by Benton, Ken
Joel stopped before the woodpile in order to shift into 4-wheel-drive. That’s one nice thing about newer trucks, not having to stop to go four-wheel.
He drove the bumpy ground around the backside of the shed to learn the third intruder was faster than he first let on. He would be at the wire fence before Joel could catch him. To his left, the guy who’d lost his hat decided to exit the property in the same direction. There was some chance Joel could catch that one before he scaled the hill there, but Joel decided having to navigate the incline wasn’t worth the risk. So he came back full circle around the shed and looked to help Debra.
Target acquired. The crowbar man was now on this side of the yard, running a zigzag pattern. Debra appeared to be having some fun chasing him. When the intruder saw Joel’s truck back in the yard, he broke the pattern and headed straight south.
Joel turned to Jessie and yelled, “Yeeeeeeehaaaaaaaw!”
Jessie’s face went from being horrified to something more curious.
Joel joined the foxhunt and cut to the far side of the runner, blocking his path.
“So you want to make up, do you?” Joel shouted. “Well, that’s fine, honey, real fine. Glad to hear it. Just in time for some country living!”
The runner changed directions, but Joel sped past him and turned sharply around, sliding the truck and causing Jessie to grab the overhead handle. When the runner then tried to resume his southward escape path, Debra came around that way to block him again. So, Joel went back towards the house.
Joel and Debra now did donuts, opposite of each other, with the encircled runner dancing in the donut hole.
“You see, darling,” Joel continued shouting, foot on the gas and wheel turned, “the thing about country living is we have different priorities than city folk. You know, God, family, country, that sort of stuff. We don’t worry about things like civil war statues, and we almost never do yoga. I think you’ll find us mostly agreeable. As long as you respect us, we’ll respect you. But don’t mess with our home or family, and don’t get any covetous ideas about any of our belongings, please, as you’ll discover we don’t tolerate no shenanigans or evildoers.”
For a second Joel thought he detected the slightest smile on her face, but then she covered it and mumbled something about being dizzy. The dust cloud they were stirring up had gotten gigantic and drifted eastward. Joel and Debra slowed their pace out of necessity.
That must have been when the runner made his move. Joel didn’t spot him for another revolution. The burglar was now running across the field the long way out, due south.
Joel turned to follow him, but kept a measure of distance. Debra gave up the chase and stayed at the house. The point had been made, and Joel would be content to run the intruder off the property without creating another sworn mortal enemy—he was pretty sure.
The fence wires were down along a sizable section at the backside of the property line. When the runner crossed it, he stopped for a moment as if in defiance. Joel slowed almost to a stop, ready to go back. But the intruder kneeled, picked up a rock, and threw it in Joel’s direction.
Joel hit the gas again.
The runner resumed his flight, this time looking behind frequently, probably to see if Joel would cross the property line.
Joel did. When the runner saw it, he increased his speed towards the house at the far side of this plot of land, an older single-story home of half stucco and half wood.
Joel had never met this neighbor. He wasn’t even sure who lived here. But he figured they would probably appreciate being protected from a potential squatter, whoever they were.
The runner reached the house and entered through an unlocked rear door before Joel could get to him. Joel came to a full stop, grabbed his Glock, opened the car door, and stepped outside, where he leaned on his open door, unsure of what to do next.
An older man came out the same door holding a shotgun. When he saw Joel, he pointed the weapon at him.
Joel ducked behind the door. “Jessie, get down!” he shouted before running to the back of the truck. He came around the other side, looking to get a bead on the new adversary from a fresh position.
All he was able to get a bead on was Jessie’s backside. This was the wrong time to see her stretchy jeans hugging her tight butt. Incredibly, she’d gotten out of the damn truck.
“We’re your neighbors!” Jessie shouted forward.
Joel walked up behind her, uncomfortably aware he was temporarily using her as a human shield.
“I don’t find it very neighborly of you to tear up my field and come to my back door with a gun in your hand!” the man replied in a thick southern accent.
“We’re chasing a home invader!” Joel yelled back, seeing that the man had lowered his weapon a bit. “Caught him at my front door with a crowbar. He ran inside your house.”
“That’s my son!” The man raised the shotgun again slightly, not quite pointing it directly at them, but at the open door.
“Why is your son breaking into my house?” Joel asked, trying to push Jessie back inside the truck. She refused to budge.
“You’d have to ask him that. Hunting for supplies, maybe? Considering the national emergency, doesn’t seem exceedingly stupid to check out abandoned properties for food and such.”
Joel felt his jaw drop before responding.
“Your definition of abandoned property is another man’s second home? An up-kept property occupied at least twice a year? Your next-door neighbor, no less, when it hasn’t even been thirty-six hours since the national emergency began? Is that what you consider a reasonable time period before declaring a house abandoned and raiding it?”
The man spit, keeping the shotgun high. “All I know is you are on my property, mister, and you’re not welcome. If your place is so up-kept, why is your fence line always down?”
“Out of the two of us, I am apparently the only one who thought to build a fence. I’ll be working on mending it tomorrow, if you care to help.”
“Nope.” The man shook his head. “Can’t say I care to.”
The sound of Archer’s truck approaching across the field gave Joel enough confidence to walk around his front hood.
The man held the shotgun steady. “What’s this, more of your land-wrecking gang?”
Joel turned and held up a hand to stop Debra before she came much past the downed fence wire, then motioned for her to go back. After she complied, Joel walked back to his still-open driver’s door.
“You’re going to talk to your son, then?” Joel asked with one leg inside the truck.
“About what? Boys will be boys. I’ll thank you to mind your own affairs, neighbor.”
“And I’ll thank you—and your household—to mind yours! I assure you ‘my gang’ and I are well prepared to deal with intruders. Next time it may not end so innocently.”
“And I’ll tell you the very same thing,” the old guy said. “It’d be a mistake to start a Hatfield and McCoy feud in this direction across your fence, I promise you. Now please use the driveway to exit.”
“I didn’t start one, sir. And I don’t want one. I’m going to let this incident go in the interest of peace. But that son of yours and his two friends, whoever they are, will be well-advised to think in like fashion. In fact, if they want to come apologize tomorrow, they have my address—and they’ll discover my natural inclination is not one to greet my neighbors with a shotgun pointed at their midsection.”
The man stopped replying, but he did not lower his weapon any further, either.
Joel couldn’t stop shaking his head as he backed the truck up and began maneuvering around the house to the front side of the property.
“What a cantankerous old bastard.”
“What does that make you?” Jessie asked. Joel noticed her demeanor had improved for some reason.
“It makes me the neighbor of a cantankerous old bastard, who has a punk hooligan of a son. What, are you defending them?”
Joel stopped for a few sec
onds at the front side of the house when a construction project came into view. A row of ramshackle cabins, if you could even call them that, were in the process of being hastily built using poor quality wood and materials. One might think they were horse stalls if not for the old mattresses that could be seen on the floors of the unfinished units.
“Great,” Joel said. “Looks like they are building a compound. Could be a radical religious cult.”
It was Jessie’s turn to shake her head. “Are you going to make enemies with your neighbors now? That sounds like a really bad idea.”
“I agree,” Joel said. “First sensible thing you said all day, other than the apology a little while ago. But Jess, they were breaking into our house, for crying out loud. I think I went pretty easy on him, considering. ‘Boys will be boys,’ seriously?”
“Well,” she said, “won’t they?”
“Boys and teenagers, maybe. Those ‘boys’ all looked full-grown. They are responsible for their poor decisions in life.”
“…and I don’t recall issuing an apology,” Jessie added. “Do you think I have something to apologize for?”
“You said it was the road that made you crazy, and you want to make up. Did I hear wrong?”
“I never used the word crazy. And that was before you turned into a monster hillbilly, yelling freakish things at me while terrorizing the neighbor kid.”
“You mean the burglar?” Joel replied. “Hmm. Monster hillbilly? I’m confused. Do you want to make up or not?”
“I probably should have to think about it now. But, like you said to your neighbor, in the interest of peace…”
“Well, isn’t that perfectly romantic?”
Joel came to the end of the bad neighbor’s driveway, which was lined on both sides by a row of trees, like his. There he had to wait for a white Toyota truck to go by before he could pull out. After it passed, it registered as familiar.
Joel soon found himself on the Toyota’s tail. It drove unnaturally slow, as if looking for an address. Two guys occupied the front seats.
The Toyota came to a full stop before Joel’s driveway. That’s when Joel recognized it.
Joel laughed, but only for a brief moment when he reconsidered the fact two people were inside. The truck then turned up his driveway.
“Someone lost?” Jessie asked.
Joel let the Toyota get halfway up the driveway before hitting the gas and barreling at it.
“No, no!” Jessie shouted. “Joel, get ahold of yourself!”
Joel resisted the urge to give her another monster hillbilly yeehaw.
The Toyota reacted erratically to being rushed at from behind. First it slowed and tried to move over, but there wasn’t enough passing room. So, it resumed up the driveway, turned into the parking area in front of the house, and stopped.
Joel pulled alongside it and jumped out. The look of relief on Sammy’s face when he saw Joel was immense.
Debra now stood on the front deck holding the crowbar. Her expression became a mix of amusement and concern. Apparently, her planned joke of pretending she was trying to break in didn’t work out due to unforeseeable developments. Joel gave her a thumb’s up anyway. Archer remained sitting in the truck.
So did Jessie.
“Man,” Sammy said getting out. “I didn’t recognize this. I assume the red F250 from the lot is under there somewhere?”
“Yeah, that’s it.” Joel glanced at his truck, now covered in a deep layer of dirt. “Had some trouble on the road. Sure didn’t take you long to show up. We only just arrived, not half an hour ago. Haven’t even been inside yet. Who’s your friend?”
Sammy looked behind him, where his passenger had also stepped outside.
He turned back. “Joel McConnell, meet Mick Murray. He’s a—wait for it—Supreme Court clerk.”
“I guess that might come in handy,” Joel said forcing a fake smile at Mick.
“Especially if you need any clerking done,” Mick replied.
“Or any firm decisions made,” Sammy added, smirking.
The scene of the shoddy cabins being built at the troublesome neighbor’s house flashed in Joel’s mind. A genuine new smile formed on his face.
“You are most welcome here,” Joel said glancing between Sammy and Mick. “Both of you.”
Chapter Sixteen
“That turned out pretty good,” Sammy said. “Even if it’s much higher in fiber than I’m used to. Glad you have a working refrigerator for all this produce.”
“Fresh produce provides the building blocks for our bodies,” Jessie said standing up. “And is also the cleanser of them. It’s vital to our physical and spiritual well-being.”
Joel watched Jessie go around the table to gather the dishes, after having let Joel and Sammy do all the meal preparation. There appeared to be a marked transformation about her. She practically hummed with happiness now. Maybe she just needed a nutritious meal.
Archer, too, spoke and moved with a renewed energy. He stood up to help, and joked with Jessie in the kitchen. It was as if those two were suddenly completely over the trauma from the road trip. That was a good thing, Joel supposed. But astonishing nonetheless.
Joel, on the other hand, felt lethargic and spiritless. Looking around the table at those still sitting, he could see it in Debra, Sammy, and Mick’s eyes as well: the end of a long day and an arduous journey. Apparently, Sammy and Mick had their own harrowing adventures. The stories could wait until tomorrow. No one wanted to relive them at the present moment.
“Don’t get used to it,” Joel said. “Debra, could you brighten the lights? The dimmer is on the wall behind you.”
“Sure.” Debra turned to reach for the switch. “Boy, it sure got dark outside fast.”
While she did that, Joel leaned back in his chair from the opposite side of the rectangular wooden dining room table, to fish out a pen and notepad from a drawer at the end of the kitchen counter.
“Used to what?” Sammy asked. “Fresh produce?”
“That and a working refrigerator.” Joel motioned at the chandelier above them. “And bright lighting, for that matter. And most other conveniences reliable electric power makes possible.”
Mick spoke. “Your generator is low?”
Joel thought for a second before responding.
“No, to be honest. It uses propane, the tank is large, and I recently had it filled. But it seems foolhardy to just run it and keep living a blissful existence as if everything were normal. Propane cannot be relied on as a renewable resource under the current conditions, so I want to conserve it.”
Sammy laughed. “You’re about to plot one of your schemes, aren’t you?”
“A rather simple one,” Joel said. “I want to time the perishables running out with me turning off the generator power switch. I figure … three days. By then we can get everything ready, and also become mentally prepared.”
“What do we do for light at night?” Sammy asked. “And will we still have plumbing?”
“Good questions. I have a portable solar generator stored under the staircase. It holds several hours of power from a day’s charge—more, actually, but I suggest we count on no more than two hours of light for the cabin and develop the habit of going to bed early. The water heater is gas, but needs electricity for the pilot light. During the day I’ll power it from the portable. The underground water pressure tank from the well holds 44 gallons, so I suggest…” Joel began making notes “…three minute showers every other day. Only run the water when getting wet and rinsing off soap. I can turn the big generator on for short intervals a couple times a week to refill the pressure tank and that won’t use much fuel. I also have potable water hoses I can run from the hand-pump through the window to the kitchen sink. If necessary, we can refill the toilet tanks from jugs when the water pressure is down.”
“Will there be enough charge left in the portable generator to power a coffee maker in the morning?” Debra asked.
“Probably,” Joel said. “We�
��ll run extension cords for lamps in a few places around the house, and one up to the loft where one of you will have to sleep.” He glanced at Mick.
“What about the bathrooms?” Sammy asked.
“And one for each bathroom to power motion-detected nightlights. For getting there in the middle of the night we can use flashlights until we run out of batteries, which should be a long time from now, and then we can use my crank powered lanterns if need be. They aren’t super bright, but will do the job.”
“Until the light bulbs burn out,” Sammy said.
“Right. But that is pretty far in the future. Hopefully, we’ll come up with a way to use candles or oil burning lamps by then, as by that time we will have learned to live with the idea that the public power grid may have been a convenience of a bygone era. I realize sharing a bathroom between four people can be inconvenient, so when it is occupied feel free to use the master bath during daylight hours, when my bedroom door is open. If absolutely necessary the grove of trees not far from the back door can serve as an occasional men’s room.”
“I don’t mind sleeping in the loft,” Mick said. “Or going to bed early. Especially tonight. I almost never need to get up in the night.”
“Good,” Joel said. “That will work out. So we’ll implement the power-off plan in three nights, like I said. If we conserve the propane we can turn the big generator on for half a day once in a great while when we are craving luxuries.”
“On holidays?” Sammy said smiling.
Joel pointed the pen at him. “Just be glad we have three days to prepare. A whole lot of people have been thrust into a powerless existence without any of the resources we have here, and have no idea how to cope.”
Joel glanced outside the window before continuing.
“That’s another reason to go to bed early and not keep many lights on at night. We may not want to shine like a beacon to the more desperate.”
“Like bad neighbors?” Debra asked.
Joel tilted his head at her. “They have already been warned that we are well-armed. I was thinking of passerby’s. This house is partially visible from the road.”