by Wilson Harp
“Okay, but I want the seed now. I’ll let the town know what you said.”
“Good. Now where is Kenny? I want him to come in and get the seed.”
“I’ll get him,” said Ted.
Ted walked over to Kenny and spoke quietly to him. Kenny nodded and went to the gate. The gate swung open just enough for Kenny to slip through.
“How many men do you figure he has?” Anne asked.
“Maybe ten or twelve.”
“Are you going to tell the town of Lester’s offer?” I asked.
“Of course he is,” Anne said.
“What? Why?”
“Because it will be less mouths to feed, less people to take care of if some take him up on the offer.”
“She’s right,” Ted said. “We are going to be dealing with drugs and booze, anyway. That is wasted energy trying to get work out of those who will want to step out of reality for a bit. Some of those girls and women will see his invitation as a way to survive with as little work as possible.”
I couldn’t believe what Ted said, but when I looked at Anne, she had the same calm resolve in her eyes that Ted had in his voice. An invitation would be made to any who would be interested.
“Ted,” Kenny called from the gate. “I got the squash and zucchini seed. Lester is having some of his men bring the wheat bags.
“He try to get you to stay?” Ted asked.
“Yeah. Just like me and you talked about. They were smoking weed and had all of their booze lined up when I went in the barn. He means to party his way through the next couple of months.”
“How many?”
“Twenty, maybe twenty-five men. About five women. All of them with one of the men.”
Ted nodded. “That’s twice as many as I was expecting. That’s also why he wants more women. He didn’t recruit enough of them.”
“That’s what I figure,” Kenny said as he placed the seed bags on the ground. “They are armed to the teeth as well. I’m guessing they have enough to live on for a while, then they will start scavenging.”
“Scavenging?” Anne asked.
“Yeah, what Les is counting on is some of the towns around here will collapse. Then he and his boys can go and gather up resources they need. And recruit some of the healthy survivors if they can,” Ted said.
“He really believes this is the end of the world.” Anne said. Her voice was a mix of disbelief and revulsion.
“Yep,” Kenny said. “And he wants to go out at the very top. Now, any of ya’ll want to help me get this seed loaded up on the horses?”
I walked over to where the seed bags were and tried to lift them both. It didn’t happen. I never thought of myself as a weakling, but after struggling with the bucket of water the day before and now not being able to lift the bags Kenny had carried a hundred yards by himself, I realized I probably should have been hitting the weights more these last few years.
Kenny stretched and then took hold of the one of the bags. Together we secured them to the back of Ted’s horse.
While we did, four men came down the drive from the house and delivered two huge sacks of wheat.
“Les says that will feed five thousand,” one of the men said. “There is enough for two plantings. Hope you have the means to flour it.”
One of the other men chuckled and spit on the ground. The other three turned and walked back to the house. The spitter closed the gate and locked it with a heavy lock.
Ted and Anne removed the saddles from Bonnie and Clyde and set them on the ground. Then they loaded one of the bags of grain onto Bonnie while Kenny and I loaded the other bag on Clyde. The horses didn’t seem to mind the weight, and I figured as much as they were capable of carrying, it probably wasn’t any different than having a rider on their back.
“Get the saddle and let’s get going,” Ted said. “I want to make town before noon if possible.”
I looked at Anne. She already had her saddle up on her shoulder. She smiled and pointed at the saddle that had been on Clyde.
I sighed and picked up the saddle. It wasn’t as heavy as the seed, but I knew I would be worn out by the time we got to town. I put it on my shoulder and tried not to think about how far it would be.
Kenny led both Bonnie and Clyde, which was a great relief to me.
“We need to get these crops in the ground as quickly as possible,” Ted said. “We should have a few hundred pounds of radishes coming up in a couple of weeks. We can add some small game meat and make a stew, but we will need more substantial food.”
“He said he hoped we could turn the wheat into flour. Can we?” Anne asked.
Kenny looked over to her. “We can, if folks will listen to what I tell them. I know how to grind out grains into flour, but we will have to do it by hand unless we can find a couple of millstones.”
“Won’t that take a lot of effort?” I asked. “I mean, more than it may be worth?”
Ted laughed. “You will never taste a better bite of bread than the first bite you take from a loaf you brought from seedling to oven.”
“You’ve done it before, then?”
“Yep, that’s why the town called us crazy. We prepared for a time like this.”
“You’re still crazy,” said Anne. She smiled at Ted as she said it, though.
“That I am. And Lester. And Kenny. Maybe not Kenny. He actually went through an end of the world experience. Me and Lester, we just read about them and realized how horrible it would be should it happen.”
“And based on what could happen, you built your life around it?” I asked.
“Well,” Ted said, “if I could survive in a moneyless society based on barter and my skills, I knew I could survive in a society where money was easy to get and even easier to trade for what I wanted.”
Kenny nodded. “It’s easy to buy a pound of hamburger from a man when the piece of paper you give him will let him replace what he sold and leave him some profit. Try buying it when he can’t replace it and his family will starve without it.”
“I see what you mean,” I said.
“So you decided since you could survive when there was a collapse, then you should be able to survive before there was one,” Anne added.
“Correct,” Ted confirmed.
“But didn’t you want more than survival?” Anne asked.
“I did once,” Kenny said. “I thought I could somehow have a big life. Fancy cars, big house, money would be no concern. Then Katrina done washed away all of those dreams. Good thing too, cause I wasn’t heading to those things. I was barely surviving, but I didn’t realize it.”
“So what about after Katrina? What did you do?” I asked.
“My sister had her husband take off on her after she had her third, so I figured maybe she could use some help. Honestly, I needed help to, and I figured she might be able to get me enough cash to get back to New Orleans or maybe Atlanta and I could start over.
“But when I got here, she was just dirt poor. I asked why she wasn’t on food stamps or assistance, and she slapped me. She asked me if I had no brains at all. I was mad, but she was my little sister, so I asked her what she meant.
“She told me it was because I relied on other people that I almost died in New Orleans. I was waiting on someone else to get me out of the pit I was in. She said I had been living that way since I left home.
“I asked her how she made enough to feed her kids and she showed me her garden and chickens. I was stunned, really. My folks never knew anything about chickens and our garden was just enough to keep Pop happy with fresh tomatoes in the summer.
“She had two full acres of beans and corn, with cabbages, carrots, onions, you name it. And she had close to forty chickens. She said she sold whatever they didn’t need and canned a bunch for the winter. She sold her eggs to a man who took them to a farmers market to resell and paid her power bill from the sale of those eggs! She also sold chicks to those wanting to have chickens and took in laundry for some of the neighbors.
Ken
ny looked at Ted and smiled.
“Including that redneck. He is the reason her husband left and he also taught her how to live off of her wits and the land.”
“How did you make her husband leave?” I asked Ted.
“I don’t like bullies. I saw him knock her around one too many times, and I went over and had some words with him.”
Kenny laughed. “Yeah, he went over to have words with a tire iron and .45. Tommy spent two weeks in the hospital.”
“And you spent six months in jail,” Anne said. “I remember that. They said you attacked him because you were upset to find out your neighbor was black.”
“No, I never had a problem with blacks. I just had a problem with those who thought that being stronger meant you could do what you wanted.”
“Yeah, well, Tommy kept beating on Sophia until he hears that Ted is getting out of jail. So he goes over to Ted’s house and burns it down.”
“What? When did he do that?” I asked.
“About two days before I got out of jail. They released me, I got some money from an ATM, hired a cab and got out to my place and it was burned to the foundation.”
“What did you do?” At this point I was completely captured by his story.
“I found a poker from my fireplace in the ashes. I went over to Tommy’s and knocked on the door. He opened it and laughed at me. Told me I was a stupid inbred cracker to think I could mess him up and not pay for it.
“I asked him if he had beaten his wife again. He told me it was none of my business. So I kicked the door open and walked in. He had a gun in his waistband, but I swung the poker until my arm was tired. His hand never found his gun. It slid across the floor. I got some newspaper and a metal pot from their kitchen and made myself a little fire-pit there in the living room. I set the end of the poker over the flames and told him I was going to get the poker red hot and then brand the words “wife beater” into his forehead. That is, unless he left the house that night.”
“I take it he left that night?” I asked.
“Broken wrist, missing tooth, and jacked up eye. He grabbed whatever he could of value and left in their car. Sophia was furious. She was screaming at me, saying she and her kids were going to starve. I went back to my place and slept in the woods. The next day I started building a shelter and set snares for rabbits.
“Sophia came over and watched me for an hour and left. She did that a couple of times before she asked me what I thought I was doing. I told her I was rebuilding and going to live off the land. Eventually, I taught her to do the same. She had it all going when this guy showed up.”
Kenny laughed. “Yeah, when I saw my sis was making it even though she was dirt poor, I thought she had been suckered into some scam by this redneck. So I went over and looked at his place and realized he was about as broke as she was. They were doing what I never realized I had always wanted to do.”
“What was that?” I asked.
Kenny pointed to the U.S. flag flying in the town square. “Live without relying on anyone else. The American dream.”
I was shocked we were already back in town. The saddle had been heavy, but the story these men told had kept me distracted from my discomfort. I set the saddle down and stretched. People were gathering around when I realized what made Ted a leader. He wasn’t a follower.
Chapter 9
“I’ll take a look, but I don’t know why Anne said I could fix it. I just tinkered with electronics when I was younger. I didn’t go to school for it or anything,” I said.
“It’s not a high tech fix I’m looking for, David. I just need to see if we can figure a way to power up the receiver. I think if we can do that, we can get some news,” Ted replied
“What news do you expect?”
“I don’t know, but anything is better than nothing.”
“Want to send Farrin out to Poplar Bluff? They might have a radio there.”
“Not after what he found at Wilcox. If he was shot and chased driving up on a small town, I can’t imagine what he might run into at a place like Poplar Bluff.”
I nodded. The smoke from the west that morning a week ago made us all curious. We didn’t know if it was a forest fire that might endanger us or maybe a controlled burn trying to signal for help. We sent Farrin and his motorcycle to find out. He returned an hour later. It took him a good hour and six beers to describe what he saw. The entire town of Wilcox looked like it was engulfed in flames. There were clumps of men roving the area, burning what they didn’t want and taking what they did. Mostly women and whatever they could load into wagons.
One band of men saw him and called for him to stop. When he turned and drove off, he heard several gunshots. He never looked back.
It was decided then no one would go out to scout alone. Every road into Kenton was also watched by groups of armed men. Every day since, we had seen more and more fires pop up from the west. The bands of raiders and destroyers stayed away from Kenton. We assumed they had sent scouts as well, and had seen we were prepared to defend ourselves.
“We may need to send someone into Poplar Bluff eventually,” Ted said. “We are running low on basic medicines. I don’t know that we can legitimately trade for some from people there, but…”
“There might be some in medicine cabinets that were left behind by their owners,” I finished for him.
“You don’t like that, do you David?”
I shook my head. “No, makes me feel like we are not better than Lester and his group.”
“Well we are, we just need medicine. Going through people’s houses might be distasteful, but that is what we are faced with.
“I agree, I just don’t like it.”
I picked up the radio and put it in my satchel. “Who told you to let me take a look at this thing?”
“Anne. When she heard you were able to fix the tractor and the well pump, she remembered you had a knack for putting things together when you were a kid.”
“Those were mechanical in nature, this is electric. But I will see what I can do.”
“No harm in trying, it’s not like we are going to get less reception from it.”
I smiled and slung my satchel over my shoulder. Clyde was needed to help move some trees today, so I would have to walk the four miles home from the library. The day of the event, the walk into town had made me tired. Now I could walk four miles without paying attention.
The days had turned warmer and the rains had come to a stop. The fields were planted with the food that would allow us to survive, and everyone anxiously awaited the first harvest of lettuce and beans. Anything other than radish and turnip soup seasoned with a little green onion and boiled squirrel.
I walked past one of the fields and waved at the boys in the field. Two of them carried rifles and several others had sharp spades. Those with the rifles were scanning the edges of the field making sure no rabbits came in to eat the precious crops. Those with spades walked along each row, making sure no moles or other burrowing varmint was making itself at home.
The boys waved back and went back to their vigilant sentry work.
I shook my head as I thought about what Lexi would say if she had seen this. She was afraid of guns. She never grew up around them and did not like them. I didn’t care one way or another. To me, they were just another tool. One I grew up with, but found no particular joy in using. It was like a hammer. Lexi was afraid of them and didn’t want one in the house, so I acquiesced to her demand.
But now they were needful things. The right tool for the right job. At night, the dogs were set free in the field and the snares were set along the edges. But in the daytime, a stray rabbit taken with a .22 meant not only saving our crops, but more meat in our stew.
I dreamed about Lexi and Emma often, but each day I felt further from them. I didn’t know if they were okay, or even alive. I pushed that thought out of my mind. I would just have to find them. Eventually. Some how.
Noon was approaching and that meant Mom would be cooking. She
always found something to cook. Recently it’s been dandelion greens with a little oil and salt. Not much of a lunch, but it fills the belly and it’s as bad as I would have imagined.
The soybean fields across the road were full of green, but there wasn’t much in the way of a meal from that. Some people suggested we could harvest the crop when ready and process oil from the beans and trade it to other towns. I didn’t think there was much chance of us finding people who would want to trade anything useful for some cooking oil. But who knows. It would give us something to do and we would have plenty of cooking oil for ourselves, in any case.
As my parent’s house came into view, I saw my dad washing my car. I blinked a couple of times and then looked back. He was washing my car. I approached the driveway and walked up behind him. He was on his knees with a soapy wet rag washing one of the tires.
“Taking her out for a spin?” I asked.
Dad turned and smiled at me. “No, just had some leftover water from laundry and didn’t want to just dump it in the ditch.
I nodded. Soapy water was dumped in the ditch, cooking water was saved for the fields.
“So, you figured you would make sure my car was the best looking one on the street?”
“I would have washed mine, but you’re blocking me in the garage,” he said.
He started to stand and I reached over and took his arm. He nodded and smiled as I helped him to his feet.
“You finally convinced your mom I shouldn’t be on the digging crews, and for some reason that’s one of the things she won’t forget. So I’m stuck at home helping her clean. You would be amazed at how boring retirement is when you can’t watch television.”
“Or dig latrines.”
“Or dig latrines,” he repeated. “What’s in the satchel?”
“A radio. Anne told Ted to let me take a look at it. Don’t know what I can do.”
Dad picked up the bucket of water and carried it toward the ditch. “You were always taking apart my stuff when you were a kid. Always wanted to know how it worked.”
“I always got it back together.”
“Except the remote.”
“Oh yeah,” I said. “Except the remote.”
