Richard came over to where the three of us stood near the barn door, rubbing his arms where the ropes had been tightest. He and Tex met eyes.
“I’m sorry I tied you up,” Tex said, in his slow, heavy voice.
“I understand,” Richard said. “It’s a crazy world right now.”
As we left the barn Angel said, “It’s always been a crazy world, darlin’, since the Fall of Mankind. But the United States is sure crazier now than ever; I think our country has taken its own fall now, just like Rome did.”
Hulk added, “This country fell when it took God out of the classroom and the public square. When I was in school, we had truancy and paper fights and cafeteria food fights. You kids have had to live with school shootings. You tell me which is better.”
Angel took up the torch. “And we’ve been murdering our own babies—I read once that we killed more Americans by abortion than any war in history. Yup, this country has raised a stink to heaven! Because God values life—every life.”
Richard was frowning. Angel caught it.
“You don’t agree, Richard?”
He sniffed. “If he values every life, why did he let the EMP happen? Millions have died, you know that, right? More than however many were killed by abortion.”
“Well, now you’re talkin’ about judgment,” Tex said. “When nations fall, it’s judgment.” He stared at my brother. “God has always judged nations sooner or later. We just got ours. People die when there’s judgment, and heck, even that ain’t nothin’ next to what happens after death.”
As we entered the house he added, “I mean, Richard, if you think this is hell, it ain’t. Life ain’t pretty; it ain’t fun, but wait’ll people get to the real hell. It’ll make life, even what it is today, look like a walk in the park. That’s why Jesus always told people to repent while there is time.”
“Does judgment mean we’re out of time?” I asked.
“Darlin,’ as long as you’re still breathin’, there’s still time,” Angel said, whizzing by us to the kitchen. “C’mon now, help me finish up over here.”
When I walked over she said, “This EMP is a call to repentance. For individuals and for our nation.” She shook her head. “All I can say is, worse is yet to come if we fail to do it.”
Richard had been listening and he said, “It still seems to me, life is cheap to God.”
“Oh, Richard!” Angel gasped. “God values life so much he sent his own Son to die for us! But he is a God of justice. This world is in rebellion to its creator. Don’t ever forget that. Whatever happened, we’ve had it coming. God sent warnings, time after time. He always does. Our country did not heed those warnings and it did not repent.”
“I didn’t see any warning.”
Angel and Tex looked at each other. Angel said, “Maybe you weren’t watching.”
We all got busy with chores then but I heard Tex say to Angel, “I was just gettin’ ready to give Richard the gospel.” He looked over at me. “Sarah—I think she’s okay.”
“I want the gospel too!” I said. I wasn’t sure what he meant by giving us the gospel, but if it had to do with God, I was interested.
Angel beamed at me. “Bless the Lord! We’ll have a Bible study tonight.”
As I set the table and cleaned up the kitchen I had to marvel at Angel and Tex. They were rough-edged, hippie-types. If they’d told me they belonged to a motorcycle gang, it wouldn’t have come as a surprise. But I hadn’t expected them to live by the Bible. And yet they weren’t anybody’s doormat. They believed in God and guns. I’d always thought Christians were against any use of force. Some are, I know it. But I guess I have a lot to learn about what it means to be a Christian.
Chapter 56
ANDREA
Lexie’s been visiting me every chance she gets. I love our time together. Mr. Clepps checks on me, but Mrs. Philpot is now hobbling around with homemade crutches and a fat left ankle wrapped in gauze. She’s taking care of me, too. She’s supposed to stay off her leg as much as possible, but I can see she isn’t the resting type.
Happily, she and Mr. Clepps agree I can go off the I.V. tomorrow, as long as I stay hydrated. I’m still in pain, but I’m bored. Lexie says that means I’m getting better. She gives me the latest news. When I asked why I wasn’t hearing any construction sounds—unusual because someone or other is always working on a log cabin around here—she said building has stopped because of the extra manpower needed for surveillance, especially guarding the perimeters. We’ve even sent guys out a mile or so in two directions with flares. They’re posted in spots with a good view, our “early warning system.” If you consider a mile an early warning.
Roper is in one of the teams. Lexie said he volunteered. I wished he hadn’t—I think it’s dangerous. And I miss his jokes and his smile. Jared has come around every day, sometimes twice a day. I don’t know how to discourage him! I came up with an idea, though. It may be a little underhanded, so I’m gonna bounce it off Lexie. My idea is to ask him to go look for my mom and Mr. Washington. If he says no, I have a good reason to turn a cold shoulder to him. If he agrees, well, that’s two birds with one stone. He’ll either find out they’re alive—which would be great. Or maybe he’ll not return, either! You see why my idea is underhanded? (Sometimes I think I’m hopelessly wicked at heart.)
I am clinging to the idea that my mother and Mr. Washington are still alive. But every day that passes makes that hope seem foolish.
Chapter 57
LEXIE
I caught Blake this morning right after breakfast and told him I needed to speak with him. He was already in full camo, face smeared with greenish-brown goo and all. He looked at me, brightly. “Shoot!”
My little sisters were watching us, giggling. They love it when they see me and Blake together, even if we’re not holding hands. To them, there is nothing funnier than when we show affection for each other. Somehow they’d learned that age-old chant, “Lexie and Bla-ake up a tree, K-I-S-S-I-N-G.”
Kids will be kids. So anyways, before they got started I said, “Let’s go outside.”
“I’m on the hill today. Wanna walk up with me?”
“Sure.” I didn’t really need the reminder that he was still a lookout while I had been banned but at least we’d get to talk.
Outside, the spring morning was warm. It was gonna be a hot day. We walked in silence for a few minutes, passing the spot on the grass where Andrea had bled out some. I felt a pang in my heart at the sight. Meanwhile, Blake waited for me to start. He was not a big conversation starter.
“Okay, so here’s the thing,” I said, glancing over at him. He nodded, waiting. Blake has big, serious eyes, and I still feel a small thrill when they’re directed at me.
“I feel like you’ve been avoiding me.”
He stopped walking. Stared at me. “How come?”
I shook my head. We were facing each other now. “I don’t know, you just seem distant. Ever since Andrea got hurt!” My tone was accusing, though I hadn’t planned on it being so. I suddenly felt like I was about to cry. I wished I wasn’t so darn emotional!
Blake was still studying me in his intense fashion.
I got hold of myself and continued, “Do you feel like it’s my fault? That she got hurt?”
He let out an exasperated breath. “No!” He stared at me with puzzlement. There was an awkward, painful silence. I wished he’d speak!
Finally, after looking around as if he’d find the words in the air somewhere he said, “If I’m—distant—it has nothing to do with Andrea. It wasn’t her getting hurt; it was you—almost getting killed!” He took my hands in his. “Lex, you gave me a real scare. I’m just trying….” He fell off for a moment and looked around, groping again for words. Blake is a brilliant guy in many ways but verbal ease is not his forte. “I’m just trying to come to terms with how I feel about you.”
I waited. I wanted him to be more specific. How did he feel about me? Was he trying to determine his feelings? To see if he
cared or not? I needed reassurance. When I just stared at him, I guess he realized his answer hadn’t satisfied me.
He added, “It’s hard…to love someone.”
Better; but oh, Blake! That’s not good enough! “What do you mean?”
He stared deeply into my eyes. “I—I love you, Lex.”
Those words were like honey to my soul. I threw myself into him and we almost fell back, but he chuckled. “Whoa! I’ve got a lot of weight on my back!” Besides his rifle on a strap, he had his backpack with food and coffee and other gear for his day on the hill.
When he regained equilibrium for both of us, we were still in an embrace. Vaguely, I wondered if now would be the time. Was he going to propose? While we looked into each other’s eyes for a moment, my question changed to, “When is he going to kiss me!” We were both aware that we were in full view of anyone looking, certainly in view of the lookouts above us and the house below, not to mention a number of the cabins. I didn’t care—but did Blake?
“Everyone can see us,” he said.
“I know. I don’t care.”
That was enough reassurance for him because he finally leaned in and gave me a warm, wet kiss. I tightened my arms around him. “I love you, too!” I whispered afterwards.
“I know,” he said, nodding, with his usual serious demeanor. I had to grin at that. He was cute, being confident that way.
“I’ll try not to be—distant.”
“Good.”
“But you—stay safe.”
“I want to be up on the hill with you again.”
He frowned. “That’s not my call. I think you did fine. But I don’t mind you staying down here. It’s safer.”
“Maybe. Not unless I’m in the safe room, really.”
“I got to go,” he said. We looked up and realized Mr. Wasserman, whom Blake was replacing, was already on his way down the hill.
He gave me another quick kiss. Mr. Wasserman whistled at us. I thought, Puh-leeze! A grown man, acting just like my little sisters!
Back at the house I started kitchen clean-up, but the twins popped in. Lainie said, “We saw you kissing Bla-ake!”
I shrugged. “So?” I felt my cheeks growing hot, even though I told myself I didn’t care who saw us.
Then they started: “Lexie and Bla-ake up a tre-e-e…”
“Go away,” I said.
Mrs. Wasserman rescued me. “Lainie and Laura! You get over here this instant!” To my relief they went running from the room.
I stayed with my chores, doing dishes, washing off the table, and checking the daily list for food preparation, which hung by a magnet on the defunct fridge. We used the refrigerator for holding firearms, now. The days of keeping it running with our generator were long gone. I dreamed of us having enough fuel some time to power it up again. To have cold food! That would be a joy.
Blake was studying in his spare time how to generate electricity using hydropower. We have a year-round running stream which could work if it ran stronger, but it’s often a sluggish flow. After a storm we get a much deeper and faster flow but it doesn’t last.
Blake said we need to figure out a way to get more water down the stream. We all had high hopes of Blake in that regard—there was no one on the compound smarter. I was proud of him. And of course I had high hopes of his proposing, too. If he did, we could get married. We had no reason not to. There was no big wedding to plan, no expensive photographer to hire or flowers to buy. It would be simple and homey because that was our life.
I just needed to know one thing: When was he going to do it? Propose?
Chapter 58
SARAH
At dinner that first night after Tex got back and Angel finally appeared, talk turned to the traps and how Angel had tracked a wounded animal without luck. She told us she always felt trepidation when checking traps because twice she’d found people at them, helping themselves to the game she’d caught. She put one hand to her heart as she spoke.
“I hate it when I find nice people at the traps,” she said. “It about breaks my heart to tell them they can’t have the game. But we learned we can’t let them have it,” she continued emphatically, shaking her head and speaking to Richard and me. “They keep coming back for more.”
Tex added, “We gave away as many traps as we could; so people could catch their own meat,” he said, “but we can’t do that anymore. We need what we’ve got.”
To my mind, Tex had said he and Angel didn’t have enough food to take in me and Richard. How much longer, I wondered, would we be able to stay? Angel had always said, “Until Tex gets back.” Now he was back. I didn’t raise the subject; I didn’t want to remind them we were like those other people, without food and dependent on their mercy. We were on borrowed time.
Angel said, “Let’s clear up the dishes and have that Bible Study.”
Richard frowned. I knew he’d prefer to do most anything other than study the Bible. But he was just as aware as I was of our dependence on Tex and Angel. He said nothing. Later with the cleaning done, Tex motioned us all back to the table. Angel handed a soft-cover, dog-eared New Testament to me and gave one to Richard.
“First things first,” said Tex. “Don’t let’s beat around the bush. If you died tonight, do you know where you’d be going?”
Richard said, “Huh? If we died?” I listened uneasily, because no one had ever posed such a question to me. It sounded faintly threatening. When Richard spoke, I knew he felt it, too.
“Why would we die tonight?” he asked. “Was that our last meal?”
Tex frowned at him. “No! This is just—theoretical. I’m not saying you’re gonna die tonight, but we all die sometime. So IF you died right now, where would you go, Richard?”
Tex glanced at my face then, and chuckled. “Did you also think I was threatening you? I am not. I’m just askin’ a question you need to answer—while you’re still on earth. So, I’ll ask you differently—if you were to die tonight, would you go to heaven? Or hell?”
After a moment’s reflection, I said with some confidence, “I’d go to heaven.” I wasn’t one hundred percent sure, but who could be, right? I wasn’t a bad person. I certainly wasn’t bad enough to deserve hell!
“What about you, Richard?”
Richard took a deep breath. “I’m not sure I believe in heaven or hell.”
Tex raised an eyebrow. “So what do you believe?”
Richard shrugged. “I don’t know. I guess I believe this is all there is.”
“And that makes sense to you?” Angel asked.
Richard glanced at her. “Nothing makes sense to me. Life doesn’t make sense. So why should anything make sense?”
Tex cleared his throat. “Actually, Richard, the whole universe makes a whole lotta sense. You ask any scientist whether things make sense and they’ll tell you about the laws of nature, the laws of gravity, the order in the observable universe. It does make sense. God didn’t create no senseless universe. Everything that happens in nature follows laws of nature—outside of special miracles, like when the sun stood still so Israel could fight a battle, or when Jesus walked on water or fed the five thousand with a handful of food. God alone has the power to supersede his own laws—but that’s why we call it a miracle; it ain’t natural. It’s supernatural. But you want to see order, just study the universe.”
Richard shook his head. “That’s not what I mean. How does the EMP make sense? How do you explain why God would let this happen?”
“We talked about that. Our country is under judgment. It may not seem fair to you, but I want you to forget for a moment about the EMP. I want you to think about you only, Richard. It’s you and God, right now. And I’ll ask you one more time, if you died tonight, would you go to heaven or hell?”
“I can’t just forget about everything else. We lost our parents and our cousin!”
He nodded. “I heard something about that when you two were talking in the barn. I’m sorry about your mom and dad and your cousin.” He
looked genuinely sorry. But he continued, “Your real concern is not about what makes sense or not; it’s not even about who died, or what’s happened to this country. Your real concern should be your own destiny, and what’s gonna happen to you.”
Again Richard shrugged. “Look, what ever’s gonna happen, is gonna happen. There’s nothing I can do about it.”
“That’s not true,” Tex said. “The Bible says there is a way to know where you’re going after you die, and there is something you can do about it. “
“What?” Richard asked. “What can I do about it?”
Tex said, “You can put your faith and trust in Jesus Christ, God the Son. Let me tell you why.” Suddenly Tex spoke faster, quoting Scripture verses and showing Richard that Jesus Christ claimed to be God.
“I already know what he claimed,” Richard said.
“Did you also know that he claimed you could go to heaven—if you turn from your sin and trust him to save you?”
Richard looked as though he’d raised a wall around himself. His face was hard. But I was fascinated. I was eating up every word Tex spoke. I’d been reading my little Bible, but I loved hearing someone else talk about it. I’d read mostly the Psalms up to this point. I noticed they echoed my own thoughts and feelings. But this was about heaven and hell! If there was a way to know for sure where I’d end up, I wanted to know it.
“What difference does it make, what I believe?” Richard said. “God’s gonna do what God’s gonna do. I can’t change that.”
“Actually, God’s gonna do what he says he’s gonna do. And he says, if you believe in the Name of Jesus, you will be saved,” Tex answered. His voice had an edge of authority—surprising for a motorcycle gang-type person, anyway. His hair, now that I saw him without the leather jacket, was held back by a bandana; he was the last person I would expect to be hearing a sermon from, frankly.
“See,” Tex said, flaring out his hands, “it’s like this. Jesus affirmed the Bible is God’s word. And he gave more warnings about hell than he did promises about heaven. He didn’t want us to doubt for a single second that hell is real and waits for those who are heading there. He wanted us to take warning and to prepare—so once again, I’ll ask you, are you prepared? If you died today or tonight, do you know where you’d end up, heaven or hell?”
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