The break in his desperate musing seemed to give him time for his brain and emotions to settle down a little bit. He felt that moving on tomorrow was the right thing to do. Somehow it had been right to leave Kim behind. Not so much because she was weak or in pain, but because she had not had the spirit to try. He started to pray again, asking the Holy Spirit to guide him and help him and his people through this. There was no immediate answer. Just more of a feeling that this was right. Yet it seemed so cruel.
~ ~ ~
The morning seemed so cold. Kim listened for anything, any slight sound, to indicate that Billy or Moe were near. She heard nothing. She scooted out of her hay nest and brushed strands from her hair and clothes. Was she so cold because she was alone? She thought this really must be the case. She limped slowly out of the barn.
The morning was lovely, with a ground fog and a pale morning sun trying to burn through it. Trees in various colors, getting ready for their last show of the year, surrounded her. It was so perfect. I wish I could sit here on the porch of this farm house and drink some hot chocolate and just rock away as the fog burns off. She was touched at the delicate balance and how every color of the leaves and every swirl of the fog seemed to be connected. She shook her head and decided she better get going.
Kim wasn’t good at figuring out directions, so she had to concentrate on figuring out where the sun was and how to get oriented so she could head north again. Just as she picked her direction and lifted her head, a ray of sunlight broke through the fog and bounced off something shiny. She looked closer. A bike! She could sit and rest her foot while pedaling north to catch up with Father Polus. It felt like the world had just given her a gift.
She wobbled along for a few pedals, rocked to the side a few times and was forced to catch herself by planting a foot on the ground. It hurt like hell when she had to do that on her sore foot. For once she took the pain and just powered through it and kept on with her task. It wasn’t long before she got her balance fine-tuned and was on her way more than twice as fast as she could have limped along. The going wasn’t ideal, there were branches, debris and junk of all kinds in her way; forcing her to zig and zag as she went along. It prevented her from really making any speed.
The leg motion without any impact on her sore foot was like heaven. The wind and sun on her face, the rolling countryside; it was all what would have made up a perfect family vacation. Kim started to daydream about a family. She had always wanted to have children, but she always seemed to pick guys that turned into flakes or cheaters. No one who a kid would have been proud to have as a father. Being honest with herself, she figured she was really not too much good at anything. As far a job goes, that is. But she was sure she could be a loving mom. Now what chance in hell did she have? First of all, more than half the men had just been wiped off the face of the earth. Second of all, she had just carried on and made a fool of herself in front of the only men she knew. Third of all, and totally unrelated but it ticked off like a list in her mind, she had also made a fool of herself by flirting with a priest. Sheesh, people must think I’m a real winner.
~ ~ ~
Glenn was moving again, slowly, but forward. His immediate attention to his ankle had kept the swelling and the pain down. They took rests often and the second they stopped, he elevated his leg and someone soaked a towel in cool water then wrapped his ankle. No one resented doing extra work gathering food or wood or setting up or breaking down camp. They knew Glenn would be back to normal soon and he was a hard worker and good member of their group.
Steve was still troubled about valuing humans differently. He was running the implications of this through his mind and twisting and turning the possibilities and outcomes. By the end of the day, no one had noticed the entire group was no longer stopping for rests and the pace was back to their normal fast walk. Not until they decided it was nearly time to stop for the night, time to look around for a safe spot to camp for the night.
“Glenn! You’re not limping!”
“I didn’t even realize.” Glenn paused and put all his weight on his ‘bad’ ankle. “Nothing.” Then he hopped on it. “Wow. Father, there is no pain at all, it is like I never twisted it.”
“That’s strange. When I did personal training with people, sprains like that usually take 4 to 6 weeks to heal. This must be a sign, a small miracle to keep us going toward safety.”
Father Polus led them all in a prayer of thanks before they ate that night.
~ ~ ~
Kim’s evening was spent in a small cottage. The owners must have been out when the dirty bombs hit. It was all tidy, clean and empty. She pulled the curtains, brought her bike inside and locked the doors then made sure all the windows were locked. She had a restful and very comfortable night in a queen sized bed.
Cautiously she peeked out the windows the next morning. No sign of anyone following her. She looked all over to see if anyone were hiding. Not that she could tell. She scrounged some oatmeal from the cabinets and had a dry but sweet breakfast. Then she set out on the bike.
She started to cry as she moved along. Kim was not being honest with herself and she realized all she wanted out of life was a tidy home and a peaceful sleep like she had just had. She would love to share it with children, but she had no talent or work skill and didn’t really want any. She was not interested in philosophy or action or anything that the others had been talking about. She just wanted to make a pretty house, dress nice and maybe host parties at the house for a mystery husband and kids. It was all so shallow. But this was her heart. This was all she cared about or wanted.
Crying in despair she was not paying attention to her surroundings. Lucky for her it was her own party she was closing in on. They had learned quickly and with the Father’s guidance to switch off walking in the middle of the group, where they could enjoy the walk and talk quietly to each other, and being at the front or rear of the group where Father Polus had instructed them to scan around, watch for movement and keep their ears, eyes and even noses open for anything that was unusual. It had served them well in hearing people stomping around, or riding around on Harleys and they had, so far, had time to fade into the trees, shrubs or duck behind buildings if they were in a town.
So it was the person on rear guard who caught sight of metal shining from the sun and unusual movement. He gave a low whistle which all recognized as trouble and like a well-trained military unit – no one waiting or ask anything –all of them just faded off to the left side of the road and the whole group seemed to melt into their surroundings.
They stayed still and quiet as the figure approached. They were able to her Kim’s sobbing as she drew near them, then Father Polus stood up.
“Kim!”
“Ag…” a strangled sound flew from Kim’s mouth as she crashed to the ground. It was half a gasp, and half the last of her sobs.
“Father Polus!” Her faced broke out into a smile as she looked up at her priest from her undignified position on the ground.
This was the nicest he remembered ever seeing her, as the smile was an honest smile, not one put on in order to fill a role or convince someone to do something for her. Her hair was a mess, her clothes were dirty, she even had dirt streaked on her face. Yet she finally looked pleasant. He answered her real smile with his own grin.
“Thank God you’re alive. I have been so worried about you. I was sure we had left you to die. How did you make it back to us? Can you forgive me for not knowing what else to do?”
“Father, I…well, I’ve had a terrible time, but…” she shook her head. Taking a deep breath she continued, “I deserved that. Father, I realize that now. It took nearly dying to open my eyes. I…well, I don’t know what to say, just let’s keep on and I promise I will be better. You promise to let me know if I slip back into my old ways?”
“It’s a deal!”
Glenn had walked over. “What I want to know is: Why we haven’t thought about pedal bikes? I know when we first left – we had to duck and dive and
hide constantly. So they could never have worked and we must have just put them out of our mind.” He gestured toward Kim who had picked herself back up and was holding the bike beside her.
“That is genius. Simple and genius. We need to check all the houses we pass and gather up any working bikes. When we all have one then we can really get moving.”
Steve was chuckling, more than a few in the group had their hands on their hips with a chagrined look on their face. Others were nodding. Kim felt the instant reacceptance of the group, felt she belonged and had actually contributed. Wild.
It wasn’t easy though. Actually going into the houses was horrid. Most had dead people, either in bed or stretched out on their couches. Unknown as to why, but so true, it seemed the dead pets were the worst. Ones in cages or too small to break out of the houses, many beloved pets had died in what Steve was now thinking of as the bomb holocaust.
They began turning lose any living animal they came across. From gerbils to macaws, any animal lucky enough to have had a large supply of food and water was let out into the world. They would all say something of encouragement. They knew many of the animals would not make it through the winter, many had no way to survive in the wild world. Yet it seemed much crueler to leave them to starve to death in silence within cages that had once been their homes and now were prisons.
Two days of this horror ended with them all having bikes. They were discussing the morality of not still going into every house to set the animals free. Knowing most of them would die within days if left in the houses and within months if set free.
“I have prayed about this. We all love our pets, and animals were a gift from God. Yet I have received no answer. I think this is because there is no right or wrong choice in this. We really can’t save them all, no matter what we do. I sadly think we must move forward as quickly as we can. Winter is coming on and I don’t know if this lake is in the U.S. or in Canada, but I do know it is still north of us and we had better get moving.”
Chapter Eleven
Mick had been practicing on his quick reflexes. He had been drawing his pistol, but then realized he was not thinking grandly enough. He started to knock things over intentionally and grab them before they hit the ground, to toss things in the air and catch them. He thought that in just a few days he was getting noticeably quicker.
He mentioned it to Sue and Lena. Sue started to concentrate on her far vision. Trying to spot smaller birds from farther and farther away. Like Mick, she thought she was getting even better at her vision as she practiced.
“Well hell. I don’t really know if I have any enhanced ability.” Lena flashed her green eyes at Mick.
“You’re our super thinker!” Mick teased her.
“Oh, ha ha. And how do I practice that?”
“Well, my sweet Leeeena, I think you should just concentrate on connections or patterns. Is there a connection between our enhanced abilities and the visions/dreams? Who has them and when. Shall we tell other people? What if other people are practicing things like we just started to? Can we build a new country? You know, light things like that.”
That brought a full belly laugh from Lena. Her green eyes crinkled up in happiness as Sue joined her in a laughing fit.
“Ok then, I’ll get right on that.”
“Seriously, though; I know you are keeping a journal. I think you should keep up with that, keeping all the details there. And I really do think you should let your mind wander as we ride along on all those other things. You did have a connection to those people in Ferrisburg, saying the right things in the right tone. I’m sure we made solid friends of the people in that town.”
“Yeah, I did feel something, some kind of real connection to the energy of the whole collective room. That’s true. Ok, I’ll put down my new job as daydreamer.”
“Sounds good to me,” Mick mumbled as he kissed her neck.
“Me too,” finished Sue.
Doug wandered up. “So how long do you think before we get to Burlington?”
“We are really closing in now. I figure we will spend tonight in a normal camp – but by tomorrow we will be in Shelburne, which the signs and maps I’ve been reading show is really just a southern suburb of Burlington. So then we will be moving through a more urban area. We are going to have talk about that tonight, because there are more places for people to hide and I think it is going to be more dangerous for us.”
“Understood.” Doug turned back to the main group.
“Shit. I didn’t think about that, Mick. The last part of the way there might be the hardest.”
“Yep.”
That night Lena decided she wanted to think more about that reincarnation thing. The dreams were now pretty much the same of Burlington, the lake, the bonfire. So it was like a loop playing in their dreams. May as well try to concentrate on something new.
Once you decide that the visions and dreams are real and you can tap into them, reaching your goal in a dream seems easy now, thought Lena. Sure enough, after falling deeply asleep in Mick’s arms, she melded into the vision of herself back in the early 1900s.
Lena didn’t know exactly what the date was, but the world had a mix of horses and those first times Model-T type cars. The mix seemed just about even. Mick told her later those cars were first produced in 1905, so her vision must be taking place a good number of years after that.
This time she was again walking with a parasol, only now she was dressed in light green. She was headed into a room with a large wooden conference table. Around the table was a group of middle-aged men. They were talking and fell silent when they noticed her.
“Hello Gentlemen.”
Silence.
Miss Jolene smiled. “I see you all know why I am here. Since you are having a meeting about setting down the names for all the people who will be voting this November.”
Silence.
“I took a good look at your criteria. You list that each voter must be over the age of 21. Each voter must own land. And finally, each voter must be a current tax payer and not be in arrears. Since I meet all these requirements, I am formally requesting that you put my name on the voting rolls.” She ended with a sweet smile.
“You are a woman and you can’t vote. End of story. We told you last week. I hate to be rude to a woman, Miss Jolene, but you are trying my patience and I wish you would now leave. Leave any decision making up to your guardian. Mr. Etulio will vote in a way that will safeguard any concerns of yours.”
“Why, Mr. Cohen, I’m surprised at you! Mr. Etulio is no longer my guardian, he is now merely my accountant. I’ve turned 21 and now I do not require a legal guardian. I am a full citizen of our patriotic town, and I want to do my patriotic duty and vote.” She smiled sweetly again.
“This is outrageous and you are being downright nasty.”
“Dear Mr. Cohen; you are the mayor here. Well, at least until the next election.” One more big smile. “I do believe that our town law states that any changes in regulations must be posted for 30 days and then a public meeting must be held. That after that meeting, the complete new regulation must be posted for another 30 days, before a town-wide vote can be taken to pass or reject any such new regulation.” Now Jolene leaned forward on the table which she had been ever so slowly approaching. “Gentlemen, you do realize the elections are in 45 days. You have no time to change the regulations to add that only men over 21 may vote.”
They started to grumble, to scoot back chairs. The noise level in the room rose so that it could have been an auditorium full of restless students.
Jolene let her voice boom out, “If you do not add my name to the voters list, I shall have my lawyer sue the town and all of you personally!
“That, Gentlemen, is that. So make sure my name is on that list before you post it up in the town hall. Good day to you all.” She spun on her heel and walked slowly and with a straight back out of the room.
She hurried to an office a few doors down the street and busted inside and slammed
the door shut behind her. She crumpled against the wall laughing out loud.
“What in the world…” Matt got up from his desk and walked over to help her stand up straight.
She was hiccupping with fading laughs. When Matt’s brown eyes saw the tears of laughter running down her cheeks he couldn’t help but grin.
“Oh, Miss Jolene, you didn’t just go over to the mayor’s office. You are really going to do this?”
“Matt, you should have seen their faces. They were all pale. You would have thought I hung them upside down and slit their throats!”
“You have too big of an imagination! What a thing to say.” He was chastising her and jovial at the same time. He couldn’t help but enjoy her happy spirit and the way she treated all people with respect.
Rise From the Ashes: Lena's Story Page 8