Looking Back Through Ash

by Wade Ebeling

  The sloshing sounds that the liquids made had him hustling to quietly scoot up the stairs. Daniel shook his head in disbelief when he saw the aqua drapes that lay on top of the glass shards in the living room. Everything that had taken place, just hours ago, came flooding back. He wished it all could have been a bad dream. Seeing the flimsy mesh covering the sliding door hammered home that it was all too real. Bladder pressure made him slide out through gap in the damaged door without regard to safety.

  The wooden fence glowed bright green; the wetness showing just how covered it was with lichen and algae. Daniel stared straight ahead at the lime-colored fencing, using it like mental blinders as he hurried over to the closest garden patch, and finally relieved himself within its confines. The seed vendors instilled in him that this act replaced some vital nutrient back into the soil. The stately women, who had sold Daniel the seeds, had been very patient with him. They told him how to start the composting pit, and how to turn a layer of the compost into the fallow gardens in late fall. They had also told him to sift and save the wood ash from the fireplace to sprinkle around the gardens and pit.

  As Daniel turned back around to escape the rain, which threatened to soak him if he lingered any longer, he glanced up at the water box. ‘Life must go on’, he thought, as he climbed the ladder to open the lid to divert water into the barrel. There was no point in missing a chance to easily fill it back up.

  Sitting on the carpet in the living room, Daniel started picking glass shards from it. Low rumbles of thunder and waves of rain crashing down on the roof sounded as he worked. This assured Daniel of two things: the rain catches were filling up with fresh water and silt. Washed from the multi-patched roof, the dust and ash collected in the bottoms of the water barrels, forming a thick slurry. The fine dirt needed to be scooped out periodically, before it reached and clogged the valves.

  Daniel was really just trying to keep himself busy. He did not want to let the anger, now mixed with equal parts of shame, that he felt over the previous night’s experiences get a chance to boil up and engulf him. Sidetracking into the garage, he approached Rebecca’s wagon and pocketed the bearded man’s pistol, bullets, and knife before continuing downstairs.

  Daniel steeled himself by making hollow promises to do whatever it would take to keep his family safe. These were all lies, and part of him knew it. He was planning to make a dozen tripwire sound-makers to string around the area surrounding the house. These were easy to make, and he had all the materials to make at least twenty of them; mousetraps, glue, shotgun shells, and nails. Having watched his father make them, he had been taught the process well enough to do it safely.

  More than anything, Daniel needed information. He had to find out how the people in the Warehouse were faring. The Moore’s needed choices. Leaving the area would mean leaving behind everything that Daniel had stored away. The thought that, maybe, it was time to move his family into the Warehouse weighed heavily on him. By his figuring, if he used the last of the gas for his truck, he could make three or four trips, easily bringing a majority of the stores they owned with them. He also wondered if there were enough people having this same exact thought that it would overcrowd the available space in the Warehouse; thus leaving his family with no other choice but to hunker down here.

  All of his plans for the day dissolved. Knowing the fate of his town, and of his family’s future, overrode making defensive preparations that might not ever be needed. Stuffing a day pack and making a stealthy walk to see the Warehouse became his new priority one.

  As Daniel entered the main room of the basement, he saw Rebecca sitting upright on the bed looking quite unsure about what to do next. As discretely as he could, Daniel pulled the AR-15 around to the front and back over his head, freeing him from the strap. Nonchalantly, he laid it on the floor by his feet, while sitting on the foot of the bed to talk to his daughter. Her brown eyes looked sunken and scared. The way Rebecca stared at him hurt his heart knowing that he had caused some of that fear.

  “Everything is alright, Bugs,” Daniel said softly. “Some bad men broke our big window last night, and Daddy had to go chase them away.” He then quickly added, “They are gone now…And they will never come back!”

  “Is that why you were yelling? To scare the bad men off? ‘Cause you scared me and Mommy, too.” Rebecca said with a glare, telling Daniel that he had better be very apologetic.

  “I know, Honey. I am so sorry that I scared you. I...I had to sound mean to scare them away. If you were frightened, just imagine how they felt?” he said to his daughter with a misplaced cheer. Daniel desperately wanted to put an end to Rebecca’s worries.

  “But…you yelled…you were really mad…So that means the bad men are gone? For good? You sure? Would…Can you pinky promise?” Rebecca rapid fired her questions, her eyes now looking a little more hopeful.

  Daniel smiled and gave out a long sigh. He offered up his pinky while emphatically saying, “They will never come back. I pinky promise, Rebecca.”

  Rebecca shucked off her blanket that she was holding tightly to her chest and crawled closer to Daniel. She connected her pinky around his, letting her troubles dissipate at the same time. Daniel grabbed her close to give her tiny kisses on the side of the neck. This made her giggle loudly and struggle to get away. He made her initial escape easy enough, then he chased her further away by tickling at her feet.

  “Daddy, stop it! You are gonna make me pee!” Rebecca howled gleefully.

  Corinne rolled over and asked quite normally, “You have to go potty?” She had obviously been listening the whole time.

  “Yeah…Will you take me, Dad?” Rebecca begged.

  Directing his response at Corinne, Daniel just said, “I’ll take her up.” He wanted to say more, but Corinne had rolled back over to face away from him. Winning Rebecca was seeming very easy, especially when he compared it to what it would take to get Corinne back on his side.

  “C’mon, Rebecca. We’ll let you go potty, and then we will get you some milk,” Daniel said merrily. He waited for Rebecca to jump into the lead before retrieving the rifle.

  While Daniel led Rebecca through her morning routine of going to the bathroom, eating breakfast, brushing her teeth, and getting dressed, Corinne worked her way into the garage for a cool shower. Rebecca was hard at work on a half-completed, mold-speckled coloring book when Daniel went upstairs to wait for Corinne to come back inside.

  When she finally did come back in, she was dressed in jeans and a tight fitting black tank top. Her hiking boots were on, and her straight, damp hair was pulled back into a loose pony tail. She saw him waiting patiently for her, so she made her way into the defunct kitchen. Corinne slid out a bar stool, across the counter from Daniel, sat quickly, and then got down to business.

  “I do not want to discuss what happened last night right now,” Corinne stated. “I do not want to be that…terrified…ever again.” She gathered her thoughts for a moment, not wanting to give away too much information. “I need you to teach me how to use that shotgun,” she finally blurted out. “I want to know how to use it…”

  Daniel was certain that his wife wanted to say more, but didn’t. “Okay, Baby. I think that is a great idea,” he replied, thinking better of mentioning the numerous times that he had asked her to go shooting, only to have her turn him down time and time again. “If the rain lets up a bit, I was thinking of heading over to the Warehouse. So…we have some time if you want. I would feel better about leaving you two here, knowing you could handle…anything that might come up.” Seeing the anger creeping back into her eyes, he changed his tone to a lighter one. “I shouldn’t be long. I just have to see what’s going on over there,” he said carefully, trying to use what little sway he might still hold over her.

  “I want to start right now. I mean…Would you be able to show me enough, before you leave?” she asked, looking at the small slice of rain that could be seen behind him through the hole in the plywood that covered the kitchen window. She wore
more of a scowl after looking at the shutter.

  “Sure, we have plenty of time. It should be no problem…It’s a pretty easy gun to learn. We can work on the basics as long as you want. I won’t leave until you feel comfortable with it. If it doesn’t stop raining before noon, I probably won’t go today anyways,” Daniel said to her bracingly. “I just want to say…Real quick, I promise. I’m sorry about freaking out last night. I…I mean…I guess I didn’t handle it all that well.” Daniel found it unbearable to look at her now.

  Seeing how he looked close to broken, Corinne suddenly felt sorry for him. It was as if he had grown new wrinkles overnight. He had just killed three men, and here she was acting upset about how he handled that kind of emotional blow. Corinne now realized that, when she had made her decision, she had focused all the fear towards her husband. The fear was still there, but it had tilted in the direction of the unknown. It didn’t change a thing for Corinne, but she did want to put Daniel at ease.

  “I want you to know…that…I do love you. And I want to thank you for saving us all last night. You said the one guy had a gun? Did he shoot at you? All I could hear was yelling…you yelling…I want to hear what happened. Do you think you could you tell me?” She said all of this as she stood up and walked around the counter to gently rub his shoulder.

  It took a full minute before Daniel could look her in the eye.

  He relived the previous night’s events for her, even taking her outside to look for the father’s bullet holes. Feeling the clean, little pucker mark in the wooden door frame made Corrine forgive him for what he had said last night about her and her mother.

  It all felt oddly distant to him, like it had taken place many years ago. Daniel told her almost everything. He omitted the coup-de-grace on the bearded man, and the approximate ages of his sons. He did mention that he intended to burn the bodies tonight, but thought he might have to wait now, on account of the rain having moved in.

  Daniel and Corinne spent the next hour and a half going over the functions of the pump-style shotgun. The only sticking point was trying to explain the action release control. Corinne was very receptive, quickly learning how to take a natural pose while holding the long, heavy scattergun. Daniel thought it a little strange that Corinne didn’t spend much time, or effort, in practicing reloading, but he assumed it was because her thumb had gotten pinched slightly on one of her first attempts at loading a round.

  After he felt Corinne was ready for it, Daniel took her out into the slowing drizzle to shoot a few shells. Wanting her to get comfortable, he had Corinne start by shooting six birdshot shells. Then he had her load and fire off five buckshot shells, aiming at a cracked bucket thirty feet away. Corinne loaded up two sabot slugs, but only shot one before deciding that sticking with the buckshot was probably the best course of action. She agreed to keep the breach empty and the safety on while carrying the gun around Rebecca, and, after clipping a pouch stuffed with twenty shotgun shells onto her belt, Corinne led the way back inside.

  After a lunch of treasured canned beef stew and the last of the bread, which was already on the far side of soft, Daniel felt he could still make it to the Warehouse and back before night fall. The Moore family gathered near the front door, where Daniel donned a small pack, then his father’s hat and blue-mirrored sunglasses.

  “Goodbye, Daddy! You’ll be back soon, right?” Rebecca asked, hugging his leg firmly.

  “Yeppers. I’ll be back before you know it,” Daniel replied, tussling her hair playfully.

  “Okay. Can I go back to my friends now?” Rebecca requested, referring to the ring of dolls sitting around her little table downstairs.

  “Go right ahead…I love you,” Daniel half yelled the last part because Rebecca was already bee-lining away from them. As she dashed away, he realized just how undersized and pale she really was; a life spent indoors was taking its toll.

  “I love you, too!” Rebecca yelled back over her shoulder and from around the corner.

  Corinne smiled at the exchange as she stepped in to give Daniel a brief, soft kiss. “I love you, too!” Corinne said, mimicking Rebecca’s volume and cadence.

  “Jeez, thanks.” Daniel said, faking a loss of hearing by sticking his finger in his ear and wiggling it around. “I love you too, Core. I will try to hustle back.”

  “I don’t know why you won’t just take your bike,” She implored, knowing it would not change his mind. Daniel had already explained that he was going to stay off the roads, as much as was possible anyways.

  “If I just jump the wall at the end of the dead-end,” he pointed down to the end of their road, “I can cross through the wood line behind that Korean church the town used. Then I will just follow the creek almost all of the way there. I really don’t want to see anybody along the way. People see me carrying all of this stuff and I might just have to fight to keep it.” Daniel was now running his finger along a page torn from a topographical atlas. The page was protected, sandwiched behind sheets of self-adhesive clear plastic, and it showed the immediate area, his finger showed the route he would take.

  Corinne suddenly welled up with tears. “I do love you,” she choked out.

  “I don’t have to go, Babe,” Daniel said calmly. He took a step closer to her, but she just stepped back the same distance.

  “No, you should go. Will you check on my mom for me, while you are there? Tell her…I love her, please,” Corinne muttered, regaining some of her composure. One tear rolled down her cheek, and she brushed the tear away, angry at herself for showing weakness.

  “Alright, I will. Make sure you put the brace back in the door after I leave. Can you make sure everything else is locked up too?” he asked, even though he had already checked the whole house a handful of times. “When I get back, I will knock three times, then three times again. That way you know it’s me, alright?” he said reassuringly.

  Corinne just nodded in reply.

  “Okay. See you in a bit,” Daniel said, stepping out the door. After looking around the immediate area, he slung the rifle in front, adjusted its weight, and looked back at Corinne.

  Corinne just nodded again, but managed to give him a weak smile this time. Daniel turned, and she shut the door.

  He got a bad feeling that he could not quite place. So much had happened in the past few days that it had confused his intuition. He was not sure why he felt the feeling of dread, he just did. He stepped off the porch and into the moist heat.

  Chapter 9

  Wednesday

  Matt and Terry Spanelli stayed in their mustard yellow dome tent, which was concealed under leafy branches until the rain subsided. They had been walking for two nights now and this was the third day. Matt had been working as a civilian electrical engineer at the Selfridge Air National Guard Base when the terrorist attacks hit and fear engulfed the country. The couple met on base and as was the norm, got married fairly quickly. Married couples were given small, cozy bungalows that sat close to the overgrown golf course on base. Just to leave the large open spaces of the single berthing units had made coupling up at early ages a necessity; if one ever wanted to gain some privacy.

  Terry Spanelli was the only daughter of one of the few families who had gained access to the bases protection immediately following the attacks. Terry’s father died horribly in an easily avoidable accident a year later. An inadequate rope, which held a large timber destined for the top of a new watch tower, suddenly snapped killing him instantly. Her mother became despondent upon following her husband’s death and stopped caring for herself. She died eighteen months later of an intestinal infection left to fester too long.

  Terry was a lost fifteen year old when she was moved into the women’s barracks. She had no shortage of suitors vying for her attention. Given the average, she was quite pretty; blue eyes with wavy, long brown hair and a body that had filled out to match her 5’ 10” frame. Matt had won her over by using his sly intelligence to become a formidable scrounger and barterer. He used all of his surreptiti
ous powers to lavish her with once-cheap, now-expensive, perfumes and sweets.

  With balding dark hair that was kept closely shaven, Matt had a stocky, fire plug body, which was slightly shorter than Terry’s when he stepped out of his boots. But he did make her laugh with a coarse kind of humor. This alone was enough for Terry to start dating him exclusively; laughter, she had started to believe, was not in her future.

  Within a year of Terry moving into the women’s barracks, the two were married. Instead of giving them a white-washed home after he performed the short ceremony in his office, the Base Commander shipped them down to the work camp in Detroit, charging them with helping things operate more smoothly. The Spanelli’s made the best of a bad situation, and they still acted more like friends than lovers. Even though both of them had forgotten it, today was Matt’s birthday. He had turned thirty-seven somewhere out on the darkened roads, a full eleven years older than Terry.

  Last week, the rumors started swirling around the large work camp that the residents called Fort Woodward; the worst of them becoming the truth. The D.o.C. was planning to leave the state altogether after the work in Detroit was done, essentially placing them all into exile. Travel was not allowed out of the quarantine zones without the proper documentation, and the Spanelli’s had no such paperwork. Talk of Selfridge closing dominated the gossip. Some of the truck drivers even told stories of a huge consolidation taking place in the Ozarks, where entire Battalions were gathering, bringing every scrap of useful material with them. People feared that the mighty Department of Continuance was going to pull the plug on what was left of the country.

  When the resupply trucks and gravel trains abruptly stopped coming, it became obvious that the civilian laborers were to be left to fend for themselves, twenty plus miles from the nearest civilization. Some stole what they could, abandoning the already listing ship. The skeletal command structure, which was left to deal with maintenance of the massive earthen works and concrete shell around the nuclear plant, tried to stem the tide of disappearances with brutal, public floggings, but this only increased the violence that was used during later escapes from the camp. The remaining workers were now locked, full time, in one of three barracks buildings or in the infirmary, and those there suffered from varying levels of radiation poisoning.