by Deb Rotuno
The bleeding had slowed down, and I applied some antibiotic ointment to the cut, wrapping his little hand in gauze. Next, I took his gloves and put them back on him.
“That’ll help keep the bandage covered,” I told him, and my little guy merely nodded, curling into me.
“Jack,” Derek whispered, sitting down across from us and leaning his elbows on his knees. We all flinched at the grunts and groans and pounding that grew louder against the walls, doors, and windows, but Derek went on. “She’s alone, man. I mean, look at this place… One bed, one weapon, only enough food stashed for one.”
Jack nodded, raking a hand through his hair and cracking his knuckles. “I see that,” he whispered back. “One issue at a time.” He sat back in the pew and let out a long, slow breath. “We’ll wait out the snowstorm here if we have to. F-F…” he started, grinning when I tsked at the F-bomb I knew he was about to drop near his son. “I mean… Forget the cabin. We’re down two, and two of us are hurt. The goal is now to get us back to the lodge.”
“I’m fine,” Lexie urged, shaking her head and sitting up a little.
“Me too, Dad,” Freddie piped up, from my shoulder, but he’d been watching Jack.
“We need supplies, Jack,” Joel argued from his lookout post at the windows. “We’ve got a few more months of this cold weather. We need canned goods and candles. We need to—”
“I know!” Jack snapped in a hiss. “I’m aware of what we need.”
“Jack,” I chided, although halfheartedly because I understood his frustration.
“Sorry,” he sighed, grimacing a little.
Betsy and Ruby emerged out of the side doors with sheets, blankets, and what looked like curtains and tablecloths in their arms. They dropped them in a pile, and Ruby took the top one off and spread it reverently over Olivia.
Jack stood up, his voice deep and sad. “Everyone get some rest. We’ll talk about it in a few hours.”
JACK
The church was damned dark and quiet, and I leaned against the window, watching the snow fall. Not everyone was asleep, but they stayed silent. We’d put together enough rations to feed everyone, and they’d all made beds on benches or the floor. Betsy had turned on the gas furnace to keep the chill down, but I wondered how much was in the tank and if we were taking all her heat, though the old woman barely batted an eye. The zeaks outside had started to settle down—or slow down, really. The swarm outside probably numbered around a hundred or so, but they’d stopped attacking the walls and front door. The snow was falling heavily, and I wasn’t quite sure how long it would last, but at least everyone was safe. Well, everyone who was left.
My head fell to the glass without a sound, but I squeezed my eyes closed. Two people. We’d lost two fucking people! And now two children no longer had their mother. The guilt of it all racked my frame, making it hard to breathe, and my eyes stung with tears I neither had the energy nor the time to shed. My hands balled up into fists, the cracking of my knuckles breaking the silence of the room.
Familiar arms wrapped around me from the side, and I pulled Sara to my front, burying my face into the crook of her neck and simply breathing her in. She said nothing but held me close, her hands gripping my shirt.
“It’s okay, baby,” she barely whispered aloud in my ear, but I shook my head.
It wasn’t okay. It was far from fucking okay. I’d led these people into a dangerous situation, possibly getting them trapped in this church, and making it home would be a bitch.
“Look at me,” she whispered, pulling me back and cupping either side of my face. When I met her gaze, she kissed my lips. “This would’ve happened no matter what, no matter who’d been in the group. This attack wasn’t your fault. It’s a risk each of us takes anytime we step outside the fence. You know that, sweetheart.”
I nodded, knowing she was right, but it wasn’t easy to hear, considering I still felt responsible. My eyes drifted around the room of huddled forms—some sleeping, some probably not—finally coming to rest on Olivia’s covered-up body that had been moved to the back of the room. I’d told her I’d protect her, promised her that precious little Sabrina and Aiden wouldn’t be left alone in this fucked-up new world. Now… Now I had to explain to a five-year-old that her mother wasn’t ever coming back, and Aiden would eventually forget who his mother was, because he was too young to understand. And the truth came barreling out of me.
“We’re now responsible for those kids, Sara,” I whispered, my gaze unable to leave Olivia’s covered form. “I…I…” I stumbled over the words. “I wanted more kids with you. I did. Fuck, baby, I still do, but not like this. Never fucking like this!”
“We’ll figure it out, Jack,” Sara vowed softly, her eyes welling up with tears. “Rina and Aiden… We’ll figure it out.”
I met my wife’s gaze and saw nothing but support, but my guilt was eating at me. “I already love them, Shortcake. I did almost the second I found them on the damn street in Wyoming. But…I feel wrong. Like that caused this, like I’m responsible… Like wanting more kids—”
“Oh, God… Jack, baby, no,” she urged, shaking her head. “This wasn’t some…some…force that caused this, that caused her death. It’s just…this new life. It’s risky and scary and ugly, and she knew that. She also saw what a good person you were, which is why she asked us in the first place. You didn’t do this, Jack. I promise.”
Leaning a shoulder against the wall, I gazed out into the snowy night again, but I wrapped my arms around my wife, pulling her closer. She nuzzled my neck, but I could feel her emotions give a little. I rubbed a flat hand up and down her back.
We stayed that way for a few minutes, but soon we weren’t the only ones up. My son was crashed out with Sasha wrapped protectively around him. Lexie shifted when Derek sat up, but everyone else was awake.
“They’re coming in from Medford…maybe as far as Alturas across the state line too,” Betsy whispered as flickers of candles being lit brightened the room.
“Yeah, that’s my theory too.”
“She had children?” the woman asked, her gaze landing on Olivia across the room.
“Yes, ma’am. Two. A little boy—almost a year old—and a little girl who’s about to turn six,” I told her.
Betsy nodded but stayed quiet for a moment. “There’s more of you, I take it.”
“We’re on the north end of the lake in the lodge. We’re from…everywhere,” I said with a weary sigh and a shake of my head. “We were aiming for the log cabin just up the way. A supply run.”
She nodded again, pulling her jacket around her tighter.
“Um… Betsy?” Sara started softly. “Are you…all by yourself?”
The old woman smiled sadly. “I wasn’t alone until just before Christmas. I had my son and daughter-in-law, and we’d made it out of Boise, heading into California, but…” She waved a hand toward the window, and we all understood. “I’ve been here ever since.”
I was about to offer her a place back at the lodge, but she started talking again.
“You’ll find a few supplies in that cabin. It’s fairly big, and I’ve only taken what I’ve needed. About two miles up the road out there, there’s a small town—Klamath Falls. It was hit pretty hard, but there are buildings I haven’t checked yet, places my son wanted to check but didn’t get the chance.”
“We have room,” Sara offered before I could, and I kissed the side of her head.
Betsy smiled, glancing around at everyone who’d been listening. “I’d…um, I’d like that.”
Derek got up, slinging his compound bow across his back, and he walked to me. He gave my shoulder a squeeze. “My watch now. Get some sleep, Jack. Come light, we may be able to get the hell out of here. We can decide whether to just haul ass back to the boat or whatever…but it’ll wait.”
I didn’t know what sleep I’d get, but I joined Sasha and Freddie on the pallet Sara had made. Sara curled up around our son, and I took the spot on the other side of her, staring up at the ceiling
as a few zeaks clawed around outside. Derek and Betsy spoke so softly that I couldn’t hear them, and Sasha’s snore was soothing. It wasn’t long before I curled myself around Sara and let sleep take me.
“Stay away from the snowdrifts, and stick to the path!” I ordered, hitching the heavy duffel higher up on my shoulder.
The storm had lightened up by the time the sun had risen. The zeaks surrounding the church were frozen, unable to truly move the way they wanted. Joel took out his frustration and grief over Abe and Olivia on the immobile bastards with that sword of his. He practically took them all out by walking around the building. He then led us up the road a bit and into the log cabin, where we found plenty of supplies—lamp oil, canned goods, dry goods, and candles. After clearing it out and loading ourselves up with as much as we could carry, the snow had stopped altogether.
We’d decided to leave the small town of Klamath Falls for another day, another scouting trip. I couldn’t risk it; I just didn’t have it in me to take the remaining members of my group into something else. And there was a part of me that knew I needed to get back to the lodge. I needed to get Lexie back to get that ankle looked at, not to mention Freddie’s hand. I wanted to have a long talk with Hank and my parents concerning Rina and Aiden and why we’d lost two people and gained one, but as we boarded the boat, there was another talk that needed to happen before we got back.
I helped everyone with their loads, only to take Sara and Freddie by their shoulders, guiding them to the closest seat.
Sara took the seat beside me, but I pulled Freddie between my legs as Derek and Joel readied the boat. I pulled his hand open, tugged off his glove, and checked the wound. It was deep and ugly, but it wasn’t bleeding, nor was it an angry-red with infection.
“When we get back, I want you to go see Grandma. Have her look this over, okay?” I asked him, and he nodded with wide, fearful eyes. “You won’t get stitches, son. It’s been too long. But I just want to make sure you’re okay.”
“Okay,” he promised. He started to step away, but I pulled him back.
“Wait, son,” I told him, looking to Sara first, who was aware of what was about to happen, and then back to Freddie. “The three of us need to talk before we get home.” I swallowed thickly because I wasn’t sure how he’d take what I was about to tell him. He was a good kid, always had been, but he’d always been the center of Sara’s and my attention, and now he wouldn’t be. It would be a lot to take. “Freddie, I… You need to understand something. Miss Olivia… She made me make a promise to her. Do you remember what I said about promises?”
“Yeah, Dad. That they were important, that we should stick to our word. Like how school comes first before play, ’cause I promised Mom.”
“Exactly,” I said, smiling a little at Sara’s soft giggle.
“What was the promise?” he asked, tugging at his wool cap when the boat picked up a bit of speed across the lake. He cracked his knuckles, wincing when it hurt his hand.
“The promise was that if something were to happen to her, that your mom and I would take care of Rina and Aiden,” I stated as gently and honestly as I could.
His brow furrowed, and he glanced at his mother and then back to me. “Does that mean they’ll live with us?”
“Yes.” I waited a second to see if he had any more questions, but his brow stayed wrinkled. “They lost their mom yesterday, kiddo. Imagine how you’d feel.”
He shook his head. “I’d be…sad.”
“Absolutely, you’d be sad,” I agreed with him. “And they don’t even know yet. I’ve got to tell them when we get back.”
“Aiden is just a baby.”
Sara let out a soft laugh but sat forward to cup his face. “That’s true, but Rina isn’t. She’s going to be upset.” Sara seemed to think for a minute. “Freddie, you remember that boy in your class at school? Robbie? Remember, he was new… He’d been adopted.”
“Oh, I remember! He…he was really happy that he got ’dopted, ’cause he got parents and a brother.”
Smirking at the word, I nodded. “Well, this’ll kinda be like that. You’ll sorta be like a big brother.”
That seemed to really get his attention; his eyes widened and his eyebrows shot up high. “Yeah?”
“Yes…” I laughed a little, shaking him playfully, but then my smile fell and I pinched his chin gently between my thumb and forefinger so that he was looking me in the eye. “Look, son, it’s like your mom said… Rina will be sad that her mom is gone. She’s already lost her dad, so you’ll have to have some patience for the changes about to happen, but I made a promise, and I need your help keeping it. Can you do that for me?”
“They’re gonna need extra hugs for a bit, but Freddie, that doesn’t mean we won’t have them for you or won’t need them from you, either,” Sara added. “Make sense? You’re our boy, and we love you, but they’re all alone now.”
Freddie shook his head. “They’re not alone. They’re with us!”
Grinning, I pulled him in for a hug and kissed the top of his head. “Yes, they’re with us.”
The boat slowed down, and I glanced up to see the lodge coming into view. I took a deep breath and let it out, setting Freddie back down.
“Don’t forget, Freddie. Let Grandma look at your hand, okay?” I told him, and he nodded, scrambling for the side of the boat once Hank had taken the line that Derek tossed his way.
The bags of supplies were handed over, and we all got off onto the dock, but Hank’s gaze met mine at the sight of Betsy.
“Hank, this is Betsy Pierce. She’d been living in a church across the lake. And saved our necks,” I told him. “Most of us…”
“Aw hell, son,” he sighed, realizing who was missing. “Two? Oh, Jesus… Olivia.”
I nodded, feeling the guilt all over again, but Sara spoke up.
“If not for Abe, Freddie and I would’ve been in trouble. And Olivia…she’d been bitten.”
He nodded, but his eyes closed as he rubbed his face roughly. “Damn, those babies.”
“I’d promised her…” I started but then shook my head. “I’ve got no choice now…”
Hank nodded solemnly, but he gripped my shoulder. “I can’t think of anyone else I’d put them with. If you need me, I’ll happily be Grandpa Hank to them too.”
Smirking at him, I figured he’d take that stance, and my own parents already doted on the two kids. They had the entire time we’d been on the road.
I caught sight of little Sabrina running as fast as she could across the bank and down the dock.
Suddenly I panicked, looking to Sara and then to Hank. “I don’t know what I’m doin’ with a girl! Boys, yes. Little girls…”
Hank snorted, elbowing his daughter, but his face was completely serious. “I didn’t either. You’ll figure it out, son. They’re like boys…just softer and cause more gray hair.”
Sara rolled her eyes and shook her head, but tears welled up when Rina started calling for Olivia. My panic dissipated when Rina reached for the ladder of the boat and started to climb. I plucked her off the steps and carried her up the dock and into the lobby. I sat down next to the fireplace, and Sara joined me.
Rina reached for my face, turning it so I could look nowhere else but her. “Where’s Mommy, Jack?” she asked me.
She was a sharp little thing. She always had been, even from the moment she’d sought my help with her mother in Jackson Hole. She barely let this new world and the ugly things it contained bother her, but she was reading me like a book at the moment. The brightness dimmed in her big blue eyes—eyes that had reminded me of Sara’s the first time I’d seen her—and her bottom lip started to tremble.
Her chin dipped, and she focused on my dog tags, toying with them. “She’s… Is Mommy comin’?”
“Rina, your mommy… She got hurt, and I…”
“No! I want my mommy!” She started to cry, and I let her, because in all honesty, she had every right to be upset, to grieve, to be sad.
&nbs
p; Aiden, who had been playing in front of the fireplace, crawled over and used Sara’s legs to stand up straight. “Rina cry,” he told my wife, and Sara scooped him up, dropping sniffling kisses to the side of his head. He was blissfully ignorant in the whole thing, and I wasn’t sure what was worse: Rina’s heartbreak or the fact that he’d have no memory of his mother.
Rina cried herself into exhaustion. I walked with her, sat with her until she fell into a deep sleep on my chest. My dad, Hank, and Mose were kind enough to move the kids’ things from Olivia’s room to ours. Freddie seemed to be okay so far with having to share his space, and he’d even helped Sara give Aiden dinner.
It was in Freddie’s room that Rina finally woke up. It was just the two of us because Sara was making sure both boys were cleaned up before bed. Deep, sad eyes looked up at me as I settled her into her bed, which was now opposite of Freddie’s.
“You hungry?” I asked her since she’d slept through dinner. When she yawned and shook her head, I reached for the pajamas Sara had found for her. “Can you dress yourself…or…”
She nodded again, taking the pajamas and sitting up.
“That’s good, ’cause I don’t know what I’m doin’ with these,” I told her, taking the pants and starting to pull them down over her head. The result was what I’d wanted: giggles and struggles to pull them off. Grinning at her, I tugged the pants back. She giggled up at me, but she was still out of sorts, I could see that much. “Rina, I… You’re gonna share this room with Freddie and Aiden for now. Okay?”
She nodded. “I miss Mommy.”
“I know you do. You will. But…Miss Sara and I will be here for you and Aiden. You know that, right?”
Her eyes looked up at me, and then to the door where Sara stepped in with the boys. Freddie was all squeaky clean with wet hair, and Aiden looked like he was about five seconds from falling out on my wife’s shoulder. Once she set him down on his bed, he stayed tucked in, his eyes drifting close. Freddie crawled into his bed, starting to set up the checkerboard for his and Sara’s nightly game.