Roads Less Traveled (35 page)

“What… what is it?” she asked.

“The radio is dead. I can’t warn them.”

Gus whined very softly, almost like he understood the reason for their intense fear. Zack closed his eyes, which was pointless anyway because they were sitting in the pitch black, and leaned his head against the dirt wall. Nancy began to cry, quietly, silent tears streaking her face for those they had lost. Outside, the only refuge they had known was reduced to cinders.

Chapter Nineteen

October 21
^st

“How are we feeling this morning?” I asked Jake. We had finally decided to stop early that morning so he could get some rest. He seemed better though, after getting some sleep, so I decided to delay my worry for him and focus on contacting the house. I had been trying all through the night since last talking to Nancy, but so far hadn’t been able to get anyone.

“I feel better. Guts aren’t burnin’ like they were. Ribs still hurt like a bitch though,” he said, grinning.

“You know, you’re one crazy bastard,” I said as I shook my head and laughed. He just kept grinning as we both mounted up and headed out. We were still a few miles from Matias, and I was relieved beyond words that the coast had been clear our entire trip back. But in the back of my mind, not being able to raise anyone on the radio gnawed at me. Jake had nothing to say about it when I told him, but he was quieter than usual as we climbed the last hill before town. I also thought I had heard gunshots sometime before daylight, but they had been so far away I wasn’t even entirely sure they had been shots at all. Or from what direction they had come.

This alternate route we had been on since leaving Gibson brought us out just west of Matias, about two miles from my driveway. I knew from the way Jake was swearing - even before seeing it myself - that something terrible had happened.

“Look, on the road!” he shouted and pointed at the pavement ahead of us. Blood smears and muddy hoof prints covered the blacktop. There were also a few piles of horse manure. I threw Jake a fearful look just before kicking Daisy into a hard gallop. He followed suit and was next to me as we turned up the driveway. We both drew our handguns as the horses kicked up leaves and gravel in our wake. Jake’s ribs had been forgotten, his panic and fear deadening the pain.

“Do you smell that?” I yelled. The unquestionable odor of wood smoke hung heavy in the air. Then we saw it. Thick white smoke drifting through the trees.

“The house is on fire!” Jake answered back. The smoke and my own terror filled my eyes with tears, blurring my vision as we exploded through the tree line and into the front yard. Jake reigned in his horse so suddenly I thought he would fly over his mount’s head, and he practically fell out of the saddle in his haste to get to the house. I stopped Daisy and stared at my home. It was burning alright, a towering inferno reaching high into the sky.

“This isn’t happening,” I whispered. The heat was blasting me in the face, forcing me to close my eyes. My guts twisted and rolled as I dismounted, sliding out of the saddle just in time to puke. I fell to my knees, sobbing loudly, and barely heard Jake when he started screaming for me.

“Kasey! Kasey, I found Ben! Over here!” I looked up, not knowing if it was Jake I heard, or if I had finally lost my mind and was simply hearing the insane noise that had once threatened to fill my head. I wiped my eyes and tried to focus, and then I saw him. He was kneeled over a body next to the tree in the side yard. I jumped to my feet and ran to him, but stopped short when I saw who he was kneeling over.

“Oh, Ben,” I whispered. I staggered around Jake and kneeled next to Ben. He was cold, gray, and riddled with holes. His pistol lay on the ground not far from him, and there were signs of a struggle all around. I looked at Jake, then back at Ben. Hot tears were still stinging my cheeks, but the sorrow I felt choked off all attempts at speaking. Jake was shockingly quiet, I couldn’t even hear him breathing. We both just sat there, on our knees next to our friend, and stared down at him in disbelief.

The crackling of the fire behind us was the only noise on the mountain. It’s strange, the things we notice at times like that. The snapping and popping of everything I was, everything I had been. The flames had not only destroyed my home, but me as well. What I used to be. That day my old life burned to ashes. I don’t know why, but I don’t think I really understood, or accepted, that nothing would ever be the same again until that very moment. Almost three weeks after the world fell apart, and I was just now figuring it out.

Movement in the corner of my eye reminded me I wasn’t alone, and I glanced at Jake just as he was un-holstering his weapon again and raising it to his temple.

“Noo!” I screamed and grabbed his hand. I twisted his wrist hard, pointing the barrel away from his face. I grabbed his other shoulder with my free hand to hold him still, but he wasn’t resisting or fighting back. Just staring at Ben with vacant, tear filled eyes.

“Jake!” I yelled in his face, then shook him hard. The pistol fell from his grip and he locked his eyes on mine before letting loose his own scream; a wordless, piercing, gut-ripping scream. I didn’t let go, but held his wrist and shoulder tightly and kept my eyes fixed on him. He needed to know I wasn’t going to leave him, wasn’t going to abandon him, and wasn’t going to let him do anything stupid.

“This is wrong! It shouldn’t have been him, he was the best one! He was good! I’m so sick of this shit!!” Jake finally bellowed. Then he doubled over and sobbed. His hands groped around until they found Ben’s, and he held them tightly as he cried and cried. I felt empty and hollow as I watched his anguish and despair pour forth like a fountain. No, fountain is an understatement. This was like Niagara Falls, and coming from Jake, the last person in the world I thought capable of losing his grip.

Where are the others, and who did this
? I thought. There were no other bodies, only hoof prints, empty shell casings, and several places where the dirt had been kicked and scuffed about. Signs of struggle, just like what was beside Ben.

“The prisoners,” I barely whispered. I didn’t think Jake had heard me over his sobbing, but he raised his head and looked up at me.

“What?” he asked. Now alert and cautious, I wiped my eyes and face and sharply studied the area all around us. Jake began doing the same, distracted momentarily from his dead friend. We both stood and continued looking around, and I was sure from all the things I was seeing that it had indeed been those damned prisoners.

“They did this. The Cedartown cons. Had to have been them,” I finally said. I whipped my head around and fixed Jake in a severe look of fear and anger.

“No, Kasey. I know what you’re thinkin’, and no. Not yet, not now. You stopped me from doin’ something stupid, now it’s my turn,” he said and walked towards me with his hands out.

“Shh!” I hissed sharply. Something had caught my ear while surveying the destruction. I wrinkled my brow in concentration, trying to discern the location of the noise, and just what the hell it even was. Jake held his breath again, his head tipped to the side and listening. His eyes lit up and his jaw dropped.

“That’s a dog!” he said loudly and started glancing frantically left and right. My face reflected his shock, except I now knew exactly where it was coming from. I bolted past him and ran as hard as I could to the barn. A steady thump-thump behind me said Jake was following.

The barn had remained untouched, so I assumed the prisoners had figured they got what they came for and there wasn’t any reason to search a barn. What could be in there anyway, besides maybe a horse or two and hay? I stopped short of the large door, panting hard and praying harder than I ever had in my life. Jake caught up, also short of breath, then reached out and tried to open the door. It didn’t budge.

“It’s locked from the inside. Remember that long two-by-six I had you fasten inside for me, so it could be slid into place and keep the door from being opened?” I asked. He must have remembered, because he immediately began ramming his body against the door, throwing his entire weight into it, hoping to break the clamps away from the wall on the other side. I helped when I saw he was having no luck, the baying of my beagle growing louder and louder. Someone was alive, unless Gus was much smarter and more skilled than I thought.

“Hold up!” someone shouted from the other side. Jake and I jumped back like we had been slapped. We heard the heavy board being slid back, then Gus as he dug at the crack under the door and whined. Jake grabbed my shoulder and spun me around, then locked me in a giant hug. I smiled and smacked him hard on the back as the barn door swung open.

“Hey man, where’s mine?” Zack said. Still cool as a cucumber.

“Shit, dude, come here!” Jake laughed with a tear-choked voice and grabbed the other man in an equally crushing bear hug. I was busy with Gus, who was so excited to see me he had jumped all the way up into my arms. He whined and licked my face, his tail beating so hard I ended up with bruises. Once he settled down, I dropped him gently to the ground and asked if there were any other survivors.

Zack was staring at the house, now a dwindling blaze. I watched him silently as a series of expressions crossed his face: shock, relief, anger, and then guilt.

“Hey,” I said softly. He switched his gaze to me and started shaking his head. I held out my hand to quiet him before continuing.

“This wasn’t your fault. You did exactly as I asked you.” I looked past him and towards the back of the barn. “Did anyone else…?” I asked, unable to finish. Jake was also staring at Zack, his face twisted with fear. Zack smiled faintly and nodded.

“Yeah, come on,” he said as he turned and walked back into the barn. We followed him to the cellar door which now stood open, and I could see the glow of a battery powered lantern below. The three of us climbed down the ladder, Zack, Jake, then me, my heart pounding harder with each rung. At the bottom I noticed immediately the cellar had been stocked as I had instructed. Shelves lined with canned goods, several gallons of water in the corner closest to the ladder, and the old propane heater I used to keep in the basement.

“Thank God,” Nancy said, crying with relief as she strode across the cellar floor and wrapped her arms around Jake.

“It’s okay, Grandma, it’s okay,” he whispered as he buried his face in her neck and hugged her tightly. Zack was crossing the room to the old twin mattress on the floor. Someone was lying on it, covered in blankets, but I couldn’t see well enough to tell who it was. I could see dark hair, but that could have been any of the three women, other than Nancy. I squeezed the older woman’s shoulder as I passed and followed Zack to the bed.

“Where the hell have you been?” Mia asked, her voice hoarse but strong. I couldn’t help but smile as I dropped to my knees next to her. Zack stood off to the side, his arms crossed as he glanced back and forth between me and Jake.

“Well, as a matter of fact, I’ve been trying to find medicine for you. You’re always getting into something, and leaving me to clean up the mess,” I said. She looked terrible, her skin pasty, her lips cracked, but for the time being she was awake and coherent. I held her hand and spoke with her a few moments, putting off doing the things I knew had to be done: making sure all the horses were okay, burying Ben, planning our next move, and the most important thing, hold the approaching depression off for as long as possible.

“Get some rest, there’s some things I have to do,” I told her softly, then stood and walked to Zack. I pulled all the pill bottles from my pockets, handed them to him, and told him I was going back up to bring our horses into the barn. He nodded and called Nancy over, who was still clinging to Jake. When Jake saw Zack handing the antibiotics to Nancy, he remembered his own bulging pockets.

“Oh hey, here’s some more,” he said and started pulling the bottles out. I stood at the bottom of the ladder and watched Nancy; she looked like a kid in a candy store. While she and Zack sorted through the bottles and placed them on an empty shelf, I motioned Jake over.

“Help me get the horses in?” I asked. He nodded, glanced back over his shoulder, then followed me up top. Gus was sitting close by, casually observing the situation, but not going anywhere near the horses. My two other mares were scraping the floors of their stalls with their hooves as we walked by. Daisy had led the horse Jake had ridden over to the barn, where they waited patiently to be led inside.

After taking what little supplies we had left off the horses, unsaddling them, and tucking them away in their stalls, we stood outside the door and watched what was left of my home smolder down to nothing. There was really nothing left to see; the house I complained had been too large for me was now a huge pile of ashes. But it kept our minds and eyes temporarily off Ben.

“Zack and I will dig the grave. You should rest your ribs, let your grandma take a look at you,” I said softly as we stared at what was left of the house. Jake didn’t answer, only grunted. His way of admitting I was right.

“I think we’ll spend the night here, then first thing in the morning we’ll go down to Crousley’s house, check it out. If the cons didn’t hit it, and it has everything we need, we’ll stay down there, at least until Mia gets better. I’m not sure after that.” I continued talking in a monotone softness as the depression pressed in around me. I wouldn’t be able to stay in one place for long now. Not without losing my mind. Keep moving, keep fighting, and keep the insanity at bay; that was my only plan at that moment.