by N. C. Reed
“Next day town was coming apart as people ran around taking from stores and from each other, and I just stayed inside. I did that for three days until I didn't have any choice but to go out again because we ran out of food and the water was off. Then, the shooting started, and then the fire, and…when the smoke cleared, we were homeless, with just the clothes on our backs. Since then it's been hand to mouth and me trying to take care of my son. That's all there is for me.”
“I take it you know her?” Clay said quietly into the silence, talking to Malitha.
“I do,” the older woman nodded. “She worked with me at the library. We would work together three, sometimes four times a week. She's had a troubled past but was working through that after her little boy was born. She had been at the library since she was waddling pregnant.”
“I almost couldn't shelve the books when my belly got big,” Callie said wiping a tear away from her eye.
“That is true,” Malitha nodded. “She was a hard worker and was only away from work for a couple weeks when her baby was born.”
“Thirteen days,” Callie was nodding in agreement. “It was all I could afford,” she admitted.
Clay wanted to tear his hair out. When he didn't know any of them it was easy to imagine getting rid of the women, even with their children, if it meant protecting the people already on the farm. Now, it was going to be harder.
He was no stranger to people being coerced into doing things they didn't want to do. He had seen it time and again in the places where he'd gone. He knew that even the best people could be forced into a bad move and there was no better lever than a mother with a child. He remembered something that he had learned from Mister Xiao, a Chinese-American he had worked for one summer in a small factory in Lewiston.
“Hire women with children, they come to work,” the little man had said. “Man, he no come to work unless he want something. Work two, three weeks, get paid and then quit. A woman, she will work to support child. Be on time, not call out. Hire women. They come to work.”
At that time Clay had thought it was a shitty thing to say or to do, but it was a lesson in people. It wasn't that Mister Xiao was actually treating the women who worked for him bad. Just the opposite in fact. It was merely his hiring philosophy. Women with children would work hard and give him a fair day's work for a fair day's wage. It had been something Clay wasn't familiar with. His own father worked hard from daylight to dark to provide for his family, and his older siblings had done the same thing. It wasn't until his experience with the broader world that Clay had learned that not every man did that. Nor every woman either, as Mister Xiao's philosophy sometimes proved to be wrong. Not often, but every once in a while, Clay would see someone who proved that Mister Xiao's rule wasn't one hundred percent accurate.
Now he was seeing that put to the ultimate fulfillment as young mothers had their children used against them to coerce them into all manner of unpleasant things. Worse yet as far as he was concerned, there was no way he wasn't going to be made to look like a complete monster if any of these women were made to leave. He could see it now, hear it even:
“How could you even suggest that they not stay here?”
“What kind of man would force a young woman and her child out on their own?”
“How dare you even say that out loud!”
And so on. It seemed that no matter how hard he worked to keep this place safe, other elements (most often his own family!) were equally determined to make it as difficult as possible for him to do that. It had happened so often over the few short months since this had all began that he had no doubt it would play out the same way now.
He was determined not to be made to look like the bad guy this time.
–
“For what?” Leon demanded. “What do we need them for?”
“You know good and well that no one will see it that way,” Clay pointed out. “And I will say, under protest, that if we want to keep them from talking about this place then keeping them here is the safest way to do it. I just. . .if we keep adding to the burden here we aren't going to make it! We're going to reach a tipping point where we have more needs than we can meet. The entire idea was to make sure we could survive and leave something for the kids growing up behind us, but I swear it seems as if some of us are determined to leave them nothing but empty boxes and broken promises!”
“Sounds like a country song,” Leon snorted. “And you say Deborah and Malitha know at least two of them?”
“Yes.”
“Well, the only thing I can say is to pick your battles, boy,” Leon said after a short pause of consideration.
“What?”
“You need to start thinking about leverage, boy. You're paddling upstream and you're the only one doing the paddling sometimes. If you give in on this you can use it against them the next time they want to do something that's contrary to keeping this place going. Like, I don't know, adopting half the frigging town or something,” Leon waved his hand in irritation. “So, let them have this if they look determined to have it, but make sure they know it's their responsibility. And then save this as a marker to use one day when they want something you don't want to risk and play it as a trump card of sorts. Even if they want to make you look like a heel it will be hard to do when you point to today. See what I mean?”
“Yeah,” Clay nodded. “That's not exactly a fix but might end up being the lesser of two evils.”
“Exactly!” Leon pounded his chair arm with his left hand as he sat back again. “And put them four to work watching the children that don't get adopted.”
“Huh?”
“You got, what, a dozen kids down there with no mother we're aware of?”
“Uh. . .a baker's dozen, yeah,” Clay did some quick mental arithmetic.
“Then you have a new cabin built if you have to, a larger one, and you make that an orphanage. You put them four. . .or was it five? . . . anyway, you put them women with their own children in charge of that orphanage. Make it clear that they better take just as good o' care of the others as they do their own, and if they don't then they're outta here. Get some work out of 'em while keeping 'em out of the way and out of things you don't want them butting into.”
“I see,” Clay nodded.
“It’s a given we can't just kick them children out,” Leon continued. “And I wouldn't even if I had to go without myself. So, them five want to stay they agree to take good care of them kids. And make sure they know we're gonna be watching, too. One slip up and they're gone. Outta here,” he jerked a thumb over his shoulder.
“I like it,” Clay admitted. “Where exactly should we build that cabin, though?” he asked, opening the small map Leon kept on his table. “I don't think we can squeeze something like that into the square,” he studied. “Well, maybe...”
“If you can't go out then go up,” Leon told him.
“What?”
“Build it taller,” Leon clarified. “Instead of a loft, have them build a real upper floor in the place and put at least two if not three kids to a room. Use it to fill in one of the corners you left open when you fixed the square. That's what they were for, right?”
“Well, yes,” Clay nodded. “It was. I...I don't think it will hurt anything. It may block the tower slightly, but we can figure a way around that I think. Maybe.”
“Well, that's the solution then,” Leon said firmly, leaning back once more. “If you have to, make me out to be the bad guy in this. They all owe me more than enough times to give me something like this. And besides that, we're helping the women and the kids both. All them bleeding hearts ought to be glad of that.”
“Mister George will have to take a look and see what he’ll need to make this happen,” Clay mused. “And they’ll have to take care of it. With Holman looking to make a move, we need everyone on the security team on full time watch right now.”
“Then they’ll have to do it,” Leon shrugged. “They want this, they have to see to it. Time for people to
start taking responsibility for their own crap.”
“Works for me,” Clay agreed completely. “I'm on it.”
“And Clayton?” Leon's voice stopped him and he turned back.
“Time for you to start taking the lead,” his grandfather told him flatly. “I mean in everything, not just protecting this place. Get them used to you being in charge.”
“Why?” Clay's eyes narrowed.
“Because I said so,” was the only reply. “Now go on.”
Clay wanted to argue but recognized this attitude and tone. Leon was finished talking for now.
CHAPTER TEN
-
Clay decided to hold on to Leon's 'orphanage' idea until the subject of what to do about the women and the remaining children came up. It wasn't until very late in the day that the discussion turned to what to do.
“Well, we can't just toss them out,” Angela said, receiving agreements from the other women.
“And we’ll have to take care of those children,” Deborah Webb added. “They can't care for themselves and we don't even know who they are. Their parents may still be alive but we have no way of knowing that. We don't even have names for some of them. What a terrible mess.”
“Are we going to allow families to adopt any of the children into their care?” Patricia asked. “I know it was mentioned at one point, but I never heard if a decision had been made.”
“There's no reason not to, providing that the family in question can see after them,” Deborah gave her opinion.
“Had I not already taken in the Haley girls, I might do so myself,” Angela admitted. “As it is, I just don't have the room.”
“Patricia, are all the children reasonably healthy?” Malitha asked.
“Considering what they've been through, yes,” Patricia replied. “They are all malnourished to some degree, some worse than others. I imagine some will have stunted development because of it but their mental and physical acuity appear to be unaffected as yet. I've given them all vitamin shots, and we’ll continue a round of oral vitamins for all of them over the next fifteen days. By then a better diet should start doing the work.”
“Why not a whole month?” Dixie Jerrolds asked.
“I don't have enough vitamins to do that,” Patricia admitted. “We didn't anticipate having to care for so many. And we had a very limited time to try and gather what we could. As it is I've used vitamins that were intended for future children among our own family. This. . .this has grown far beyond anything many of us anticipated.”
“I don't think anyone could anticipate anything like this,” Nadine Jessup stated. “You were lucky to have the chance to get what you could.”
“We were having lunch when Renee came running in telling us the sun was exploding,” Patricia remembered idly. “Everyone went home after that, though I did take the time to gather the medicines that we've been using before I left. I assumed someone would break into the clinic looking for narcotics and there was no reason to leave that medicine for them to ruin.”
“Do you have the narcotics?” Carlene Goodrum asked her.
“We didn't keep anything like that at the clinic,” Patricia told her. “About the most we could give someone for pain was Ibuprofen.”
“We need to get back on track here,” Angela said. “We've got to make some kind of accommodations for all these children, and for the five women that are staying here.”
“Who said they're staying?” Clay asked, having sat silently against the wall until now.
“Clayton, is this really the time for that?” his mother asked, though she was careful to keep her tone even. She and Clay were still on shaky ground.
“When will be the time?” Clay countered, his voice also calm. Calculating. “When we run out of food? When we have to start shorting our own children to feed others? Where do you draw the line between helping others and hurting ourselves? Patricia already said she's exhausting the vitamins that were meant for our own kids. What else are we spending on others that we meant to use ourselves? We're talking about things our kids may need and that we can't replace.” He stood up.
“Ladies, there are some hard choices ahead of us, and that is just a sad fact. The world has changed and won't be going back to normal. This is our normal, now. And that means that we have to think about more than today or tomorrow, or even next week. You better learn to start thinking about next year, and the next five years, because whatever we need at this point we either have to make it, grow it, or take it. Those are our options.”
“Those women came here to sow discord, commit sabotage, and to attack us from within when Holman launches his attack. The five that are still here may have just been camouflage for that, may have been forced to be part of their group, but when they had the opportunity to let us know what was happening they didn't take it. By their own admission they did this and did it because they thought Holman was going to win. They chose a side, like it or not. We don't owe them anything. If anything, they owe us. So, for starters we need to abandon the idea that them staying here is a given.”
“There's no other choice,” Deborah Webb replied at once. “We can't send five women with small children out into that mess,” she waved her arm in the general direction of the door.
“So, when twenty more show up tomorrow, we take them in as well?” Clay asked her.
“You don't know that more will show up at all,” his mother fielded that one.
“And you don't know they won't,” Clay rebutted. “My point is there has to be a stopping point. Where do we draw the line? We had things figured pretty close on how many people we could support here, by which I primarily mean how many we could feed. Remember that we also need acreage for other crops besides food. We need crops for bio-diesel, we need cotton to make cloth and thread, we need silage for the cattle and hogs, for the horses and jacks. Some of the land has to be in hay so that we can feed the herd through the winter.”
“That leaves gardens. We all have them, already in the ground. Did you grow enough for extra people? If so, how many extra? For how long? None of them have anything other than the clothes they're wearing. How are you going to clothe them? What about shoes for those kids? For the women for that matter. When winter comes do you have coats enough for them all? Are any of you seeing what I'm getting at here?”
None of the women spoke as they digested what he had said.
“What are you suggesting then, Clayton?” Malitha George asked finally.
“Miss Malitha, I've been against all of this from the beginning,” Clay told her honestly. “I didn't want to bring them here to start with, mostly because I knew it would end up just like it did. With some if not all trying to start trouble, and in fact six of them did attack us. The rest would have if not caught by surprise.”
“And if we had done it your way all of those children would be back in the hands of those animals in town!” Angela fired back.
“And I'm sorry for that,” Clay nodded. “I truly am. I've seen the same thing in a dozen and more places around the world. I admit I never thought to see it here, but the lights going out have brought out the worst in mankind. I believe I told you something like that would happen,” he told her pointedly.
“Clayton, I do understand your point,” Deborah Webb told him. “Honestly I do. But you can't be suggesting we just. . .abandon those children.”
“I haven't been discussing the children,” Clay surprised them all. “Leon himself said they're staying if he had to go without to take care of them. We all feel the same way. What I'm talking about is keeping five grown women who allowed themselves to be used as camouflage for an attack on this farm. I realize that they were coerced,” he raised a hand to ward off the coming objections, “but as I pointed out earlier they had the perfect opportunity, under armed guard no less, to let us know what was happening. They made the conscious decision not to assuming Holman would win and wanting to cover themselves when he did.”
“Now knowing that, are you sure, and I me
an absolutely, no doubt about it, willing to trust them living next door to you and sure that you want people like that living on this farm. Living here among us where they can gather information, cause difficulty, bring harm to our people and even sabotage our efforts if they decide we're losing and want to make sure they stay in Hyatt Holman's good graces.”
That got their attention.
“Next door to us?” Malitha frowned. “They'd be staying here.”
“No, they won't,” Clay said flatly, leaving no room for misunderstanding. “There's no place here for them. I suppose we could build them a home somewhere, but we would have to talk to Mister George about that since he'd be in charge of the construction.”
“They can stay in the apartments above the clinic,” Angela pronounced as if ordering it to be done.
“No, they can't,” Clay responded at once. “They won't be given access to Building Two under any circumstance. Our communications are there, the clinic is there, our command structure works from there, there are just too many ways for someone to really hurt us inside that building. So, no, they won't be staying in Building Two in any form.”
“Building One has only one small bathroom and is crammed full of supplies. Building Three is our garage, workshop and also stores supplies on a loft type platform, and the only bathroom is a simple toilet, sink and cold water shower for clean up. And that doesn't take into consideration that we keep our special vehicles there to be out of sight. No way are they going in there under any circumstances.”
“So,” he kept punching while he had the advantage, “the only alternative short of you folks taking them in yourself is to build a new cabin for them in the square. It was designed for that eventuality anyway.”
“But. . .those were supposed to be places for our children to have cabins,” Deborah Webb spoke up almost immediately. “For when they started a family.”
“Those vitamins were meant for the kids in our family,” Clay nodded.