Neighbors

by Jerry D. Young

  Pete had already talked to the developers. There would be no help from them. They’d even discouraged the gate, but there really wasn’t much they could do about it, or the walls, if the neighborhood chose to put them in.

  After much discussion, the decision was put off until the next regular meeting. Hank wasn’t the only one rather annoyed at the amount of non-cul-de-sac traffic coming in, taking the roundabout, and leaving. The neighborhood was being checked out by other members of the development.

  That was the first thing brought up when the scheduled meeting was called to order.

  “We have to stop this increased traffic!” Sara said. “My youngest was almost hit by one of them when the driver was looking all around, not paying any attention to the road.”

  It was quite a difference from Sara’s reaction the previous meeting. “We should go ahead and put in the gate and wait on the walls.”

  Of course there were questions about “What walls?” and Pete quickly filled everyone in on what the committee had learned.

  Again it was Elizabeth that spoke up first. “Juan and I have done some concrete block work. What if everyone pitches in and we build the walls ourselves? Just pay for the components?”

  “Sí,” Juan said, “I can do most of the work, but will need help with the concrete and mixing mortar and carrying the blocks.”

  Several people chimed in to say they would help, including Sara’s husband Steven.

  Finally the question was asked about how much it was going to cost, even if the community did the work.

  There were a few in-drawn breaths, and a few nearly silent whistles at the amount. But the neighbors in the cul-de-sac had learned to work together. Pledges of amounts of money ranging from a few dollars, to several hundred, began to be voiced.

  Elizabeth was hastily scribbling down the amounts. When silence fell, she said, “That should be enough. With just a little left over for the next project.”

  There was applause and congratulations and people thanking those that had pledged money. Hank held up his hand for silence. “Okay. We’ll get started on it as soon as possible. The gate first, since it will be custom built, and then the walls. Everyone that can, and wants to help with the walls, get with Juan and Pete and set up a work schedule.”

  That was pretty much it for the meeting. A few lingered to talk to Juan and Pete. Hank stayed and did the cleanup after everyone had left, feeling better than he had in a while. The sense of urgency was lessening, with the plan for the gate and walls being approved.

  The economy was tanking and the world political situation was getting worse. So was the weather, and due to it, food availability was dropping as prices rose. The big problem now was the Russians again talking nuclear attacks on Poland, if the US missile shield was installed. Hank was still well aware of the Chinese growing their military, and rapidly running out of resources to feed their growing population.

  Iran and North Korea were both silent at the moment, but either could turn up the threat of nuclear weapons use. And India and Pakistan, also both calm for the moment, was a global nuclear war just waiting to be triggered.

  Hank finally made the decision to harden the basement rather than build a free standing or underground bunker. It would cost about the same, and be a bit more difficult, but the advantages of everything at hand, and less visibility to the neighbors, made the decision for him.

  After buying a small trailer just big enough to haul the components he needed a bit at a time, Hank began the construction by laying down a foundation four feet from the wall of his walk out basement. He began stacking retaining wall blocks and filling in the space between them and the basement wall with dry sand.

  With large diameter pipes set into the wall at the windows, and a column supported metal arch for the doorway, Hank finished off the top of the wall with solid blocks. The window pipes and door arch would be filled with the sandbags Hank filled with the last of the sand he’d brought to the property. They would be kept in the yard shed until needed.

  While building the wall, each load of materials had included those needed to put in a column supported solid block filled drop ceiling in one quarter of the basement and sand filled block walls to enclose that area of the basement.

  Only one thickness of block was used, as the basement floor of the house was nothing to brag about. Hank didn’t want to crack it with concentrated weight. Between the new, thick, outside wall, and the filled block walls, Hank figured he had enough protection factor on the sides. He did bring in another load of sand and bags to put it in, to provide for a layer of sandbags on the floor inside the house over the basement shelter area to provide more protection overhead.

  The cul-de-sac had become a group of close-knit neighbors over the months of slow preparations that Hank had guided. He was feeling a bit guilty about having a shelter too small to take everyone. But he just couldn’t afford it, and didn’t know how to bring up the subject of a community shelter to the group.

  He didn’t have to. The mortar in the wing walls at the now gated entrance was hardly dry when Pete brought up the subject of shelter at the first meeting after the gate and walls were finished.

  Basically, an explanation of what had been done was given at the meeting, and it was about to break up when Pete spoke. “Uh… I’ve got something I’d like to discuss with everyone.”

  There were groans and comments about “Please! Don’t ask for more money!”

  Pete almost sat down and let it go, but the worsening world situation was bothering him as much as it was Hank. And when he mentioned it, several people also expressed concern. “That kind of leads to what I’d like to see the group do. Figure out a way to have fallout shelter for everyone.

  “I’m planning on building one for my family…” Naturally the calls that people would just come to his house occurred and were laughed about. But Pete stayed serious. “I could take some of the kids, but I couldn’t take anywhere close to everyone. The community needs to have a shelter to take those that don’t have their own shelters, and for anyone visiting that wouldn’t all fit in a home shelter, if you had one.”

  “You’re scaring the kids,” Sara said.

  “Scaring me, too,” Elizabeth said. “Juan and I have been talking about this, too. We’ve discussed a home shelter, but they are really expensive.”

  “I didn’t know you could still buy them,” said someone. “Not since the sixties.”

  “Oh,” Hank said, “There are several companies out there that will install a manufactured shelter, or build one in place. But it shouldn’t be too expensive to build a shelter in the basement. Everyone has basements in the cul-de-sac, don’t they?”

  People looked around at one another. There were plenty of nods, and no contradicting statements.

  “But I wouldn’t know what to do,” Fred Cummings said, “Even if we had a shelter. And wouldn’t one in the basement be awful crowded? I’ve seen those old Civil Defense drawings. They showed people in shelters with no standing room. Hardly any room to move at all. And what about a bathroom? I think I’d rather be in a community shelter with others that do know what to do and how to handle things.”

  “Pete, you and Hank seem to know the most,” Bren said. “Is it practical to build a shelter for all… or at least most of us, if some have their own shelter?”

  “Again, money would be an issue. And in this case, space would be, too. I’m not sure where we could put it,” Hank said.

  “What about the ravine behind us?” asked Henry. “Wouldn’t it be easier and cheaper to build something there? It would already be underground, and that would be best, wouldn’t it?”

  “What if it rains?” asked Juan. “Wouldn’t the shelter flood?”

  “Actually,” Hank said, looking thoughtful, “That ravine was cut in three places on the property and gravity drains put in to divert the water so it wouldn’t erode any more. I haven’t seen any water in the ravine since they did that not long after I moved in. We’d probably put
diversion pipes around the shelter, just in case, though.”

  “So it might be possible?” Pete asked. “Building it there would really cut down on the dirt work, and that would be a big part of the cost. We’d want to really build it watertight, with good drainage, just in case. But I don’t know… I’d have to talk to Angie… We might be willing to put the money we were going to use to build our shelter into the community shelter.”

  “We’d put in some, too,” Elizabeth said. Juan was nodding.

  “I’d be willing to pitch in, too,” Hank said. “Let’s see. How many are there of us?”

  A roll call was done and Elizabeth added up the numbers in each family. “Sixty-two people in the twenty families.” She looked disappointed. “That would take a big shelter, wouldn’t it?”

  “Yeah. Pretty big,” Hank said. “Ten square feet per person is the minimum allowed in government sponsored fallout shelters, with a minimum height of six and a half feet. The height wouldn’t be a problem. I don’t see all of us in a building with only six hundred twenty square feet. More like sixty-two hundred square feet. A hundred square feet per person. But that could include interior storage space and all that, too.”

  “But like Pete said,” Frank said, “What about visitors that might be here during something like that?”

  “Call it a hundred people, and ten-thousand square feet,” Pete said immediately. “If we square up the sides of the ravine, the building could be fifty feet wide, two-hundred feet long. It would take a lot of columns to support the roof. And the dirt we take from the sides of the ravine to make that space should be enough to cover it with at least three feet of earth.”

  “You have any idea what that would cost?” asked Sara. “Our house is only thirty-two hundred square feet and… well… It cost in the mid-three figures. A ten-thousand square foot building would cost a million or more!”

  “Not anywhere near,” Henry said. “I don’t plan to help pay for gold faucets and granite countertops. It’ll just be open space enclosed in concrete, wouldn’t it?” He looked at Pete and then Hank.

  “Something like that,” Hank said. “Probably a series of wood framed walls inside, giving each family a private enclosed area, plus shared common room, baths, kitchen, and storage areas. Say thirty twelve-by-fifteen rooms for our residents, plus what visitors might be at anyone’s given household at the time we had to use the shelter. Including hallway space, that would take up seventy-two hundred square feet, leaving approximately twenty-eight hundred for the common use rooms.”

  There was much discussion among families and friends. Hank let it go on for several minutes, and then said, “What if we have the committee look into what it would cost, and what kind of time frame we would be looking at? I don’t think we should waste much time on this. If we do it, we need to do it pretty quick.”

  It was unanimous. Hank and the committee would start the next day on the plans for the shelter.

  Due to the increasing sense of urgency everyone was feeling, Hank called for a meeting only two weeks later. He laid out the details and the costs. There were sighs of dismay. Far from a million dollars, but still over a hundred thousand for the shell.

  “What about the inside? Wiring and plumbing and all?” asked Bren.

  “We’d do that ourselves as time and money permit,” Pete said. “Juan has his contractor’s license now, so we could legally do it.”

  “We would do it at my cost,” Juan said. “I’d have receipts for everything.”

  “Five thousand per family up front,” Hank said. “Then whatever you want to spend on your family’s room and contribute toward the common areas.”

  With only one family member in attendance for the most part, spouses had to go home to talk to the other half of the relationship before committing five-thousand plus dollars to the project.

  But the answers were all back by the following day. Work would start the following Wednesday.

  Hank’s attempts to energize the rest of the development had fallen on mostly deaf ears. But a handful of people living outside the cul-de-sac asked to talk to the group at their next meeting. A project like the community fallout shelter couldn’t be kept secret. And it wasn’t.

  Three people, representing three families and one individual, attended the first meeting after the shelter work started. All three looked nervous. There had been many hard looks turned their way since they had arrived.

  “Okay, people. This is Gwen Chandler, Stan Jenkins, and Gene…” Hank stumbled on the name and Gene spoke up.

  “Descartes.”

  “Gene Descartes,” Hank said, pretty much getting the pronunciation correct. “They represent a total of nine people, in four families.”

  “And just what is it you want?” Sara asked, her narrow eyes even more narrow than usual.

  “A place in your shelter if the worst happens,” Gwen said. “We’ve heard that it only costs five-thousand to buy in. That’s not much more than building one of those tiny things in your basement that Civil Defense had plans for. And with a group, it would be safer.”

  “You expect to just pay five-thousand and have a place here? Just like that?” Henry was showing his anger again. “We’ve built up what we’ve got with not only money, but sweat and blood equity. It’s not just the shelter we’re building. We’ve got community gardens, and stored food, a Neighborhood Watch, all done by us, here in the cul-de-sac. I say no. Not for just the five-thousand.”

  Several murmured agreement and the three people looked a bit forlorn. Hank spoke up again, having talked to the three intently before the meeting. “Now, that is five-thousand per family. Even the single guy… Can’t remember his name, would contribute five-thousand, plus five thousand from the other three families. They’d each get a room for their money.”

  Apparently some of the neighborhood had thought it was five-thousand for all of them. Different murmurs began.

  “Would they bring their own supplies?” Elizabeth asked. “To contribute to the community supplies?”

  “Yes, yes we would!” Stan Jenkins said quickly. “And I’m willing to chip in another five-thousand dollars for the community fund, if you’ll let me and my family come here if things get bad.”

  “I’m a good gardener,” said Gene. “I grow and harvest non-hybrid seeds. And if we ever need to defend the community, I have the means to do my part.”

  “All of our group do,” Stan said. “We’re all hunters and sport shooters. A couple of us have military service experience.”

  More murmurs.

  “And this is all of you? We have to keep some space open for our extended families,” Fred said. “If we let them in, we can’t let anyone else but our own families in.”

  “You guys go on home, and let us discuss this,” Henry said.

  The three looked startled, but left the community center without a word.

  “Okay,” Hank said, wondering if he was being a bit too open, “one thing that will affect the decision… I have a shelter in my basement. I won’t be taking up one of the rooms in the community shelter. That leaves more space for other’s families. But I’ll contribute an equal portion, to have use of the facilities.”

  There were some surprised expressions, but many didn’t look surprised at all at Hank’s admission. Another person, William Reynolds and his wife Julie, had been at all the meetings, but had said very little to anyone. He’d been contributing their basic share without protest. He raised his hand and Hank acknowledged him.

  “We have a shelter in our basement, too. That would be another of the rooms that would be available for families. Like Hank there, I’d like to contribute so the space would be available if some of my family is here when it happens.”

  More surprised looks, and then a quick round of yeses, agreeing to both Hank and William’s plans.

  It was Elizabeth that finally stood up and said, “I think we’re in agreement, aren’t we? Let those four families come here, as long as they contribute their fair share.”
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  There were a couple of dissenters, but the majority agreed. “I have Stan’s phone number,” Hank said. “I’ll call him after the meeting and tell him they are in. And make arrangements to get their contributions. Now. Anything else for tonight?”

  There wasn’t and the group broke up. Again Hank cleaned up the community meeting room they were using and went home; satisfied he’d done everything he could to protect not only his own preparations, but those of the cul-de-sac community as well.

  It took only a few minutes to contact the newest members of the group and let them know they would be included if the shelter had to be used, when it was finished. All promised to bring by their portion of the shelter money, and some supplies for the common stores.