Authors: Rich Goldhaber
“We get Captain Stewart to fly us there. I’ll
bet we can find long range military planes, maybe
those big refueling tankers. They must be able to
fly for days on the fuel they carry. Some of us will
make the trip, and we’ll talk to the other groups.
We can give them some of those military satellite
phones so we can stay in communication with
each other. We’ll divide up the work between the
groups, and working together we’ll put the country
back together one piece at a time.”
I thought about her action plan, and I liked
it. “Maybe we form a loose confederation so we can
develop a political infrastructure,” I said. “At the
end of all this, we’re going to need some legitimate
form of government. Let’s visit MacDill tomorrow.”
Blaine flew us over to MacDill after breakfast. I called them after talking with Jessie, so they
were expecting us. We started out in the general’s
now air-conditioned conference room. We briefed
them on our need for flour and made a list of their
needs. Then we got down to the main topic, Jessie’s plan to make contact with other groups.
Major Connors listened to her while asking
a few clarifying questions. He thought for a few
moments, trying to digest Jessie’s proposal and
then spoke. “Jessie, you’re right of course; we’ve
been so focused on today’s issues we’ve neglected
the long term strategy. We do need to eventually
put the country back together; otherwise we’ll wind
up as a band of tribes, each with leaders, each
competing for vital resources, and that’s a recipe
for disaster.
“I’ll talk to Private Duncan. We’ll begin the
search for electrical power tonight, and I’ll call you
as soon as we have something. Captain Stewart,
I’m assuming if we can locate one of our refueling
tankers, it has very long range capability.”
“Yes Sir, I’m sure we can find some at one
of the military bases we transferred all of our assets to during the pandemic.”
“Good, I’ll have Duncan look for a tanker
this afternoon. Jim, let’s assume we locate some
survivors tonight. If we do, let’s plan on meeting
again tomorrow. How about if I come over to see
you guys? You can show me around. I’ve heard
some good things about what you’ve got going on.”
Arnie, we’d like the opportunity to show you
around. Why don’t you have Sammy fly you over in
the helicopter? Then we can fly over to the dairy
farm and the food center in Immokalee. I think
you’ll be impressed.”
I then spent a few minutes reviewing our
long term plans for starting up the electrical grid
and bringing power to his entire airbase.
“That’s good news Jim,” Connors said.
“Since we eliminated the thugs’ presence in Tampa, more survivors have been coming out of the
woodwork. We’ve got about 140 people living on or
near the airbase.”
“We’ve increased our population too,” Jessie
said, “mostly survivors from the Miami area. It
seems everyone has abandoned the cities. They
can only make it work in the countryside, close to
sources of a food supply. We’ve got almost 800 residents now.”
Blaine filled up his airplane with fuel, and
we headed back to the campus. By the time we arrived in the parking lot, it was time for dinner.
With the influx of new residents, Beth had now
implemented early and late dining. She greeted us
from behind the buffet line. The residents loved
her, and she seemed able to make everyone happy.
Her expanded crew always had a dessert the kids
loved, and there was always an assortment of main
courses and vegetables.
Today their team was serving seafood pasta
with fresh-caught shrimp and large chunks of
Grouper. When I arrived at the end of the serving
line I saw ice cream with fresh berries.
We arrived near the end of the second seating and sat down at a table with Paul, Margaret,
Jessie, and Blaine. I asked Beth to sit with us and
relax, and she gladly joined us with a cup of tea.
Halfway through dinner, Debbie and Ralph
approached the table. They wanted to speak to
Paul. “Paul, Debbie and I want to get married, and
we want to make it official. We’d appreciate it if you
could perform a ceremony sometime tomorrow?”
Paul smiled and rose from his seat to congratulate both of them. “Of course I can. How
about in the afternoon.”
Before they could answer, Beth said, “Absolutely not; if you’re going to have a wedding, then
we need to celebrate the occasion, and I’m going to
need to meet with both of you to plan the party. I’m
going to need at least two days to prepare everything, and don’t argue with me; there’s going to be
a party.”
Debbie was laughing; it was the first time I
had seen her smile since she was raped. They both
left our table holding hands and clearly in love. I
looked at Jessie, and she had tears in her eyes;
and I knew why. We needed to talk about our relationship, and I think I knew how the conversation
was going to play out. I saw Patty at a nearby table
and asked her to join us.
I said, “Debbie and Ralph are going to get
married. Can you work up a marriage license;
something very official looking?”
Hunter was the next to arrive with a big
bowl of ice cream and slices of strawberries. “Look
what Beth made for me? She’s the greatest.”
He leaned over and gave her a big kiss, and
Beth’s smile would last for the next week. As he left
the table I reminded him to finish his homework.
After dinner, Jessie and I went for a walk
along the lake. She surprised me as she was quite
adept at doing. “We can’t get married, not now anyway.”
I waited for a clarification. We walked another quarter-mile before she elaborated. It won’t
look good for a husband and wife to both be governors. It will set a bad precedent, and there’re too
many things happening for one of us to resign. I’ll
be okay as long as you tell me you want to get
married.”
We stopped right there and I looked at her
in the fading twilight. “When you’re ready, I’m
ready; just tell me when, and I’ll have Beth start
baking the cake.”
She was crying now, and she wrapped her
arms around my neck and enveloped me with a
special kiss. “I love you!” she said.
Arnie Connors called me a little after eight
o’clock. “We found two areas with electricity. One
is out in California in a place called Corcoran. It’s
about thirty miles north of Bakersfield. The second
is in Massachusetts, a place called Rutland. It’s in
dairy farm country about forty miles west of Boston. It looks like about a couple hundred people
are living there. Duncan will be assessing the size
of both communities as soon as it gets light.”
I gathered the governors together, and we
were waiting in the parking lot just as Sammy
Lafayette circled over the campus. With some fairly
obvious hand signals we directed him to a vacant
corner. A crowd had gathered out of curiosity. Most
of the residents recognized Sammy and Ami, and
they had heard of Major Connors but had never
met him.
We started out in the dining tent, and Beth
treated Arnie, Beth, and Sammy to a batch of
blueberry pancakes and fresh squeezed orange
juice. Arnie thanked her. “Beth, I think I’ve died
and gone to heaven.”
It was a beautiful day, so we decided to
meet in the shade of the tent, close to Beth’s endless supply of freshly-baked sweet rolls. Arnie told
the other governors what he had told me earlier in
the morning. Ami added, “We’ve located a tanker at
a military airfield in Arizona. The base will have
plenty of jet fuel. I’ll want to have Blaine fly as copilot.”
I called Blaine, who was working on his
Piper Cub, and asked him to join us. He arrived a
few minutes later, and we continued planning our
trip to the west coast.
I answered, “They probably don’t have any
problems with fresh produce. The area they’ve settled in is a big agricultural section of the state.”
Major Connors said, “We’ll bring them satellite phones. That might mean more to them than
anything else, and we’ll give them phone directories with all of our telephone numbers.”
“Arnie,” I said, “why don’t we let Blaine and
Ami plan our trip while the rest of us show you
around?”
We took Arnie Connors everywhere. We
spent extra time visiting the classrooms where the
teachers stopped their daily lessons to introduce
the major. Greg was teaching organic chemistry to
the oldest kids, and the major stopped to give them
all a pep-talk about the importance of their studies
to the future of our country. They all listened intently.
By far, the most impressive part of the tour
was the visit to Mary’s emergency operating room.
She explained how her medical team was operating
on dogs to learn various surgical techniques. She
insisted the major fly over any of his people who
needed medical care. He seemed genuinely appreciative and told her he would have Sammy Lafayette set up a medivac transport service with his
helicopter.
Sammy flew Jessie, Manny, Arnie, and me
over to Immokalee and Manny took our guests on a
tour of the fields of fruits and vegetables growing
and the irrigation system powered by our solar arrays. There were over fifty people now helping
Manny out and they all seemed to be enjoying their
work. I tried to say thank you to each person I met
along the tour.
We ate lunch with Manny’s people, and
once again Major Connors thanked all of the workers for their efforts. He spoke about how many of
his people were suffering from malnutrition until
they began receiving food from Immokalee. The
major received a standing ovation and everyone
went back to work with renewed enthusiasm.
After lunch we got back in the helicopter
and flew over to the dairy farm. Barbara met us as
we landed, and I introduced Major Connors, and
Sammy Lafayette. She led her guests over to an
electric golf cart. Jessie and I decided to stay at the
farmhouse and talk to some of our people.
Connie Field was in the barn running the
electric milking machines. She was one of the
Marco Island survivors. She greeted us and explained how the milking machine worked. I asked
her how she liked working at the farm.
“It’s funny,” she said. “I thought I’d give it a
try because I’d never been on a farm. I’m a city girl.
Working on a farm sounded romantic, and I liked
Barbara. Let me tell you, it’s hard work here, but I
love it. I think I’m going to stay here after my
month’s up.”
As Jessie and I wandered around, we heard
the same story from many of the volunteers. A
couple of our people said they would not stay after
their tour was up, but the vast majority loved the
experience.
After visiting the cattle ranch, the tour returned, and each of her guests was carrying small
containers filled with fresh eggs. Barbara took us
inside the farmhouse and served us wine and some
of her now-famous cheese. Arnie sampled the
cheese and smiled, “I’m not sure whether I’m going
to miss Beth’s pancakes or this cheese more; it’s
delicious Barbara.”
It was almost three o’clock before we made
it back to the campus. Blaine and Ami were still
sitting at the same table planning our trip. We sat
down, and Beth immediately showed up with some
freshly baked chocolate-chip cookies.
Margaret came up to our table and showed
me the latest spreadsheet. “We had four people
come in from Miami today, she said. “They said it’s
been chaos. They finally ran out of food and decided to leave in the middle of the night. There are a
lot of gangs still prowling the city looking for drugs
and abducting women.”
Margaret looked very tired, and she said
she was getting over a cold. It didn’t look like a
cold to me; she just looked very tired. I turned my
attention back to our planning. Captain Stewart
and Blaine would be ready to leave the day after
tomorrow. Blaine wanted to assemble a pump we
could use to transfer jet fuel from underground
storage tanks. We might need it if the military field
in Arizona didn’t have a working fuel pumping system.
We agreed to meet at the MacDill airbase in
two days at nine o’clock. Our visitors from MacDill
then left. We walked them out to Sammy’s helicopter and waved to them as the chopper rose up into
the sky.
During breakfast, everyone was talking
about the wedding. People at the dairy farm were
all planning on driving in and spending the night.
Beth, who seemed to be the self-appointed wedding
planner, said the ceremony would be conducted on
the beach. She and Debbie along with Ralph had
driven into downtown Naples yesterday and found
a beautiful wedding gown and tuxedo for the
groom.
People were already setting up extra tables
to allow everyone in the community to eat their
dinners at the same time. Beth had found a dozen
willing volunteers to help prepare the special dinner for the almost nine-hundred residents. The
kitchens in many apartments were being utilized. I
finally realized it was the first true celebration in
our community since the beginning of the pandemic. I knew there would be very little work completed
today, and I certainly approved.
Then, as if to prove me wrong, Greg sat
down at our table with a broad grin on his face. He
reached into his pocket and pulled out a square
sheet of clear glass. “We did it!” he said, “It has the
same physical properties as the Opti-Solar supplier’s photovoltaic cell.”