The tallest, a teenage girl with what looked to be a baby wrapped in a sling across her chest, looked somewhat familiar, but the two younger kids weren’t ones he recognized. Damned if they didn’t have some floppy-eared mutt leading the way. The dog trotted a yard ahead of the teenager, nose to the ground, ears cocked forward.
Belton wasn’t a large town, but it wasn’t that small either, and he couldn’t see them well enough from the sights of the gun. They looked relatively harmless; certainly not any of those damned Western Front soldiers come to prey on the remains of his beloved town and home. He lowered the rifle, slowly slung it over his shoulders and stood up, stiff from sitting so long in one position. At least the weather was warm, today was only the first day of April, but already the days were in the mid-70s. It was about time to start planting.
Since the invasion, those who were spared had formed an informal militia. They did what they could to watch the entry points to the small town and report in if they saw anything of interest coming their way. He pulled out a sheet of paper, scribbled on it a short message, and reached his hand out to the German Shepherd lying quiet at his feet.
Isa was at his side instantly, perfectly quiet, but her fur raised and stiff. These were strangers, but they were small, similar to the little ones who used to play in the nearby houses each day. Those children were all gone. Isa had smelled some of them, their fear scent, sometimes even the painful death scent, in the days back in the cold time, when they had been taken by the bad men. She missed the little ones. She sniffed the air, smelled the woman-girl and the tiny one cuddled against her, the sharp fun smell of a boy (they were the best for playing with), and a small girl-child beside him. The pup galloped in front of them and the sight of it drew a small territorial growl from the older dog’s throat. Despite the distraction, her attention was still closely focused on her master. Isa knew her place, knew her part in the pack, and waited for orders from the old man she loved so much.
He spoke softly to her as he tucked the note into a small film canister that dangled from her collar, “Isa, go to Farley. Go!” The dog sprang forward, ran down the steep stairs along the side of the building and disappeared around the corner heading west towards the old courthouse.
Thurman followed the dog to the stairs, moving far slower, joints creaking. The nights were still cold and his knees ached fiercely until mid afternoon. He slowly moved down the stairs and off of the roof of the old grocery store. On street level you could still see most of the sign, B—ks Grocers. Thurman had inherited the store from his father, bequeathed it to his son Mark and he guessed he owned it still, though it was bare to the bones now. The shelves were empty, had been half empty that fateful day when the Western Front had blown through. Now both windows were broken and nothing remained within to sell or steal—not even the shelves or cash register. He had washed the blood of his son from the walls and floor and buried him in the cemetery, next to his mother and Mark’s wife Annette. Thurman thanked God and fate and all the rest each day since that his Mary had been gone and buried before that terrible day. It would have killed her to know her only son and daughter-in-law were dead and her precious grandson missing and most likely lost to them as well.
He headed south towards the small group coming in. Farley would be along soon with backup if it was needed. Thurman doubted they were a threat, but Farley was mayor now, and he could make up his mind on that.
Jess was nervous, scared to death, actually. The endless miles they had walked, the dangers, the hunger, just so she could ‘come home’ suddenly seemed so ridiculous and foolhardy. How could she possibly know if Belton had been spared? What if her home was gone and enemy soldiers occupied the town? Serena’s words echoed in her head and David and Tina both looked at her expectantly, even a little frightened. They too wondered quietly, what if this town was no better than the others they had traveled through?
She saw the old man approaching them and recognized him. Thurman Banks lived two blocks to the north of her parent’s home. Old Thurman was Allen’s grandfather and he used to mow the lawn for granddad in the summer then head down to Jess’s house to see his buddy Chris. That old Thurman was alive and here in Belton brought a whoosh of air back into her lungs. She smiled in relief. “Mr. Banks! Oh, Mr. Banks! Do you remember me? I’m Jess Aaronson, Michael and Julie’s daughter.”
“Jessie? My God, Jessica Aaronson,” Thurman was amazed, none of those taken in the first wave had returned, he had written off the children and their parents as dead long ago.
“Where is Chris? Your parents?” He took hold of her and hugged her to him, and then pulled back, “Have you word of my grandson, Allen?”
All of Jess’s hopes crashed and died in that moment. The past seventeen months had been filled with horror, struggle, and even success. My God, she was alive, so were David and Tina and little Jacob. The miracle of that had not escaped her notice. But all along, in the back of Jess’s mind she had clung to the belief that her mom and dad had made it through. They hadn’t been in the camp, but then again, she had never seen Chris, although Allen told her he was there.
She didn’t know when she had decided it, with such Pollyanna certainty, that Mom and Dad were still home in Belton. But she had.
And now it felt as if she had been shot in the chest.
“My parents aren’t here? And Chris and Allen, they didn’t make it back?” Her mind began to spin. She had been so sure, so absolutely sure that Mom and Dad would be here, waiting for her. She had imagined their reunion over and over. Their joy at seeing her, the love they would show Jacob and the surety that she would be safe again, for good, in their arms.
She had imagined too, that Allen and Chris had made it out that night like Allen said they would. Surely they had made it out. Guilt at not helping them, at not having a plan that included them and her and Erin together, it all exploded like fireworks in her head. Her legs felt like rubber and she slowly knelt down on the ground, her brain and heart spinning faster and faster. No Mom. No Dad. No Chris. Erin gone, her blood spilled in an abandoned farmhouse so far from here.
She remembered vomiting what little food she had in her stomach before the world turned to black, first at the edges and then all over. From far away she could hear Tina scream her name and David yell for help as she slumped to the ground.
She was finally home, but those who had made it a home to return to were no longer here. Farley and several others arrived in time to see her pass out on the hard ground.
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And now, here is an excerpt from War’s End: A Brave New World the sequel to War’s End: The Storm
A Café on Main Street
“We overstayed our welcome. We bullied, we pushed, we invaded...and when we were done, when the world had felt our presence in every corner of it, felt our hand on their backs, shoving our way into every aspect of their lives, faiths, even their very existence...we were hated. God, were we hated. In retrospect I can feel no real surprise for what happened next. Our time had come. For our hypocrisy, for our crimes, we each paid such a terribly high price. The world we had known, the nation that our parents had been told to be proud of, a place of fast food and ‘freedom fries’, home of the consumer, center of capitalism, world leader, it all ceased to exist.
It was a slow, painful end, an extended death rattle, as we slowly tore ourselves apart, and then allowed others to finish off what remained. What was left in the wreckage of the world that was? We were. And this is our story, my story, and the story of us all. We have survived. We have found a way to live on...in a world where ghosts haunt us and memories whisper in our ears. Life goes on, one day at a time, and by the skin of our teeth and the force of our will, we will continue. What else can we do?” – Jess’s Journal
“Drink it slow,” an unfamiliar face in the crowd swam into focus.
The woman’s face was prematurely aged, her brown hair streaked liberally with gray. Her brown eyes crinkled at the edges as she smiled at Jess. Jess blinked and accepted the steaming mug offered. She was sitting in a café, at a battered little table right across the street from Banks Grocers. It had been the last place she had stood before being ripped from Belton some seventeen months earlier. She couldn’t see it right now; too many people were blocking the way, staring in through the window, staring at her. Some looked vaguely familiar, but most were strangers. The café, dimly lit, and packed full of the mayor, Mr. Banks, and far too many others, was charged with excitement. Jess’s fingers nervously traced the cracked Formica top of the table and tried to will away the rising anxiety. She hadn’t seen this many people in a long time. God, they were close, so close; she could barely breathe.
Tina had scrambled under a table and buried her face in David’s leg as he stood awkwardly. The little girl was shaking like a leaf. It had been a very long time since Tina had seen this many people in one place. David, his dark hair disheveled, a smudge of dirt on his cheek, wasn’t doing much better. He kept attempting to move closer to Jess, seeking some amount of space between this overwhelming mass of strangers and him. Quincy stood at attention, glued to Jess’s side, eyeing the crowd warily.
Another mug appeared before David, who sat down awkwardly, his sister wrapped around his leg, clinging to him with a tenacity that would rival that of a lamprey eel.
The same woman who had spoken to Jess lightly touched his shoulder, “Would the little girl like anything? I might have a packet of hot chocolate here somewhere.”
David shook his head, “No thank you, ma’am. I’ll just try and get her to drink out of my cup in a minute or two.”
The woman nodded and smiled again before slipping back behind the counter, giving up the space to Todd Stevens, the militia leader, Mayor Farley, and old Mr. Banks, who had, after all, been the one to discover them in the first place.
Jacob mouthed a hard, dense biscuit.
Madge had shown Jess how to make them, pointing out their uses, saying, “They are good for traveling, since they never go bad, and when Mi’-da-in-ga begins teething, they will give him something to chew on.” She had winked at Jess, “Believe me, Mi’-na, they are worth the trouble to make.”
As with everything else she had taught them along the way, she had been right about this. The biscuits had provided countless boosts of energy, propelling Jess, David, and Tina down miles of road and kept Jacob from fussing. One tooth nub was finally poking through his little gums, with a second not far behind, and the edge of the sling was now dingy and encrusted with biscuit slime.
Mayor Farley and Mr. Banks had sat down in chairs around the small table. Jess thought that Mr. Banks looked much older than she remembered him. His hair was a shock of white and hadn’t been cut in a while. The mayor, who had once been obese and shaped like a big round ball with skinny legs and possessing an overly large red nose, was now rather lanky, the extra skin hung in folds, but his nose was as red and large as ever. As she looked around the room, Jess couldn’t see anyone who was overly large. The mayor spoke first.
“Now, you are, hmm, Angelica?”
Jess shook her head and Thurman Banks spoke up, “This here is Jessie, Michael and Julie’s daughter.” He said, correcting Mayor Farley’s mistake, “You remember Julie baked bread, taught classes, and helped organize the farmer’s market. Before the...” He looked distinctly uncomfortable, “Well...you know.”
Jess could see by the slightly blank look on the mayor’s face, who she still thought of as the president of Congress Bank, where Mom and Dad had had all of their accounts, that he didn’t remember her mother at all.
“Of course, Ang...err...Jessie,” he smiled at her broadly, before turning his attention to David and Tina, “But who are these children? And this baby there?”
“This is my son, Jacob,” Jess answered without any further explanation on that topic, “This is David and Tina Farnsworth. They are from Clinton.”
“Your son?” The mayor blinked, looking scandalized. “And the father of the child?”
Jess felt a quiver of anger run through her, “He has none.”
“I see.” The mayor’s voice definitely held a tone of disapproval now.
Mr. Banks, who understood far better than Mayor Farley put a hand on Jess’s thin shoulder. He could feel her bones sticking sharply through the fabric and he suppressed a surge of fury at the mayor’s lack of tact. Here was one of their lost children, who had gone through God knows what, returning to find only disappointment and misunderstanding.
“One of our own, everyone, Jessica and her family have traveled a long way to return home again.” He said it loudly, so it would carry to the crowd outside, and he emphasized the words “family” and “home.” He had long suspected the mayor was an officious, small-minded fool, and Farley was proving him right by leaps and bounds.
“What Jess and the kids need right now are food, a safe place to rest, and some time to settle in.”
He ignored the mayor, who was trying to hush him and muttering something about the two younger kids not belonging.
He looked around at the crowd expectantly, “I think we can give them a good home-cooked meal while Todd goes and scouts out the Aaronson house to see what shape it’s in.”
Todd Stevens, who had been watching this whole exchange, nodded and stood up.
“I’ll go and do that right now. What’s the address?”
Jess found herself stumped at such a simple request. Her address? When was the last time someone had asked for that? She closed her eyes at the memory of those tents, the group of men sorting the prisoners.
Name? Family?
But even they hadn’t asked for an address. It seemed so immensely mundane, so normal, that her mind just went blank for several long seconds before memory kicked in. She rattled it off to him and he nodded, gave her a small encouraging smile, and slipped away through the crowd.
They could hear Sarah, the woman who had given Jess and David the steaming mugs of tea, talking in the kitchen of the small café, issuing directions to a young woman a year or two younger than Jess. Wonderful, mouth-watering smells began to waft their way and the kids’ stomachs began to rumble painfully. Jess was so grateful for old Mr. Banks’s intercession that she could barely speak. And then, of course, she remembered Allen, and his visit to Tent Five, the first and last time she had ever seen him since she had left Belton.
She turned to the old man, leaning close so that the others could not hear, and said, “About Allen, Mr. Banks.”
He set a large, callused hand over hers and shook his grizzled head, “Not now, Jessie. Later. You tell me later, all right?”
He could see from the look on her face that it was unlikely his grandson would ever return home. Despite wanting to know, even if the details hurt, he couldn’t bear it in front of such a large crowd. Better to keep his grief close and to care for the living. The girl had obviously been through terrible trauma. And from the wary look on the boy’s face, he and his sister had as well.
“Right now we need to get you all fed and a place set up to sleep for the night. I’m assuming you all want to stay together?” Jess and David nodded.
“Okay, I’ll see what I can do.”
Farley, who had been quiet far too long, felt the need to intercede.
“Now Ang...I mean Jessica, whe
re exactly have you been all this time? In Clinton?”
“No sir, Clinton is in ruins, although there continues to be a lot of fighting and different troops moving through there,” Jess answered. “I was held by the Western Front until a year ago. I escaped with Erin McGowen, discovered David and Tina in Clinton, where Jacob was born, and we over-wintered in a cave near Truman Lake before heading back through Clinton and up Highway 71.”
“A cave? You lived in a cave?” The mayor looked incredulous.
He would have said more, but at that moment the food arrived. Two large plates were set in front of Jess and David. There were eggs, thick slices of homemade bread with butter and a dollop of homemade jam, and slices of bacon still sizzling.
Jess winced as her empty stomach rolled ominously, reminding her of how she had just been sick not an hour before, and also that she hadn’t had such rich food in a long while. Sarah Turner stood near her, her brown eyes soft and kind.
“Is the food too much for you, dear? Do you need something simpler?” David had already inhaled nearly half of the plate before remembering to offer a slice of bacon to his sister, who had folded herself neatly under his chair.
“I, um,” Jess didn’t want to be rude, but she felt exhausted. From hunger, from stress, and from the fear that her stomach would not be able to hold down anything she put into it right now.
Sarah patted Jess on the shoulder, “Don’t you worry, honey. I’ll scrounge up some oatmeal for you that should settle your stomach.”
She bustled off and Jess slid her plate toward David and Tina. The offer of a slice of bacon had been enough to lure the little girl from under her brother’s chair and a grubby set of fingers snatched at a piece of the toast while David eagerly cut into the eggs. Quincy whined once, licking Jess’s fingers, and she offered the dog a piece of her bacon.
The Storm: War's End, #1 Page 31