The Provider

by John Hunt

  She stopped, put her end of the pole down and stretched, as if needing a break. I did the same.

  “Jim, Bess tells me you killed a guy, back in Anchorage.”

  I started; it was the first time she’d called me by my name. With her next to me now, her hair bobbing around her shoulders, a view of her breasts straining against the red T-shirt she was sporting, tied up so her tanned midriff was bare, I was a bit breathless anyway, had a real boner — my trousers were so baggy, I hoped she couldn’t see — and now my heart seemed to stop.

  “It…it was an accident, I didn’t mean to…” I mumbled.

  “Didn’t sound like an accident to me,” she said. “Bess said you shot him plumb in the middle, with one shot. She’s very proud of you, you know.”

  “She is?” I said, shocked. “I didn’t know. It was just something…I didn’t mean…you won’t tell anyone…?”

  “Of course I won’t. It’s strange here, isn’t it?” she said, changing subject, so that my brain spun, trying to catch up. “It could be the end of the world, we’re almost alone. Like Adam and Eve…are you gay?”

  “What? No, no, not at all!”

  “Do you like me?” She stepped closer.

  I shuffled my feet. “Of course I do. I—”

  “Well then, could we be friends?” She took another step. I was frozen to the spot.

  “Us? Me? Well…”

  “I don’t know where this is going to go, Jim,” she interrupted, “but here…”

  She put her arm around my neck, drew me in, and kissed me on the mouth, soft and sweet, her breasts pushing against me. It wasn’t quite the first time I’d kissed a girl, there was the time at some party when I managed to get in because no one realized I hadn’t been invited, and a drunk girl came up to me. But I was still a virgin, and I’d never got this close to anyone like her before. Her tongue came in. I stood rooted in surprise.

  “We could get to know each other better, if you’d like to,” she said. “Looks as if we’ll be sharing company for a while.”

  “I…I haven’t had a girlfriend before,” I stammered.

  “Then it’s about time you did.”

  “But why me?”

  “I like you, Jim. You’re straightforward. You seem honest. And you were never all over me, like most guys. Actually, I was starting to wonder if you would ever notice I was here at all.”

  “But, but Jessie…”

  “And I love your face,” she continued. “OK, it’s a bit lopsided,” her hands moved over my features, “it’s what you might call characterful. And you’ve got a couple of crooked teeth, and your ears are too big, and you’ve got a beak for a nose, and your eyes are too close together and never look at me, but I love it when they do, like they are now, and I don’t think I’ll get tired of it.”

  Our kisses deepened, our bodies were warm against each other in the sun. Water gurgled in a nearby stream, eddying around the rocks. Flycatchers were whistling whit whit.

  It was an out of time moment that I never wanted to end. I thought I’d been happy before, but now I was floating up on cloud nine.

  That evening Jessie and I walked over to the lake, where Bess was sitting on a rock, fishing. She glanced around. “They’re not coming for me like they do for Bob,” she said, turning back to focus on her rod. “I haven’t caught anything yet.”

  “I have,” Jessie replied, taking my hand.

  Bess turned again, her mouth dropping open in what could have been delight or horror. “Gosh, this is soooo wierd. My geek brother making out with my best friend,” she exclaimed. “Fantabulous!”

  A couple of days later, I picked a moment when Dad was alone and blurted out, “Dad, do you have any condoms?”

  “What!”

  “Um, you know, protection.” My face was hot.

  “I know what they are, son, but I didn’t know you and Jessie had something going.”

  “Ur, well, I think so.”

  He stood up, treating me to a long, searching look. “You’ve both managed to keep that really quiet. She’s a nice girl. Are you treating her right?”

  “I wouldn’t…I wouldn’t do anything she didn’t want me to. We’ve only kissed. This is just in case. Actually, it’s her idea,” I babbled. “We’ve been talking about it. She wants to do it.” I felt myself blushing.

  “Have you done this before?”

  “No! I just think…I just think…she might be the one. That this might be…the time.”

  “Actually, I don’t have any, I’ve been snipped. But we could look out for some.” He paused. “I’d like to talk about this with your mom, if you haven’t told her yourself, OK?”

  I ducked my head, even more embarrassed. “OK.”

  “Let’s do it now, get it over with. I’ll go find her, we’ll walk over to the beach there.”

  I was sitting on a rock overlooking the lake, my favorite spot, where you could see the small fry in the clear water, the beetles zipping through the plants, caddisflies trundling across the bottom, and all the way down to the far end of the lake, when Mom and Dad came over.

  “Your Dad’s told me, Jim, and I’ve got to say, I don’t like it. You’re too young.”

  “Mom!” I could feel the anger rising in me — I wasn’t sure where it was coming from. I hadn’t contradicted my parents before. “I’m not! And I don’t actually need your permission. I’m old enough to fight in the army, and kill people, and I already have. I’m old enough to have a pilot’s certificate. So I’m old enough to have sex.”

  She looked taken aback. “But Jessie’s only just old enough at sixteen, Jim, legally. And don’t get so thin-skinned about this. We’re just concerned about what’s best for you.”

  She hesitated. “Jim, if you feel ready for it, if Jessie does, I’m not going to stand in your way.”

  Dad looked at Mom, who nodded. “I’m glad for you, Jim,” he said quietly. “We’ll see if we can get hold of some. But don’t even dare think about going too far till then, this is not the time for unplanned pregnancies, you understand?”

  “Thanks, Dad — I won’t let you down.”

  PART TWO

  FALL

  TWENTY-THREE

  The next day we were all sitting around the table, crammed in – us Richards, the Hardings, Bob, and Louise.

  Dad was opening the discussion.

  “I’m worried about what’s happening in the world outside. We’ve been here for a month now and there’s no way to get news. I keep thinking, do we need to protect ourselves? What’s happening with other neighbors? If the government doesn’t get the power back, how are things going to develop through the winter? How are we going to make a go of this?”

  “Surely they’re going to sort things out before winter,” Mom replied.

  Dad pulled in a long breath, letting it out again in a sigh. “I really do hope so, Mary, but they haven’t done it yet. If they had, we’d surely have seen some evidence of it. Some vehicles on the road…”

  Bob coughed. “There was a jam on the Highway, at the beginning; it’s cleared now, but we haven’t seen anyone moving down there for weeks now.”

  “What?” Mom exclaimed. “Bob, you didn’t tell us!”

  “What was the point? What could we’ve done?”

  “There must’ve been something we could’ve done, Bob,” Mom spluttered indignantly. “Oh, I knew I should have stayed in Anchorage. I could have helped.”

  “Mary, we know each other now. You’ve got to believe, if it had been a few stranded motorists, we would’ve gone and done what we could. But how many people are you going to share our food and the lodge with? We’re on our own here, so are they.”

  “But it’s just not right, Bob!”

  “We made a deal,” Bob said harshly, “that we’d look after each other. That’s what we’re doing. If you want to take care of everyone else, that’s fine, I’ll move on.”

  There was a long silence.

  “Mary, Bob’s right,” said Louise. �
�We have a deal. We shook hands on it.”

  “But…”

  Dad interrupted. “Let’s continue. I think we can take it that power, let alone law and order, hasn’t been restored yet. I wish I’d figured out about ham radios and brought one along. The guys down the Portage River don’t have one either. Honestly, though, I thought we’d have heard something by now. I think we need to venture out, to see what anyone else knows.”

  Matthew intervened. “Maybe the cities are getting back to normal, and they just haven’t got around to contacting people outside yet. Maybe the rest of the country’s back on its feet, and it’s just in areas like Alaska there’s still a problem.”

  Mom frowned worriedly. “We should think of the risk. Maybe we’re better off staying here until someone comes to find us than going looking for trouble. What if we just run into more people like Mr. Trinker?”

  I shuddered at the memory. “Mom, first you’re saying we should go out and help people, now you’re saying we should keep away from them. You need to make up your mind.”

  She looked at me, surprised. “Well, I just don’t think this is right.” She got up in a bit of a huff, and filled her cup from the water barrel.

  “Donald and Matthew are right.” Bob rubbed his chin. “We need to figure out what’s happening before the fall snows come. Come September or October, we’ll probably be stuck. We won’t be able to get anywhere till next spring or summer. And I wasn’t reckoning on spending the winter here.”

  “So if we did have to stay,” said Dad, “could we do it? Matthew, you’re the storekeeper, what do you think?”

  “We’ve a hundred fine salmon and a load of other fish, three carcasses of deer, several dozen hares and ptarmigan, thanks to Bob and Jim here. They’ve all been smoked and dried, so they’re not going to be fine dining, but they’ll see us through for a few months, if needs be, so long as the ice cave’s secure. We don’t have enough for much longer though. So we’d need a lot more meat and fish. And we don’t have much in the way of vegetables or fruit. We need a lot more foraging trips. And if you’re really thinking we’re going to be here through the winter, we need mega flour, pasta, rice, beans, dried milk, baking powder, cornmeal, as essentials. Then there’s cheese, eggs, potatoes, onions, tomatoes…how much more do you want me to list…and of course salt, vinegar and sugar. We do need those. They all last forever, and I can use them to preserve food. If we can’t do that, we’ll be hand-to-mouth.”

  “Whoa!” Dad interrupted. “I get the message. That seems about the size of it. So even to get enough food, we have a lot to do.”

  “Well, it surely looks like we need to scale up the foraging trips,” Jessie commented.

  “OK. We should go carefully, in groups,” said Bob. “Rifles and shotguns. The cranberries are out now, and bears love ’em. And we’ll need a lot more firewood as well, the wood stack needs to be the same size as the lodge.”

  Jessie caught my eye. She seemed to be expecting me to say something. “We’ll need more living accommodation,” I said.

  “You could be right there, Jim,” Dad replied. “Though whether we can all fit into this lodge – probably too tight. So we’d have to build another one, or an extension, we’ll see.”

  I glanced back at Jessie. She nodded.

  “Jessie and me would like our own place.”

  There was silence, puzzlement, and then general consternation around the table.

  “About time, Jim.” Bob clapped his hands. “I thought you’d been up, lately. Glad you’re getting lucky. Best keep your trouser snake zipped in though.”

  Jessie blushed, Mom sputtered, Dad looked disapproving, Sue seemed not to know what we were talking about,

  Matthew looked up in surprise. “What’s this? When did this happen?”

  “Adults!” exclaimed Bess. “Blind as bats. Never notice anything.” She sniggered. “I’m all in favor, I’d have more room, and I don’t want to hear them doing whatever they’re going to do in bed all night.”

  We looked at Mom, expecting her to object but she just shrugged. “In for a cent, in for a dollar. This is further than I expected – shacking up. But it’s your lives, might as well get on with them now rather than have you and your hormones fretting around us all winter. It does seem strange though, last year you were my little boy and now you’re talking about setting up home.”

  I managed to look Matthew in the eye.

  “Is that all right, Mr. Harding?”

  He looked at Mom and Dad. Dad nodded.

  “It’s a lot of extra work,” said Dad. “And there’s not much time. At least you’ll find out pretty quick if you’re suited or not. But if it doesn’t work out, you stay friends, alright? There’s not going to be room for enmity and tantrums here.”

  “We’re not children!” Jessie exclaimed hotly.

  “I didn’t mean it that way,” Dad replied firmly. “Plenty of angry and bitter adults around when they break up. But we could be cooped up here for some time. If you split up, there’s nowhere to go to.”

  “That’s not going to happen, Dad,” I replied.

  Mom added, “Matthew, if you’re OK with it…it depends on you.”

  “Gee. I don’t know about this.”

  Jessie stood up, looking fierce, color flaming in her cheeks. “This is between Jim and me. We don’t need your approval.”

  “Yes you do, Jessie,” Mom said firmly. She went over and took Matthew’s hand in hers. “Matthew, we haven’t known each other for long, but if Jim and Jessie want to be together, I think we should support them.”

  I went over to Matthew. This was the hardest thing I’d ever done. I could feel my voice cracking. “Thanks, Mom,” I said, glancing at her. “I’ll look after Jessie, Mr Harding, I promise,” I said nervously.

  “This is the way of it, folks.” Louise smiled. “This is how we used to do it; two families, need blood ties, in the native tradition they’re old enough to have been married for years already.”

  Matthew got up and gave me a hug. His mustache had turned into a soft beard which tickled my neck – he was a few inches shorter. “You’re a good boy, Jim, take care of her for me. Call me Matthew, please.” He sat back on his chair.

  “You know,” he continued, his voice breaking, “it was very difficult for me when Alice died. She was ill for a long time. I know I haven’t been the father I should’ve been.”

  Jessie went over and kissed him on the head, her hand on his shoulder. He raised his to cover it. “It’s OK, Dad. And I wasn’t a good daughter. I could’ve helped more.”

  “Does this mean Jim is my brother now?” Sue chirped up.

  “Yes, Sue, if you want me to be,” I replied. That didn’t seem quite enough for the occasion– I went over and gave her a hug.

  “Wish I’d met someone like Jessie when I was younger,” said Bob. “I might not have messed up so much.”

  “Well, after that bombshell,” Dad picked up the discussion. “I think we’re agreed that we need to do some building.”

  “All right, I agree with that,” Mom replied. “We can make things work here. But we’re in someone else’s place. We should try and get in touch with the owner, find out who he or she is before we start changing it that much.”

  I was thinking real hard. I gulped. “We should go to Anchorage tomorrow, find out what’s going on,” I said determinedly. “Pick up what supplies we can get.”

  A ghost of a smile hovered on Jessie’s face. Dad raised his eyebrows.

  “Yes, let’s do that,” he replied. “I guess we’re all short of some essentials. We’ve barely used any fuel yet, and I’d like to see how the neighbors are, Jerry and Marcia, and the others. I suggest it’s me, Bob and Matthew.”

  “I’m not sure I’ll be much help,” said Matthew. “You’re the boss, as far as I’m concerned, and I’ll do whatever you want, but perhaps Jim would be better. He can shoot, I can’t.”

  “I don’t want any more shooting,” Mom said tightly, getting to her
feet. “And I don’t want Jim more involved in this. He’s not going.”

  “Mom, I’m grown up now!” I interrupted hotly. “I need to go.”

  Mom looked surprised; I guess I rarely chipped in.

  “He’s the best shot here, Mary, far better than me, to be honest,” said Bob.

  Mom seemed to struggle with herself. “OK. I don’t like it, but you’re right.” She smiled at me shakily. “I guess I’ll always think of you as my little boy, Jim, but I can’t deny you’re walking taller nowadays. I’d even swear you’re a couple of inches higher. We should think about what we need. With more of us now, I could do with more medicine, if you can find any. I didn’t think we’d be here this long. I’ll make a list. Donald, I need to talk to you about this. And we need sanitary items.”

  “If you get stuck on that,” said Louise, “I could help out, we never had them where I grew up.”

  “Can I come?” asked Jessie. “Jim and I are together now.”

  “No, sorry, Jessie,” said Dad, as he picked up a rifle from the rack at the door. “It might be dangerous and there’s no point in exposing any of us to risk when it’s not necessary. Don’t worry, the three of us will be fine, and we’ll bring Jim back to you. Don’t expect us back today though, and don’t worry if we’re away a night or two. Here, Matthew, you’d better take this gun. Just in case. It’s not loaded, get the feel of it, and Bob can show you how to use it this evening.”