by Kathy Miner
A rustle in the brush along the streambank startled him, and a moment later, Rosemary trotted to his side, tongue lolling in the moonlight. Ed called out a few seconds later. “Jack? Everything all right?”
“Fine.” Oh, Lord, his voice had cracked. He really was revisiting his adolescence. He cleared his throat. “I’m fine. Just needed to, you know.” He decided to leave it at that.
Ed stepped into view, placing his feet carefully in the near-dark. “We’re circling the wagons for the night. Owen and Piper have already turned in.” He shook his head, and Jack could hear his grin even if he couldn’t see it. “Sure enjoyed your music. You have a real gift.”
“Thank you,” Jack said tightly. “I guess I’ll head back, then. We’ll probably want to get an early start tomorrow, get across the river with our wits about us.” Though he seriously doubted he’d ever collect all his wits, ever again, not the way they were scattered now. “You, ah, said the others had already gone to bed?”
“Yep. You go on ahead. I’ve got to see the same man about that horse. I’ll be right behind you.”
Jack left Ed and Rosemary and headed back to camp, forcing his feet to move briskly in spite of his reluctance. What if Ed had been wrong? What if she was still up? He stopped for a moment and closed his eyes. And if she wasn’t, how was he going to face her in the morning? It took a considerable amount of willpower to get his feet moving again.
Owen and Piper had indeed gone to bed, and Jack quickly followed suit, settling into his tent and releasing a pent up breath as slowly and quietly as he could. He lay there, tense from head to toe, and tried to think it through.
Maybe she hadn’t experienced what he had. Ed hadn’t noticed anything – either that, or he was the greatest actor of all time. Jack hadn’t made eye contact with Owen, but even if he had sensed Jack’s emotions, he wouldn’t talk out of turn. Jack smiled grimly in the dark. No, if there was one thing he could say about Owen, it was that he didn’t run on at the mouth. Maybe it had just been him.
He thought back, remembering the way his voice had wrapped around Piper’s like a lover, the sudden lock of energy between them, the way her eyes had glowed, green as grass in the firelight, the way her cheeks had flushed soft and rosy and her lips had seemed to caress each word she sang, looking so damn soft and kissable…
Jack barely stifled another groan. No. It hadn’t been just him.
Through the long night, he dozed fitfully, imagining and dismissing a dozen different things he could say to her. He heard Owen take over the watch from Ed, then Piper take it over from Owen. When her low voice called his name two hours later, it was a relief. He unzipped from his tent and rose to face her, but before he could speak, she did.
“I don’t want to talk about it,” she said in a rush. “I meant what I said before, about not, you know, hooking up. With anyone.” She set her jaw belligerently. “I know I’m not who you want. I’m not Layla. Let’s just chalk it up to a bizarre alignment of the planets and move on.”
He was speechless. He waited for words to rise up, but nothing came. Finally, he just nodded. She nodded as well, and said, “Good. Everything’s been quiet. Goodnight.”
Well, then. In under two minutes, it was over. Jack slid into his boots and retrieved his shotgun, then went to walk around the camp. As Piper had reported, the night was quiet, and he was left with all kinds of time to go back over what she’d said, brief though it had been.
He wasn’t inexperienced. He’d dated his share of women and had been sexually involved with a few of them. But the whole “hooking up” phenomenon had come after his high school and college years, and it just served to highlight the difference in their ages. He felt suddenly old, washed up and humiliated. Why would a beautiful young woman even look twice at a pastor who was as close in age to her parents as he was to her?
Nor was he a stranger to sexual longing. He’d been lathered up over a woman before, had felt burned up by desire. After his ordination, he had still dated occasionally, though he had not sought to have sex with any of those women. His personal beliefs might accept sex before marriage, but the teachings of the church were clear, and he had an example to set for the kids in his ministry.
Then Layla had happened.
He paused in his circuit where the cottonwoods gave way to prairie, and looked up at the blaze of stars. “You’re laughing at me,” he said to her. He could feel her presence all around him, a tingle on his skin, a barely-there scent that stirred memories, some good, some bad. “Don’t even try to deny it.”
As if in agreement, a sudden gust of wind stirred grit and pollen into his face, and he sneezed. He swiped at his nose, then sighed. “I miss you,” he said softly. “I think I always will. But what I felt for you was…dark. You were forbidden. What I felt for you was wrong. Not wrong because of you, but wrong because of what was in my heart.”
Another swirl of wind, gentler this time, and he felt her sorrow as if she were standing right beside him, shields down, wide-open. His throat was tight. “I’m sorry for that. For how I treated you. You deserved so much better, and I’m glad you found it. But I’ll bet you already know all that, don’t you?” He was quiet for a few moments. “What I feel for Piper is different. Not easier, but different. I like her, so much. She’s my friend. Until tonight, that was all.”
He would have sworn, then, that he heard her laugh, the sound blending with the distant chuckle of the stream. It made him smile, if crookedly. “Yeah, yuck it up. Criminy, I’ve never felt anything like that. I thought my skin was going to catch on fire. And now we get to pretend it never happened. How well is that going to work?”
Frustration set him in motion again. He prowled several circuits around the camp before he felt a measure of calm, returning to the same spot he’d stood before and picking up the conversation where he’d left off. “She’s not what I had in mind, Layla, not at all.” He laughed wryly. “But then, neither were you. She’s wounded, but she is as tough as they come. I can’t think of anyone I’d rather have at my back or by my side, the way the world is now. Well, okay, I’d take Martin, too, but he’s nowhere near as pretty as she is.” He sighed. “I guess I forgot for a while that it’s in God’s hands. Everything is.”
Dawn was an hour away, but a meadowlark burst into song just a few yards away, the sound lifting from an old fence line that was barely visible in the moonlight. Jack’s eyes stung with tears. He could feel her fading. “Thank you,” he said softly. “What a beautiful gift. Rest well, Layla.”
Her presence dissipated on a soft, westerly breeze. He stood for a moment, until she’d faded completely, then returned to camp. Though it wasn’t yet 5:00 am, Owen was already up, moving quietly around the fire, prepping for breakfast and sipping a mug of tea. He looked up at Jack, but didn’t quite meet his eyes. “Couldn’t sleep. Figured I’d get a jump on it, make some fresh biscuits.”
“Piper will be happy. She loves her mom’s biscuits. No pressure, though.” Jack turned his back to the fire, and scanned the night around them, relieved that he could mention her name naturally. For the moment, anyway, he felt peaceful all the way to his bones. “Did you have bad dreams? It wouldn’t be a surprise, given what we saw yesterday.”
“No.” Owen glanced up at him again. A few days ago, he would have left it at that. It pleased Jack that he chose to explain. “Good dreams. They’re worse than the bad ones. For a few seconds after I wake up, I think she’s still alive. Then I remember.”
So Layla had visited Owen as well. How that would have bothered him, once upon a time. He gazed at the other man with genuine compassion, trying to figure out how to offer comfort. They may have reached a place of ease between them, but he doubted Owen would appreciate hearing Layla had stopped in to see him, too. “Verity says our loved ones can visit in dreams, that it’s one way they let us know they aren’t really gone, they’re just with us in another form. I don’t know if that helps, or hurts.”
Owen looked to the side. “A little of b
oth, I guess.” He smiled a sad but very male smile, one Jack recognized from a long, long time ago. “I liked the form she was in.” He stood up abruptly, grabbing their water bottles and a flashlight and heading towards the stream. “I’ll fill these up and get them purified. I know Piper’s anxious about getting across the Missouri, and the sooner we can get that behind us, the better.”
Not long after Owen returned from the stream, Ed was up, and Piper was right behind him. She murmured a good morning to both Ed and Owen and nodded at Jack, meeting his eyes with a determined lift of her chin. He nodded back and smiled, though he kept it brief. Whatever was between them would have to wait.
Jack and Owen had already broken down their tents and loaded their bikes. Owen served breakfast, and they ate in almost total silence, all of them radiating tension in their own way. Owen’s face was a stoic mask; Ed muttered constantly to Rosemary under his breath and jiggled his legs; and Piper was in full, magnificent Valkyrie mode, her face fierce with battle-readiness. Jack and Owen cleaned up while Ed and Piper broke down their tents. They were loaded up and on the road before the sun had completely cleared the horizon.
They were planning to make the crossing in Decatur, Nebraska, a tiny town roughly halfway between Omaha and Sioux City. If that bridge wasn’t viable, they would head south to Blair, a larger town not far north of Omaha. After that, their choices got slim. Either they would have to chance the larger city bridges, or find a way to portage.
Long before they entered the town proper on Highway 51, they were sure there were people living there. Smoke rose here and there in the early morning light, and there was a subtle sense of activity about the little village. They paused where Highway 51 intersected with 4th Avenue to check in with each other. Jack looked at Piper.
“Bond-lines?”
“Not yet. I don’t think anyone is in our immediate vicinity. But I feel people.”
“I do, too.” He looked at Ed and Owen. “Any input?”
Ed inclined his head down at Rosemary. The dog’s scruffy ears were at maximum perk, and she was quivering. “She’s nervous as a cat in a room full of rocking chairs, but she’s not growling.” He glanced at Piper. “Wish your mom was here. Sure would be nice to know what Rosemary’s sensing.”
Piper’s face tightened; Jack would bet she was doing her best not to think of her mother right now. Swinging her rifle from her shoulder and placing it across her lap, she looked around, then lifted her chin to the east. “River’s that way. Stands to reason the bridge is, too.”
They wound their way through quiet residential streets. When they had gone several blocks, curtains started to flicker in windows, and Jack smelled, of all things, bacon. Rich, smoky, bacon. Piper, who was still in the lead, turned to look at him. “They know we’re here now.” Her eyes flickered to the other men. “Can you all smell that?”
Jack nodded, swallowing a mouth full of saliva. He glanced at Rosemary, who was whining softly now, two delicate strands of drool dripping from the sides of her muzzle. “If it’s a trap, it’s a darn good one.”
They started to catch glimpses of the wide, brown river through the trees, and to the north, Jack spotted the white crisscross pattern of a large bridge. He pulled up beside Piper and pointed. “There – see it? Do you think they’re just going to let us cross?”
She shrugged, but when they rounded a bend in the road and spotted the entrance to the bridge, he got his answer. Two people, both holding shotguns, were standing in front of the bridge, silhouetted against the morning sky. A man and a woman, Jack saw as they crept closer, both of them breathing heavily, as if they’d run to beat the travelers here. When they were about 20 feet away, the man held up his hand.
“That’s far enough, for now.” He paused to wipe his hand quickly on the leg of his jeans, then returned it to the stock of his shotgun. Beside him, the woman was discreetly wiping her mouth on her shoulder. The scent of bacon was thick as smoke. The man spoke again. “There’s a toll to cross the bridge. We don’t take money, but we’ll take food, medicine, or gold jewelry. If you don’t have anything you can spare, you can work the toll off in advance, but it’ll be hard work. And if none of that’s acceptable,” his hands tightened on the shotgun, and his jaw jutted forward, “There are other bridges south of here, in Blair or Omaha, or north in Sioux City.”
Jack looked at Piper. She spoke low, and out of the corner of her mouth. “Strong bond-lines stretching behind us, into the village. Not many. Maybe a dozen.” Jack nodded, then raised his eyebrows and tilted his head at the pair, asking what she thought without voicing the words. She caught on immediately, and shrugged. “Seems fair, as long as they don’t try to take us for everything we’ve got.”
Jack turned back to the man, who was actually more of a boy, no more than 19 or 20. The girl looked younger yet, and there was a similar cast to their features. Siblings, maybe, related, surely. “We’ll agree to trading our way across, if the rates are reasonable,” he said. “Do you have any information about what’s on the other side? What we’ll be headed into?”
The pair exchanged glances. The girl nodded, and the boy’s shoulders relaxed. He turned back to Jack, visibly more at ease. “Michaela says you’re alright. My name’s Christopher. We’ll tell you what we know at no extra charge. We don’t get many travelers through here, so we’d like to know where you’ve come from and what you’ve seen.” His face reddened slightly. “I’m sorry we need to charge you for the bridge and all, but we need to survive. We have people depending on us.”
Jack glanced at his companions and got nods all around. They shut their bikes down, but stayed on them, just in case. Owen backed his bike up and to the side so he could watch behind them. Ed let Rosemary down but kept her close with a low command. Piper scooted up beside Jack on her bike before she shut hers down and kept her rifle across her lap.
Jack performed the introductions and gave them the information Christopher had requested. Both of them nodded as Jack spoke, absorbing his words like water on parched ground. When he’d finished outlining where they’d been and what they’d seen, Michaela spoke.
“Have you heard from anyone from Phoenix? We have friends who were going to college there, and I just hoped…” She trailed off with a sad shrug.
“No, we haven’t. I’m sorry.” He paused a beat. “Now – two things: What can we expect ahead? And for pity’s sake, is that bacon we’re smelling?”
Michaela and Christopher both grinned, and Christopher spoke. “Only thing we’ve got an abundance of. A semi-truck carrying cold cuts and such stopped here just as the plague came through – the driver was already sick – and we ran generators to keep it all cold. Some of it we just couldn’t eat in time, but the bacon is still good. We could work out a trade there, too.”
He wiggled his eyebrows in what he probably thought was a shrewd and worldly manner, and Jack’s heart broke at his youth, at the air of innocence he had somehow managed to hang onto. He reminded Jack of the kids they’d left behind in Woodland Park, and he missed their bright energy with a suddenness and intensity that surprised him. James, and Chloe, and little Rainbow Dash.
“A trade would be great.” His voice was husky when he replied, and he felt Piper look at him curiously. He cleared his throat. “Now, Piper, if you’ll get out your map and your notes, we’ll find out what these young people know.”
Christopher and Michaela both scooted around to flank Piper when she unfolded her map. Christopher traced a slightly grubby finger across the bridge and along Highway 175 where it ran into Iowa. “You can’t see it from here, but around this curve, the road is impassable. Cars stacked up clear into Onawa, which is about seven miles past the bridge.” He traced another line. “Same thing on I29. I have no idea where people were trying to go, but it seems like the whole world died in their cars.” He swallowed hard and squinted a little. “We’ve been back and forth with Onawa quite a bit. Lots of folks from here worked there before the plague, and they’re trying to clear Highwa
y 175. They’re also working their way north and south on I29, salvaging stuff from the vehicles. People packed up their valuables, and what food and water they had left, and there it sits.” He shrugged, trying to be casual, but Jack could feel the horror the young man felt, even through his shields. “They’re not using it anymore.”
Piper touched the tiny dot on the map. “So the people in Onawa are friendly?” She looked up at Christopher and raised an eyebrow. “They won’t charge us a toll to go through?”
Christopher’s face reddened again. “No, I, ah…well…I don’t think…”
Michaela rolled her eyes. “What my idiot cousin is trying to say is it’s all good. Tell them we let you across, and it’ll be fine.”
Jack nudged Piper with his elbow. “Play nice,” he murmured. He checked over his shoulder. Ed was walking a slow circle around the area they were in, letting Rosemary sniff, but keeping her at his heel. Owen was still scanning the town behind them, but his huge hand was splayed on his chest, and when Jack reached out for what the other man was feeling, he got an almost overwhelming wave of sorrow. What was that all about? With an effort, he returned his attention to Piper’s map.
Michaela reached out to run her considerably cleaner finger in an arc representing a 50 mile radius around Decatur. “We’ve seen people from nearby towns, but only a handful from farther away. A man from Des Moines came through this spring. He was there on business and got stranded, and he was going to look for his family in Oregon. He said conditions there were pretty bad. And only about a month ago, a group came through from Madison, Wisconsin. They were headed for Montana – said they were going to hide out in the mountains like old-time trappers and live off the land.” She glanced at Christopher and shuddered. “They bothered me. It was four men and two women, and the whole thing just felt…off.”