299 Days: The Community

by Tate, Glen

  “So, Scotty, to answer your question about the fridge,” Grant said. “We’ll be making a milk run tomorrow morning, but we should have a nice big breakfast first. I have some grub at my place. Can you guys keep a secret?” Grant paused for effect. “A couple months of food, at least a couple months for my family, but you can have it, too.”

  Wes said, “We know. Pow told us.” Pow looked a little guilty.

  “I know it was a secret, Grant, but I figured it was OK to tell the guys,” Pow said shrugging.

  “Of course,” Grant said, realizing that he had been taking the secrecy about the contents of the “spider shed” a little too seriously now that the Collapse had hit and he was among friends out there.

  “It’s other people I worry about,” Grant said, which was true. Random people knowing that they had food would guarantee some break-in attempts. Maybe even an armed mob. But not with the Team and the Morrells and Colsons.

  “So we’ll have some pancakes in the morning,” Grant said. He had been looking forward to big breakfasts with the Team and his family. “What time sounds good to you guys? Sun comes up at about 5:00. We all need to sleep. What about 7:00?”

  Grant noticed that, despite feeling like they were in military mode, he was using the civilian times instead of “0500” or “0700.” That made sense. They were civilians. This reminded Grant that one of the things he liked so much about the Team was that none of them were mall ninjas or military wannabes. They were just sheepdogs with guns. They didn’t have to try to be anything they weren’t. They were comfortable in their own skin, but not cocky. It was the perfect combination.

  Grant realized that they might be hungry now. They had been on the move since about dinner time and it was now about 11:00 pm. “You guys need some dinner or a late night snack?”

  “I do,” said Wes. The others didn’t disagree.

  “We had some deer steaks BBQ’d right before you guys came,” Grant said. “I bet Tammy,” he pointed up the road to the Colsons’, “put them in the fridge. I’ll go see. You guys should come with me so they can meet you more.”

  Scotty had an MRE in his hand. “I’m OK,” he said. “I’ll take this and go hang out with Chip.” Grant hated to see an MRE used when other food was available, but he wasn’t going to tell people what to eat. Besides, showing alarm at the use of an MRE would imply impending starvation. He didn’t want to have people worrying about that. It was just one MRE and they had a bunch of them out there.

  All of them, except Scotty, left the yellow cabin. They had pistols on their belts, of course. Wes pointed at his AR propped up on the couch, motioned, and asked, “should we bring these?”

  Grant shook his head and said, “I don’t think we should carry ARs all the time around the cabins. At least for now. Probably later. But for now I don’t want the neighbors to feel like this is Afghanistan. I don’t want them wondering if we’ll turn on them. So let’s downplay the firepower. For now. Pistols for sure, though. What do you guys think?”

  “With Chip and Scotty guarding the entrance, we’ll be OK without ARs,” Pow said.

  “Let’s go get our eats on, gentlemen,” Grant said. This felt so good. Hangin’ out with the Team. At the cabin.

  Grant wanted to say hi to Chip. They walked out to the guard shack. “Hey, man, thanks for taking guard duty,” Grant said. “Scotty will be joining you in a minute. Don’t hesitate to get me if you need me.”

  Chip said, “Sure. I talked to John and Mary Anne and they’ll put me up in their guest bedroom.”

  In all the activity, Grant had totally forgotten about Chip’s accommodations. He felt bad about that. “Oh, cool, I figured they would,” Grant said, as he realized he’d made the assumption they would do that.

  “It’ll be good to have us spread out a little in the cabins,” Bobby said.

  “We’re going to see if the Colsons have any leftover deer steaks for the boys,” Grant said to Chip.

  “They’re fantastic, guys,” Chip said as he rubbed his stomach. Chip was a thin guy.

  Grant didn’t want Chip to feel abandoned. He asked, “Chip, you need some more coffee?”

  “Nope, I’m fine,” he said.

  “OK then,” Grant said. “We’re off to get some grub.” Right then, Grant’s stomach growled. He remembered that he hadn’t eaten dinner, either and all of a sudden he was really hungry.

  They went to the Colsons and were consciously talking in their normal voices as they approached so the Colsons wouldn’t think strangers were sneaking up on their house.

  Tammy answered the door and was glad to see them. The Morrells were at the table.

  “You guys hungry?” Tammy asked. It reminded her of when Paul had his friends over growing up. She had loved feeding the boys.

  “Got any deer steaks?” Grant asked. “I tried to eat one earlier tonight, but these jackasses decided to show up. With my family or whatever. Interrupted my damned dinner.” Everyone was laughing and smiling.

  Tammy opened the refrigerator and got a platter covered with foil. “Eat up, boys.”

  They did. It was amazing how much food hungry men could eat.

  After a while, Grant said, “Hey, I’m having a pancake breakfast tomorrow morning. Come over at about 7:00.” Everyone said they’d be over.

  They didn’t talk about guard duty, food supplies, looting, inflation, the collapse of America, or anything like that. They just ate. It was a group of people who had known each other for a couple of hours, yet they were eating like they had grown up together. It was an amazing time.

  Grant wanted his family to come over, but he knew Lisa would be trying to get Cole and Manda to sleep. There will be plenty of chances to have the whole neighborhood together for dinner in the coming…days? Weeks? Months? Who really cared. They were there, and they were safe. They were way better off than most of the country.

  Chapter 79

  Pancakes

  (May 8)

  Morning came way too fast. After deer steaks at the Colsons, which went past midnight, Grant quietly snuck over to his cabin and collapsed into bed. He was so tired that he didn’t even remember his head hitting the pillow. He had slept most of the previous day, but the emotions of the arrival of his family and the Team had wiped him out.

  Grant woke up with Lisa next to him. Wow. That felt great. He honestly thought that would never happen again.

  He looked at his watch. It was 6:30. He had some pancakes to start cooking. He got up and got the pancake mix out of the storage shed; a five pound vacuum sealed bag. He would have to tell the Colsons and Morrells that he had the food because they would see the vacuum sealed bag and realize something was up.

  Oh well, it was OK for them to know. Keeping the food storage a secret made sense before the Collapse and before he fully trusted them. Besides, they had shared their deer steaks the night before and would be sharing many other things until this was over. They were in this together. They would only get through it by sharing. The cabin neighborhood of the Matsons, the Team, Morrells, and Colsons were now a gang. Not the motorcycle kind of gang, but a group taking care of each other.

  Grant’s favorite smell in the morning was pancakes, and the enticing scent called to the others, as well. Slowly, people started stirring in the cabin. It was magic. They were all together and Grant was getting them up with pancakes. The sun was shining into the cabin through the evergreen trees. The water was still and beautiful.

  Grant wanted to make sure Cole, who needed the same routine because of his mild autism, was OK with his new surroundings. He had been to the cabin plenty of times, but never had his grandparents sleeping in the other bed in the room. Grant went up to the loft. Cole was awake in his bed talking to his sister.

  “I’m happy that we’re all here,” Cole said. That melted Grant’s heart. Cole really, really needed that tucking in last night.

  “Me too, little buddy,” Grant said. “I have some pancakes for you, pal. We have syrup, too.” Grant didn’t tell Cole that
the syrup was a different brand; whatever they had at the Dollar Store. He was curious if Cole’s need for routine would allow him to eat a different syrup.

  “Sounds delicious, Dad,” Cole said. Grant had never heard Cole say the word “delicious” before.

  The new syrup would be a test for Cole. He was a growing thirteen-year old boy and constantly hungry. Grant figured Cole’s hunger would override his need for routine.

  He needed to invite the Morrells, Colsons, and the Team over, and went to get his hillbilly slippers on. He felt naked, though. His pistol. He forgot his pistol. He quietly went into the bedroom where Lisa was sleeping to get his gun belt off the nightstand. She was stirring.

  “Whatcha doing?” she asked, half awake.

  “I need to invite the neighbors over for breakfast,” Grant whispered. “We have some things to talk about.”

  “Could you not leave that gun on the nightstand right by our heads?” she asked politely.

  OK, Grant thought, decades of thinking guns spontaneously combust had rooted itself pretty deep in her. She was fine with him wearing a gun and carrying an AR, so this wasn’t too bad. He had to pick his battles.

  “Sure, honey,” Grant said. “By the way, your dad and I talked to Cole about guns again. We told him that it’s only OK for him or any other kid he’s around to touch a gun if a grownup is there and says it’s OK. I asked him to repeat it back to me and he did.”

  “Good,” she said. “You know, I see kids in the ER with accidental gun shots.” That was a fair point.

  “That won’t happen here,” Grant said. “Your parents or Manda are constantly with him. My guns will only be on me or under the bed.” Grant would put his AR under the bed. Probably his shotgun, too. At least at first, until Lisa got comfortable with his AR and shotgun being propped up on the wall by the bed.

  Under the bed was not an ideal quick-reaction spot, but he was trying to ease his wife into this whole situation. He was trying to convince her that this was just a week-long vacation while the government got everything back in order. Grant realized he could try to win an argument, or have his wife on board with the most important decision they would make in their lives. It was an easy choice.

  “I understand your concerns,” Grant said. “I will be ultra-careful. The good news is that with the guard shack and the Team, I don’t need to have guns out too much in the house. We are very safe here. Very safe.”

  Lisa nodded. She would rather not have any guns around, but she, too, was more interested in a harmonious stay out at the cabin than trying to win an argument. Besides, with all that had happened in the past few days, her opinion of guns had changed a little bit.

  Grant grabbed his pistol belt. He hid it from her. Not that she didn’t know it was there, but he thought “out of sight, out of mind.” That’s why he kept his tactical vest with magazine pouches in a suit bag in the closet. That thing would definitely scare Lisa so he kept it out of sight. For now.

  When Grant was in the kitchen, he put his pistol belt on. Ahhh. He had missed the weight of the pistol and his mag holders with four full magazines. He felt naked without it. With his pistol on, he felt like things were back to normal. A new normal.

  He went outside. It was gorgeous out; about seventy degrees, with a slight breeze from the water. He went to the Morrells. Chip was making them coffee. Grant told them to come over in a while.

  Grant went to the Colsons. Paul volunteered to pull guard duty while the rest of them ate. Paul didn’t like people to see him eat. He was so heavy that he thought people would look at him funny for eating a meal, like he should only be eating carrots and celery or something. He usually ate alone.

  Grant went over to the yellow cabin. The Team was sound asleep. They probably stayed up late telling and retelling war stories from the trip out and from their various milk runs.

  He went to the guard shack and saw Scotty. God, he looked impressive. Standing in a tactical vest with his AR across his chest. He looked like a military contractor. The average criminal would see him and run away to an easier target. That was the point. Grant hoped they would get through this whole Collapse without ever firing a shot. He knew that was unlikely, but it would sure be great if it happened.

  “There’s hot tasty pancakes at my cabin, Scotty,” Grant said.

  “Awesome,” Scotty said. “I’m starving.” He looked down the road. “Nothing at all last night. Some dogs started barking around 2:30. Could have been a rabbit they were hearing. It could have been…” He didn’t need to say.

  Dogs were great burglar alarms. The Colsons had two little dogs who yapped when someone was coming up to their house. It was annoying at first, but reassuring now.

  “Paul’s coming to relieve you, then it’s pancake time,” Grant said with a smile.

  Scotty nodded. He was watching the road the whole time they were talking. In most settings it would be impolite to not look at someone during a conversation, but guarding their family was more important.

  This felt so right. Like it was meant to be. Grant was getting that feeling a lot, lately.

  As he headed back to his cabin, Grant realized that he had a choice to make. He could continue with the story to his family that this was just a week or so of vacation and then everything would turn out OK, or, he could use this first meeting to set the tone for the whole stay out there. First impressions were everything. The breakfast meeting would be the first time the whole group was together.

  This was an easy choice. He needed all these people to realize that they were in a survival situation. The most important thing—the very most important thing—in a survival situation is the will to live. Everyone needed to understand the dangers and then decide whether they’d do what it takes to make it through it.

  Grant had eased his family into the “vacation” thing as much as possible. Now it was time to take the easing process up one level, from vacation to permanent stay.

  Surprisingly, Lisa had already come to this conclusion. Not from Grant’s brilliant managing of the situation, but from reality.

  While Grant was out rounding up people for pancakes, Lisa checked her cell phone. There were the pictures of her trashed house and Ron’s message, “Don’t come back.”

  OK, it is real now, she thought. It wasn’t some big misunderstanding that would lead to a few days at the cabin because Grant overreacted and she was humoring him. This was real. She couldn’t go back. Some lunatic, probably Nancy Ringman, had decided to go after her family. All the “politics” that Lisa hated weren’t just a game anymore. The government, or at least some psycho in the neighborhood, hated Grant for some reason. He was on some terrorist list and their house had been destroyed. There was no going back there. Not until things fundamentally changed, and the Nancy Ringmans of the world were no longer able to do things like this.

  Lisa felt violated. Someone had come into their beautiful home and destroyed it. Their home. Lisa had worked so hard to make it just the way she wanted it and then this happened. She kept looking at the pictures on her phone. It was ugly; both the trashed house and the reason it happened. There was something dark and almost demonic about the whole thing.

  Well, at least this solved the problem of whether she and the kids really needed to be out at the cabin, she thought. OK, then. This cabin thing sucked, but at least she wasn’t in the house when the destruction happened. She and the kids were in a safe place. She took a deep breath. This was where they needed to be for a while. She would make the best of it. People were stirring and coming over. It was time for breakfast.

  Pretty soon, the cabin was full of people eating and talking. Perfect, Grant thought. When he came in, they seemed to unconsciously realize that he was the leader. It was his place and he was the common thread connecting all of them. He knew he needed to lead. He’d been doing it his whole life, and he felt very comfortable leading out there at Pierce Point.

  “OK, thanks for coming over this morning,” Grant said. “I wanted to go over a few bu
siness items while we’re all here. I guess it’s no secret that things are kinda going downhill back in the city. Things will be rocky for a while. We will have to count on ourselves for food and security. I hope this is temporary; it probably will be. But we can’t count on things just getting back to normal. Therefore, I propose that we treat our mutual survival as our jobs. Just like our former work jobs. We should put the time and energy we normally put into our old jobs into getting food and taking care of things here on Over Road. If things get better, this will have been a great big adventure we’ll tell our grandkids about.” Grant smiled. He wanted to be positive. “Is everyone OK with what I’m talking about here?”

  Most people slowly nodded, including Lisa. He didn’t know about the text and pictures of their trashed house. Lisa wouldn’t tell Grant about that. It would be one more thing for him to worry about and she didn’t want to worry him.

  Grant had to get buy-in from the group on the big picture. It was time to go into the details. He had been thinking about them for quite some time.

  “OK,” he started, “sounds like we’re all on the same page. Now that we have a full picture of how many of us are out here, we can start talking about splitting up duties like guard duty and food. If it’s OK with you guys, I’d like to put Pow in charge of the guard duty.” Everyone nodded.

  “Chip,” Grant continued, “I consider you part of the Team, so you’ll be doing that kind of stuff, too.” Chip grinned. He was in his early sixties and was being treated like one of the young guys. The guys on the Team nodded, too. They liked Chip. Everyone liked Chip.

  “John, Mark, Paul, and I already know the drill,” Grant said. “Could one or more of you guys get with Pow and the Team and go over the guard duty details?” John and Mark nodded. Grant wanted to make the three of them feel like they had something to add to the Team. He wanted them to be integrated to the extent possible, even though they weren’t tactically trained or as well armed as the Team.