Surviving the Fog

by Stan Morris

  “I think so. Of course, he will. What should I tell him about you?”

  “Tell Big Chief that I’m your long lost girlfriend. Girlfriends get to vote, huh?” murmured Jean.

  Howard was glad to hear her bantering. He took it as a hopeful sign that she wasn’t as sick as he had feared.

  “Yes. All right, I’ll tell him you’re my girlfriend,” he retorted. “But I have to warn you. I was raised to be a very traditional man. I’ll expect to be obeyed.”

  She let out a soft snort. “Dream on. Tell you what. I’ll obey you one time. Only once, but whatever you tell me, I’ll do it.”

  “Yeah, right,” Howard scoffed.

  “No, I’m serious. My word is good, and I’m giving you my word. One time. Whenever. Better use it wisely.” Jean slumped on his back, her strength expended.

  They made their way down the trail until dark, and then they stopped. Howard was exhausted and defeated. He strained to listen for the sound of voices, but he heard nothing. They found shelter of a sort under an overhanging cliff. As they were unrolling their bags, a light snow began to fall. They zipped their bags together, and then they snuggled close together. Jean had improved during the first part of the day, but as the night continued, she seemed to worsen again. Howard held Jean close and prayed, and then he fell asleep. Slowly, a sprinkle of snow covered the tops of their heads.

  They were found by Jacob early the next morning. Urgently, afraid that they were dead, Jacob shook them. They stirred, and the smaller red head opened her bleary eyes and blinked.

  “Hi, I’m Howard’s girlfriend,” she said.

  Relieved, Jacob paused to consider her words. “You just met him,” he replied.

  “Never judge the depth of a relationship by the length of its existence,” she lectured.

  She yawned and went back to sleep. Jacob saw that Howard was waking. Howard looked at Jacob and gave a start.

  “Jean!” he exclaimed.

  “Your girlfriend is okay, I think,” Jacob assured him. “She woke up, but then she went back to sleep. Found them!” This was called out to the rest of the rescue party hurrying up the path.

  Howard climbed wearily to his feet, as Ralph, Rasul, Ahmad, and Yuie arrived. Quickly, Ahmad handed a thermos of warmed water to Howard, and he woke Jean and forced her to drink a small amount. Then they placed Jean on a stretcher that Hector had made from tree limbs and a blanket. Howard leaned against Yuie, as the other four boys carried the young forestry officer down the mountain. The sky had cleared during the night. It was still cold, but Mike had thought to send a fresh set of clothes, including two pairs of socks, for Howard.

  “Who is she,” Ralph asked, as they plodded along the river.

  “Howard’s girlfriend,” Jacob answered.

  “Wow, that was quick,” Ralph muttered.

  Jean woke the next day in a comfortable bed. By the light streaming in through the high window, she could tell that it was well into the morning. She was bone tired, and her muscles ached as she sat up and saw a short, sandy haired young boy and a slightly taller, black haired Asian girl staring at her.

  “Where am I?” she asked.

  “This is the Chief’s Headquarters,” the girl said. Jean thought about that, and then her eyes narrowed.

  “And is this the Big Chief’s bed?” she asked, her voice sharp.

  “Um…. yes,” was the girl’s reply, as she glanced at the boy.

  “Listen,” Jean said, her tone becoming very serious. “I want you to tell Big Chief that I already have a boyfriend; Howard.”

  She fell back and closed her eyes. The two kids looked at one another. Jean suddenly sat up again.

  “And tell Big Chief that Howard and I have already done it. Three times.” She lay back down and closed her eyes.

  “Uh, gee,” said the girl to the boy who was scowling.

  Jean sat up again. “And tell Big Chief that I’m probably pregnant.” She lay back down, and presently she began to snore.

  The boy motioned for the girl to follow him out of the building. “Get Howard,” he said.

  “Now don’t be hasty, Chief,” the girl said.

  “Get. Howard. Now!”

  “Yes, sir,” the girl muttered, and she fled.

  Howard appeared with Yuie a few minutes later. The young man’s face had a greenish look.

  “Did you do it with that woman while she was sick?” Mike snapped.

  “Oh, Howard!” Yuie exclaimed sadly.

  “What? No! No, I didn’t do anything except take off all her clothes!”

  “Oh, Howard!” Yuie repeated.

  Howard put his hand on his stomach. “I think I’m going to be sick,” he moaned. Mike and Yuie sprang away as Howard leaned forward and vomited.

  Jean woke three more times that day. She was feeling much better. The young boy was usually around. She wondered if Big Chief had assigned him the role of helping her. Or maybe he was guarding her. Was she a prisoner? Big Chief had not appeared yet, and she was getting anxious. She slept well that night, and the following morning she woke refreshed. Mike, she had learned the boy’s name, was sitting at the desk.

  “So, I hear that Big Chief is a real tough guy, Mike,” she said casually to the boy, trying to probe for some information.

  The boy looked at her. “He’s not so bad. If you don’t count the times we have to stand under freezing cold water for punishment. And, of course, the beatings hurt some, but we’re tough. We can take it.”

  Jean was shocked at his words, and then things got worse. She heard a terrible moan from the loft.

  “What’s that!” she demanded, as the hair stood up on the back of her neck.

  There was a look of sympathy on Mike’s face. “Poor guy. He made Big Chief mad.” Jean heard another pitiful moan.

  “Jeez,” exclaimed Jean.

  I am SOL, she thought. The next moment, she heard a knock and then a man opened the door and came into the cabin. He looked directly at Mike.

  “Chief, I got the four barrels from Mrs. Brown,” he said. “She says ‘thanks’ for the venison we sent, and she sent back a truckload of potatoes and some beets. I guess she had a good crop this year.”

  Then the man looked at Jean and said, “Hola. I hear you’re Howard’s new girlfriend. I’m Hector.”

  “Thanks, Hector,” said Mike. “If that idea Eric has for a solar heating system works, it will be a lot nicer in the Lodge during the winter. I’m sending Jacob back up there to kill another deer for her. That should fill her freezers.”

  “Si, that will be nice, amigo,” the man replied. “Chief, Kat has finished the platform for the Porta Pottys. She already drilled the starting holes, and she’s ready to cut out the spaces for the toilet waste, so I need the jigsaw.”

  Jean watched as the boy retrieved a jigsaw from a large red tool chest. The man and the boy talked for a few more minutes, and then the man left.

  The boy turned to Jean who was glaring at him. “Freezing cold water, huh? Beatings, huh?” she said sarcastically. “You are Big Chief?”

  Mike giggled. “Just, Chief,” he replied. Another moan came wafting down from above.

  “Who’s that?” Jean asked.

  “That’s Howard,” Mike replied. “Whatever you had, he caught.”

  “Damn!” Jean sprang out of bed.

  She was wearing a man’s long shirt, so she didn’t bother putting on her dry pants before she climbed the ladder. She found Howard lying on a futon.

  “Howard,” she asked anxiously, as she knelt by his side. “Are you okay?”

  Howard opened his dull eyes. “Oh, hi, Baby,” he answered. “I’m fine.” He looked like a sick dog. “I’m glad you’re better.”

  Jean leaned back on her calves and sighed. “Yeah, I’m better, thanks to you.” Howard closed his eyes and slept.

  Howard was sick for two more days. Whenever he woke, Jean was usually at his side. Sometimes Mike shooed her out of the cabin, and whenever he did, Jean explored the camp,
marveling at the things these kids and one man had accomplished. The rough Lodge amazed her.

  Everywhere she went, kids would whisper behind her back, “That’s Howard’s girlfriend.”

  Some of the girls were not happy about that. Jean wondered whether she should deny or confirm the rumor. Once, when she was up in the loft, she referred to their long trek back to the camp.

  “I still can’t believe you were only wearing a pair of briefs and your boots, Howard,” she marveled. “You must have been freezing.”

  “It’s not like I could fit into your clothes, Jean,” he replied.

  They fell into a comfortable silence for a few minutes, and then Jean murmured, “You’re something else, kid.”

  Howard looked up at her. “I’m not a kid, Jean. Not anymore.”

  “Yes, that’s true,” she acknowledged sadly. “You’re not a kid. I think that’s what pisses me off most about this situation. You kids should be hanging at the mall, playing computer games, and trying to decide how to ask a girl to the prom.”

  “Instead of trying to decide how to get you naked again?” Howard asked with a grin.

  “You!” Jean smacked him on the head.

  “Owww!” Howard yelped.

  “Oh shit, I’m sorry, Howard. Dammit!”

  Gingerly Howard rubbed his head, and then he asked, “So, do you think I will ever get to see you naked again?”

  Jean sighed. “Maybe. But don’t rush me.”

  “All right.” Howard took her hand. “I can wait.”

  When Howard felt better, he left Chief’s Headquarters. He was eager to see what had been accomplished in the recent week. Hector had been busy. He had walled the narrow spaces between the old cabins and the edges of the cave. On the west side, he had framed an opening for a door, and then he filled it with the door that had been used to carry Jackie’s body. Presently, Hector was working on what Eric called a closed solar heating system, whatever that meant.

  Howard was slightly unnerved by the sight of nine of their ten Porta Pottys sitting on the two cabin floors that had not been used to build the Lodge. The mobile outhouses had been moved just west of the Lodge, but they were close enough that they could be reached in seconds from the door of the Lodge.

  “How are we going to empty the Porta Pottys in winter?” he asked. He had helped Hector and some of the other kids empty the Porta Potty tanks into a gulch just above the fog, not long after Hector’s arrival at their camp.

  “We’re not,” Kathy replied. “I removed the tanks and the bottoms from the Porta Pottys and cut holes in the floors under each Porta Potty.”

  Stunned, Howard stared at Kathy. “No!” he said.

  “Yep, the stuff will go right on the ground under the floor. That way we should be good for all winter. It’ll be frozen until spring, and then covering it will be a really smelly chore. I wouldn’t break many rules this winter, if I were you.”

  “Where’s the last Porta Potty?” he asked.

  “It’s in the bottom room closest to the door. It’s next to the outside wall, and Hector draped some of the cabin canvas to screen it. It’s for night emergencies only. There’s a hole in that floor too, and below it is one of the recycle bins. Hopefully it will stay frozen for most of the winter. Don’t forget. Night emergencies only,” she advised. “The rest of that cabin is for washing, since we won’t have the showers. We’ll collect snow in buckets, and hope that it melts. I bet we all stink by March.”

  The camp got a heavy snowfall a few days later. It was October now, and it was time to make the last preparations for winter. The water lines were drained in the dining hall and in Chief’s Headquarters. Hector attended to the fluids in the machinery. Jacob killed three more deer. They kept two and delivered one to Mary Brown’s freezer.

  The solar heating system was working. Hector had scraped together every piece of pipe he could find, even scavenging some from the buildings at the logging camp and from the dining hall.

  Eric placed the barrels at the entrance to the smaller alcove cave to reduce the size of the entrance to the small grotto. If it became dangerously cold in the Lodge, the plan was to gather everyone in the small cave. There would be too many of them in there for the amount of air that could circulate, but it would let them survive for a day, before the carbon dioxide level rose too high.

  Mike had one last idea. He asked Hector to talk to Mrs. Brown, and she agreed to his proposal. He thought about the various members of their tribe, and then he went to speak to Ralph. He and Ralph would never be good friends, but after Jackie’s death they had reached a modus operendi, so Ralph listened respectfully to Mike’s idea.

  “You want me to live at Mary Brown’s house this winter?” he asked.

  “Yes, and I want you to take four kids with you. I want them to be the youngest kids. It’ll be less crowded in that house, if you take the smallest kids. For starters, take the twins,” Mike said.

  “And which girls?” Ralph asked.

  “That’s up to you,” Mike replied. “Try to pick two that will get along well with the twins.”

  “Kylie and Paige then, I guess. I’ll talk to them. You tell the twins,” Ralph responded.

  Ralph spoke to the girls. “Mike wants some of us to spend the winter at Mary Brown’s house. I’m going, and the twins are going. I would like you to come, too.”

  “Why us?” Paige asked. She was a small twelve year old girl, as was Kylie. They were good friends. Both were from Tonopah, Nevada.

  “Because you get along with the twins so well,” Ralph explained.

  Kylie wrinkled her nose. “Not that well,” she said. “They’re both dorks.”

  “You get along with them better than the other girls,” Ralph said. “And Mrs. Brown will probably let you bake cookies.” Paige looked at Kylie. That was a good reason. Both girls liked to bake pastries, and they liked to eat them.

  “Okay,” they chorused.

  Mike talked to the twins, and they were agreeable to the move. The day they left, he gathered the five and spoke to them.

  “You are going to be guests of Mrs. Brown, so do what she says. And do what Ralph says. I’ll see you guys in the spring.”

  Suddenly Mike realized that he didn’t want them to go. They were his people! They belonged with him! He swallowed the lump in his throat, and he hugged the girls. He fist bumped with the twins. Then he turned to Ralph.

  “Take care of them,” he said. “Take care of yourself. Good luck, Ralph.”

  Ralph shook his hand. “I will. Good luck to you too, Chief.”

  The two former foes laughed, both recognizing the irony of the moment. The twins climbed into the bed of the pickup, and the girls squeezed into the cab with Hector. With a last wave to Mike, they were off.

  The food, except for the items in the freezer, was moved to the Lodge. All of their supplies and personal items were moved. The Chief’s Headquarters was stripped of everything that they could use. The bed and the desk were brought into the Lodge and put in one of the downstairs rooms. Mike felt awkward using an entire room, but the consensus of the tribe was that he needed a private room to hold meetings.

  Mike was willing to give John and Desi their own room, but he was privately relieved when they told him that they had agreed to share the room with Howard and Jean. That left five available rooms. Mike gave the girls all four rooms on the upper level, and he gave the two couples the bottom room farthest from the door. He took the next room, and left the one next to the cleaning room to six of the remaining nineteen boys. The other thirteen boys were housed in the small cave.

  Mike felt bad about not giving Hector a private room, but Hector assured him that it was not necessary. He would be the cave room boss, Hector added. The only one who was really unhappy about the living arrangements was Kathy, who definitely thought that Hector needed his own room.

  “Can’t you screen off part of the cave, at least?” she asked.

  “Why would Hector want to do that?” Mike asked, puzzled
at her request.

  Kathy glanced sideways at Hector who was frowning at her.

  “Well…,” she began.

  “Chica, I agreed that we could make out,” Hector interrupted. “Don’t push it.”

  “Okay,” she replied, pouting.

  Everyone had moved into the Lodge, and they hoped they were ready for winter.

  Chapter Seven

  WINTER IN THE LODGE

  The kids were allowed to come and go as they pleased. Mike sent out a few more hunting parties, although they were receiving more snow than rain now. Mike cautioned the leaders, Jacob and Luis, not to go too far. Now that everything was in place, he was anxious that there should be no injuries. So far, they had been lucky. Except for Howard’s adventure, the only medical problems had been scrapes and bruises. Everyone who had been invited to the camp had been instructed to bring a tube of Neosporin, so they had plenty of that medicine.

  Mike asked Erin to dream up some ways to entertain the tribe during the long months ahead. Erin formed a social committee made up exclusively of girls. The committee began by asking each of the campers what kinds of talents they had. By the time it became too cold to play outside, the committee was prepared with a variety of activities.

  When it got cold enough outside, they would move their large chest freezers to a level place just outside the door, and pack snow on top of the food. The freezers held the dismembered carcasses of three deer along with other items. Bags of potatoes, rice, dry cereal, powdered milk, and flour were stashed under the floors of the bottom rooms along with the canned goods from the logging camp. Mike hoped they had enough. He wondered if Jacob might be able to get one more deer. He wondered how long the road would be open to Mary Brown’s house, so they could restock their butter. At the first meeting in Mike’s new quarters, the Council discussed their food supply.

  “Are we going to make it to spring, Yuie?” Mike asked.

  “Well, our original supplies are just about gone except for some rice, cereal, flour, and powdered milk. Switching to water in July helped a lot. We used up the food that we found in the bikers’ shack and in the RV. We used up the first deer that Jacob killed, but we have three more in the freezers. We have twenty bags of potatoes and ten bags of beets that Mrs. Brown sent, plus those jars of pickles. And we have lots and lots of her winter squash.