We slowly wandered north on the final leg of our journey. The final leg of Brit’s journey actually. I had plans to be on my way to Bayfield within a few days. My resolve being deepened by this morning’s near death experience. I needed to see who, if any, of my family members had made the trek north to the far end of Wisconsin. Whoever was there deserved me as much as I deserved them. Brit would have her grandparents, and I would have some family. At least that was the plan. It was subject to change at any time.
The 90-pound girl clung on my back was silent. She’d been through a lot that morning, a lot in the past five days. She started the journey by not wanting to say a word and then changed to talking non-stop. Now, after this morning’s shooting, she didn’t have much left to say. Who could blame her? It was a lot to expect from any person. I felt her head go up.
“Is that smoke?” She wasn’t scared, just concerned. I looked forward, to the north. There were three or four columns of thin wispy smoke rising in the distance. Maybe a mile, maybe two, ahead.
“Looks like it. Whatever’s burning is almost out I think.” What little breeze there was this morning moved the smoke ever so gently southeast. The now clear blue, cloudless sky seemed to absorb the smoke within seconds. “I don’t think it’s a problem. Probably just burning some trash up near Frederic.” This seemed to calm Brit’s concern. I felt her chin settle again on my shoulder.
Suddenly, from a small crossroads just ahead, appeared five young men. Five angry looking, weapon-toting men. Two had bats, one had an axe. A fourth carried a machete. They were only sixty yards away, not a step more. Just over half a football field. They saw us, and we saw them. This looked like trouble, again. I dropped Brit from my back and she plopped on the road on her sore feet.
I looked around; the ever-present corn had disappeared. To our left was a low soybean field. To our right was mostly swamp, no large trees just some tall brush and water. 280th was almost a quarter mile to our rear. There was no avoiding this group.
“Crap.” I feverishly looked for a hiding place. Finally, I led Brit by the arm towards the swampy side of the road. She’d be safe in the ditch. I looked back at this morning’s trouble. They were on a slow trot closing the distance every second. “Get in the ditch. Try and make your way toward that brushy patch out there.” I pointed to the only tree, a mighty small one at that, about thirty yards in. “I’ll be right behind you.”
Brit scampered into the ditch and looked back at me. “Come on, Bill. Come on.” I looked at the group. I felt the pistol in my pocket. Something snapped. I was done being chased, and hiding like a scared child. My heart raced, beating faster and faster with each passing second. Without looking at the teen I spoke, firmly.
“Get in there, Brit. I’m going to take care of this. Once and for all, I’m going to stop this crap.” I heard footsteps as she came back.
“No. Let’s just hide out, and hopefully they’ll go away. If they can’t find us in there they’ll leave.” I turned and stared at Brit. I shook my head slowly.
“No more, Brit. I can’t hide anymore.” I stepped back onto the road and drew my gun. I pointed it in their direction and fired a shot safely over their heads. They stopped. A stare down ensued. I think they could see that I was truly pissed, pissed at them, pissed at the world.
“Whatever you think you want from us,” I waved the gun at the group, “you can’t have. We aren’t giving you anything. We don’t have anything. Not one damn thing.” I looked at the group one by one. Two had taken refuge in the west ditch, two on the east side. The only one without a weapon stood in the middle of the road fifteen yards ahead. I couldn’t tell his intentions. I pointed the gun directly at him.
He raised his hands. “Just give us the girl. There’s a guy, he wants the girl. That’s what another group told us last night. She’s got short dark hair and a pair of cute legs sticking out of her shorts. She looks close enough to that.” He pointed at Brit standing behind me. “You can go. Just give us her, and you can pass.” He tried to sound reasonable, but I was having none of it. These weren’t the same clowns that had been looking for us earlier, but I needed to deal with this right now.
“No,” I shouted again. “He’s dead. The girl shot him this morning.” I watched as the leader took a step closer, his face questioning my words. The two in the west ditch slowly rose. I shot over their heads, and the pair dropped back down.
“You killed that old man?” The leader continued his slow walk towards my position. I pointed the gun at him. He stopped.
“The next round I fire is at someone. You’re all close enough to be within range of a nine mil, right?” No one replied. “I’m not doing this anymore. I’m the one with the weapon. I’m not going to be chased around like a wounded deer. No more. And yes, he’s dead. Go take his house. Go take his food. Take his land and make it your own. I couldn’t care less. Just leave us alone. Or else someone’s going to die.”
The leader pondered my words. One of the two in the east ditch made a run for Brit who was standing between the ditch and the swamp. I turned and pointed the gun at him. When he didn’t stop, I fired but missed. He slowed just for a brief second, so I fired again. He dropped to the ground ten yards from Brit. I heard her quickly move in behind me. I felt her at my back. I looked back at the leader.
“Who’s next? I’m done playing games. Get your group and get lost. Last warning.” I stood on the roadside in the crisp late summer air. I pointed a weapon at another person, something I would have never considered a month ago. Now it was second nature. The leader looked at his group and shrugged. His wounded man moaned to my right. “I don’t think he’s dead. If anything, I hit him somewhere low, by the legs. You can leave him or take him. Doesn’t matter to me. Just get going.” I saw the leader’s head move ever so slightly.
“Carl, George,” he looked over his right shoulder at the two in the west ditch. “Come get Freddy. Liam, you too.” Slowly the three rose from their spots. They watched me carefully as I kept the gun on them. “Only gonna get worse you know.” The leader felt it his duty to fill us in on life on the road. “Gonna get a lot worse for men and women on the roads. From now until winter, I imagine.” He stared at Brit, then at me. “Just so you know.”
I let out a small laugh. “Buddy, in the last week I’ve seen so many things out here I didn’t think were possible. So much. I get what you’re saying. I know.” I watched as the three subordinates helped Freddy to his feet. I had hit him low in the thigh, just above the knee. I looked back at the leader. “Just be warned. There’s a lot of armed people out there, too. Decent people just trying to get somewhere.”
The group’s leader was next to laugh. “We’re mostly looking for food, not trouble. We’re sick of eating field corn and soybeans. You can boil them forever, and they still taste like crap. That other group told us that guy, that dead guy, offered food and shelter to anyone who brought him the girl. They said he claimed she was his daughter.” I shook my head at him. “Whatever. We’re sick of living on the road, too, ya know. I just want to lay my head on a pillow again. And eat something that tastes good. That’s all.” He smiled at the ground and then looked up. “We’re decent people, too. Just desperate. Real desperate.”
“Why don’t you go into town? Frederic or Luck or wherever? There’s something to do there. Some kind of work.”
“You don’t get it, do you?” I stared at him waiting for a logical explanation. “Most of the food is gone out here. No one was ready for this. All the stores had low reserves to begin. Those big stores in the bigger cities have forced so many of the little stores out of business. Or to the point where they just carry a little stock. Not much though. And these towns you talk so highly of, they’re feeding their residents first. Strangers are second rate to them. There ain’t much left. Unless you got money. In that case, come on in. We’ll take your money. But we don’t have none.” The five had congregated together in the center of the road just a few feet from us. Danger had passed. This was just a group of
people conversing.
“Sorry, I guess people are scared and have lost that sharing spirit,” I said. “Go back to John’s house, the dead guy. There should be food there. Just take this road to the next crossroad and turn west. His place is down there about three miles.” The group nodded one by one. These weren’t bad men, just desperate men. They began to move south past us. As they walked away, for the first time I saw them for what they were, what they had become. Lost men. Their eyes were empty. Their faces and clothes dirty. Their gait slow, their shoulders slumped. Lost souls.
Brit moved her way around me as they passed. I felt her take hold of my right arm as they walked off, slumped off actually. I felt bad for them. I felt sad for humanity.
Brit’s small voice broke the morning silence. “How are we ever going to get supplies if people aren’t sharing? What happens if Grandma and Grandpa need things? I don’t think they have much money.”
I watched the group move away and looked back at Brit. “I have money. Not a lot, but enough to last us for a while.” I knelt for Brit to get back into her riding position. “I just didn’t want to mention it in front of them. Seeing as there were five of them, and we only have two or three bullets left. I think they were desperate enough. No need to tempt them further.” I turned north with my rider and started our slow march onward. I couldn’t shake the feeling of sadness.
Brit spoke softly. “I just want to get there. I just want to be somewhere. Heck, anywhere. I want off this stupid road.”
I had to agree. Every minute seemed to bring a new adventure. And not a good adventure. More like a journey into hell.
“We’ll be there soon. Not more than another hour now.” I shifted my load so Brit rode a little higher. I didn’t want her head down and her chin digging into my neck any more. I wanted her looking ahead. For either home or trouble. We needed to keep a sharp eye out for both.
The smoke from earlier was mostly gone. I could see some slight discoloration in the sky ahead and a little to our left. But for the most part, whatever had been burning was burned out. For the first time in many days the air was clean and fresh. The humidity had been scrubbed away by the rain of the past few days. Things looked better this morning. Even after our latest trial on the road. I felt more optimistic than I had in many of days. Maybe even since the power had gone out.
My stomach started to growl. We hadn’t eaten in a couple days. I felt Brit’s stomach churn from time to time as well. We’d have to be careful when we started eating again. I was sure our stomachs had shrunk quite a bit. If we ate too much or too fast or too rich of food, it wouldn’t stay down. Brit had already had one mishap this morning. I was pretty sure she’d want to avoid any repeat performances.
“I think I’ll drink water when we get there. Lots and lots of water.” I felt Brit chuckle at my words. I was so thirsty I would almost stop and drink swamp water. But I knew better. It might go down okay, but it would come up and make me sick as a dog. My heart ached as I thought of Buddy. It seemed like so long ago now that he had wandered off. I was so sure he would rejoin us, but he never had. He probably found a new home with a bunch of kids who were giving him all the love and attention he deserved. That and some food. I couldn’t remember hardly feeding him at all since I’d been on the road. Maybe that was the reason he had left. He was searching for food. Couldn’t blame him.
Food was certainly at the forefront of most people’s minds these days. It was for the group we’d run into this morning. Thirty days in and people were already desperate for food. I wanted to be surprised, but I wasn’t. I had read somewhere, a few years back, that the average American family had two week’s worth of food on hand. Two week’s worth, a paltry fourteen days. And with the power going out, most of their refrigerated and frozen supplies would be worthless. You’d have to eat it all fast before it spoiled. What I wouldn’t give for a pack of frozen hotdogs right that second. Or a loaf of semi-stale bread. Even a bottle of water seemed like a luxury now. We needed water.
Brit spoke quietly from my back. “When we get there I just want to sleep.” I smiled ahead as Brit chose sleep over food. “I’ll drink some water first, but then I’m climbing into bed, and I don’t want anyone to wake me up. I just want to sleep for days. No rain, no bugs, no leaves, no crap. Just sleep.” I nodded. That seemed like a pretty good plan.
I looked ahead. No side roads were in sight yet. But they’d be coming.
I plodded on.
Chapter 34