What sort of freak had the man who grabbed her by the throat been? The same hand that clamped around her neck might have done unspeakable things to innocent people. Garden variety bank robbers or car thieves didn’t often end up in super high security prisons.
She shuddered, not even wanting to roam down that mental road.
Thinking about what nearly happened to her siblings made Harper want to forbid the kids from even going outside again. However, as emotion faded to rational thought, she figured it wouldn’t have been too long after they disappeared before a search party discovered the convict gang. Kittredge, after all, was fairly close. Also, aside from threatening to kill their parents if they tried to escape, the convicts hadn’t been overly mean to the two small girls. Hardened prisoners had a reputation for murdering pedophiles after all. They probably wouldn’t have been horrible to Madison and the others either, though kids growing up raised by violent convicts would certainly have developed issues.
On the upside, the freed people eagerly joined Evergreen as citizens, bringing with them all the goats and some knowledge of how to process hide into leather and make clothing from it. That explained why those gang members and most of the laborers wore ‘tribal’ looking apparel. Both former corrections officers expressed interest in joining the militia, though it would be a while before they could, given their physical condition from frequent punitive beatings.
By the time Harper and Cliff returned home, the kids had already eaten dinner at Carrie’s. Harper had no appetite left, and didn’t bother scrounging up anything to eat. Instead, she spent the last hour or so of daylight on the couch holding Madison and Lorelei like giant teddy bears. Upon sensing her mood had gone into the pits, Jonathan added himself to the pile.
She told the kids they found the rest of the bad guys who tried to take them and saved some other people who had been kidnapped. When Madison asked why that had upset her so much, she deflected by claiming ‘they hit them a lot and I didn’t want that happening to you.’
That apparently satisfied them enough that they tolerated her clinginess.
Not that Lorelei ever needed a reason to tolerate being held.
Harper woke the next day, largely having dealt with her worries.
Bad people did bad stuff. Worse could have happened and didn’t. The people she cared about were safe, so she moved on. After breakfast, she walked the kids to the farm, then crossed Route 74 to wander her patrol area. She still felt kinda weird about the kids having to work over the summer on the farm, but asking them to learn how to run a farm plus keeping the town afloat made sense. Not like anyone forced them to toil in the field under threat of violence. They all knew everyone chipped in to keep everyone else alive.
Darci joined her again, having nothing else to do with herself and being ‘awake stupid early’ as she put it. She still wore a half-tee, but had swapped the denim shorts for a miniskirt. Due to a lack of pockets, she’d also added a hip satchel—probably carrying a pot stash. Not like anyone needed cell phones, wallets, or money anymore. Darci usually wore her jet-black hair short during civilization, but had let it grow past her shoulders either through laziness, apathy, or a deliberate intent to do something different.
“You’re letting your hair grow out?” asked Harper.
“Yeah, why not.” Darci shrugged. “Figured I’d see what it felt like.”
Harper smiled. “Oh. I thought you might’ve just been too lazy to cut it yourself.”
“That, too.”
“Heh.”
Darci glanced over. “You cut your own hair? Must be since it’s not down to your ass by now.”
“No. Madison’s doing it. I’m trimming hers. Lorelei won’t let anyone near her with scissors. It’s going to be dragging on the ground eventually.”
“She really is a nature child.”
Harper laughed. “Yeah. I hope she grows out of her ambivalence to clothing before she gets too old for it to be simply cute.”
“That would require she know what embarrassment means.”
“Ugh. She’s a handful.”
“I think she’s fierce.” Darci smiled.
“Fierce is what you call a child that’s a handful when you’re not the one responsible for her.”
Darci tapped a finger to her chin, pretending to be in deep thought. Harper assumed it an act since deep thoughts weren’t usually her thing.
“Harper?” called Marcie.
She stopped and spun around.
Marcie Chapman cruised out of a side street on a mountain bike, riding up to a stop beside the girls. “Walter wanted to talk to you.”
“Okay. How’s your arm?”
“Burns. Shallow hit, nicked the bone. Nothing too bad.” Marcie patted her right shoulder. “Rather this than taking it in the face. Lucky for me, those guys weren’t very good shots.”
“No kidding.” Harper whistled. “Any idea what he wants? I don’t think I did anything wrong.”
Marcie smiled. “Nah, he’s got an errand he wants you to run.”
Sigh. Guess the kid gets the errand job. Oh, well. Beats being sent into a gunfight. “Cool. Thanks for letting me know.”
“No problem.” Marcie waved and rode off.
“Why aren’t you on a bike?” asked Darci.
“I thought about it, but I’m supposed to be patrolling this area, observing, and looking for stuff that seems wrong. If I had a bike, I’d probably end up just riding in circles.” Harper chuckled. “The bikes are for covering ground fast. Like responding to 911 calls.”
“Shouldn’t you at least have one with you then? Pushing it if you walk? I mean, if there’s an emergency far off, you wouldn’t be able to get there as fast.”
Harper shrugged. “I guess. But pushing a bike around all day would kinda suck. And it would slow me down if a bad guy rushed at me.”
“Do you really think someone’s going to ambush you here?”
“No, but I also don’t trust they won’t.”
Darci pursed her lips. “Okay. Fair point.”
They headed south out of the residential area to Lewis Ridge Road, following it west to Route 74 and down to the militia headquarters. Darci tagged along, making random conversation about Lucas, growing weed, and what she imagined various famous people might be doing at that moment. While laughing at the idea that the Kardashians probably still hadn’t figured out why no one they called answered their phones, Harper walked into Walter’s office.
“Good morning.” He smiled. “It’s nice to see you in high spirits.”
“Morning.”
He looked at Darci. “Who’s this?”
“My friend Darci. We knew each other before the war. I hope it’s not a problem if she’s following me around.”
Walter shook his head. “Nah. Not a problem. I don’t expect you’re the sort of person who’d just sit there all day chatting instead of keeping your eyes open.”
“Nope.” Harper smiled. “Darce isn’t getting in the way at all.”
“All right. Then don’t worry about it. Anyway, the reason I asked for you is that we got a ping from Janice in the south. One of the residents down there, guy by the name of Henry Rogers, has an ongoing medical situation. Think it’s heart-related, but I’m not entirely sure. Anyway, he’s on medication and ran out of pills. Just so happened we got some of whatever he needs when you and Dr. Hale visited that hospital couple months back.”
“That was more than a couple months ago, but okay. And you need me to run them down there?”
“Yep.” Walter smiled, gesturing at a white plastic bottle on his desk.
Harper picked it up. “Prednisone?”
“That’s the stuff he needs according to Dr. Hale. He’s on Pine Road down near Evergreen High School. I understand you are familiar with the location of the high school?”
Harper’s cheeks caught fire—metaphorically. “Umm. Yeah.” Crap! Does everyone know?
“Something wrong?” Walter tilted his head. “Why are you blush
ing? Did something happen at the school?”
“You could say that.” Darci grinned.
Harper gasped, then stared at her. “Really?”
“Oh well, I’m sure I don’t need to know if you’re having that sort of reaction.” Walter leaned back in his chair. “Near the football field, swing a right off Buffalo Park Road onto Valley View, then that first right is Pine. Henry’s going to be in the second house you’ll pass on the right. Go on and grab a bike from the pool.”
Darci blinked. “Why are there bikes in the pool?”
“I’m going to assume your friend has a dry sense of humor.” Walter raised one eyebrow.
“Yeah, she likes to pretend at being blonde.” Harper poked her in the side. “Either that or she’s smoked herself brain dead.”
“You guys are no fun at all.” Darci rolled her eyes. “Weed doesn’t kill brain cells. That’s a lie from big pharma.”
“Right.” Harper mouthed ‘don’t get her started’ at Walter. “We’ll get going right away.”
He nodded.
Harper headed outside to the stash of mountain bikes next to the HQ building. Luckily, the bikes had been modified by the addition of small storage boxes, mostly containing first aid supplies. She stuffed the pill bottle in one so she wouldn’t drop it on the way. Darci helped herself to a bike as well.
“You wanna grab shoes real quick?” asked Harper.
“Why?”
“I dunno. Seems kinda weird to ride a bike barefoot.”
“Maybe to you.” Darci hopped on. “Been a while since I rode a bike at all. It would feel weird no matter what. Damn. Maybe I should go put on underwear at least.”
Harper gawked. “You are not running around in a mini without panties on.”
“Hah. Wow, it’s so easy to make your face match your hair.” Darci flapped her skirt up to show off a sky blue bikini bottom. “Not exactly Calvin Klein, but it gets the job done.”
“You are ridiculous.” Harper laughed, swung a leg over her bike, and started riding.
Amid the clicking of a ratchet gear, Darci rolled up alongside her. “This is wild. How do you work these gear thingees?”
“No damn idea. Never rode a bike like this before.”
“Oh, right. You had one of those pink ones with the white tires.”
Harper gave her the finger for barely a second before trying to steer with one hand nearly caused her to wipe out and dump the bike.
This, of course, made Darci laugh.
“Bite me.” Harper couldn’t help but laugh, too.
“How do I be non-conformist when there is no society to conform to?” Darci leaned back, savoring the wind in her face. “Can’t listen to my music anymore. What’s the norm now?”
“Umm, I don’t think people care that much about conformity anymore. We’re all trying not to die.”
Darci hummed to herself for a moment. “Well, I don’t want to go around attacking people. Can’t get tattoos now. No one bats an eye at weed. My goth clothes are all back in Lakewood. Guess I can buck convention by declaring clothing evil and going full Lorelei.”
“Please don’t.”
“I’ll claim I’ve embraced Gardnerian Wicca and it’s my religious freedom if anyone complains.” Darci grinned.
“Darce. Honestly. Renee would kill you if you went nudist.”
“Aww, you’re no fun.” Darci raspberried.
“And you’re not really being serious.” Harper shot her a look.
Darci laughed. “No, I’m just messing with you. Gotta have fun or you’re going to turn into an old woman. Like, one of those nasty bitches who watches everyone outside their window and calls the cops on kids selling lemonade.”
“Hah. Okay, fine. Let’s dance naked around a bonfire tonight and summon elemental spirits or something.”
“Okay.”
Harper turned her head in a slow Terminator fashion. “You weren’t supposed to agree so fast.”
“You aren’t serious.”
“That’s beside the point.”
“I’d totally have done that if you were serious. Don’t think we’d have been able to convince Renee or Grace to go along with it though.”
Harper laughed. “That’s right, you did mess around doing occultist stuff, didn’t you?”
“Yeah. Been a while though. Think I’ve more recently been on a bike than tried to contact The Goddess.”
“I haven’t seen you on a bike since sixth grade.”
“Yeah, that’s about right.”
“You were into witchcraft at Madison’s age?”
“Yeah.” Darci shrugged. “Isn’t every girl a ‘witch’ at like ten-through-thirteen?”
Harper sighed. “No. Guess I was too, umm, ‘preppie’ for that.”
“Dear, the word you’re looking for is ‘basic.’”
Harper raspberried her.
“This would be much cooler if we had horses.” Darci pedaled faster.
“Horses?” yelled Harper before working to catch up. “Why horses?”
“If we’re gonna be stuck in the Old West, we might as well go all the way.”
“Nah. That’s not going to happen. No reason for it.” Harper eased off, cruising.
Darci slowed a bit as well to keep even with her. “Why not?”
“Umm. Cliff said people are going to use bicycles and other tech stuff before horses, since you don’t have to feed a bike. People would be more likely to eat horses than use them for transportation.”
“Eww.” Darci gagged. “Eating horses? That’s horrible and sad. We shouldn’t eat horses.”
“Yeah. I agree, but we’re not really in the Old West. We have modern ideas still in our heads. We know cars are possible and bikes don’t take a lot of technology to get working. I’d rather eat a horse than starve to death, but I haven’t seen any around here.”
“We have cows on the farm. And chickens. No need to eat horses.” Darci shook her head. “Not gonna do it.”
They rode down Route 74—aka Evergreen Parkway—discussing what factors differentiated ‘food animals’ from other animals people wouldn’t eat. Darci suggested that it had something to do with cuteness until Harper disputed that horses counted as ‘cute.’ They agreed on ‘magnificent’ for horses, thus ‘magnificent’ animals didn’t qualify as food. No one ever rode a milk cow or bull into battle in dramatic fashion.
Cruising down the road on a bike with a shotgun across her back, laughing herself silly at the mental image of the Lone Ranger trundling off into the sunset riding Bessie took on a sense of the surreal. Never in the past seventeen years of her life could Harper have ever imagined a scene even half as strange. But as crazy as the world had become, a moment like that of pure goofiness felt as precious as anything.
They rode past Evergreen Lake where Route 74 changed names to Bear Creek Road. A narrow bike path ran along the street, sandwiched between the guardrail at the edge of the road and a rusty metal fence at the lake’s edge. The water almost came right up to the highway, only a six-foot incline separating the road from the surface. Several people fished from there, glancing over at them as they cruised by on their bikes. Neither Harper nor Darci bothered taking the bike path since no working cars remained anywhere in the country—unless the remnants of the US Military had some way to produce gasoline or diesel fuel.
Bikes made the trip down to the high school much faster than the other day when she and Logan walked it.
They swung to the right around the loop past a little decorative stonework wall, rode by a building covered in old road signs, Cactus Jack’s Saloon, then passed a water filtration plant. She didn’t know for sure if it still operated. Evergreen, at least the part of it she lived in, still had functional plumbing. So someone managed to keep that part of it going. The day may come when it failed, and everyone would be forced to take water from the lake and boil it, or collect rainwater… hopefully, it would be a while before the town had to deal with that.
They kept going past d
ead traffic lights, riding on a road devoid of cars except for the occasional abandoned one, past stores that hadn’t seen use in over a year and the ghosts of a recently dead civilization. Riding a bike through the streets of a mountain town would have been relaxing if not for the constant reminders of the world being broken.
A garage on the left still had an army of ATVs arranged in front of it. Must have been some kind of dealership. She figured the militia would definitely have already raided it for any usable gasoline. Riding ATVs instead of bikes would’ve been cool… but those ate fuel no one had anymore.
They took an off ramp to the right near the Evergreen Library, following a looping road around a tree-lined stretch flanked on both sides by numerous houses and a few businesses. The trip from North Evergreen where she lived down here felt like a real undertaking in an era without motor vehicles, though the bikes definitely helped.
Eventually, they came within sight of the high school and, following Walter’s directions, veered off to the right down a road opposite the football field. Straight ahead, the street led past homes, but she took the first right turn onto an unpaved dirt road. A few locals working among plants in a garden behind a house on the left paused to watch them ride up to the second home on the other side.
Harper stopped, got off the bike, and took the pill bottle from the storage box before approaching the door and knocking. Darci took the opportunity to stretch and complain that they hadn’t brought along water bottles.
A man quite well into his fifties if not past sixty already, answered, regarding the girls with a note of confusion. Only a little black remained in his mostly grey hair. “Yes?”
“Can we interest you in some Thin Mints?” asked Darci, making her voice sound like a twelve-year-old’s.
The man blinked.
“Ignore her.” Harper sighed. “Are you Mr. Rogers?”
Evergreen (Book 4): Nuclear Summer Page 14