Ichabod

by Mark Goodwin

  “Get on down here. Breakfast’ll be ready in a minute,” she said.

  Danny looked around. The glimmer of daybreak was illuminating the room. “The sun is coming up. We must have been asleep for at least two hours.”

  “I needed it.” Alisa rolled out of bed and got dressed.

  After breakfast Danny, Alisa, Steven, and Dana set off to the backfield to plant sweet potatoes. Nana had sprouted several of the potatoes in a small garden bed near the house. She had then taken cuttings from those and planted them in a hodge-podge selection of containers. Danny carried fifteen of the cuttings in various plastic containers: peanut butter jars, cottage cheese containers, and yogurt cups in a wheelbarrow. Alisa packed an old milk crate holding twelve empty soda cans which had the tops cut off and drainage holes poked in the bottom to accommodate one sweet potato cutting each. The cuttings would take root in a couple of weeks, as long as the soil in the containers was kept moist. Dana hand-carried another four containers, and Steven carried the hoes and shovels to work the ground.

  Danny stopped at the edge of the woods. “Let’s put a couple plants right here. They’ll blend in with the undergrowth and, unless someone knows they’re here, most people will walk right by them.”

  Dana stood, holding two plastic containers in each hand. “Aren’t we going to plant rows of sweet potatoes in the garden? If you put a bunch of them here, we won’t have enough for rows.”

  Danny took a shovel from Steven and began to dig. “Sweet potatoes are very prolific. If we put two plants here, they’ll take over this entire area, as long as something doesn’t eat them before they have a chance to start growing.”

  “Like what?” Steven asked.

  Danny removed one of the cuttings from a container and planted it in the hole. “Rabbits, mainly. They love the sweet potato greens.”

  Alisa helped him pat the dirt around the freshly planted cutting. “I love the greens also. I couldn’t believe Nana had never heard of eating them.”

  Danny gave her a quick kiss before brushing the dirt off his hands. “Eating sweet potato greens is kind of a new thing. We were blessed to work in a restaurant that served them, but it wasn’t a popular dish in the South, like turnip greens or mustard greens.”

  Dana followed as Danny led the way to the next location with the wheelbarrow. “Sounds like the perfect survival food. You get the vitamins and carbs from the potato, a green vegetable from the top, and the whole thing just looks like some random vine if you plant it near the edge of the forest. So even if we have looters, they’ll probably never find all of our sweet potatoes.”

  “As long as they’re not rabbits,” Alisa chuckled.

  The group found several other inconspicuous locations to plant some of the cuttings. The rest were put in the freshly plowed rows in the backfield. Once they finished with the sweet potatoes, they planted several rows of squash, melons, turnips, and a few more rows of green beans, then headed back to the house for lunch.

  Steven brushed the dirt from his knees with his free hand as he walked. “I think these pants qualify as dirty now.”

  “Those pants qualified as dirty two days ago.” Danny pushed the wheelbarrow full of the empty containers which would all be used again to start the next round of crops for a later harvest.

  When they arrived back at the house, JC’s family was unloading some of their personal effects from the back of Catfish’s truck and bringing them into the trailer.

  “Need a hand?” Danny offered.

  JC looked the group over. “I appreciate the offer, but I think we can handle it.”

  “It’s no bother at all.” Steven reiterated the offer.

  “Look, uh, no offense, but you guys are pretty dirty. I know it’s just a trailer, but I’d like to keep it clean as much as possible. We might be here for a while.”

  Danny looked at his shirt and pants, which were heavily coated in dirt from the garden. “Oh, yeah. We’ll get cleaned up, and if you need any help after lunch, I’ll give you a hand.”

  “We should be done by then, but I might need you for something else.” JC adjusted his ball cap.

  “Sure, what’s up?” Danny asked.

  “I want to set some trip alarms along the back property line. I’m less worried about the hedgerow that runs along the road and the creek, but the fence that runs along the back pasture and the woods running behind the house, I’d like to know if someone is coming through back there.”

  “What do you have in mind?”

  “I made some trip-wire alarms out of mouse traps and fishing line. When sprung, they’ll set off an emptied-out shotgun round that has the powder, but no shot in it. If someone trips the line, it will scare the heck out of them and let us know they’re on the property.”

  “Sounds clever. Why wouldn’t you use live rounds? Maybe that would kill them and we wouldn’t have to worry about them coming back.”

  Rusty was standing next to JC, wagging his tail. JC bent over to pet him on the back. “Like I was telling you about the alarms I set up over on my place, you wouldn’t want the dog to set one of those off by accident. Or worse, one of us. Still, since you and Steven are typically the guys gathering firewood, it would be good for you two to know where the trip lines are located. Even if it’s not dangerous, we don’t want to set them off by accident if we can help it. If anyone else goes to the back property line for wood or any other reason, they’ll always have one of us three to point out where the lines are.”

  “That sounds like a good plan.” Danny nodded.

  “What about a map?” Alisa asked. “Could you make a diagram of where each one of the trip wire is? If they’re set up for a long period of time, even you guys might forget exactly where you put them.”

  “That’s a good idea,” JC said. “You draw pretty good. Why don’t you come with us and make a map?”

  “I paint,” she replied. “That’s a little different than mapmaking.”

  “Close enough. At least people will know it’s a tree if you draw it.”

  Steven ran his hand through his hair. “Could we blaze the trees that have a wire attached to them? If we blazed the side facing the house, anyone approaching from the back wouldn’t see the blaze anyway.”

  “What’s a blaze?” Alisa asked.

  “Like on a trail. It’s a small patch of paint to let you know you’re on the trail,” Steven explained.

  “Fantastic idea.” JC smiled.

  Dana added, “Since we’re most likely to get hit at night, we could paint the blaze with a dark color. It would be easy to identify in the daylight, but nobody would see it at night. We wouldn’t be back there collecting wood or hunting at night anyway, right?”

  “Right.” JC snapped his fingers. “Another good idea. Since the blazes will be painted with a dark color, nighttime trespassers won’t see them if they use the back woods as an avenue of retreat.

  “So, all of you meet by my trailer after lunch. Jack, Danny, and I will set the alarms. Dana and Steven can paint blazes, and Alisa can draw a diagram.”

  “See you in a bit.” Danny waved.

  “Hang back, I’ve got something else to discuss with you.” JC gave Danny’s arm a light tug.

  “Sure.” Danny waved Alisa and the others on. “I’ll catch up, guys.”

  “Don’t be late getting to the table.” Alisa winked and blew him a kiss as she walked off.

  “What’s up?” Danny asked.

  JC looked around. “Catfish wants to go on an expedition tomorrow.”

  Danny shook his head. “I don’t like any of the words in that sentence -- Catfish, go, expedition, tomorrow. When you string them all together, I like them even less.”

  JC snorted. “I get that. I felt the same way when he approached me about it. But hear me out. There’s a lot of supplies out there on the road, and if we’re going to make this place into a fort, we’re going to need it.”

  “You’re talking about stealing! We need the protection of God more than anything we
’re going to find out there on the road. And if we start stealing, I think we lose that protection. Look at Catfish. His window got shot out trying to boost gasoline from someone. I think that was his warning from God, and it might be his last.” Danny’s voice became a bit louder and higher pitched as he protested.

  JC put a hand in the air. “Settle down. No one said anything about stealing. Let me finish.”

  Danny crossed his arms and listened reluctantly. “Go ahead.”

  JC looked toward the road. “There is a place out on US 29 that sells utility sheds. Some of them are really nice. They look like little cabins, metal roofs, windows, top-notch.”

  “How is taking one not stealing, and besides, how in the world would you ever move them?”

  “I’ve got the cash in the house to buy a couple, provided we can locate the owner. About moving them, that isn’t such a big deal. Have you ever seen one of those being delivered?”

  “No.”

  JC continued explaining. “They usually come in on a flatbed truck with a tilt-up bed that has a winch to pull the shed up on the bed.”

  “Which we don’t have.” Danny really wanted no part of this conversation.

  JC kept talking. “Once the shed is delivered, it can be repositioned using what’s called a mule. Basically, it’s a really small forklift that lifts one side of the shed. The back side of the shed is put on a small set of wheels.”

  “We don’t have those things either.”

  JC nodded. “I know. Just listen. The place that sells the sheds probably has a mule. We would only need two pairs of the wheels, then we could pull it with the truck back to the farm.”

  “How would you get the shed up to put the wheels under it?”

  “Two truck jacks. We jack up one side, slide the wheels under, put tire chocks down, and then do the other side.”

  Danny crossed his arms tighter as he shook his head. “Seems like we could just build sheds out of the wood from your barn. It wouldn’t be much harder than all of this.”

  “Trust me, it would be a lot harder, especially with no power tools.”

  “Can’t you charge power tools with the solar generator?”

  “You’ve never built anything with battery-operated power tools, have you? Those batteries from Home Depot are garbage. They last about fifteen minutes, and that’s if you happen to get a good one that still takes a charge after six months.”

  “Why are you telling just me about the mission? This is everyone’s decision. Heck, Nick is the one you’ll have to convince.”

  JC put his hand on Danny’s shoulder. “If you’re in, it will be a lot easier to convince everyone else to go along with the plan.”

  “Why me? I just live here. You and Nick are the security and administration for the whole group. Steven is the spiritual leader, or at least he’s trying to be.”

  JC shook his head. “Don’t sell yourself short. People listen to you, maybe more than you know. You’re the guy who has the dreams. We’re pretty much all here and have some basic level of preparedness for this situation because of your dreams.”

  “Great. So if Catfish’s expedition goes south and someone gets hurt, it’s my fault.”

  “Don’t think of it like that.”

  “Then how should I think of it?”

  JC looked around the property. “Think of it like, if we get hit hard by a big gang of ruthless criminals, scumbags like Nick said to expect, will you know that you did everything you could to protect the people you love? At least that’s the way I’m thinking of it.”

  Danny did not want to think of it like that. But JC was right. He had to do everything he could to keep Alisa, Nana, Cami, and everyone else as safe as possible. “And then, that’s it? We’re just getting a couple of sheds?”

  JC looked back toward the road. “We’re going to need fencing.”

  Danny exhaled. “Fencing? Where will we get that?”

  “There’s an old Owens Corning plant on 81. We can scavenge some of their fencing. It’s not like they have anything left to protect with a fence. Anything of use or value has already been looted.”

  “And that’s it? Sheds and fence?”

  “And gas.”

  Danny threw his hands in the air as he repeated what JC had just said. “And gas. JC, this is stealing.”

  JC lowered his head, then looked back up to stare directly into Danny’s eyes. “Danny, it’s been five weeks since the EMP. Any unclaimed, unprotected resources still out there now are going to get taken by someone. The question is, will they be used for good, to defend the people you love, or will they be used by the bad guys, to fortify positions that they can use as a base to come pillage your unprotected property? I think you’re having a little trouble envisioning the America of tomorrow, so let me paint you a little picture.”

  JC sarcastically swiped his hand across the sky. “Come with me to the magical land of tomorrow, a land where Mad Max would soil himself from fear at the thought of venturing out from behind a heavily armed, gated wall, a mystical place where Rambo and Clint Eastwood shiver in panic and anxiety. Why? Because the animals running the show in the world of tomorrow are the worst of the worst, sociopaths that take what they want and kill everyone who gets in the way. And let me remind you, your pretty young wife has already been through enough for one apocalypse. If I were you, I’d beg, borrow, or steal to make sure nothing like that ever happened to her again.”

  Anger flashed through Danny’s mind at the thought of Alisa being hurt or abducted again. JC had pushed the right button. “Okay, whatever it takes . . . within reasonable, moral boundaries.”

  JC patted him on the back. “We’re not taking anything by force. If anyone lays claim to any resources while we’re taking them, we’ll walk away, as long as they don’t engage us.”

  Danny grimaced. This was not what he wanted to be thinking about. Times were hard enough; he hadn’t expected them to get harder. But it seemed as though they might, and he, most assuredly, wanted to keep Alisa as safe as possible. “What do we do next?”

  “We need to get Nick on board. I’d rather have you with me than Catfish when I go talk to him.”

  “He’s probably in the trailer with Cami, getting cleaned up for lunch. Want to talk to him now?”

  JC shook his head. “Definitely not before lunch, and I’d rather catch him when it can be just the three of us. Cami is great, but she’s another person that would need convincing if she’s involved in the conversation.”

  “Hmm.” Danny thought about when they could get Nick alone. “We could ask him to double check the trip wires after we’re done setting them up.”

  “Good idea. He’ll be tired, so he won’t have much fight left in him to argue. You better go get cleaned up and get to the table before Miss Jennie starts yelling.”

  “Okay, see you after lunch.” Danny grinned as he walked away.

  Danny washed his face and hands in the plastic wash basin on the back porch. He changed his clothes and headed to the table for lunch.

  Shortly after lunch, the four friends worked with JC and Jack to get the trip wires set along the perimeters of the property. They finished around 5:00, so Danny and JC would have just enough light to use an inspection of the trip lines as a ruse to get Nick off to where they could speak in private. Danny found him and Cami by the solar shed, moving the panels in order to squeeze the last bit of energy from the remaining sunlight.

  “How’s it going?” Danny asked.

  “Not bad,” Nick replied. “We’re producing plenty of juice to keep the batteries charged for radios, flashlights, the small fridge, and JC’s night vision scopes.”

  “That’s fantastic! It seems like such a small thing, but a handful of batteries is completely changing our life.”

  “Especially when it comes to security, the flashlights, radios, and night vision may end up saving our lives.” Nick finished setting the last panel at the best angle to get the most sun.

  “We set up some trip wires alo
ng the back property line in the woods and a few more where the cornfield meets the pasture. JC wanted you to look it over and let us know if you think we missed anything.”

  Nick dusted his hands off. “Sure. Cami, do you want to walk with us?”

  “I think he had some other security matters he wanted to discuss with you as well.” Danny wanted to infuse just the right amount of drudgery to make it sound like more of a task than a relaxing walk in the woods.

  Cami looked over her shoulder toward the house. “Nana probably needs some help with dinner. Besides, I need to get cleaned up and we only have one bathroom. If you think you’ll be okay without me, I’ll have a nice pot of hot water waiting for you to take a shower when you get back.”

  Nick gave her a quick kiss on the lips. “Sounds good. See you in a bit.”

  Danny led the way to JC’s trailer. “Here is a copy of the map that Alisa made. It helps us to remember where all of the booby traps are located. None of them are dangerous, so we wouldn’t get more than a bad scare if we accidently tripped one anyway, but the map is a nice thing to have.”

  Nick smiled as he looked over the map that Danny handed him. “She did a good job on this. We can incorporate this information into a larger map when we split the property up into zones. If we’re ever attacked, it will be easier to say zone one or zone two, rather than over by the creek or behind the barn, especially if one of the alarms is tripped. Someone could say, a wire was tripped in zone four, and everyone would know exactly where the threat was coming from.”

  JC was waiting when they arrived at the trailer. “Let’s go check ‘em out.”

  As they walked back toward the woods, JC looked over at Nick. “I was talking with Danny, and we were thinking that if things get as rough as you say, we’re going to need to fortify this place a little more heavily.”

  Nick shrugged as he walked. “We’re doing everything we can.”

  “Maybe,” JC said, “and maybe not. Catfish seems to think there’s a lot of resources out there that no one has claimed yet.”

  “Catfish’s idea of claiming resources is what civilized folk call looting.”