The Storm (27 page)

              Without even thinking, I underhandedly tossed the bag of seeds to Samantha, having them land right in front of her on the ground. Jaded didn’t even begin to describe me at this moment. “There are the seeds we needed. We have a little bit of everything in there. Most take sixty to ninety days before they’re ready though.”

              Samantha looked down and then reached to pick up the bag and unzipped it. Not even noticing the bullet hole that had ripped through it, she peeked in to see her more precious than gold seeds of life. She then re-zipped the bag and was about to set it to the side when she finally recognized a hole in the side, and she placed her pinky into it while looking a bit confused. Her mind was solving a puzzle that it didn’t want to acknowledge was real. Suddenly she dropped the bag and looked at me with a sense of fright. “Where is everyone else?”

              “We walked into an ambush.” My heart was beating so hard that I could almost hear it. For the first time today, I set down my rifle in the grass and then just lay down. Fatigue was overbearing. “Let me backup.” I paused a second to figure out where to start. “So we started off well enough. We got to LeapMart, and we had carts full of supplies, tools, and fertilizer. We were coming back down Plantation Road when we ran into a wall of gunfire. Tom, Randy, and Mohammad are dead. I don’t know what happened to Nana and Miller. They were battling still and got separated from me.”

              “You ran away and left them?” She sounded perturbed.

              Yeah, now I felt like one of those soldiers I had scalded before. Go out and fight hard and risk your life to only come home and be second-guessed by an armchair quarterback. F that. “I didn’t leave them. Mohammad died in front of me. Tom and Randy never had a chance. Miller and Nana were in a separate group and were being pushed in a different direction. I had the seeds and was lucky to escape alive.”

              She was about to say something, but I grabbed my rifle and stood up. Almost kicking up dust, I turned and started walking away. I could feel her eyes stabbing my backside, but I was beyond caring. If this was a soldier’s way of saying “talk to the hand,” then it at least restored some pride in myself. I had given all my effort, while my amigos had given more. I didn’t have to explain myself to anyone. Toward my house I walked and barely took notice of the faint smell of cigarette smoke in the air. Samantha had mentioned “we” when she spoke. I pondered that for the briefest of time before dismissing it.

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              When I was in Paris long ago, there were many cultural aspects that shocked me. Coming from London, Kentucky, I had limited exposure to arts and culture. So much of that trip was burned into my psyche, but a few pieces of artwork really stuck with me. One of them was a lone straggler of Napoleon’s army walking home. Over a hundred thousand marched into Russia, and only a few thousand made it back. The odds of survival were frightful, much like the world today. That picture was underappreciated, I thought, and I stared at it for the longest time. The soldier’s face was ragged, scarred by battle and the cold, while his clothes were tattered. He looked almost like a walking corpse out of a modern science fiction story, but he also was filled with determination. It was only his desire to survive that drove him forward when all his fellow soldiers were long gone. I felt like that man now as I walked the final stretch home.

              Finally arriving home, I went to open the door and realized it was locked. Good for Stacy. She needed to stay secure, I thought, even if I didn’t want to wait for her to come open it. I had left my keys home as I didn’t want their jingling to give us away in the dark. I knocked gently and laid my head against the door for rest. “Daddy!” was the audible scream coming from in the house. A moment later, it opened, and I looked down to see a smiling princess that had been waiting for my return.

              Part of me melted like butter at seeing my sweet, innocent girl smiling and happy to see me, but it was mixed in with something darker. What if it hadn’t been me at the door, and she opened it like that. We would need to have a chat about that, but I immediately bent over to scoop her up. Gripping and squeezing her tight, I felt a small nugget of normalcy start to germinate deep in my soul. She was giggling, and I couldn’t help noticing she had a peach smell. She had probably snuck into Stacy’s perfumes again. I finally allowed myself to set the rifle down and closed the door behind me as I stepped inside, with Tabitha still in my arms. “How’s my princess doing?”

              “I’m good, Daddy! I’ve been playing with my sticker book! I’m almost out of stickers though. Mommy said I could use some of Paul’s, but he was crying.” Stories from children always cut right to the meat of whatever their experience has been.

              “So you’ve been a good girl this morning?” I finally set her back down but continued to stare at her smiling face. I probably mustered a small smile, but it would be a stretch to call it a grin.

              “Of course!” Her little voice was filled with excitement and she said it in such a way as if to say “what else would I be?”

              “Where’s Mommy?” I had just noticed she wasn’t standing there.

              “She had to take Murphy outside. He got sick and threw up. See?” She pointed at a small pile of dog vomit on the floor. Murphy had always run straight for the carpet when he got sick, much to my annoyance. “It’s yucky, Daddy.”

              “Why did he get sick, pumpkin?” Leave your problems at work had always been a creed I subscribed to. No matter how bad my day at work was, I would be cheerful and play with the kids and insulate them from any troubles in the world. Today I felt like that wall was torn down, and I couldn’t help frowning and showing a touch of disgust on my face as I closed my eyes a second and almost prayed for any piece of good news.

              “Mommy said he ate too much people food. Doggies aren’t used to it, Mommy said.”

              Again I closed my eyes a second and then looked over at the pile of vomit. I saw chunks of corn clear as day in it. Clearly she had fed him a whole bunch of something he wasn’t used to. Probably some canned chili from the looks of it. “Why did Mommy feed him that food?”

              She gave me a confused little look and then ran into the kitchen. A small giggle indicated that she was having a rare moment of being proud to know something that I don’t and was going to show me. A second later, she came back into the hallway carrying an empty bag of dog food that was almost her size. “See, daddy. We don’t have any more dog food. You need to go to the store and get some.”

              I almost laughed at the irony of going back to the store. Slowly I squatted down so we were at eye level and calmly told her, “I don’t think we can go to the store anymore, sweetheart.”

              Little Tabitha’s lips pursed together, and her eyes squinted as she looked down at the floor in frustration. “But, Daddy, you have to go to the store. I need my stickers.”

              A second later, Murphy ran up the stairs from the basement, and I heard Stacy with Paul right behind. We had much to discuss.

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              Three hours had passed since I returned home from our seed grab operation. I spent a half hour playing with the kids and then poured my soul out to Stacy. My heart exploded in emotion as I sobbed like a baby. She listened quietly, holding my head against her chest as I laid out everything that had transpired. Her fingers gently massaged my skull as she listed to everything. My emotional foundation was gradually restored after I had a chance to vent. She had always been silent but strong in my rare moments of panic or weakness.

              Finally after realizing I had soaked a good part of her shirt with my tears, I wiped away the few remaining ones and spent a couple of hours with the children. I was basically a blob on the floor fading into and out of sleep as they climbed on Mt. Daddy and performed the occasional wrestling move on me. Murphy kept to himself in the corner, watching as the kids yelled and played. I knew what I needed to do but was procrastinating. This day had already brought afflictions of biblical proportions to me, but there was one more I knew just ahead. Like pulling off a bad band aid, it was best to yank it fast and be done with it. That’s what I had to do now. “Murphy boy, let’s go for a walk big guy.” He started jumping up and down. The word “walk” always excited him.

              Ten minutes later, I was going back into the woods accompanied only by Murphy. He was running fast ahead of me, scouting and peeing on any trees that he took a fancy to. I watched him with the same gaze of affection I reserved only for my children. He had always been a good dog, a good partner, and a child to me. For years, we would take long walks all over. We even ventured through the apartments on Plantation Road a few times and never once had I even taken notice of anything fearful. Our long walks were usually a time for me to meditate and reflect on vagaries in my life. This walk he would be free of any leashes. He had at least earned that. I loved him as a member of the family and called him over to me. “Murphy!”

              Panting and racing, he turned and obediently came to my summons. His tail was wagging, and he was eyeing my hands to look for a treat. “Good boy,” I said to him as I kneeled and gave him a big hug while patting his head. His mouth was open, with his tongue hanging out in that peculiar but obvious doggie smile that all dog owners would recognize. I loved him almost as much as I love my children.

             
BOOM!

              The gunshot echoed through the empty forest, and Murphy fell onto the ground. A small tear started to form before I grabbed the shovel and started digging. There wasn’t enough food for any of us to survive indefinitely, and he was one extra mouth to feed. I should have felt horrible with guilt, but a cold numbness that had never left me from this morning resurfaced and took hold. The only sounds were my shovel hitting the dirt as I diligently buried my beloved dog. It may not have even been noon yet, and I only wanted this damn day to be over with.

Chapter 14

Truly Organic

              One of my past addictions in life was to look at my community through online maps that allowed anyone to zoom into streets anywhere in the world. I suddenly found myself looking at my neighborhood from high in the sky. Each building was petite, with the greenery of the trees giving the appearance of a great place to live. The LeapMart with its giant parking lot stuck out as a suburban blight. It was all serene and beautiful, but then I started falling. The ground was rapidly approaching, and I tried to scream, only to have nothing come out. The air blowing onto my face was so strong that I could barely squint with my eyes open to see the ground approaching as my decent continued. Three seconds. I could almost feel myself dying before it happened. Two seconds. I noticed what looked like a nice patio set on a person’s back porch. One second. I started to slam into the ground at terminal velocity.

              “Aaarrrggghhh!” I was screaming and sweating as I awoke shirtless on the couch in the basement. Another period of sleep, again filled with nightmares. For a moment, I wondered if I would ever get a peaceful rest again, but then it occurred to me that only death would bring a permanent slumber, and I didn’t want any part of that. I sat there, covered in sweat staring outside at our backyard, which was riddled with poop landmines left by Murphy.

              It all came back to me now, and I shook my head. I had always worried about him getting hit by a car or eaten by an alligator when we visited Florida. Never did I think it would end like this. I took a moment to reflect on that. Everyone’s lives had suddenly turned upside down, the whole world over. If things were this crazy here, what would they be like in a mega-crowded city like Tokyo or New York? If we were struggling in a distant suburb community, how on earth could someone hope to salvage any sort of lifestyle in a sixtieth floor apartment?

              My wits were returning slowly from sleep, even if every muscle in my body cried out for more rest. If I could have sweet dreams, I probably would have passed out for more than a day, but as it was, I got dressed and walked upstairs. The house was still filled with daylight, so I probably hadn’t rested more than a couple of hours. When I entered the den, I saw Stacy sitting on the couch, reading a book quietly. She looked up at me, eyed me from head to toe, and then closed her book. “I thought you were down for the day and night,” she said.

              I stood there, looking at her sitting with an open window behind and rubbed my eyes. Maybe I wasn’t as awake as I wanted to be. “Yeah, I probably should. Had nightmares again and wanted to see what was going on up here.”

              “Do you want to talk about it?” She was so sincere and gentle in asking, and I was being rude to continue keeping her at arm’s length about my nightmares, but now wasn’t the time.

              I gave a small grimace of the face and shook my head no. “Kids okay?”

              “They are up napping. They will probably be up soon though. It’s getting kind of late though I don’t know what time it is. Probably feels like three or four.”

              Slowly I stepped over a few scattered trains on the floor and plopped down next to Stacy. The air blowing in from the window felt refreshing, and I gently put my arm around her and squeezed her tightly against me. “I miss anything while I was out of it?”