A Brave New World: War's End, #2

by Christine D. Shuck

  Jess turned and gave him ‘the look.’ “Well then, perhaps, young Jacob, you should stay here with me and help with laundry and still have plenty of time for your lessons afterwards. It seems to me that you should be farther along in that book by now, and your math needs work too.”

  Jacob practically stumbled over himself getting his objections out, in the end it was a wail, “But Mom!”

  She raised an eyebrow, “So I can depend on you being back by sundown?” He nodded excitedly. “Glad to hear it. Now be sure to pack a lunch for the two of you while breakfast gets cooked and wear your warm wool socks that I made you.” As he prepared to launch himself like a rocket into the living room and on through into his bedroom she called out in a loud whisper, “And quietly! Becka’s still sleeping!”

  Saying Goodbye

  “I can’t stay here. It isn’t home without him. Chris will say, ‘What about our babies?’ And what about our babies? Our babies are gone, gone before they drew their first breaths. If I stay, here where I have lost so much, I will taste the ashes of regret in my mouth forever.” – Carrie’s Journal

  The little graveyard didn’t have much room left. Not with its newest addition. And unlike the four previous, mostly private, ceremonies, this one was well attended. Practically everyone in Tiptonville was here. Carl had whispered to Chris that they had even shut down the Trade Mart for the day.

  To the right stood Joseph, looking quite tall and somber for his fourteen years. Beside him, seated in a well-padded chair with a blanket was Mr. Liles. The man was 116 years old and looked so frail and thin that Chris feared a stiff breeze would blow him away. His rheumy eyes watered and he clutched a much-abused handkerchief in one hand while the other plucked randomly at the blanket that swaddled him. Joseph said that Mr. Liles slept a lot these days and ate little.

  The teen had volunteered to stay with the old man after a recent fall had left him weak and fragile. Joseph had developed a knack for working with motors and he had begun helping out Mr. Liles a few years earlier in the shop. Now he stayed and cared for the old man, fixed meals, and made sure the stove stayed lit. He also manned the store and helped the infrequent customer.

  Despite the attention, Mr. Liles had declined steadily during Fenton’s illness. Chris wondered what it must be like to outlive your children, your grandchildren, and to see your friends pass before you. How many funerals had Mr. Liles attended? How many goodbyes?

  Liza and Carl, along with their three children, Molly, John and little Abby, stood on the left. Liza’s face was a mask of grief, her eyes red-rimmed, and her nose blotchy. She would not cry, however, in front of the children. Abby, not quite two years old, wriggled in her arms, itching to be set down so she could run through the tall grass. Little John, just three and a half years old, stood holding his dad’s hand and looked puzzled by all the people and the mournful tone in the air. Molly Ann, who would be six in less than two weeks, clutched Carl’s other side, her tiny face sad. She had been Fenton’s favorite, the first of his great-grandchildren and he had doted on her.

  Outside of immediate family and Mr. Liles, it appeared that the rest of Tiptonville stood outside of the waist-high metal gates. Everyone wore black armbands. Mrs. Jennings, the town librarian, stood close to the fence, grasped it with one frail hand, and wept softly into her handkerchief.

  Reverend Deeds stepped forward, leaning heavily on his cane with one hand, the other arm around his young wife, Grace. He opened a well-worn Bible riddled with tabs and papers marking different passages.

  Carrie leaned against Chris. She had miscarried just a week before, and was still weak and tired. She closed her eyes, trying to stop the tears from sliding down her face.

  Gramps had suffered for so long, and Liza had done everything she could. In another time, when the world had been whole, Gramps could have had bypass surgery. The doctors would have been able to open him up, clean out the clogged chambers, and give him a decade more.

  But that time, like the country they had long identified with, was gone. The recovery and founding of the new nation was taking its time. This had all taken too long for Fenton. This life they led was harder, with no time for the weak or the sick to heal. Not when there were fields to be plowed or the basic necessities to be met. Slowly, his heart had reduced his ability to walk very far or exert himself in much of any way.

  There were rumblings of a Reformation, now that the Second American Civil War was officially over. Life was slowly going back to normal. However, that seemed to be happening with more speed on the east and west coasts, not here, not in Tennessee, or even the larger southern cities. The citizens of Tiptonville, along with so many other small towns, were still on their own.

  It had been a difficult thing to see, watching Fenton slowly succumb to heart disease. It had been especially hard for Liza, there in the house, pulled in so many directions. She had three small children, the duties of the farm and the townspeople, who now regularly visited for their doctoring needs.

  Jeremy—Carrie still had a hard time thinking of him as Reverend Deeds—stepped forward and began to speak.

  “We are gathered here today in memory of our friend, a beloved grandfather and member of this community, Fenton Perdue.” He opened it to a marked page and began the sermon, “Jesus tells us that we will know not the hour of our death...”

  Carrie’s attention wandered from Jeremy to the markers in the small family cemetery. Her gaze came to rest on her father’s and mother’s graves. Her heart ached at the memory of them, especially her mother, Amy.

  That last time she had seen her she had been in the hospital bed looking so thin, so insubstantial. Carrie had been afraid to hug her, afraid that Joseph, who had just begun crawling, would hurt his frail mother as he wiggled in her arms. It had been three days before Thanksgiving and the hospital reeked of turkey and disinfectant, an unpleasant and disconcerting combination.

  Fenton had stepped out of the room with Liza and baby Joseph to get a bite to eat at the cafeteria and Amy had beckoned her daughter closer. “Carrie, sweetheart, come here.” Her bony fingers were cold in Carrie’s hand. A tear trickled down her mother’s pale cheek. “You are so beautiful and I love you so much. You know that, don’t you?”

  Carrie had nodded, unable to say anything. There are moments when you know it, whether the words have been said or not, that things are not going to get better, that life will never be the same again. Dad was gone and now Mom was dying too. Carrie could see there was little time left, but her voice seemed to have deserted her. She wanted to tell Mom everything and beg her not to leave, to just fight harder.

  “Carrie, sweetie, your sister and little brother need you right now. Even Gramps needs you. And these next few weeks and months will be hard. I know they have already been hard and that you feel lost and scared right now.” Her mother stopped, struggled to breathe, and then continued, “Someday though, someday you will find love. You will make a family of your own and you will have babies and you will laugh and love. Promise me that you will do these things—that you won’t wait for the perfect moment—but jump into life and live it and love every moment of it. Promise me that you will find happiness and that when the time comes to leave, you will do it, and you will go where you need to go and be who you need to be.”

  Carrie nodded, her eyes full of tears, “I promise Mom.” A moment passed before Carrie mustered the courage to admit, “I stole five dollars from Dad’s wallet the day before...the day...” her voice faltered.

  Her mother managed a small chuckle. “I know you did. Your dad told me.” She squeezed Carrie’s hand with remarkable strength. “Anything else you want to confess?” she asked, her voice cracking with the effort.

  Carrie struggled for a moment to form the words, “I blamed Joseph at first. For making you weak, for making you get sick. But...I know it isn’t his fault and I promise I will be a good sister and not fight with him or Liza.” She could see her mom slipping into sleep, exhausted from their brief discussio
n. “I love you, Mom.”

  Jeremy’s words interrupted Carrie’s reverie, “Even though I walk through the shadow of the valley of death I will fear no evil, for thou art with me.” He continued the Lord’s prayer, and she could hear the others murmuring it softly all around her.

  Gramps had loved them, grouched at them, guided them...and now he was gone. The memory of her mother’s words fell like arrows on her heart. Jump into life and live it and love every moment of it. What had she been doing?

  Carrie couldn’t help but feel she had ignored her mother’s advice, at least some of it. She had found love and embraced that, but she had somehow lost her way on the rest. As the coffin was slowly lowered into the ground, and her tears, along with many others’, flowed freely, Carrie could not shake the feeling.

  Somehow, I need to change. Somehow, I need to be more than I am right now.

  Love Finds Us

  They say, those soft-spoken romantics, that love finds you when you least expect it. Somehow sneaking up behind you after all of that loneliness and searching. It hits you dead on in your brain-pan and touches your very soul. It sucks you in and steals your heart. It is a moment when you are looking down at the ground, trudging forward, innocently aware that fate is coming down the highway, barreling along, making time, a load of bricks on its back. This deep and great love, it takes you and sweeps you away with no regrets or time for compromise. – Christine Shuck

  In the end it was really Satan’s fault. If it hadn’t been for that awful creature, and a very bloody finger, who knows how long it might have been before Jess realized that she was in love with David and he with her? So in the end, that damned goat got to live, despite her violent tendencies.

  Satan grunted and her bloated stomach convulsed and twisted. David stared at the rear of the animal, “I think I see the head!”

  Jacob sidled up next to him and stared as well, “Oh gross! That is so cool!”

  Jess had had enough of everyone. “Out! Out!” she ordered Erin and Jacob. Satan had been laboring for well over four hours now and Jess had missed breakfast and lunch and was hungry and cross and done with the circus act the pregnant goat seemed to be putting on.

  David eyed her warily, “You all right?”

  She just glared in return and eyed the retreating kids. Jacob foolishly spoke, half inside the sanctuary of the house, half of him still in reach, “But Mom, I...”

  “I said OUT!” The door slammed shut and she relaxed somewhat and turned back to Satan. “This effin’ goat had better have a girl this time.”

  “Still going to turn her into stew?”

  “You’re damned straight I am!” Despite her tough words, she stroked the pregnant goat as the kid’s head slowly began to emerge. “C’mon Satan, you can do it!”

  Out slithered a kid, covered with blood and definitely, oh quite definitely, another damn male. Jess cussed low and furious. “Damn you, Satan, another boy?”

  The goat’s stomach convulsed and writhed again. David stopped staring at Jess’s tousled blond hair and turned back to the goat. A few seconds later he was holding a tiny, damp newborn kid and grinning.

  “Looks like a girl to me!” Satan made a strange sound and David’s grin slipped as he stared at Satan’s rear in puzzlement.

  “What is it?” Jess asked, sounding concerned.

  “I...uh...think she’s having triplets!”

  “You are shitting me.” David arched an eyebrow in mock shock. It was a rare thing to hear Jess curse and she was always after him to watch what he said in front of the kids.

  “No...I’m uh...ah crap, here it comes!” David shoved the slimy, damp newborn kid into Jess’s arms and reached up in time to catch the third one before it slid out onto the hard concrete. He examined it quickly and looked up with a grin, “Would you believe it’s another girl?”

  As if sensing her days were numbered, Satan reached back and bit down hard on the hand resting near her flank. Jess dropped the floundering newborn kid and recoiled away from the vicious animal. Blood flowed freely, and brought tears of pain into Jess’s eyes. “Oh damn it all to hell, that really hurts!”

  David was at her side in an instant, applying pressure and wrapping the finger in a clean cloth. They had a pile of them there on the floor for toweling off the newborn kids.

  The minute he touched her, smelled her hair near his face, it made him crazy. And today was no different. He’d been avoiding being alone with her for weeks now. It was just too much, these feelings he had when she was nearby. The slightest touch, the smell of her, even her smile—and his body would vibrate from deep inside.

  And all the while he wondered if she even knew how much he wanted her. At first he had told himself he was just horny. It was natural, normal, and they weren’t related after all. But it seemed as if they had known each other forever. He told himself that she couldn’t see him that way, because he was younger and she’d taken care of him when they first met.

  He’d only been eleven and her fifteen and pregnant and both of them as lonely and scared as could be. For years he’d thought of her just like that, just like the moment they had met. A big sister figure, alone, just like him and Tina.

  But something had changed. First the dreams had come, bringing visions of soft lips, deep blue eyes, fantasies of her lying naked in his arms. After a few of those dreams and blushing furiously when he looked at her across from him at the breakfast table, he’d headed east on a week-long hunting trip hoping to get his head (both of them) screwed on straight. Along the way he had found Elle Beringer alone picking mushrooms in the woods and she’d showed him what he’d only dreamed and fantasized about. It had taken the edge off for a while.

  Whenever it got bad, he went on another hunting trip and looked up Elle at her cabin where she lived alone and traded mushrooms and wild carrots for some fresh goat’s milk or eggs. She’d asked him to stay once, and he was tempted—the sex was phenomenal—but something kept pulling him back to the little house in Belton.

  One day, after many months away, he’d stopped by Elle’s to find her with a swelled pregnant belly and a man by her side. The tiny cabin had doubled in size, new wood gleaming in the sun. Elle was a good woman; he was glad to see her settled and happy. She introduced her man, Mike, and they sat and ate supper together before parting ways.

  “You’re a million miles away,” Jess’s voice brought him back to reality, his face inches from hers, “you okay?”

  He looked into her eyes, they were a deep crayon blue, and before his brain could come up with a million reasons not to, he leaned in, reached one hand up into her soft blond hair and pulled her close and kissed her. The kiss lasted several seconds, her lips were soft and she made a quiet almost purring sound in the back of her throat. He found it to be incredibly sexy.

  When they broke apart he was terrified to even look her in the eye. What if he looked up and saw pity? What if he saw a look that said ‘sister’ or ‘friend’ and not lover? He had wanted to kiss her, to know the feel of her skin and lips against his own for so long. He could not bear the thought of her not wanting him back.

  Jess was stunned by the kiss. More than anything, she was shocked by her response to it. Her whole body thrummed! She had avoided men for so long, kept herself safe by sticking to the family, hiding behind the children and their needs in order to never have to be attractive or attracted to another man for the rest of her life. So why did she want to grab him by the shirt, pull him back up against her, and have him kiss her again like that?

  At that moment, the door to the garage opened and saved them both from whatever foolish words they might have uttered next.

  Jacob flew into the room, “Oh wow! THREE baby goats. Satan had triplets!!!!”

  Becka was at his heels, bouncing up and down, and Erin followed silently. Although she could speak, she still chose silence more often than not. Old habits die hard. Jess and David had practically jumped apart when the door opened and while Jacob had eyes only for the newborn k
ids, little Erin gave them a once over and smiled secretively at them before turning her attention to the newborns. She was a perceptive little girl.

  The rest of the day was consumed with cleaning up the afterbirth and making sure all three newborns were nursing well. Satan was looking fine, despite the strain of multiple offspring, and Apple kept his distance from the tiny family unit after Satan bit his neck when he sniffed the newborns.

  Jacob was singing some impromptu song about goat curry, stopping only to ask what exactly curry was and Becka had asked to name the newborns Damien, Lucifer, and Beelzebub. When reminded that Lucifer and Beelzebub were both male names she was quick to note that angels were androgynous and after all, and that Satan wasn’t particularly a girl’s name either. So the names stuck.

  In later years, their names would prove to be frighteningly accurate. Both girls took after their mother and exceeded her in viciousness. Damien ended up being the gentle one. Lucifer and Beelzebub ended up in the stewpot long before their mother did.

  Jess and David avoided each other’s eyes and busied themselves with chores and dinner and cleaning. Jacob and Erin ran and played for most of the day outside and fell asleep, dead asleep, in the middle of the living room floor by the fourth page in the book Jess had begun reading to them, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. Jess’s voice faded to a whisper as she surveyed the limp bodies at her feet. They were wrapped in blankets and breathing even and deep.

  She raised her gaze to meet David’s. He had been staring at her steadily for the past ten minutes, slowly convincing himself that she hadn’t said “no” to that kiss, she had even touched his hand lightly, caressingly, earlier when asking him to pass the salt. She smiled at him nervously, broke eye contact, and stood up. Negotiating around the limp sleeping bodies was difficult; the floorboards creaked noisily and caused Jacob to shift and mutter in his sleep. Jess negotiated her way to the dark hallway and the open door to her bedroom. Her heart gave a thump of surprise as she realized that David was inches from her.