by Holly Ardent
“So, do you have any skills that would be useful for a group?” he asked.
She stopped drinking and paused to think, her head cocked at an angle.
“I don't know. I can cook, you know, like from scratch? And I can do it for lots of people. I used to cook for six people all the time.”
“That's good, anything else?”
“I can sew. By hand I mean. Don't need a machine or anything.”
He glanced at her coat dubiously.
“Yeah, I sewed that, but you don't need to look at it like that. You try sewing four different fabrics together when the edges aren't in so good a shape because you just trimmed the burnt parts off of them.”
I have absolutely no idea how difficult that would be, but it sounds like it would be. I don't want to ask the other women though. I want to spring this as a fait accompli if I manage it.
“Okay, I'll take your word for that. One other thing, where's your stuff? We've got a truck, but there might not be a lot of room left in it for more gear.”
“You're looking at it. Everything I still own I have on me, unless you count a quarter acre lot filled with burnt down rubble. I guess that's mine now too.”
Bill's jaw dropped open.
She said her house burned down with everything, but to have nothing other than the clothes on your back?
“So, is there anything else you're good at?” he asked. “Something you might need tools for or something? I know we have needles and thread, and we have cooking gear.”
“The only other things I've been told I'm good at aren't exactly a... group type of thing. You know?” she said.
Whoa, hold on, wait a second. I think she just made some sexual innuendo. I wonder if that was her trying a pass at me, trying to convince me to take her on? Hell, I hope it was, that'll make this a hell of a lot easier.
“Well, that's good then. The additional duties for me aren't exactly a group type of thing either,” he replied.
She looked up at him then, actually studying his face.
“Okay then,” she said.
After she spoke, her hands went to the top of her coat and she loosened several fasteners, letting the coat swing open. He could understand why she constantly wore the coat fastened all the way up when he saw what she was wearing beneath it. Silky style pajamas, much the worse for wear, shone in the light when she opened up her coat. But what caught his attention was the fact that she looked like she was starving except, somehow, for her tits, which looked massive on her gaunt form.
After she'd let him get a good look, she started redoing the fasteners.
“That's all you have to wear?” he asked.
She nodded.
“Well then, cooking and sewing will have to do for group skills. But let's get you some more clothes, and maybe fabric so you can sew more than the ones we get for you?” he said.
“I can do that, but I would like to have some real clothes again.”
Bill led her out into the main area of the park where people had their blankets spread. There were a couple of the clued-in people who'd had clothing displayed. To his eye it had looked like clothes set aside for their children as they grew up. He wasn't sure if they'd just grown already, not been home when things went to shit, or died. He wasn't going to ask either, better to not pull any negative memories up for the people he was going to try bartering with.
Gina wasn't very large. He guessed her age as late twenties or early thirties, but she had the stature of an older teen, aside from her breasts. He was guessing that they weren't going to find any bras to fit her, but a little voice in his head told him that that was just fine because he could enjoy watching her moving around without one.
He thought that maybe, if they were as clued in as he thought, he might be able to get away with paying with silver instead of barter. If they were looking for anything specific though, he didn't know if he'd be able to supply it. He hadn't brought much in the way of barter.
He'd stocked a mixture of hygiene items and vacuum sealed foods like beef jerky for bartering, along with a few multi-packs of lighters. He had a little bit of each of them with him, having thought that he might need to barter for some small items, but nothing like full sets of clothing. With a sigh, he set to bartering.
Gina hung behind him, pointing out the things she thought might fit that she liked. It only took a couple of minutes until they had a pile of items on the edge of the blanket.
“That should do it,” Bill said. “What are you looking for?”
The older man who owned the blanket and the items on it looked at him, then peered at Gina behind them.
“Is that you Gina lass?” he asked.
She nodded.
“This is all for her then? Just make me an offer, if it's reasonable I'll take it. I'll help the poor girl out since she's had a hard time of it. I'd heard she just up and disappeared after her place burned down. There were a few folks who were wondering where she'd gone.”
“I hid because I ain't gonna take any charity. These clothes are going to be part payment for work.”
The old man's eyebrows raised as he looked at Bill.
“I've got a group of people,” Bill said. “Gina said she can cook for a group and sew. While we do have some others that can do those things, they have other more important skills we can make better use of if Gina is doing the cooking and sewing.”
Not gonna mention her comment about having some non-group related skills also. That'll be no-one's business but mine and hers if she meant what I think she did, he thought.
The old man nodded his head.
“Okay then, what's your offer?” the old man said.
“Is there anything you need? I'd like to make it as fair as possible. Or I could pay you with silver coins, old junk silver ones from before 1965.”
“Sounds fair. What've you got besides the silver. Maybe a mix of barter and cold hard cash would work best.”
After a few minutes Bill handed over four silver quarters, two travel sized bottles of shampoo, two bars of soap and five packs of beef jerky.
Wow, if that's going cheap for Gina I'd hate to find out how much I would've paid otherwise, he thought.
“You want to change now?” he asked.
“That depends. These are clean, I'm not. Do you have a shower or something back at your place?” she asked.
“Yes, yes we do.”
“Then I'd rather wait until I'm clean to put these on.”
They wandered the place and found that not only were there no bras in her size around, there was no-one trading bras at all.
Either they went fast or they're holding onto those for some reason, Bill thought. Either way, it's not a problem for me. I'll like watching her walk around without one. Call me a lech, but bouncing boobies just rock!
By the time they were done looking around Bill thought it was probably close to the time they'd all agreed upon to leave. So he led Gina back towards the truck. When he got there, he found the others chattering excitedly. Evidently their reusable pad idea had been a massive hit and they'd gotten everything they wanted, plus more.
Gina hid behind Bill as they approached. Now, he could watch the others being affectionate with one another and not be nearly as jealous as he'd been recently. They quieted as he approached, looking at him.
Actually, looking behind me, Bill thought after noticing exactly where their gazes were focused.
“This is Gina, she'll be coming to the Retreat,” Bill said. “She's going to take care of the cooking so Suzie can help Scott out with defense of the place, and do her welding as needed. She also sews and since you ladies were talking about making more of those pads, which seem to have been very popular from what I heard walking up, she can help out with that as well.”
His face was stony as he spoke, and stayed that way when he was done. He waited for the objections he was sure were about to follow, but instead Jackie and Vivian started asking Gina questions about sewing. When they found out that she could s
ew clothing if she had the materials for it, their questions started ranging much wider.
Bill listened and discovered that Gina was actually older than he'd thought, in her mid-thirties. She'd been married and had a couple of kids, but when her husband divorced her he got custody. According to her it was because her husband was buddies with the judge, who hadn't recused himself because of it.
She'd moved back in with her parents, who'd subsequently died when the house caught on fire while all of them were sick with bird flu. Gina hadn't thought her mom was going to pull through, she'd been in bad shape, but it became a moot point when her father had stoked the wood stove with too many logs before going to sleep. From what she could tell a few days later when everything had cooled, he hadn't managed to close the wood stove door all the way and sparks popping out through the open door had set the house on fire.
When Gina finished relating all of that, piece by piece extracted by Vivian and Jackie, she fell silent for a moment before bursting into tears. Jackie gathered her into her arms, comforting her. Bill felt like a bit of a heel, not having realized just what an emotional burden she'd been keeping in, but even so he still felt as though they should get moving. The light was starting to fade and if they waited much longer it would be dark before they got back to the Retreat.
He caught Vivian's eye, looked at Gina then nodded towards the back of the truck. Vivian took her attention away from Gina and looked around, then nodded at Bill.
“Come on, we've got to get moving if we're going to make it back before dark,” she said.
“I'm sorry,” Gina said, straightening. She wiped her face with the mismatched fabric of her coat then apparently simply willed herself to stop crying, but not before Bill saw the pain and anguish on her face and felt like even more of a heel due to his plans for her.
This time Bill left the cab to Ted and Vivian alone, the other four of them climbing into the back of the truck along with their acquisitions. When Bill sat down, Gina scooted over near him and leaned her head against his chest.
“Thank you for this,” she said.
“Umm, you're welcome?” he replied.
Once the truck was out of town it was impossible to speak to each other over the sound of the rushing wind. But Ted made quick work of the drive home. He'd been cautious and moving slower than normal on the way in, not knowing what condition the road was in, but having driven it earlier in the day, he applied a lot more speed on the drive home. They made it to the Retreat with about ten minutes to spare until full dark.
* * *
Suzie had dinner ready and waiting for all of them, but Gina shook her head and whispered in Bill's ear.
“Show me where the shower is first so I can get clean. I don't want them to remember me like I am now, let me get clean and into some of those clothes you got me, then I'll sit down. I'm sure they're going to want to grill me some more and I want to be comfortable while they do.”
Bill led her to the large bathroom on the main floor. She looked at the dual tub/shower and almost cried again.
“Can I soak too?” she asked.
“How about a shower to get clean now and you can soak later on?” he replied.
She nodded and, ignoring the fact he was there, stripped off her coat, then her pajamas. His cock instantly sprang erect when he saw her tits. They were just as huge as he'd thought before, capped with short, thick nipples at least as big around as his thumb. He stood there for a moment, staring, before she looked up at him.
“Good, you like what you see?” she asked.
“I'm sorry, I should really turn around, or go, or something.”
“Why, you don't like it?” she asked. “I was pretty sure you said something about me having some duties for you also and couldn't possibly imagine what else you'd be talking about.”
He found he couldn't meet her eyes. As his own darted about the room, he thought of a saving grace.
“Everything you might need for your shower is in here,” he said, opening a cabinet. “There's soap and shampoo in the shower already, but if you want a razor or shaving cream, you'll find those here. I'll see you when you come down to dinner, alright?”
Not waiting for her response, he turned and bolted from the bathroom, closing the door behind him.
Twenty minutes later Gina showed up in the dining room. Everyone else, except for Scott who was on watch, was there. The women had been talking about Gina, much to Bill's dismay, with Suzie asking quite a few questions of the others since she hadn't met Gina yet.
Bill was talking with Andy and Ted, trying to convince them of the wisdom of bringing Gina in.
“I'm telling you, Suzie's other skills are a lot more valuable than cooking, so if Gina takes over the cooking it'll be for the better,” Bill said.
“Well, we still don't know how well she cooks, so you can't be making that claim yet,” Ted replied.
“That's like saying just because we haven't had a medical emergency yet we don't know that Vivian's claims are true. You heard the women back at the fair, just before we left. They were asking all sorts of questions. Mostly about sewing, but I heard a few cooking ones in there. I imagine Suzie would have better questions about that, but she wasn't there.”
“Yeah, and this sewing thing? You think that's worth it?” Andy asked.
“You know how to patch a pair of jeans Andy? I don't. I'm sure some of the other women do, but which one do you want to take away from their primary duties to do it? Or do you want them to use some of their free time for that? I seem to recall that their free time is kind of taken up already, now isn't it?”
Gina walked in on the tail end of his statement. Bill glanced at Jackie, then back at Andy to make his point. Andy blushed and dropped his head.
Bill looked over at Gina and motioned her over. He watched as she approached. The way she looked, freshly scrubbed and in clean clothes, made a huge difference. He found himself glad that she was the one he'd picked.
“Hey, these guys are worried you're scamming them when you say you can cook. Would you mind chatting with Suzie? She's been doing all the cooking and they've had no complaints, so I imagine if you talk with her and she vouches for you they might shut up about it.”
“I can do that,” Gina said, “or, if you don't mind me using some ingredients I can prove it beyond a shadow of a doubt. Just as soon as I eat first.”
“What do you want to make?” he asked.
She shrugged.
“That will depend on what ingredients you have available, won't it?”
Bill motioned to the pantry.
“Be my guest,” he said.
She sat down at the plate that had been left in place for her and proceeded to quickly eat small portions of everything that was on it. After a couple of minutes she pushed the plate away.
“I haven't been eating much recently so I think I'd better stop there,” she said.
Then she got up and headed for the pantry.
Suzie noticed Gina walking into the pantry and waved her hand to silence the other two women. She went into the pantry herself and the sound of soft voices came out the door. The clatter and clink of bottles and cans getting moved around accompanied the voices and when the two of them came out, Suzie was smiling. Gina had a satisfied look on her face as she set down an armload of ingredients on the counter.
She turned and asked Suzie something, who pointed at a cabinet. Soon the two of them were baking something and half an hour later an incredible smell was wafting from the oven.
“I can't believe you still have electricity,” Gina said to Bill.
She'd come back over to make small talk while her proof was baking. Bill wasn't good at small talk, so she'd been carrying the conversation. But when she mentioned the electricity he finally started opening up. Since he was one that had made sure they'd have it, he was justifiably proud of his accomplishment in that area.
“Yeah, we wouldn't, the grid power went down here weeks back, but I set up solar panels and a battery
bank to supply the Retreat. Unless we get a week's worth of totally cloudy days in a row we should be able to keep using most of the electrical appliances we've got.”
As they continued to chat, the timer on the oven went off. Gina got up and went over to it, pulling out a pair of cookie sheets that had rolls of dough on them. Each one was about the size of full head of garlic and the smell of cinnamon and sugar that wafted from them was heavenly.
She moved them to a plate, then put the plate on the table and gestured to it with 'help yourself' sweep of the hand.
“I'm glad you had that butter flavored shortening. They won't be quite as good without the real butter, but they should do okay,” she told Bill.
She picked up one of her pastry rolls and handed it to him. He took a deep sniff over it, savoring the aromas. When he bit into it the pastry was flaky, delicious, and hot. Even blowing on it before biting into it hadn't helped much. But the cinnamon and sugar flavors, with a hint of butter, that struck his tongue had him taking the next bite even before the pastry had had time to cool.
In almost no time the plate was empty. The only reason Scott would get any at all was that Suzie had claimed a pair for him, then gotten up from the table to take them to him.
“Okay, I was wrong,” Ted said. “I admit it. I apologize for doubting your cooking skills Gina.”
“That's okay, you don't know me. I'm just glad Bill was willing to believe me and give me chance.”
Her hand went to his arm and Bill's gut was flooded with a warm, fuzzy feeling.
“And on that note,” Bill said. “She was expressing interest in a bath earlier but I convinced her a quick shower and a meal would be better first. But now, it's tub time for her if she's still interested.”
He turned to Gina who nodded vigorously.
“Excuse us please,” Bill said.
He almost felt bad about the way he got to be the one to excuse himself with a pretty woman this time, but not quite. The numerous instances of him being on the other side of that the last few weeks were still all too fresh in his mind.