by Connor Mccoy
He let out a contented sigh. The rain had given him a chance to rest and eat, so he could approach the rest of the trip with renewed energy.
Unfortunately, as he wheeled his bike back to the road, he discovered a new problem. The asphalt now was freshly wet. He would have to pedal on a watery road, causing havoc on the brakes. Also, puddles lay in places where the road sank, sloped or had small holes. He feared that if he rode through them, his bike’s front wheel would catch in a pothole and fling him over the handlebars onto the nearby grass or worse, onto the street itself.
Those fears kept him from mounting his bicycle right away. Even when he rode a bike regularly years ago, he rarely pedaled on wet roads. Generally, he did not travel very much during times of rain. He often stayed in one spot, whether to relax, do schoolwork, or hang with friends.
But if I stay on foot, I won’t reach Middleburg before the sun goes down. Whether he liked it or not, he had to try.
So, Jacob remounted his bike and started pedaling, though his pace remained slow. Would his wheels slip and slide? Would he skid off the road and into the grass? Fear kept him in the center of the road and at a relatively slow speed. By staying at the road’s highest point, he avoided puddles and water runoffs.
After a while, Jacob’s apprehension started to fade. The lack of motorized traffic meant he could stay in the middle of the road without worry, and since this road led straight to Middleburg, he was spared major turns that might upset his balance.
As his confidence grew, Jacob couldn’t help but feel amazed. He never thought up until last night that he would pedal from one town to another, to say anything about riding through a freshly rained-on road. Life had thrown challenge after challenge his way, and he had taken each one and adapted to it.
But that’s how life has been, hasn’t it? That’s how you wanted it.
Indeed, Jacob had decided on that course when he was eighteen. That was his seminal moment, the time that made him who he was. He was on the verge of graduating high school. Sheryl, four years older than him, had come visiting from medical school. She wanted Jacob to come with her to Pleasantville, where she was studying and would complete her work. She believed Jacob should go to college there and become an engineer.
Sheryl cared for Jacob. She knew his life on the streets had been difficult and at times life-threatening. She imagined a new life for him, one that put him in coveralls working on a power transmission line and perhaps in time in a suit and a tie. She saw him as a smart, hardworking man who could achieve great things.
At the same time, their mother was ill. She had been sickly since Jacob had been a high school junior. She was approaching sixty and never had been in robust health. Sheryl wanted to uproot her as well and take her to Pleasantville. They would be one big, happy family there.
Jacob was tempted. He almost took Sheryl up on it. But the lure of another life called to him.
Domino first had brought it to his attention. She had been looking up pictures of country houses when she found an account of how the family who resided in one of them lived their life. It was fascinating. The family had chosen to live off the grid. They grew their own food and canned it for long-term storage. Domino showed Jacob the online link to the story, and he became fascinated by it. He wanted to learn more.
Within a couple of months, Jacob had consumed a lot of information about how to live in a rural setting in a self-sufficient manner. It was as if he had discovered a gateway to a whole other world. He could escape the dark influences that marked his teenage years in Alexandria, the rowdy and unruly teens who tried to get him into trouble and often thrashed him for not going along with them.
Better yet, he could spare his children the same fate. If he raised them out in the countryside, he would not have to worry about them falling in with a malicious crowd.
When he first broached the idea to Sheryl, she laughed. She thought he was indulging in a fanciful dream that he soon would discard in favor of her “wise” plan for his life. Admittedly, he did not dismiss it out of hand. He appreciated what Sheryl would do for him.
In the end, Jacob still would reside in a heavily populated urban setting. Even if he had lived in a more upscale area, he couldn’t shake the feeling that the shadows of his old life would come back to haunt him or his kids, if he had any. He just didn’t want to take the chance any longer. He yearned to make a clean break.
And so, one day, Jacob told Sheryl of his plans to buy a home far from the city.
At first, Sheryl took it as a joke that was going too far, but once she figured out Jacob was serious, she launched into a series of questions about Jacob’s choice. Where would he get the money to build his so-called dream life? How would he educate his children? Could Domino really handle all that he planned to accomplish? What about medical needs? Would he live close enough to a hospital?
In fact, given that Sheryl was going into the medical field, she peppered Jacob with many questions about how he could endure the rural life, from handling animals to venomous bites from insects or snakes. Jacob answered some, but not all of Sheryl’s concerns. He admitted he had to do further research about living off the grid. He didn’t plan to launch into it right away, but from what he read, he felt confident he could pull it off.
“You don’t know what you’re getting into,” Sheryl had told him. “You won’t be safer out there. If you have an emergency, it’ll take longer for the police to reach you.”
She also could not understand what kind of a living Jacob would pursue. If he went to college, he could end up with a well-paying career that would give him any home he wanted. Would Jacob make enough in his current position in life to pay for his rustic homestead and whatever else he needed?
“Domino has a big stipend from her parents. They don’t talk very much anymore, but they still wanted to give her something to get on her feet,” Jacob had told Sheryl. “With a year or two of work, I can make more than enough to buy a house and get started.”
Sheryl couldn’t see it. In her mind, Jacob was leaping off a high cliff without a bungee cord and expecting to fly safely down to the ground.
As much as it pained him, Jacob knew the two of them would part and live in different areas of the state. Sheryl had, almost miraculously, stayed out of the hard life of Alexandria’s streets. Jacob admired her for that. She was too smart to get involved with the wrong crowd. But her intellect also kept her from entertaining an alternative to the city life she always had known.
Jacob wasn’t asking Sheryl to join him. He readily accepted her life choices. She just seemed so uneasy with the idea in general that it cast a pall over their relationship. After their mother had passed away a few years ago, it seemed they had even less reason to talk.
We may never get another chance to talk, he thought. If the worst had occurred, if she had been caught in the aftermath of the EMP blackout and was killed, they never would have the opportunity to reconcile their differences.
Domino peered into the small room where Jubilee slept. Brandon was inside once again, but he was not tending to his sleeping sister. Instead he sat nearby and just stared at her. He dug his hands into his pants pockets, his tension evident. Domino wondered what was wrong.
“Hey.” She walked up to him, speaking quietly. “You haven’t left this room except to use the bathroom.” She chuckled. “I guess Doctor Sam’s little piping system hasn’t caused any problems.”
Last night, the doctor showed them his homemade piping system that ran into his bathroom, which would take away waste without the assistance of Trapp’s plumbing system. It was a great source of relief for the Averys and for Cowell. Brandon had joked about having to go outside from now on to relieve themselves, much to Cowell’s chagrin.
“Nope. I pee, I press the handle, it goes down the pipe,” Brandon said, quickly and without much energy.
“Now you don’t sound much like the Brandon I know.” Domino knelt down by him. She started nuzzling his hair. “My son who is full of energy
and gloriously creative observations on life.”
Brandon sighed. “I don’t know. Maybe…” He drew his legs closer in under his chair. “I just wish I had seen that creep sneaking up with the bow and arrow.”
“Aww, you’re thinking you could have stopped Jubilee from being shot?” Domino wrapped her arm around Brandon’s shoulders. “Sweetie, you couldn’t have known he was there. You were fishing with your sister. You were having fun. He shouldn’t have been on our land at all.”
“I know,” Brandon replied.
“If anything, I think your father and I dropped the ball. We probably should have put up motion sensors, but I was afraid the damned—sorry, stupid--thing would go off every time a bird flew over our fence. He thought we should set up cameras, maybe link the alarm to that, but…” Domino threw up her hands. “Well, that’s one problem we don’t have anymore.”
“That’s something else. I miss using my phone. I miss watching TV. I’ll never be able to stream Star Wars again. And Jubes won’t have her MMA anymore.” Brandon rested his elbows on his legs and propped up his hands in his palms. “I know everything’s terrible and I shouldn’t think about, you know, watching movies.”
“It’s alright. I think we’re all a little shocked and, yes, we’re thinking about the fun things that we’re not going to have anymore. But you are thinking about your sister, about how to survive. You have a good heart.” Domino kissed the side of Brandon’s head. “It’s natural to mourn the fun things. But we still can find things to do. I mean, you and your sister fish in our lake. You two know how to enjoy yourselves outside. Some things in your life aren’t going to change.”
A small smile formed on Brandon’s lips. “Yeah,” he said.
“And, you and your sister can find new things to enjoy. You have a great imagination. Why not write a story? You can’t take away pencils and paper with a big electromagnetic pulse, can you?”
Brandon’s smile grew. “Nope.”
“And you also can draw things. We can find colored pencils, markers, crayons. Those aren’t electronic. Put whatever is in your head down on paper. Draw stuff that can really knock our socks off.”
Now Brandon grinned. “Sure.” He pulled free from Domino’s hold and stood up. “And I know what I want to draw. I want to draw this house!”
“Really?” Domino stood up.
“It’s so weird! It’s a house made of bags! I’ve never seen a house like this before!” His smile faded a little. “My phone doesn’t work, so I can’t take any pictures. I want to remember this place when we leave.”
Domino agreed. She too wanted to have something to remember this home by. “Well, let’s find you something to draw with. Maybe Doctor Sam has something you can use.”
As Domino escorted Brandon out of the room, she thought about Doc Sam himself. The man produced a lot of warm feelings inside her, perhaps because he was like a father figure. Domino’s relationship with her own father had run hot and cold, and during the last few years, she did not know his or her mother’s whereabouts at all. So, she probably had lost any opportunity of reconnecting with her parents, if she desired to do so.
If they’re still alive, what do they think now? Do they understand what’s happened? Are they thinking of me now? And how would they be able to survive? How would anyone survive if they had not learned the kind of survival skills that she and Jacob studied?
Chapter Fourteen
Cowell slammed the pack down on the ground before sitting down next to it. He was spent. He had tried. He put all he could into picking the grapes, but he still only had picked half of the amount Moses wished.
It’s my damn fault. I should have done this first. I figured drawing the water would be easier, get it out of the way.
Sweat coated almost all of his shirt and much of his pants. Simply being outside, exposed to the sun, wore him down. He craved the presence of a functioning air conditioner. Sometimes he believed all he had to do was go inside to cool off, to replenish his energies so he could return outside, only to recognize that no working HVAC was going to await him and that there was no point. He might as well keep working.
He looked at his dirty hands. They had not been so caked with soil since he was a child. He always had worked in clean environments. He poured himself into academic studies, progressing through college up to government jobs and eventually into an independent practice, though the government still retained his services when needed. Nothing in his life had prepared him for this.
Josephine, she’s a different story. He and his sister were as different as night and day. And to think, I have to go to her and plead for shelter. We haven’t spoken in two years. What will she say to me?
Cowell watched a pair of young men work the crops, gathering their own portions inside brown sacks slung over their shoulder. They had been working longer than he had without taking a long break. Their physiques were more muscled, more fit. Cowell thought about his abdomen and noted, to his chagrin, that his once thin frame had put on a few pounds in recent months.
He wanted to get up and resume his chores so he could acquire the supplies from Moses, but exhaustion kept him rooted to the ground.
Before long, one of the men strolled by, shouldering a sack of potatoes. “Hey, man. You okay?”
“Just…” Cowell abruptly coughed before he could finish. His throat was drier than he thought. “Just resting.”
“You know, you really ought to wear a hat out here. It gets hot around this time.”
Cowell looked up higher and took note of the straw hat that the man wore. The hat must help in keeping off the sunlight.
“Everybody knows that,” the man said with a chuckle, exposing his teeth as he laughed.
Cowell scowled. Hardly general knowledge where I come from, he thought.
“Hey, if you need a drink, you can go inside Saburo’s.” The man pointed to the right, past the edge of the crop field, to a small shack across the street. “They got water in there and Saburo’s is offering one drink free to everyone’s who working.”
“Really?” That offer was enough to induce Cowell’s body to stand. “Thank you for telling me.”
With his pack on his back, Cowell stepped through the open doorway. The glass door was propped open, no doubt to help the room’s air circulation. Most of the tables were taken up, and all of them by men. Some of them guzzled water from glasses. Just about every man had at least someone to talk to, so the room was abuzz with chatter and guffaws.
It’s like the Old West, Cowell thought.
Cowell approached the counter. A thin teenage boy with an open shirt was manning it. “Hey, sir. You want water, we got it.”
“I certainly could use some, young man. I would tip you, but I’m afraid it wouldn’t be of any use to you,” Cowell said.
The teen reached behind the bar and hoisted a glass of water. To Cowell’s delight, the glass was tall. Saburo’s was not skimping Trapp’s workers.
After taking the glass, Cowell surveyed the room. The place offered a few empty tables. Cowell was happy to take one. He didn’t know any of these men, so sitting with them would be too uncomfortable an experience. In any case, they didn’t seem like his type of company. Of course, he held no disdain for working men. He simply never had lived in their world and felt like a stranger in their midst. He never knew what he could talk about? The latest football game? Women? Given that he cared little for sports and found open discussion of gender relations an uncomfortable subject, he doubted he would fit in at all.
Cowell took long sips of his water at a table near the window. Leaning back in the chair, he looked outside. The window overlooked a passing road, and as usual, no cars drove by. The silence of the outdoors had been eerie for the past day, but now Cowell was finding it calming. At least he was adjusting to something in this new life.
“Good afternoon.”
Cowell was so startled he nearly spilled his glass. A newcomer, a tall man, had approached him. Cowell did not hear him ar
rive amid the conversations ringing out around him. Quickly, he composed himself. “Afternoon.”
The stranger, with his brawny build, buttoned-up red checkered shirt, blue jeans, and brown boots, looked like he could have come out of a Chuck Norris film. The neatly trimmed brown beard certainly added to the man’s rustic image. “You must be from out of town,” the newcomer said.
“Vienna, although I work farther south,” Cowell said.
“Really? You must have been caught on the highway.” The man grasped the backboard of the chair opposite Cowell. “Mind if I join you?”
Cowell figured he had been alone with his thoughts for too long. “Go ahead.”
The man sat down. “Jimmy Sykes, manager of Corbin Transportation Lines, Virginia division.” He offered his hand.
“Alexander Cowell.” Cowell shook Sykes’s hand. “Social worker, employee for the Virginia court system.”
“Really? Part of the legal system, are you? You haven’t worked on any cases against Corbin Transportation, have you?”
Cowell shuffled a little. “No.”
Sykes chuckled. “That’s a little joke. I figured by the looks of your clothes that you were probably in some high-end line of work.”
Cowell tugged at his shirt. He still was wearing his button-up shirt and dress pants, and while they had started out yesterday clean and neatly pressed, by now they were dirty and ripped in a few places.
“So, you don’t live in Trapp? What are you going to do? You need a place to stay, right?” Sykes asked.
“I have family in Fall Crossing, but I need supplies to get there,” Cowell said.
“You’re going to hike all the way there?” Sykes asked.
“I don’t have a choice. I don’t have any other family I can reach.” Frustration boiled up inside Cowell. “Moses Travers and Doctor Samuel still think it’ll be three days at least, maybe more.”
“Doctor Samuel? He’s that kind of eccentric man, lives in a house all made of bags of sand?” Sykes said.