Ichabod

by Mark Goodwin

  Steven snorted. “Kind of ironic, huh?”

  “Kind of proud.” Danny looked him in the eye.

  Steven knuckled his forehead. “Proud?”

  “Yeah, you’re too proud to forgive yourself. You asked her to forgive you at your first church message in the barn, in front of the entire group. I saw her. She was bawling. She completely forgave you.

  “I guarantee you that Dana never gives a second thought to being told she couldn’t come along. She remembers that you relented and finally said it was okay for her to come with us. She’s grateful. You, on the other hand, won’t forgive yourself. Despite the fact that Jesus, the King of the universe, has forgiven you, you won’t. It sounds like pride to me; like you have higher standards than God. You think that you’re more righteous than Christ, and that he was wrong for forgiving you. Or worse, you think the blood of Christ isn’t good enough to cover your sin of abandoning Dana, which you never did. Either way, I’d say you have some soul searching, especially if you intend on being the spiritual leader around here.”

  “Wow!” Steven’s face had a look of shock.

  “I’m not trying to beat you up. You were doing a pretty good job of that yourself. I just want you to look objectively at what you’re thinking, what you’re doing, and how it’s affecting the people around you, especially Dana.”

  Steven sighed. “Well, that was pretty offensive, but I needed to hear it. You’re right. I’ve got some soul searching to do.”

  The two of them dragged the tree to the side of the house and proceeded to chop and saw it into firewood. Next, they cut and processed two more small trees. Neither one said much.

  CHAPTER 11

  They which builded on the wall, and they that bare burdens, with those that laded, every one with one of his hands wrought in the work, and with the other hand held a weapon.

  Nehemiah 4:17

  Danny stumbled out of bed and put his jeans on. He was still not accustomed to the early mornings and tough manual labor. He nudged Alisa. “Time to wake up.”

  She covered her head with the pillow, and her muffled voice responded, “No! We were hauling boxes, feeding animals, and working in the garden all day yesterday. I’m beat. Can’t I sleep through breakfast?”

  Nana yelled from the bottom of the stairs. “Y’all come on. The biscuits is gettin’ cold.”

  “If you’re brave enough, sure, go ahead.” Danny looked his shirt over to consider if he could wear it one more day. It was dusty from hauling wood but not sweaty. He gave it a quick sniff test and put it on. Since there were no washing machines and the only detergent was what they’d stockpiled, the standard for dirty clothes had been lowered by several rungs. Socks and underwear were put on fresh every day, but shirts were expected to be worn two days, if possible. The goal for jeans and pants was to wear them until they were visually soiled. With the amount of farm work the group had been doing, that was typically three days or less.

  “Let’s do it all over again.” Alisa threw the covers off and put on the same pair of cargo pants she’d worn the day before but went straight to a clean tee-shirt.

  Danny winked at her. “You’re chicken to sleep through breakfast.”

  “Has anyone ever done it?”

  “Cami tried it once, when we were kids. Once.”

  “What happened?”

  “Crawl back in the bed and find out for yourself.”

  Alisa flung one of the pillows at him. “Quit messin’ with me, Danny Walker! It’s too early and I’m in no mood.”

  Danny winked, gave a mischievous grin, and blew her a kiss as he headed to the breakfast table. Danny took two steps at a time to get downstairs faster. Dana, Steven, Cami and Nick were already at the table.

  “Where’s Lisa?” Nana asked.

  Danny bit his tongue slightly to keep from laughing. “She said she’s going to sleep through breakfast and that we could eat without her.”

  Nana walked over to the foot of the stairs. “Now listen here, young lady, you best get down here at this table ‘fore I have to come up there and drag you down by the hair of your head! The sun has been up for an hour and . . .”

  Alisa came bounding down the stairs, “Coming, Nana!”

  Danny fought to contain his amusement as he looked to see the reaction of the others at the table. Steven, of course, was snickering. Dana looked like she was trying to figure out what was going on. Cami appeared to be having flashbacks, and Nick was grinning from ear to ear.

  “Oh.” Nana looked surprised to see Alisa so quickly. “Steven, you say grace.”

  Danny regained his composure as Steven asked the blessing over the food.

  Alisa reached under the table and pinched the side of Danny’s leg as hard as she could. She whispered, “You better hope that I don’t find out that you had something to do with that little scene.”

  Danny winced in pain as he pried her fingers from his thigh. “Ouch! You’ve already tried, convicted, and punished me.”

  She winked as she passed the plate of pancakes. “It’s the apocalypse. Justice moves swiftly.”

  After breakfast, Danny poured another cup of coffee, went out front to sit under the tree to be alone, and read a few chapters from his Bible before the day was completely devoured by chores. A soft, cool breeze rustled through the tree limbs, which were slowly turning green with new leaves. Down by the creek was a long, meandering patch of wild daffodils, mixed in vibrant yellows and pure whites, with bright green stems. “Tomorrow is the first day of spring.” Danny wanted to keep track of seasons and holidays to maintain a sense of normalcy in an otherwise chaotic world. He took a deep breath. “It even smells like a fresh start.” Danny thought about the dystopian landscape they’d had to travel through to get to Nana’s and how dreary it had looked when they arrived. But now, the flowers, the new growth on the trees; maybe the worst was behind them and this was a new beginning. Danny smiled, looking up at the wonders of creation around him as he read through the Book of Psalms.

  Suddenly, all of his thoughts of a fresh start were shattered as Catfish drove down the gravel path pulling a trailer full of pigs. The hogs were held on the flatbed trailer by a makeshift cage constructed of wood pallets that had been coupled together using bailing wire. The image was a jolting reminder that everyone was moving to Nana’s farm for mutual defense. The daffodils were in bloom, but America was heading into the darkest of winters concerning God’s judgment for forsaking His Word and His ways.

  “Ichabod,” Danny whispered to himself. The glory of God still appeared through the renewal of creation, but it had most certainly departed this cursed nation.

  Catfish leaned out the window of his truck. “Where does Miss Jennie expect me to keep my hogs?”

  Danny got up and walked toward the vehicle. He waved his hand to disperse the smell coming from the creatures. “Downwind.”

  Catfish chuckled, letting a dribble of tobacco juice drip from his lower lip. “You’ll get used to it.”

  Danny looked over at JC, who was getting out of the passenger’s side. “Maybe so, but I still think we should build them a pen on the back side of the barnyard.”

  “All right. I’m gonna let ‘em waller about with the cows till we get ‘em somewheres else to go,” Catfish said.

  Danny noticed the bullet hole in Catfish’s windshield. He walked closer to the truck. He turned to JC. “Did Catfish make you mad on the way over?”

  JC snickered. “No.”

  Catfish waved his hand. “Just a little misunderstandin’.”

  “I’ll say.” Danny crossed his arms as he waited for an explanation.

  Catfish put the vehicle in park and cut the engine. “When the lights got turned out, there was free gas all over the creation. Every car on the road had several gallons just a-sittin’ there, like a peach waitin’ to be plucked. All these heathens ‘round here done sucked up all the gas from the cars on the road, so I’ve had to hunt a mite harder to keep my truck runnin’. I went to get a little fuel
from a car in some feller’s driveway. He didn’t take too kindly to it at all.”

  “Catfish! You’ve been stealing gas?” Danny let his mouth hang open.

  “Well, folks got different ways of sayin’ what stealin’ is and what it ain’t, times bein’ what they are.” Catfish shrugged innocently.

  Danny crossed his arms. “I guess the guy who shot your windshield has a pretty clear definition of stealing and a pretty good idea about how he handles thieves, times being what they are.”

  “Hmm,” Catfish snorted as he examined the bullet hole. “I reckon he does.” He started the engine. “Anyhow, I’ll have to be a mite more stingy about galivantin’ around town.”

  “How much fuel do you have left?” Danny asked.

  “Oh, less than fifty gallons.” Catfish slowly pulled away and drove his pigs over toward the barn.

  JC shook his head. “He’s got gas stashed in coffee cans, plastic buckets, and milk jugs. I don’t necessarily approve of the way he acquired it, but it will come in handy.”

  Danny watched as Catfish drove off. “Is he going to drive you over to the Reeses’ place?”

  “Yep. Did anyone talk to Rocky about moving over here?”

  Danny nodded. “Nick went over there yesterday evening. He explained the concept, but Rocky thinks because he can see Nana’s house from his porch, that’s close enough.”

  JC slowly shook his head. “With just the two of them in that house, he wouldn’t stand a chance. I understand, he doesn’t want to walk away from his home. I feel the same way, but we’ve all got to do whatever it takes to survive. If you don’t mind, why don’t you help Catfish with moving my trailer? I’ll go talk to Rocky, see if I can persuade him.”

  “No problem.” Danny patted JC on the back as he walked toward the creek.

  Danny picked up his Bible, which was next to the tree, and brought it back in the house. Next he called Steven to help out moving the trailer.

  Steven carried his shotgun as they walked toward the trailer. “I thought a lot about what you said yesterday. But I’m not sure she still likes me.”

  “I am,” Danny said, matter-of-factly.

  “How?” Steven looked at him curiously.

  “She said she loves you.”

  “I never heard that.”

  “It was after you were shot, you were lying over in the grass, not in great shape. She prayed and asked God for a miracle, to get you back to Nana’s safely. When she was praying, she told God she loved you.”

  “I didn’t know all of that.”

  “You do now.”

  “And that’s when Catfish showed up with the truck? Right after she prayed for a miracle?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Hmm.” Steven was quiet for a while. “I remember her giving me water and feeding me. She’s a really great girl.”

  Danny nodded. “She is.”

  “But what am I going to do? I can’t ask her to go to the movies.”

  Danny shook his head at Steven’s thick-headedness. “All you have to do is quit pushing her away. Just be nice. Of course, if you want to move things along, you could ask her to go for a walk.”

  Steven smiled. “I guess I could do that.”

  They reached the trailer and helped Catfish get it hitched up. It was soon in position, just where JC had requested it be parked. Shortly thereafter, Danny heard the sound of Rocky’s tractor coming down the hill toward the gravel drive. “I guess we should go tell Nick and Cami that it’s time to move the RV.”

  Catfish moved his truck out of the way, while Steven and Danny walked to the RV.

  Danny knocked on the door of the RV. “Hey, guys, Rocky is coming with the tractor.”

  Cami’s voice came from inside. “Thanks, we’ll be right out.”

  JC was standing on the back of the tractor as Rocky drove around the back of the barn.

  Steven looked the tractor over. “At least tractors don’t have computers. Hopefully most farmers will be able to keep things going until they run out of gas.”

  Rocky let out a sarcastic laugh. “Ha! Now that’s a good one, tractors don’t have computers. John Deere has been putting proprietary computers in their tractors for years. They come with a lifetime licensing agreement for the software that run the computers, so farmers technically never own the tractor. What’s worse, they can be prosecuted under copyright law for attempting to make alterations to their own tractor. You can’t even work on it without a licensed diagnostic computer to tell you what’s wrong.”

  Steven looked surprised. “Wow. Well, I guess they can’t be prosecuted anymore.”

  Rocky smirked. “Yeah, guess not. Anyway, I got sick of being cornered by Deere and the other corporate giants, and rebuilt this old 1975 International Harvester Farmall. Did most of it myself.”

  “It’s a nice-looking classic tractor. And it runs great.” JC jumped off the back and inspected it from the front and side.

  Rocky smiled. “At least we’ll have a tractor until we run out of gas.”

  Steven asked, “Think we could use it tomorrow to get the front field broken up? Nana wants us to fill that entire field with corn. It would be a heck of a job if we had to do it all by hand.”

  “Sure. I’ll go ahead and get it plowed after we finish moving the RV. But won’t a field of corn right by the road paint a giant target on the farm?” Rocky cut the engine.

  Danny said, “It will, but we’re putting melons, beans, tomatoes, potatoes, and strawberries on the back side of the farm. Corn is the most high-profile, but it’s also the easiest thing to grow en masse. We’d be able to produce way more than we can eat, so if we have beggars coming around, we can put them to work harvesting, then pay them in corn for their work.”

  Rocky adjusted his red, International Harvester cap. “If looters don’t have it cleaned out by the time it’s ready to harvest.”

  Nick crossed his arms. “We could put an observation post up in the hedgerow along the road.”

  JC looked toward the hedgerow. “Won’t do us much good without comms. We can’t afford to allocate more than two people for security on that corner. With all the other tasks, even two would be spreading us thin. Suppose four or five guys come through and decide they want to pick corn. Two people can’t engage five looters with no way to call for backup.”

  Nick winked and pulled his keys from his pocket. “We put a few goodies away in the metal shed next to the RV. I did the best I knew how to protect them from an EMP. Why don’t we go see if they still work?”

  Danny had been itching to know what was in that shed. “All right!”

  “You got comms in there?” JC’s voice was optimistically curious.

  Nick removed the lock and opened the shed. “We’ll know in a minute.” He took out two .50 caliber ammo cans and removed a strip of foil insulation tape that covered the seam where the lid met the base of the first can. He pulled the latch and opened the lid. He removed a piece of cardboard lying on top of the contents, which acted as an insulator between the can and whatever was inside. Nick pulled out a Mylar bag and handed it to Danny. “Will you do the honors?”

  “Sure.” Danny took out his pocket knife and cut the Mylar open. Inside were two boxes, each individually wrapped in heavy-duty aluminum foil.

  Nick opened the other can, removed a second Mylar bag, and retrieved two more boxes, giving one to JC and the other to Cami. He took one of the boxes from Danny and began to open it.

  Danny followed his lead as did JC and Cami. Danny pulled the foil back to reveal a cardboard box. “Baofeng. Professional FM transceiver.”

  JC had his unit unboxed and quickly attached the antenna. He gave Nick one of his rare smiles. “Good call.”

  Nick keyed his mic. “This is November Foxtrot calling Juliet Charlie. Do you read me?”

  JC keyed his mic. “Loud and clear, November Foxtrot.”

  Steven quizzed JC. “How did you know who he was talking about?”

  “Juliet Charlie, that’s my initials,
JC.”

  “Got it.” Steven nodded.

  “Them is some fine doohickeys till the batteries play out.” Catfish admired one of the units.

  Nick nodded. “If everything in the shed survived the EMP, I’ve got that covered. Danny, give me a hand with that large box.”

  Danny carefully helped Nick remove a large box covered in aluminum foil and foil insulation tape, which was roughly half the size of a door. “Solar panels?”

  Nick nodded. “Yep, 100 watts. I have four of them.”

  “Don’t you go to shreddin’ that tin foil. We can save it. Might need it for somethin’. Miss Jennie’ll tan your hides if she finds out you’re a-bein’ wasteful.” Catfish helped Danny and Nick remove the aluminum foil without tearing it up.

  Rocky helped Steven pull the second panel out of the shed. “You must have spent a fortune on all of this.”

  Nick shook his head as he pulled the panel from the cardboard box. “100 dollars on the charge controller, little more than that on the inverter, 550 for all four panels. I might have another 100 in cables and connectors.” Nick pointed to the two large 370 amp hour batteries. “Those bad boys set me back about 400 bucks each. Still, the whole system, even with the protective material I had on, it cost less than two grand. Considering we knew this was coming, it seemed like a worthwhile investment.”

  JC nodded. “All of this is a game changer. What did you pay for the radios?”

  “Like twenty-five dollars each.” Nick pointed to some other ammo cans in the back. “I’ve got a few rechargeable batteries, a shortwave radio, and a couple other things back there.

  “After we decided to splurge on getting the RV, everything else was sort of small potatoes. Then, Danny had his first dream, which came true. After that second dream, we made getting ready for this our top priority.” Nick pulled the charge controller out of one of the ammo boxes and began connecting the wires.

  “Smart move,” JC said. “Between these radios and a few trip-wire alarms like I’ve got set up over at my place, I think we can lock this place down pretty good.”