“Don’t know,” Kristie confessed. “I think all I have left is some canned beef stew and spam.”
“Yum. I bet the baby loves that,” she joked.
“What the baby would love is a large number four from the BK lounge right now,” Kristie laughed.
“Can’t say I blame him…or I mean her…it?” Lauren said awkwardly.
“Yeah,” replied Kristie.
“Okay,” Lauren smiled. “Now that I’ve made a fool of myself. Could I offer you some homemade chili?”
“Really?” Kristie sounded excited. “Homemade?”
“Well,” Lauren explained. “It’s homemade, but instead of hamburger meat it’s spam.”
Kristie’s stomach growled loudly.
“Baby says yes,” she laughed.
“Good,” Lauren smiled.
The two of them walked out of the meeting room and into the hall. Kristie led Lauren out of the armory. It had become the village community center, town hall, school, and even the market place. There was no real currency so often times people traded for what they needed. Those who had nothing to trade worked for supplies.
Both women paused and retrieved their jackets from the coat rack. Lauren put on her brown coat with tan fur around the hood. Kristie fought to zip her black coat over her belly.
“Good God,” she huffed.
“We’ll have to find you something bigger,” Lauren observed. “I used to have a bunch of maternity clothes but…”
“It’s fine,” Kristie assured her. “I’ll find something.”
“We’ll put in a word with the scavenging mission for clothes,” said Lauren.
“Okay,” she replied.
“Where are the kids?” asked Kristie as she held the door to the foyer open for Lauren.
“Thanks,” Lauren said. “Stacy and her boys are over there right now, watching them.”
“How’s she holding up since Roy…” Kristie paused. “You know?”
“She’s been trying to stay busy,” explained Lauren. “Stacy is trying to be strong for the boys.”
Kristie thought about how Stacy would manage with her boys. Their situations were similar. Her intention had never been to have kids. Let alone raise one by herself. And now Ben was gone. Not that that had mattered. Immediately after they had sex, Ben had threatened her, then hurried off to Lauren’s rescue. She knew she’d always play second fiddle to her then. Kristie thought when Ben and Lauren came back from scouting the other camp that it’d be official. That they’d be together. And Kristie wouldn’t have him. But then Ben didn’t come back.
“Guess we’re just a village of single mothers,” stated Kristie.
“Guess so,” Lauren replied sadly.
Kristie could see Lauren’s sadness in her body language. She felt bad for putting her in this mood. Lauren appeared lost in thought.
“Tell me about him,” demanded Kristie.
“Hmm?” Lauren stared vacantly.
“Cale,” Kristie said. “Tell me about him. What is Cale like?”
Lauren laughed.
“What?” asked Kristie.
“No one has ever asked me to describe him. Not even sure I could,” confessed Lauren.
“Why?”
“I can try, but I’m not sure I could do him any justice,” explained Lauren.
Kristie smiled.
“I haven’t seen a picture of him for almost a year. If it weren’t for Marie…I might have forgotten what his face looks like.”
“She looks like her daddy, then?” asked Kristie.
“Like you wouldn’t believe.” Lauren’s eyes widened.
“Go on,” encouraged Kristie.
“Where should I start?” she asked.
Kristie could feel her enthusiasm about her husband.
“I dunno,” hesitated Kristie. “start with how you met.”
“He normally covers that part. We have two very different opinions about what happened,” she explained.
“They can’t be that different,” Kristie stated.
“I think about the first time we spoke. I was super flirty with him. But he would say I was mean.”
“Why?” laughed Kristie.
“I think of the first time spoke to each other as our first meeting. I was a new girl in a new school so I was rude to everyone in general. That’s what he remembers,” replied Lauren.
“Out with it! You’re killing me!” joked Kristie.
“In order to tell this right I have to tell you a little bit about before we met,” explained Lauren.
“Okay,” Kristie smiled.
She loved stories. Especially ones about budding love. The autumn air nipped at their cheeks as Lauren prepared to speak.
“Before I met Cale I was with this other guy, Bryan,” she said.
Kristie’s full attention was on Lauren.
“Bryan was a junior when I was a freshmen in high school. I thought I was cool because I was dating an older boy. We were together for almost two years. I thought I loved him. But then my mom accepted a job out in Nebraska. I begged her to just let me stay in Illinois for my last two years of high school. But she said no. She just kept saying that there would be a silver lining to it. I even made plans to run off to Chicago with Bryan,” she laughed. “He’d go to college and I’d get my GED and we’d just be together. But when I talked to him about it, he said it would be best to split up. That he didn’t want to get tied down before going to college. He was supposed to be able to experiment without worrying about a girlfriend back home.”
“What a dick!” exclaimed Kristie.
“Yeah,” Lauren agreed. “So to get back at him I spent the summer partying. He’d call and I’d ignore it. So at the same time I was doing all of this; Cale was ending a relationship that lasted just as long. He dated a girl named Faith. It was a steady thing since they started high school. They broke up when she started cheating on him before he went to basic training. She couldn’t stand the idea of being alone for one summer.”
“Her and Bryan would be perfect together,” stated Kristie. “What a bitch.”
She hated seeing nice people in the military get screwed over. Kristie didn’t know Cale but they were practically family. Army siblings.
“Anyway,” Lauren continued. “School started. I was a junior and he was a senior. I was winding down from my rebellious summer and he was coming back from his summer of training. Our paths crossed for the first time in Law class. It was a class debate on some stupid law and he disagreed with what I said; but when I went to give him the stink eye…” Lauren smiled.
“What?” prodded Kristie.
“He had the bluest eyes—” she had to force herself to keep going with the story. “I gave him a mean look but he just smirked at me. He looked right through me. He made me feel like no one had ever made me feel in that moment.”
“Aw,” pined Kristie. “Love at first sight.”
“Maybe for me,” laughed Lauren. “He’d gotten use to silly under classmen girls batting their eyes at him. Cale had learned to guard himself over the summer. I started asking the girls in softball about him. He’d been friends with most of them before Faith. All of them agreed that at first they were good together. But then she started to change who he was. She picked what he did and who he’d see. Faith pushed away every girl that Cale had been friends with. And once she’d secluded him she cheated on him. Because of her own insecurities. All they could say when I said I liked him was good luck. That he didn’t get close to anyone after her.”
“Sounds like you had your work cut out for ya,” said Kristie. “I’d have given up.”
“I couldn’t,” confessed Lauren. “I just kept thinking about the moment we locked eyes and he just smirked at me. The entire time I was with Bryan we both agreed we didn’t want kids. I didn’t even like kids. Wanted nothing to do with them. I just wanted it to be me and Bryan always. But with Cale—”
“Everything was different?” Kristie finished Lauren’s sentence.
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“Exactly,” said Lauren. “Something inside of me changed that day. I suddenly wanted to have a hundred babies if they were all his. I wanted to be his everything. To just be with him. I knew that this was the silver lining my mom had talked about. I can’t explain it.”
“So what did you do?” asked Kristie.
“For the first few months of school I was invisible to him,” she said. “I had to show him I wasn’t just another silly girl. That I wasn’t there to play games.”
“You really worked for him,” laughed Kristie.
“He was worth it,” Lauren smiled. “I watched as other girls moved in and got kicked back. I learned from their mistakes; what they lacked was confidence. He was testing them. He’d kick them back and see if they persisted.”
“And they didn’t,” interrupted Kristie.
“Actually they did,” she informed her. “But the second time around they were unconfident. Cale was looking for an equal. He didn’t see himself as better than them; but he saw that they were on a different level than him.”
Kristie laughed. “He’s definitely not like most guys.”
“No,” said Lauren. “No he’s not. These girls tried to appeal to him in a way that to him was short term. That’s where my opening was. I playfully began to flirt with him.”
“That’s when you got him?” Kristie asked.
“No,” Lauren asked. “If you ask him; this was our first interaction. I flirted and he pretended to ignore me. Part one of his plan to weed out the girls who weren’t worth his time. But Cale admires persistence. Which I was.”
“So you wore him down?” she asked.
“I sure did,” Lauren smiled. “I told him to take me to lunch and he did. It was adorable the way he fidgeted. I was able to break down the wall he’d built up to protect himself. It was then that he could see me. That those gorgeous blue eyes belonged to me. And even though our relationship was just starting; they’d always belong to me. One week later he officially asked me out. But not until confessing to me that being in the army he’d have to leave at some point. And that he wanted to be with someone he could trust. All I could do at the time was say that I could handle it. I wasn’t sure he believed me until he walked me to my car. He said he’d call me later then, just out of the blue, he kissed me.”
“Aww,” exclaimed Kristie.
“Not just any kiss,” Lauren continued. “This was the kiss of all kisses. The single best kiss of my entire life.”
“But how did you know?” Kristie asked.
“I…I just did,” answered Lauren. “There was just something about the way he held me.”
Kristie was jealous. Not of Lauren but jealous of the relationship she’d found. And that she’d found it so early in life. Some people go their entire lives waiting for something like this. Lauren at the age of seventeen found it.
“Well, here we are,” said Lauren as she opened the RV door.
The smell of chili wafted out and enticed them to enter. Stacy’s two boys, Michael and Leonard, sat with Marie and Callum at the table.
“Momma!” a chili-covered Marie shouted.
“Good lord, cutie!” exclaimed Kristie. “Did ya get any of it in your mouth?”
Everyone laughed.
“Lauren I am so sorry—” Stacy began to apologize for the state of her child.
“Don’t be,” Lauren interrupted with a laugh. “If you could get her to eat without her getting it all over I’d give you a medal.”
“Momma!” shouted Marie again.
“Marie!” Lauren replied.
“Mess,” she said.
“I see that,” Lauren smiled.
“I’m clean,” Callum spoke up.
“Yes you are,” she praised him. “good boy.”
Callum flashed a smile and went back to his lunch.
“Hi,” Michael and Leonard said in unison.
“Hey guys,” Kristie greeted them.
“I didn’t make a mess,” stated Leonard.
“Me neither!” protested Michael.
“Good job, Mikey,” Stacy acknowledged him. “Leo hurry up. I need help cleaning up.”
“Mom, I told the guys that I’d meet them at the north watch tower,” explained Leo.
“I told you I don’t want you anywhere near that wall or those towers,” his mother lectured. “It’s dangerous.”
“Mom really?” his face flushed as he looked at Kristie. “I’m fourteen. I’m a man now. I should be helping with security,” he argued.
“A man? You’re a fourteen-yearp-old boy,” she pointed out.
“My birthday is—” Leo began.
“Isn’t for another nine months,” interrupted Stacy.
Leo looked defeated.
“I’ve always liked guys who help out their mom,” smiled Kristie. “It’s an attractive quality.”
Leo perked up.
“I think so, anyway,” she added.
He looked as if he were mulling something over in his mind.
“Ya know what mom?” he asked. “Why don’t you relax and I’ll take care of the dishes.”
Leo jumped up and began to clear the table.
“Well thanks,” said Stacy in a sarcastic tone.
Kristie winked.
“Thank you,” mouthed Stacy.
Lauren and Kristie removed their jackets and tossed them on an empty chair.
“So how’d it go?” Stacy asked.
“The vote passed to try and form a truce,” answered Lauren.
“Oh praise Jesus,” Stacy’s voice trembled. “There’s already been so many people killed…”
She wiped tears from her eyes and Lauren hugged her.
“I just wish Roy were…” she attempted to add before crying.
“You okay, mom?” Mikey asked.
“Yeah honey,” she assured her youngest son. “I just miss your dad.”
“Me too, mom,” he said sadly.
Stacy went over and hugged her son.
“Here you go,” said Leo as he offered Kristie and Lauren bowls of chili.
“Thanks,” Lauren stated.
“Thank you,” smiled Kristie.
“You’re welcome,” Leo added sweetly.
Kristie inhaled the aroma of the chili.
“Do we know how we’ll extend this olive branch?” inquired Stacy.
“We took a lunch break before—” a look of surprise came over Kristie’s face. “Oh my God this chili is amazing!”
Lauren laughed. “It’s all Stacy’s recipe.”
“So good,” Kristie praised her again. “Anyway, we’re going back after lunch to hear ideas about sending someone as a diplomat or something.”
“We’re just sending one person?” questioned Stacy.
Lauren shook her head. “Definitely not. It’ll probably be a group.”
“Are they taking volunteers?” she asked.
“You can’t be thinking about going?” Lauren replied. “If something were to go wrong…” she gestured to Leo and Mikey.
“I know. I just want to make sure everything goes okay,” answered Stacy.
Lauren nodded. The rest of their lunch time was spent discussing Kristie’s pregnancy and gossip that was going around the village. Kristie tapped Lauren on the shoulder when she saw people going back into the armory.
“Time to go,” she said.
“Okay,” Lauren replied. “We shouldn’t be long. Thanks again, Stacy.”
“You’re certainly welcome,” said Stacy. “Besides, you’ve got the cutest kids around,” she tickled Marie, who giggled.
“For now,” joked Kristie as she rubbed her belly.
The women laughed as Lauren and Kristie put their jackets back on.
“Later,” Leo called out as they walked out.
The two of them hurried back to the armory in the cold autumn breeze. It had gotten colder in the last hour. Charles held the door open for them.
“How was lunch?” he asked.
“Thanks,�
�� said Kristie. “Lunch was great.”
“Good to hear.”
The three of them made their way back to the meeting room where most everyone was waiting. The committee sat talking amongst themselves. Lauren looked around to see who they were waiting on; but just then Jim and Doc entered.
“Ms. Mills, make note of the time,” Charles instructed her. “We’re about to get started.”
“Right,” the stenographer replied as she scribbled away.
Everyone took their seats and prepared to resume the conclave.
“We all know what needs to happen now,” explained Charles. “We’ll open the floor to volunteers, then.”
Chapter 7
IN CHARGE
Leo waved to his mother as she and the other volunteers drove through the gate in the 1998 Chrysler Town and Country. The “mom-van” had metal grates welded over the windows, but he could still see her. His little brother stood next to him and waved too. A few shots were heard when the Zs got too close to the entrance. Leo thought about his mom’s last words before she went on her peace mission.
“You’re in charge, mister. Keep out of trouble and watch your brother,” Stacy said in a stern yet loving tone.
She’d be gone for a couple of days. That meant he was the “man of the house” so to speak. “Man of the RV” was more accurate. He was excited to tell his friends. This would be his chance to be one of the “cool kids.” Leo was thinking that hosting a house party would be cool, but the lack of alcohol around the village would put a damper on that. Not to mention, all of the adults would know immediately that something was amiss. He’d have to figure something out.
“Leo!” Mikey pulled at his sleeve. “What are we gonna do tonight?”
“I don’t care what you do,” he replied, sounding annoyed. “I’m gonna hang out with the guys and you’ll make yourself scarce.”
“What? Mikey whined. “How come?”
“Cuz we don’t want a kid hangin around,” Leo answered coldly.
“Kid?” objected Mikey,”I’m not a kid!”
“Yes you are,” argued Leo. “Now go do something. I’m gonna find my friends.”
“They’re my friends too!” Mikey fussed.
Leo ignored his brother’s protest and walked away. The gravel crunched under his feet.
Z Plan (Book 3): Homecoming Page 7
