by Sweet, Dell
“Want to go that way, you can get right back in your truck,” Mike said. “This is our place. You came here. You came here with a weapon. You seem on edge. Some way or another, you disconnected the interior light in your truck so it wouldn’t come on when you open the door, like you didn’t want us to see you, or maybe the inside of the truck. Maybe both for all I know.”
Mike walked closer to the man as he spoke. His own rifle, he had grabbed one of the assault rifles, held in both hands. The index finger of one hand rested lightly against the trigger guard, caressing the cold steel of the trigger, feeling its curved shape as it slipped past the ridges of skin on the edge of his finger. It made the rifle feel alive to him. The other hand was wrapped tightly around the stock. “You don’t look stupid, but it must be that you are. Or you think we are. If you’ve been close by, you know there’s been trouble. One of ours was killed a few days back, and you want to talk like a smart ass to my woman.”
The man stayed silent for a moment. When Mike had finished talking, he had continued to walk until he was no more than five feet from the man, facing him, his eyes hard.
“I took the fuse out. Otherwise, every time I open that door at night, I’m a sitting duck. Maybe it looks another way to you,” he paused. “I didn’t know she was your woman. Not trying to make excuses. I’m not used to being talked down to by a woman, I guess.”
Mike saw Candace lean back into the shadows once more, her hands fall to her sides, the guns within easy reach. It was clear how the man's words had made her feel. His reaction was not much different. Ronnie stepped forward and rested one hand on Patty’s arm. She had taken a step forward.
The man cleared his throat, oblivious to the drama playing out around him. “I came to ask your plans. What’s next? There’s six of us, none in the truck, all close by. I’d be stupid to come here without them close by.”
No matter how Mike looked at the situation, he didn't like it. He was uncomfortable with it, the man, his motivations… whatever they might be. He didn’t want to let the man inside to see how the cave was set up. If he wanted to join us, he told himself, he would’ve already asked us. And we wouldn’t have him anyway. No, this is something else, he told himself.
“We can talk here. There are children inside,” Mike said.
“You’re not inviting me inside?”
“No,” Candace said from the shadows.
“That so?” The man asked.
No one answered.
“We knew you had trouble,” The man said at last. “We’ve had some trouble ourselves. You came out alright.”
“And?” Mike asked.
“And, I’m just making conversation,” the man answered. He sighed. “Okay, we’re trying to get ourselves in shape for next winter. You got this big cave. It’s easy for you. We’re in an old abandoned factory up on… Well, forget where. It don’t matter. What matters is we’re trying to look ahead. We don’t want trouble. We got gas to trade. Fuel oil, good for heaters. We can find other things too.”
“There’s gas free for the taking everywhere,” Bob said. “Same as the other stuff you mentioned.”
“Not really,” the man replied. “At least not out State Street there isn’t.”
“Plenty of gas stations out there,” Bob disagreed.
“Didn’t say they weren’t there. They’re ours though.” The man said.
“Really?” Bob said.
“Really,” The man replied.
“And?” Mike asked.
“Well, you got vehicles, you’ll need gas.”
“Uh huh, and what’s it you’re looking for in trade?” Mike asked.
“Listen,” The man said. “I see your setup here. It looks good. I see this is your show. I’m not trying to step in either. I run my own show too… really.”
“What do you want?” Mike asked, losing patience with the man.
“Women… I need a few women. We talked to Sin about that woman that was with him and he was saying...”
Mike cut him off with a wave of his hands, but Tom spoke over him. “What?” Mike asked.
“You knew that Sin guy?” Tom asked.
Candace stepped out of the shadows. Patty moved away from Ronnie. Both of them walked to within a few feet of the man and stared him down.
The man nodded at Tom’s question. Tom also moved closer to the man.
Tom swore lightly, and his rifle started to come up. Mike reached out and lightly rested one hand on the barrel. Annie spoke from the darkness. No one had known she had come out.
“Sin planned to trade me to him. I remember him,” She sounded on the verge of tears. Nell rushed from where she had been standing over to where Annie now stepped from the shadows.
Mike watched Candace’s hand come up and then drop onto the butt of the Forty Five closest to him.
“So, you think we’d trade that little girl for some... what, gasoline?” Mike asked. He seemed to be the only one who could still speak. Everyone else had fallen into a hard silence.
Candace released a deep breath, turned and went to Annie and Nell. She squatted in front of Annie and looked into her eyes, freezing everything and everyone else out.
“Honey,” She said softly, much more softly than she felt. “That man is not going to touch you. Not going to, you see?” She waited until Annie nodded through the tears that had begun to spill over the bottoms of her lids and course down her cheeks. “Oh, Baby, don’t cry,” Candace said. She reached out and pulled Annie into her arms. She held her as she sobbed against her breast. “I promise, Annie. I promise,” she pulled away and looked in her eyes. “Okay?”
Annie nodded. Candace raised her eyes to Nell. “Nelly, take her inside, would you?” She reached forward, kissed Annie, hugged her once more and then waited until Nell took her inside, past the hanging mass of tarps and blankets.
Tim stood glaring at the stranger from the side of the cliff face where he had been standing next to Annie.
“You good, Tim?” Ronnie asked now.
“I can’t believe that guy came here to hurt Annie. I hate him,” Tim said.
“Now wait a minute,” The man said. “I didn’t come here to hurt anyone at all.”
“No. Just come to buy a woman, a little girl, like you would a dog,” Candace said. She was walking slowly back toward the man as she spoke.
“It’s a different world, Miss,” The man said. He looked at Mike. “I thought that some of you folks saw the way it is.”
“You’re in this with Death?” Mike asked.
“I never said that. I see him… I’ve seen him. I…” He began to stutter.
“Lately?” Tom asked.
“Well,” The man said.
“Since the murder?” Patty asked. Fury in her voice.
“Well… Yeah, maybe,” The man finally answered.
“Get out,” Candace said. She had walked to within a few inches of the man. Her eyes were unblinking. Her left hand was closed around the butt of one Forty five. Her voice sounded low, controlled, but Mike could feel the emotion on the air like electricity before a thunderstorm.
Before the man could speak again the gun was out of her holster and in her hand. “Get out.”
“Listen, I…” The man started.
“It’s loaded, the safety’s off, get the fuck out,” Candace said softly.
The man hesitated for a second. Candace began to raise the gun. He turned and began to walk quickly back towards his truck. “Wouldn’t shoot me in the back, would you?” He asked in a high, crazy voice.
“I don’t know,” Candace said. “And leave the truck where it is. Walk out.”
“That’s my truck, Bitch!” The man stopped and began to turn.
“Not anymore,” Candace said. She sighted with the pistol. The man turned and walked past the truck, disappearing in to the storm.
Candace shook with anger. Mike pulled her into his arms. There were tears in her eyes. He held her as she shook. He caught Ronnie’s eye and nodded towards the truck
. Ronnie nodded and he and Patty walked off towards the truck. Bob and Tom walked along beside them.
A few minutes later, the trucks lights came on, the engine started and the truck rumbled the short distance down the road to where Mike still stood holding Candace. Candace pulled away as the truck pulled up. Ronnie jumped down from the cab; Patty came around and stood next to Candace.
Ronnie and Bob held out two of the carbines with the clips like the ones they had taken from Sin and Death.
“Could have been someone else in that truck,” Ronnie said. “Or else why would they need two of these?”
Bob nodded. “Could have done a quick fade.”
“I guess we better keep a hard watch tonight,” Mike said. “No telling what they might do.” He bent and whispered in Candace’s ear, “Go inside?”
She nodded “I’ll be back in a little while,” Mike said. The three men nodded.
Candace ~ March 21st
A long, bad day. I almost lost it today. Maybe I did a little. There are men here trading women, children! They think they own them, really; that’s what it comes down to. It made me understand stories my father’s granny used to tell me about the slave days, and it made me feel every day of my life where someone has hated me because of the color of my skin or the shape of my eyes, or because I’m a woman. And this man wants the world to be that way. Jesus, I was so disgusted. And he was with the others, the ones who had Annie and the two little ones. God only knows what that girl has been through, but she refuses to talk about it. I know that too. I’ve been there too. Fear? Shame? Both?
I am so fucking mad about it. I wanted to kill that man. I wanted to do it. And at one point I think he was going to say something else that would have pushed me over the edge, then changed his mind. Lucky. Smart for him. I was right on the edge at that point. I wanted to kill him because I know what would’ve happened to Annie, what may have already happened to Annie. And I was mad, mad after five years because of what happened to me.
Mike held me. I couldn’t tell him. I will though, or maybe I’ll let him read this. He’s smart though. He probably knows, or has a good idea. I pray to God I never see that man again.
March 22nd
Mike awoke with Candace curled into him. He lay quietly for a few minutes listening to the silence in the cave, holding her loosely, listening to her quiet, slow breathing. He closed his arms around her and pulled her closer to him, stroking her hair lightly, feeling the warm press of her body against his own. She mumbled in her sleep, pressed her face more deeply into his chest and quieted back into sleep once more. Mike lay still, content to hold her, feel her body against his own. He was in no hurry to get up and get the day started. It could get started on its own, he told himself.
He glanced at the hanging collection of tarps and blankets. No light seeped around the edges, so it was not sunrise yet. There was no rush.
He had only spent a few short minutes with her the night before when they had come in. She had spent most of that time talking to Annie. He had finally left the two of them alone. It seemed to be what Annie needed. He had gone back outside where Tom, Ronnie, Bob and Patty were keeping watch.
“She okay?” Patty asked. Mike had told her she seemed to be and that she was talking to Annie right then. It was clear to Mike that Patty wished she were inside talking to Candace and Annie, so Mike had told her to go, that he’d be happy to stand watch for a while.
Awhile turned into a four hour shift with Ronnie, Tom and Tim. Bob had gone back in shortly after Mike had come out. They had talked on and off through the hours, but most of the time they spent looking around themselves at the darkness, even watching the cliffs above them that led up to a large, paved parking area at the back of the public square.
Twice in the distance they had heard a motor running. But it had faded in and out so quickly that they couldn’t place the direction it had come from. Ronnie thought it had come from someplace out State Street. Tim was sure it came from Washington Street which ran out of the opposite side of the square from where they were. Once they had heard voices raised in anger, or distress, it was hard to tell. But nothing came near them during the night.
He had finished the four hour shift, and when he had come back in, Candace had been asleep. She had awakened briefly when he had crawled in beside her, told him she loved him and then fallen back asleep with her head resting against the rise of his chest just as she was now. He had lain awake then for a long time, just holding her, stroking her hair, unwilling to fall asleep. Now he was unwilling to get up and start the day. It was the same thing. The same feeling of the night before, an overwhelming need to hold her, to let the day go wherever it might go on its own.
As he lay holding her, he realized the cave wasn’t silent after all. It was quiet though. Small noises from the other people as they slept: the rustle of blankets, soft breathing, the quiet sounds of someone getting up and moving around, softer sounds, sounds he couldn’t quite identify. They were comforting sounds. He was completely content to stay right where he was and listen to them.
There was a little light from the fire, really only small curls of flame casting just enough light to make out the contours of the walls and the other sleepers.
Sometimes, like this, he could feel the weight of responsibility on his shoulders like some impossibly heavy load, something he could not ever hope to bear, and he felt like an imposter. He was no leader. He had no idea why anyone would want to make him one or listen to anything he had to say. But they did. And not only did they listen, they were prepared to follow too. And he had no more idea than anyone else where they should go, what the future held. None at all.
No idea if there would be other people, a place to live, food, more crazies like they had run into here. He felt as if he knew absolutely nothing at all, yet here he was responsible for fourteen people. Fourteen people! The number alone made him feel panic, and what if what the others thought was true? What if they did pick up others along the way? What then? Could he be responsible for fifteen? Twenty? Thirty? Where would it end? And what would they think if they knew he was not as calm, cool and collected as everyone else thought he was?
Candace moved, one hand tracing along his side. Her body pressing more firmly against him. He felt her lips against his ear as she whispered to him.
“Make love to me.”
Tom and Bob had both made jokes about learning to make love in near silence. He pushed the thoughts out of his head, lowered his mouth on Candace’s own and pulled her closer to him. Candace pulled him over on to her, and he quit worrying and lost himself in the moment, when he awakened again it was much later. Candace was gone, the smell of coffee was on the air and hunger was gnawing at his belly. A dull gray light was seeping around the edges of the tarps and blankets that hung over the entry way.
He lay for a few minutes thinking about how much he loved Candace, wondering how funny it was that he had lost so much yet gained so much, something he had never had and had been in no hurry to go out and find. He wondered how he had ever managed to live his life without her in it. He wondered over how deep his love was in such a short period. It seemed like it was just yesterday when he had first met her. He had remembered how he had never really found tattoos attractive on a woman, but she had this tribal thing that started on her left hand, wrapped around that wrist and then sleeved her arm, disappearing under her shirt sleeve. It was one of the first things he had noticed, and when she had been reaching for something he had seen another piece of the same work that came down across her flat stomach and slipped below the waist band of her jeans. While he had been wondering if it was a second piece or part of the same piece, she had caught him looking. Her eyes had settled on his own and the next thing he knew he was thinking about her in an entirely different way. Thinking about making love to her, about being with her. Thinking that could never happen, Tom was obviously interested. And then she had walked over and changed his entire life.
He couldn’t be without her now. The m
an he was becoming had a lot to do with her, probably would have never existed without her, and he had never even known she existed, never even known that love could be like that. The entire world was destroyed, but he had found himself. And she loved him too. He could feel it, see it. It was every bit as strong as what he felt for her. Not clingy, just real. Total.
“Hey,” Candace said. His eyes had slipped closed; he opened them to see her standing over him, a cup of coffee in one hand.
“Coffee,” He said.
“Good,” she said. “It’s alive. Were you going to sleep the day away?” She handed him the coffee carefully as he sat up.
“Something wore me out,” He grinned. “You okay?”
“More than okay,” She answered. She leaned over and kissed him.
~
The snow had finally stopped falling sometime after Mike had come off shift. A blanket of wet, slushy snow covered the ground outside the cave. Mike examined the truck that had been left from the night before. It was a new sport utility, but someone had put more than a little work into it: a lift kit, larger tires, brush guards. It had much more ground clearance than any of their trucks.
“This looks as though it could go anywhere,” Mike said.
Bob and Tom were going over it.
“It could, nearly. And whoever did it did a good job. They must have a garage somewhere with a pit. And they had to have done it all with standard stuff too, no air tools,” Bob said. He looked and sounded impressed.
“Changing suspension parts without air tools?” Mike asked.
“Not hard,” Bob said. “Also, it’s a new vehicle. The nuts and bolts aren’t rusted on yet. A couple of years up here and they would be a lot harder to turn. But, now? No big deal. That’s what they make breaker bars and three quarter inch socket sets for,” he finished.
“You know,” Tom said, “If we did this to a couple of our trucks, we wouldn’t have to worry about leaving them if we got stuck, or drove a rock through an oil pan. Those things wouldn’t happen.”
“We could drive around almost anything,” Bob added.
Mike nodded. “Yeah, but how long does something like this take to do?”