by Anna Oney
Clancy gave them a hearty wave.
“Hello there,” he shouted. “Evening!”
Fawn waved back and remembered her father going into great detail about Clancy’s sickly appearance as a young man.
In his twenties, Clancy had had deep-set eyes, and a frail, boney figure. Staring at him now, Fawn realized Clancy had gotten better-looking with age. A perfect shade of grey had been threaded through his black hair, and a light beard dusted his jaw. The muscles he’d developed in his early thirties were just as defined as they had been back then.
The sixty-five-year-old was the only son of the deceased Mayor of their community. Clancy was married to Claire, who was seventy-years-old. Claire was also Jane and Lizzie’s youngest sister. Their community was located 150 miles away in the small town of Stagecoach. Stagecoach sat at the bottom of a bowl, surrounded by steep slopes. Because of this, their homes were elevated. When storms blew in, they got up to three feet of water. The town provided everything an eighteenth-century town would. They had vendors that sold everything from tools, to food and clothing.
In the years leading up to the solar flare, Stagecoach had been known as Marshall. The old bank where Gran had worked before the flare was now used as a meet-and-greet for newcomers to the community. The only reason Fawn had traveled to Stagecoach was to visit the old public library. She had taken an obsessive liking to a volume of Henry David Thoreau’s collected works, so Clancy had agreed to permanently lend it to her.
Laken lifted her hand to the height of her shoulders and dropped it almost as quickly as she’d raised it.
“Yeah, yeah,” she grumbled. “Evening.”
The last twelve years had dulled Laken’s baby-blue eyes, and stripped her long, wavy hair of yellow. The deaths of her husband and two sons had made her hard. They had died of the same sickness that had stolen away Fawn’s parents and sisters. Like Fawn, Laken had been left to wonder why she had been spared.
The sixty-three-year-old fisherwoman’s community, Caddo, was located one hundred miles from Back Wood. Due to the occasional overflow of the lake from the rainy season, most of their homes were elevated by stilts. Laken’s group provided nourishment in the form of fruit from their orchard and fish from the lake. They thrived in weaving nets and building canoes.
Fawn pulled the rope to open the gate, and Pete rang the bell five times to signal Tucker and Manny to return to their posts. Hunter climbed down from the platform, with Fawn and Pete trailing behind him one at a time.
Dean and Davlyn were the first to pass through the gate.
“We’re going to head that way to Momma’s,” Davlyn said, and nodded as she passed by Fawn, Hunter, and Pete. “We already filled them in.”
Davlyn and Dean weren’t drawn from the same blood as Fawn, but they were raised as such. Fawn’s Gran had raised Davlyn and Dean’s grandmother, Jane, and Jane’s younger sisters, Lizzie and Claire, as her own children. Being the three sisters’ babysitter before the solar flare had hit sixty-three years ago had created a strong bond between them and Gran — a bond thicker than blood.
Davlyn and Dean weren’t twins, but looked like they very well could be. They were two years apart. When they weren’t splitting up to deliver messages, they went everywhere together. Davlyn was the eldest, and could almost pass as a man due to her short brown hair and square jaw. But her high cheekbones and doe-like, dark-brown eyes gave away her gender.
“Yeah, no need to go into great detail,” Dean added, arriving at his sister’s side. “Let us know if you need anything else.”
Dean had full lips, and the same brown hair and square jaw as his sister. The shirt he wore clung to his perfectly crafted body and outlined every muscle. Many women from each community wanted to bed him, but he only obliged a few.
“Fawn,” Clancy said, as he rode through the gate. “You’re looking pretty as ever.”
“You would think that,” Laken cut in, as she emerged behind Clancy. “She’s wearing even less clothes than when I last saw her.”
Fawn looked herself over and turned to Hunter.
“I’m not wearing less clothes, am I?”
Hunter cleared his throat and looked to the sky, shrugging his shoulders.
Clothing was usually handed down to people from their parents. The material was provided by Stagecoach’s herd of sheep and their large cotton field. Using a spindle, a skilled set of women were able to make thread out of wool and cotton. Women wore clothing that consisted of shawls, long skirts, and blouses. Men wore britches, shorts, and button-down shirts. Buttons were crafted and shaped from all kinds of dried animal bones.
The garments were woven or sewn. Once the customer’s measurements were taken, payment was expected. The clothing could be purchased in town by the trade of goods or work. These women were also able to provide footwear made of thick cloth. The shoes were mainly meant for town folk as they weren’t sturdy enough to withstand the harsh environment that hunter’s frequented, but it was better than nothing. Many people had offered Fawn fair trades for a pair of her famous moccasins, but no trade could sway her. If they were willing to learn, she was more than willing to teach.
“Hell,” Laken said, as she dismounted. “Think nothing of it. If I had your body, I’d be showing it off too.”
“It’ll take half a day’s ride to reach Hickory Grove,” Pete said. “If we leave now, we’ll be spending the night on the road. Or we can stay here and set out first thing tomorrow morning.”
Hunter held out his hands, palms facing up.
“Comfy bed,” he said, raising his right hand higher than his other. “Hard ground,” he continued, lowering his left. “I vote bed.”
Fawn pursed her lips, and thought, Sure . . . comfort is all you’re thinking about. Boom Hole it is tonight.
The others weren’t too keen on sleeping on the ground either. They, too, had gotten used to their comfortable featherbeds, and rarely had a reason to stray from them. Fawn was the only one who could bear to sleep on the ground.
***
Two hours after they’d eaten supper, and showed Clancy and Laken to their guest quarters, Fawn and Hunter lay intertwined inside their cabin at the Boom Hole.
The cabin was dimly lit by a candle that sat on a small bedside table. It had been molded from wax they’d stolen from Back Wood’s beehives. The shadow of the candle’s small flame danced slowly up the wall like a woman’s hips swaying.
Lying on her side, Fawn stared out the window, and watched the fireflies floating near the glass. The tranquil moment was interrupted by Hunter breaking the silence.
“What’re you thinking this could be?”
Fawn glanced at his arm draped over her hip.
“What? Us? I don’t know.”
“No, woman, these newcomers.”
Fawn turned to face him without interrupting the space between them.
“A threat.”
“What makes you think so?”
“Not sure,” she replied, pressing the pad of her finger to her chin. “It may have something to do with their guns. Oh, and that beast they came riding up in.”
“Okay, okay, easy.” He chuckled. “No need to be a smartass.”
Their horses neighed outside and Fawn wondered what Hunter’s troublemaker of a mustang, Rodale, was doing to annoy Juniper.
“Back to what you thought I was asking.” He propped his head up on his elbow — his brows drawn. “After nearly three years, I hope you have some idea of what we are. I hoped we’d be getting married and talking about having kids. We’re not getting any younger.”
Fawn envisioned the day she’d wrapped her baby boy in cloth and buried him near the back of her tepee where a group of dogwood trees convened. Joshua, she’d named him. No one knew about the miscarriage, or the pregnancy, for that matter. She’d carried the weight of that sadness on her own for the last thirteen years.
“I don’t think kids are an option for me. If I were able to get pregnant, I think I would be by now. It’s n
ot like we’re being careful. I know Grandma Darby had trouble getting pregnant.”
“You never know. The problem may be with me.”
She gave him a kiss and thought of a way to change the subject.
“How’s Mr. Aiden?”
The spark in Hunter’s eyes was snuffed out, and the corners of his lips turned down.
“Not too good. He’s been asking for Mom lately. It’s got me worried.”
Memories of her own father on his deathbed came flooding in. Samuel’s shortness of breath, the blood staining his chin, and lastly, his agonizing pleas for Fawn to put him out of his misery. She mourned for both of her parents, but she was haunted by the grief of losing her father more than her mother.
It wasn’t that Willa had been cruel — quite the opposite, in fact. She’d been a kind soul through and through. But as Fawn grew older, Willa never seemed to understand the wild ways of her eldest daughter. Even though they weren’t as close as Fawn would’ve liked for them to have been, they’d still had their moments. She cherished the memory of Willa humming and singing Bob Seger’s, “Night Moves,” while braiding her hair. It wasn’t until Fawn reached her teens that she understood exactly what that song was about.
Hunter never knew his mother. Had never even seen her face, and now he was about to lose his father.
Fawn reached up and ran her palm down the side of his face.
“I know it’s hard. Hard doesn’t even cut it. There are no words. I’m so sorry.”
A single tear escaped him and lingered above the top of his lip.
“You should come by,” he said, and swiped his finger beneath his nose. “Dad’s been asking for you, too.”
“Really?”
“Yeah. He said he has something to tell you.”
“He doesn’t seem to like me very much.”
“Nonsense,” he replied, stroking her jaw. “Dad’s never said anything to me about not liking you.”
“Since we’ve been together, he hasn’t really said anything to me.” Lying on her back, she took a deep breath and exhaled. “A word or two maybe . . . I just hope whatever he has to say doesn’t crush me.”
“I’m sure it won’t,” he replied, and changed his position to match hers. “Let’s call it a night. We’ve got to get up bright and early tomorrow.”
Fawn nodded and curled up beside him. A few minutes later, she drifted to sleep.
Thick air had Fawn struggling to breathe. She was enclosed in darkness. For a brief moment, she believed her eyes were simply closed, but the sensation of her long lashes caressing her upper eyelids proved otherwise.
The sound of a woman whimpering nearby dared her to move from the spot where her feet were rooted.
“Hello,” Fawn whispered, and took a blind, cautious step forward.
“Not yet,” the woman whispered, and took a ragged breath. “Please, not yet.”
Fawn held her hands out before her and moved at a brisker pace. The air seemed to get denser as she approached the unknown.
“Where are you?”
A child’s laughter jolted Fawn an inch from the ground. Cold terror trickled through her body as she sensed the slightest movement in the darkness. The laughter echoed behind her, forcing the small hairs on her arms to stand on end. Her heart thudded so fiercely that her eardrums pulsed along with its rhythm.
Fawn’s fear willed her eyes to shut. Trembling, she turned to face the unknown and had to convince herself to reopen her eyes. Once she had, a piercing light poured from all four corners of a room. The light-blue walls of Gran’s living room were revealed. Fawn sighed at the realization that she stood in a familiar place. The walls were covered in the same photographs she had grown up admiring. She cherished the painting of Gran and Griffin as children leaping into the creek above all the others.
The laughter resurfaced. This time, at a higher volume.
“You wanna play?” a young boy asked to the left of her.
She looked to the side and turned to face him. A boy with dimples was clothed in overalls. He sat in the middle of the floor playing with building blocks. Everything in the room was bathed in black and white, but this boy, who couldn’t have been more than five years old, had orangey locks of hair.
“Oh,” he said, and pointed toward her stomach. “You got a baby in your tummy.”
“What?” She shook her head. “No . . .”
“Yes,” he replied, and continued building. “Look . . .”
She blinked, swallowing back a catch in her throat, and glanced down. She could only see the tip of her toes over her rounded belly. A warm substance dribbled down her inner thighs. She eased her hand between her legs and discovered she was bleeding.
The crimson drippings soaked into the carpet.
“Oh, no!” the boy exclaimed, and scooted backward. “You bleed!”
A sharp pain had her doubling over, collapsing to her knees. She clutched at her stomach, feeling as though she were being ripped apart.
“Not yet,” Fawn wept, and took a ragged breath. “Please, not yet.”
She woke with a start, gliding her palm across her flat stomach.
Just a dream, she told herself. Only a dream.
She glanced at Hunter, who slept peacefully beside her. The rapid rise and fall of her chest was calmed as she ran her fingers through his thick, brown hair.
Thank God, you’re here, she thought, and kissed his forehead.
She didn’t bother mentioning the dream when he woke later. If she had, she was certain another discussion about babies would have followed.
***
An hour later, she and Hunter met up with Pete, Clancy, and Laken at the barrier. All of them ate deer jerky for breakfast and were groggy for the start of their trip. They rode side-by-side, averaging a speed of ten-miles-per-hour.
No one spoke until the second hour was upon them.
“Anyone thirsty?” Fawn asked.
A gourd filled with water hung by her side. She’d grown them in the green house six weeks before the last frost. Since then, she’d dried out ten and used them as canteens.
Sloshing the water around, she asked again, “Anyone?”
“Yeah,” Pete said, waving his hand. “Pass that over.”
Fawn handed the gourd to Hunter, who passed it on to Clancy, who then tossed it into Pete’s reaching arms.
“Thanks,” he said, taking a sip. “I’ll hold on to it for now.”
Fawn nodded to her brother, and then turned to Laken who rode to her left.
“How’s Uncle Griffin? Have you seen him lately?”
“He’s been pretty busy with his plum and fig trees. He dropped us off two crates full a little over a week ago.”
Griffin had fled to Caddo after Shelby died giving birth to Hunter. As a young girl, Shelby had accompanied Griffin on his journey home and had grown to be a daughter to him. He took up residence in Caddo’s deceased orchard man’s house. The dwelling was located across the lake from their community. The fastest way there was by canoe. Tending to the orchard kept the eighty-seven-year-old in shape, with little to no health problems. Although, the thought of him abruptly expiring due to his age and not being found until weeks later had Fawn concerned.
“From what I saw, he’s doing well,” Laken continued, nodding reassuringly.
Two and a half hours later, they turned a corner and began trotting up the dirt road of Hickory Grove. Every rider’s sight was pulled toward six forest-green tents. The newcomers’ numbers had tripled since Fawn and Pete had last saw them.
A long, yellow contraption, with huge wheels and numerous small windows was parked at the back of their encampment. The number twenty-four was painted in black on its side. Four of the same massive vehicles that had made an appearance at Back Wood were parked one behind the other on the side of the road.
“By God,” Clancy whispered in admiration. “Those are Humvees.”
Each rider turned their heads and gawked at him.
“What?” Clancy
shrugged. “Father was a military man before the solar flare.”
The smell of smoke and freshly cooked meat drew them nearer. Three men in white uniforms stood before a grill and flipped slices of circular shaped meat. At least thirty men stood in line for lunch.
Fawn’s mouth began salivating. She startled herself by slurping.
Hunter laughed and shook his head.
“Hungry, are you?”
“I was praying you didn’t hear that.”
“I think they heard that from way over there,” Laken joined in, and smiled, revealing crow’s feet.
“Whatever they’re cooking sure does smell good,” Clancy said, and took a big whiff.
Pete licked his lips, and joined in, “God, I’m hungry.”
Twenty feet from the encampment, Fawn’s vision was pulled toward two women who sliced bread from a loaf. The only bread she’d ever eaten was round, unleavened, and a smidge thicker than the pages of her copy of Henry David Thoreau’s collected works. Fawn recalled Jacob the cook referring to the bread he’d prepare as Jesus bread.
A short, stocky man, whose head was donned with a camouflaged cap, stepped out from the nearest tent.
“Welcome,” the man shouted, and waved them over. “You’ve arrived just in time!”
Another man, much taller, and more muscular than the other, emerged from the tent once the first man had cleared from the entryway.
Clancy smiled, and leaned toward Pete.
“Should we wave?” Clancy asked.
“Oh hell,” Laken said. “Are you serious?”
Five strides from the seemingly welcoming host, Pete, Clancy, Laken, and Hunter decided to tackle the rest of the way on foot.
Be positive, Fawn told herself, as she slid from Juniper’s side. Not negative. Positive.
The shorter man who’d greeted them began walking forward. The taller man followed behind him. There was a stern, unwelcoming way about the taller man. He walked with a powerful gait and a clenched jaw. Over the years, Fawn had grown accustomed to people’s whispers and stares because of her attire. A sense of awkwardness would cause them to look away when Fawn made eye contact with them. That was not the case with this fellow. His stare was unrelenting.
