning on doing with bikes? It’s not like there is anywhere you can ride them and cover any ground,” Ben asked.
“It’s just something Sam and I were kicking around. We’re going to build a wagon out of the wheels for one of the horses to pull. Olivia said her dad had rolls of chicken wire and fence posts in the warehouse where she was hiding. Seems a shame to let anything else there go to waste. I know there’s a pile of two-inch angle iron out behind Matt’s barn leftover from when we built the fuel tank stands.”
“Andy, how would bike wheels hold the weight of fence posts? Couldn’t we just cut some here?”
“Metal T-posts and wire. We can use them to fence in the box canyon, which isn’t a box anymore. John and I found the cow that was missing as well as both of last years, calves, and a new one. The creek that ran all the way here through the canyon is spring fed and still there, plus there’s no fallout.”
“That was the surprise you weren’t going to tell me about?”
Sam laughed, “I was going to let John tell everyone once we got the kinks worked out, but this thing with Mike kind of threw a monkey wrench into them. We thought we would like to get as far away from that monster as we could without leaving the area completely.”
As a group, they turned to look at the mountain. Steam still rose from the top and out the side of it as if it had a crack allowing vapor to be released. The few remaining trees on the lower hills that had not burned, as well as the ground that they could see between them and the volcano, where gray with ash. They had no way of knowing if the one eruption was all it would threaten them with or would it continue to spew ash and rock whenever they least expected it.
“I’m for leaving here. The idea that that thing could blow at any time scares the crap out of me. Maybe next time it could be worse and decimate the whole area.” Gina looked around at her friends’ faces as she talked, “Do you guys want to stay here and take our chances?”
“We started as a family and I’ll go wherever you and Lucy go. I think if we’re going to do it, we should before we lose the whole planting season. We have no idea how long it will last with all the changes, but we should get something in the ground.”
“I confess that being here, so close to the road or what’s left of it will bring people we don’t want, and without ammunition to waste, we’ll run out if we had to fight one battle. I’d like to see Abby and the rest of the kids have the chance to grow up. So, I vote for seclusion.”
Lucy slid closer to Ben, “I agree. We may be off the road, but someone is going to remember this place is here. Maybe one of those you and John ran off before or someone he knew from town, but someone will. The only people who will not come are the ones who can survive without killing to take what they want.”
“Miss Gina?”
Gina jumped hearing Olivia’s voice so close behind her. She had forgotten the girl was anywhere close. For some reason, Olivia had become Gina’s shadow. Maybe it was that Gina was the first woman she had seen after her escape or maybe there was something in Gina that she identified with and naturally sought her out.
Gina laughed, “Sorry. I didn’t realize you were right behind me. What do you need?”
“What you said about your ammunition and running out, my Mom or Dad didn’t tell those men, or they would have found me too.”
“Didn’t tell them what?” Gina frowned. She wasn’t sure what Olivia was talking about, “You never said that you knew why your parents had been targeted. All you said was that your parents sent you to hide in the warehouse.”
“I thought I did. The men were trying to make my Dad tell them where his guns were. He made Mom promise that no matter what happened to him, she was not to say anything because they would use the guns for killing people. I guess my Mom didn’t because the men never came to the warehouse, and when I went back to the house…well, you know that part and what happened after.”
“Olivia, when the men found you, why do you think they didn’t ask you about the guns? Doesn’t it seem funny that they killed your parents for the information and they didn’t bother to ask you?”
“The men that found me when I was trying to bury them weren’t the same ones who were at the house…before.”
“That kind of makes sense. So, your Dad had a what? A gun shop?”
“Her Dad used to reload for some of the guys and…when someone needed a firearm, but couldn’t pass the background check, Zack would find a seller and set them up with a meeting. He didn’t buy guns for people who had a less than stellar history, but for the ones who at one time had been picked up on some bullshit charges. DWI or back child support or something stupid they did when they were young…things that prevented them from owning or buying guns. If I remember correctly, he had quite a collection, but most of them were antiques.”
“So, he was a fine upstanding citizen then?” Ben laughed as if he’d made a joke and when
no one else joined in he let it taper off. “What? Wasn’t he an illegal gun salesman? Did I miss something here?”
Sam chuckled, “No you didn’t. But this isn’t the big city. If a young person makes it through high school without being picked up for something, in most people’s eyes, they had a very sheltered childhood. Here in the country, most everyone has some issues with the establishment. Nothing major, just shit kids get into.”
“My Dad was a good man, and he cared about people. Why are you trying to villainize him?” Olivia turned on Ben and the personality that only Sam had seen, lifted its head. “Anything he did he did to help people. If he was so unethical, he would have given them the guns and not cared what they did with them. He and my Mom might be alive today.” Olivia was on her knees and somehow had moved to kneel directly in front of Ben, leaning toward him, Olivia looked like she was going to attack him.
Gina reached out and set her hand on Oliva’s shoulder. She could feel the girl shaking under her hand. “Olivia, it’s time to settle down. Ben didn’t mean anything with his words. You have to remember that we came from the city where things are handled differently. Our definition of gun sales to undesirables is a far cry from this.”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean anything against your father. I am thinking of the crimes committed by criminals with guns who should never have been allowed to have one. They bought them from somewhere.”
“Not from Zack. I just said that he sold them to local people who didn’t deserve to have their ownership rights taken away because of something they did years ago. Today they would have never lost their gun rights.”
“Her Dad isn’t on trial here. The thing is, do we need to go and see what’s left of his weapons. If she’s right, and they’re still there, it could be a valuable asset for us, not to mention, they could save our lives somewhere down the road.”
Sam looked at Gina and then around at his friends. He shrugged, “I’m afraid we have too much on our plate right now. We have to prioritize our wants and needs. As soon as John is up to it, we need to move the cattle. Then we need to get something built to move our belongings and see if we can find diesel for the tractor.”
Beyond the New Horizon (Book 3): Living on the Edge Page 4
