by Chris Bostic
“Sure, now you listen. You know I wasn’t planning on using the building until winter anyway.”
“Winter?” I interrupted. “It’s barely June! How long are we-”
“Calm down, hon,” Mom said. “No one’s saying we’re gonna-”
“You just said it!”
“It’s a plan. You plan for long term, but hope you can go back sooner.”
Much like mine, Dad’s eyes kept returning to the sky. “Don’t count on it,” he muttered.
“Great.” I plodded back to the steps and sank down. Leaning my back against the wooden siding of the church, I considered the weight of the matter. With everything I’d seen over the last couple hours, it made perfect sense, but that didn’t make reality sit any better with me. “So we’re supposed to survive out here for six months, maybe longer?”
“At least. We can make it. We’ve got plenty of dried food, and canned stuff too.” I turned up my nose. Mom turned to Dad and added, “We’d better get the garden started tomorrow. The chances of getting away for a bunch of supply runs isn’t looking so good…other than, you know.”
“That’s alright. There’s berries to pick, plenty of water. We can catch some fish, maybe shoot a deer.” Though it seemed like a wacky prepper plan to me, Dad didn’t sound or look nearly as discouraging as I’d expected. Somewhere along the way, he’d apparently gotten more onboard with the prepper lifestyle than I’d thought possible. I still preferred to do my grocery gathering with a shopping cart, if I had to go shopping at all.
Austin stuck his head out the door. “Maddie’s in here bawling like a baby. One of you wanna do something about that so I can get some sleep?”
Dad looked at Mom. “Whose turn is it this time?”
She shrugged. “I ‘spose I better. Wish me luck.”
While she headed inside, Dad turned back to the night sky. “There are so many more stars out here than around the house.”
I followed his view and momentarily forgot about the planes. Though totally random, he was right about the stars. I tried to count a small little piece of the sky and quit well before a hundred. There were thousands, yet I needed a bigger distraction than that to keep my mind from running wild.
Mostly, I wondered how on earth we were going to pass the time. Six months in a primitive cabin in the woods, with no television or phones—or even decent food to eat. Though we were sitting a mile high in the mountains, my world had gone dramatically downhill.
I pondered about home. Were the Feds still parked outside, waiting for us to come out? How long would they wait? And how soon until they found us? I imagined television shows with crime scene people combing our house, looking for hair fibers and DNA and tire tracks that would somehow lead them to the top of Nowhere Mountain.
Then there was Katelyn. If little Gatlinburg was ripped in half by bombs, I could only wonder about life on the outskirts of Knoxville. Hopefully she was home on the big leather couch, snuggled in a blanket, completely oblivious to the collapse of the rest of the country. Though I was still getting to know her better, things had been going really well. I should’ve been there with her. I was ready to start walking back to town to stay with her. Then Dad spoiled my dreams.
“We’d better sleep inside tonight. Let’s go.” The rickety steps creaked as he climbed. The door hinges squealed like my joints, feeling tight and rusty from a long, uncomfortable ride crammed into the back of the Jeep.
A faint wail grew in volume once the door opened. I heard Austin huff and mutter something under his breath. I turned my back on him to follow Dad into the church.
Mom was sitting on the last pew. My sister leaned against her, her body quivering. Gasping sobs broke the quiet every so often.
“Help me spread out some sleeping bags,” Dad said.
“On the pew or the floor?”
“One’s as hard as the other,” he replied. “I think I’ll take the floor.
“Me, too.”
We took the bags to the front of the church up by the lectern where there was more room. Once they were unrolled, I passed out the pillows and flopped down on the nearest one. It was warm enough inside the church that I didn’t bother to get into the bag. Even with the extra padding, the wooden floor was still as hard as I had expected.
“So much for being comfortable,” I said with a groan.
“You’ll be too tired to notice,” Dad said as he stretched out next to me. But he couldn’t stifle a moan of his own.
“Not hardly. By the way, I heard that.”
“Heard what?”
“You know. The tired sound of achy old bones.”
“I’m just tired from driving,” he protested. “That road wore me out.”
“Wore you out? At least you could move. I beat my head more times than a boxer.”
“Someday you’ll appreciate the effort it takes to drive a car. It’s not easy.” He chuckled and rolled over. “If you ever get your license.”
“I will. Soon.”
The lack of a quick reply was disconcerting. It wasn’t that I couldn’t. I just needed to practice a little more to take the test. Dad knew that. His silence hinted at something more sinister, probably related to travel permits and other restrictions to keep people off the crumbling roads.
I stared at a ceiling as dark as the world outside, and felt no relief.
“Tomorrow’s a brand new day,” Dad said eventually. “Let’s get some rest.”
With nothing to look at and even less to say, I rolled onto my side. The heavy curtain of sleep descended like mountain fog, and I lost consciousness in the wispy tendrils.
* * *
When morning came, I realized how badly the old church needed curtains. I was bathed in the purple glow of sunlight streaming through stained glass. Austin was next to me with a swath of red giving his black clothes and hair an evil tinge.
Maddie sat up and rubbed her eyes. She was covered in blues and yellows, adding plenty of color to her pale face. Unfortunately, the green mixture didn’t help take away the sickly look.
“Psst. You okay?” I whispered.
She nodded and brushed her hair from her face, only to end up squinting into the sun. She buried her face in her hands and sighed.
I stood up and walked over to a pew where I could sit down and block the sun for her. “Keep sleeping if you want, sis.”
She laid down, but only for a second. With a groan, she kicked herself up and joined me on the bench.
While staring at the floor, she whispered, “This totally sucks.”
“What?” I tried to bury my nagging concerns. “It’s like any other vacation.”
“Exactly. Only worse.”
I pointed to a skillet and a bag of dried breakfast food sitting on the pew across the aisle from us. Mom must’ve unpacked a few things sometime after I’d nodded off. “Look, nothing’s worse than powdered eggs. The green tinge is way creepy.”
Maddie threatened to smile, but turned it into more of a smirk. “It’s not just the eggs.”
With an overdose of fake cheer, I said, “I can make you some pancakes this morning.”
“Take a hint, dude. It’s not just the food.”
“I know, you’re missing Lukey.”
“Very funny.” She slugged me on the shoulder.
I faked injury. She leaned her head on me and I resisted the urge to shove her away. I’d never been a big fan of having my baby sister hang all over me, but it looked like she needed a shoulder.
“I wanna go home, Zach.”
“Yeah, me too.”
Just like that, Katelyn was suddenly back in my thoughts, wishing me a good morning. It was bordering on obsession, and I shook my head to try to clear her away. I needed to stop thinking about her. One month or six, I knew she would move on before I ever got back to town. At least she would have by the time things got back to semi-normal.
Maddie sighed. “I mean what’s the big deal? Can’t we just leave?”
My overactive imaginat
ion dropped out of the clouds, and that brought me low enough to remember the jet zipping overhead last night. “I’m not sure, but I don’t think that’s an option.”
Unexpectedly, I heard the sound of a motor grumbling. I sprang from the pew, leaving a confused Maddie having to throw out an arm to keep herself from falling over.
“Sorry,” I said as I ran down the center aisle for the door to the church.
I pulled the door open just a crack. Metal rattled from the valley below, the sound funneling up the driveway to me.
It seemed like we really were in the clouds. The ground up to shoulder height was mostly clear with a layer of fog settled in on top. The sun was trying its hardest to burn it off, lighting up the windows on the outside of the white, wooden church like a spotlight punching through the haze. I felt dew settle on my arm as I held the door open.
The growing racket reminded me of an old trailer bumping along a gravel road. The louder it became, the more I expected it to crest the hill any second.
A heavy hand slammed onto my shoulder. I jerked around and nearly tumbled out the doorway.
“Sorry, boy,” Dad said. “Didn’t mean to scare you. What’s up?”
I pointed to where the driveway dropped off the hillside. “Something was clunking around on the road down there.” The rattling had rapidly died down, making me wonder if I had been imagining things.
“Hmm, didn’t think we’d be able to hear anything up here.” He scratched the stubble on his chin, not giving any indication that he’d actually heard it. “I guess that’s a good thing.”
“Not if it scares the crap out of us every time someone drives by.”
“I reckon that’s true too.” He spun around only to be greeted by Mom.
“Looks like it’s time to get some breakfast going…then it’s off to work.” She gave Dad a stern look. “We’re not staying here long.”
“I usually like to read the paper before I get moving around,” Dad joked.
“Missing your T-Bills, Harold?”
“No more than you miss putting in an IV.”
She shook her head. “That never was my favorite part of the job.”
“At least your skills could come in handy up here.”
Though his mood grew darker, Mom didn’t seem to notice it. I didn’t like the way he seemed to be predicting the future.
CHAPTER 13
Mom walked over to the kitchen area she’d arranged in the corner of the church. Next to an empty baptismal font, she’d stacked a number of the water jugs. I felt a little guilty that she’d apparently emptied out the rest of the Jeep while I had slept. I knew better than to assume Austin had helped. His eagerness only went so far when physical labor was involved.
While she filled a blackened steel pot, Dad got out a little burner and hooked it to a portable propane bottle.
“We ought to be saving these,” he said.
“We’ll gather wood for cooking fires soon enough,” Mom said. “But we’ll need to be careful about smoke.”
“Is now a good time for a fire?” I asked, remembering the haze hanging across the clearing.
“Probably so.” Mom nodded. “We’ll be outside tomorrow morning.”
“You’re thinking we should get all of our stuff outta here,” Austin said to Mom. He was sitting cross-legged on top of his sleeping bag, scrubbing the sleep from his dark eyes. “Someone’s gonna come check on the building, right?”
I quickly got over my disappointment at agreeing with Austin. We’d driven through other parts of the park before, like the big village of old log cabins in Cades Cove, and there were always park rangers driving around to check on things.
Mom agreed too. “We’re definitely not staying another night inside.”
“What do you think about dropping a tree or rolling some boulders over the driveway?” Dad asked. “That’ll slow ‘em down if they come check.”
“We’re still not staying,” Mom deadpanned.
“It’s not like this is a busy part of the park,” Dad added. “It was a challenge to get back here.”
“You can say that again,” Austin said. He seemed much happier than he normally would’ve been at that time of the morning. It must’ve been the leftover adrenaline talking.
“Besides, the Park Service has been decimated by budget cuts,” Dad added. “I was sorta hoping they’d gated off the whole park by now.”
“Isn’t there still the highway that runs through the middle to Cherokee?” I asked.
Dad brushed off the question. “Other than that, I doubt too many people are around checking on things.”
“Don’t be so sure, Harold.”
“Then I guess we’ll have to do some more exploring.”
“We need to pack up and get the garden started,” Mom said, continuing the ping pong match of strong opinions.
“But not until we’re sure we’re staying here?” Dad countered with more of a question than a statement.
“We’ve scouted this area out enough. It’s a good spot…just not the building.” She lowered her voice until I could barely hear her say, “At least…now. Depends on…meet up…others.”
Every time they mentioned something about how many times they’d picked out that location, it struck a nerve. I had no idea when they’d done it any more than I had any idea that we’d actually needed to do it. I wasn’t the type to whine or shout about being left in the dark, but I couldn’t just sit around either.
“Zach, where you going?” Mom called as I strode toward the door of the church.
I stopped when I noticed Dad’s hunting rifle leaning against the wall next to the door. “Uhm, I’ll be back.”
“Don’t be running off,” Dad said, and it made me think twice about going.
Surprisingly, Maddie shot down the aisle to join me, saying, “I’m going with him. We’ll be back.”
“Harold?” Mom said. I opened the door while we waited for an answer.
There was confidence lacking when he replied, “They’ll be fine. We wanted them to play outside earlier.”
I wouldn’t have ordinarily wanted Maddie tagging along, but I didn’t object. Misery really does love company, so who better to bring along.
We stepped out into the yard to find the fog was burning off quickly. It was a cool morning, though humid as if we were standing inside a cloud. I took a deep breath of mountain air and looked around the clearing.
“Where to?” Maddie asked.
“Anywhere I don’t have to listen to them bicker.”
“Bothering you too, huh?”
“Yeah, it’s gonna be a long winter.”
Maddie’s jaw dropped. She turned to stare at me. I couldn’t remember if she’d been there for the conversation about hiding in the mountains for months, and I instantly felt bad about bringing it up. Rather than explain, I decided to change the subject.
“Let’s look around back.” I walked off to where Dad had parked the Jeep behind the church. “We won’t go too far, just far enough to get away.”
“Alright,” she said tentatively.
At the far end of the church, four short rows of granite monuments poked through the grass like Grandpa’s weathered teeth. A rusty black fence was barely visible above the tall grass of the clearing, but the area inside the fence was in even greater need of mowing. Despite the colonies of ticks and other bloodsuckers waiting for me, I moved like I was drawn by a magnet.
“What an awesome graveyard,” I whispered to myself. For some strange reason, they’d always fascinated me—especially in the daylight. The older, the better.
Maddie held up short of the fence and looked at me with wide eyes as I stepped over it. I mashed my way through waves of grass, heading for the closest headstone.
“Eighteen eighty-five,” I said. “It can’t be the oldest.”
My sister shook her head. I didn’t blame her for not wanting to join me. I’d pay for it later when the chigger bites started itching.
I was right about
the ages. It turned out that 1885 was actually one of the newest. Several of the death dates went back to the early 1800’s. I stood there for a while longer than I should have, thinking about what life was like in those days, back when there might’ve been a few small cabins scattered on the mountainsides around the old church. I smirked when I realized it probably hadn’t been much different than what was in store for us—and I had no desire to relive the pioneer days.
My mother might have been right, I realized. Kids were spoiled. Until most of our family income had disintegrated and the country followed closely behind, I had pretty much every new electronic gadget. It was limitless entertainment at the touch of a button, at least until the new regime took over and started blocking certain apps and websites, and eventually many of the forums that got Dad in trouble.
I had come to expect that I’d have the latest phone, whether I’d asked for it or not. My parents were that good to me. It seemed like they’d wanted to give me all the things that they’d never been able to have when they were kids. But with an added dose of toughness and self-reliance. I could’ve thanked them for trying, even if I had resented it at the time.
I looked up to see Maddie frowning. I didn’t think it was at me, just at the world in general. I decided to quit playing and soon joined her on the other side of the fence.
“Let’s go check over there,” I said, pointing to the Jeep. It was covered in a dark green tarp to supposedly make it less noticeable. But what really caught my eye was an odd shadow at the edge of the woods behind the vehicle.
She shrugged.
“You can go back inside.”
“No, I’m coming.” She followed me like a puppy dog—not the type that would run off into the woods and explore. She was close enough to touch me, which is exactly what happened when I heard the sound of gravel crunching under wheels.
I dropped to a knee and Maddie ran over my back. She planted a hand with a yelp, and I had to catch her before she tumbled onto her side.
“What the heck?” she said as I lowered her to the ground.
“Shhh. Did you hear that?”
Maddie scrubbed at the dirt on her hand. “What?”