The Last Tribe (19 page)

She looked at the bottle and then
up at him.  She was touched and began to cry.  Rebecca rarely showed emotion.  She
looked back down at the bottle, and after a pause she thanked him.

“Through all the death and horror came
a person as genuine and thoughtful as you.”  She said quietly.  “Thank you,
Greg.  You’re the best friend I’ve ever had.”  Rebecca lifted her head to look
him in the eyes.  She stood onto her tippy toes and kissed him gently on the
cheek.  She closed her eyes as she kissed him.  It was the first time Rebecca
kissed a boy.

“Don’t let it go to my head. 
You’ve saved my life.   I’m glad I can make you smile.  Let’s get that water
warm so you can take a bath.” 

Rebecca stayed in the tub for
almost a half hour.  Greg made his fish, waiting to bake hers until she was out
of the tub.  At the 20 minute mark she asked him to boil another pot of water
so she could warm the bath. 

She washed her hair and soaked in
front of the fire.

When she was done, dried off, and
in her pajamas, she walked into the kitchen.  “Sorry I missed dinner.  Wait
until you get in there.  It’s incredible.  It makes you feel like you’re normal
again.  Really, you feel normal.”

“Well, the rice is kind of warm
instead of hot.  I cooked your fish in the oven when you called out that you
were getting out of the tub.  Watch out for bones.  There are a million of
them.”  He put a plate in front of her with rice, fish, and warmed canned peas.

“Veggies?  You’re making me eat
veggies?”

“We’ve got to keep up our strength. 
Peas are good for you.”  He spun around to leave the kitchen.  “I’m out!  Don’t
bother me for at least 20 minutes.  I’m going to smell like a beautiful lilac
when I’m done!”  He ran out of the kitchen, coming back a minute later in his
new flannel robe.  He grabbed a boiling pot off the stove and went into the
bathing room to warm the water.

Rebecca heard him slip into the tub. 
She picked up her food and walked into the other room.  Greg pulled his knees
to his chest to cover himself.

“Hey!  What are you doing?”

“Don’t worry, I’m not looking,
much.  I’m going to eat at the table with my back to you.  Let’s talk about the
gunshot.”

“I didn’t bother you.”  He whined.

“Oh come on, you’re a guy.  You can
lean back and enjoy yourself while talking to me, can’t you?”  She pulled a
chair off the table and sat with her back to him.

She began.  “I believe we have
three options.  Ignore it like it never happened, actively seek the person or
people, or passively seek them with a signal fire.”

“I like the last option.”  She said
after a pause.  “Being proactive is our best approach, but trying to find them
is a waste of gas and time.”  Rebecca was serious in her tone.

“If a giant, mean looking person
comes out of the woods and up to our fire with guns and knives, we make a
decision.  If a child comes out, we make a different decision, but lighting a
fire and luring the person here gives us options.  We control the encounter.” 
Greg had a feeling his input was not necessary.

“Let’s light it tomorrow morning.” 
She concluded before turning to lighter conversation.  Rebecca talked about how
fun it was the fish again, how her dad had taken her on weekends when he could
get away from the store.  When she was finished with her dinner, she got up and
averted her eyes for her walk back into the kitchen. 

Greg enjoyed his soak.  He stepped
on the towel Rebecca left for him next to the tub.  He dried off and slipped
his robe back on.  He looked down at the dark gray water filled with dirt and
grime.  “Man did I need that for both my body and soul.”

He put his pajamas on and pulled
out one of the board games they found at the mall.  When Rebecca came out of
the kitchen, she sat down.  They spent the rest of the evening trash talking,
laughing, and having fun.  It was a rewarding end to a long day of work.  They
fell asleep in their twin beds within seconds of hitting the pillow.

The morning sun brought a new day
of challenges.  As planned, they built a fired in the middle of the college
Green.  Greg used wet leaves to create smoke, a trick he saw on a survival
show.  The fire sent thick black smoke high into the air.

They watched from the corner office
of a nearby college administration buildings.  The office had a fireplace they
used to keep warm while the waited.

Greg and Rebecca lit a signal fire
for three consecutive days. 

Paul and Hank were socked in for
days.  The sun shined briefly the first morning they spent at the Rutland hotel,
but the clouds rolled in later in the day and snow began to fall.  It snowed
for two more days.  Three feet fell before the storm was over.  The front steps
were gone as the snow drifted above the porch landing. 

They stomped a path to the wood
pile, stayed in the hotel, and debated their next steps. 

The winds blew drifts and the temperature
outside settled into the low twenties during the day and single digits at
night.  Hank studied the phone book and the local area maps.  Paul discovered a
hotel cribbage board, a backgammon board, and dozens of puzzles.  The Inn had a
mystery library in the lobby with a small sign that read “free for guests,
please return before departure.” 

Paul and Hank were stuck.  They did
not know for how long, but they assumed they would be in the Rutland Inn for a
while.  Despite the situation, they considered themselves lucky to have
provisions to last them through the entire winter, water (thanks to the snow), fuel,
and companionship. 

The Inn’s Honeymoon Suite was a
large room on the second floor with a fireplace and a hot tub.  Paul and Hank heated
the room at least once a week to bathe.  Paul unpacked his solar shower which
they filled with warm water in the kitchen before hanging it above the Suite’s
tub.

They found clothes in the Inn’s lost
and found and the owner’s quarters, and made themselves as comfortable as
possible. 

The snow was so high that even if
they found snowmobiles, they could not find the road.  Neither Paul nor Hank
knew the area well enough to risk going over a mountain in deep snow and
sub-freezing temperatures.

Their second week at the hotel
brought Christmas.  They did not exchange gifts, but they did make a feast from
the gourmet pantry.  Despite the uneven and high cooking temps of their
woodstove, Paul was able to bake a small chocolate Buche de Noel.

The brother’s retired after their
holiday feast to a fire in the main room and a vintage port from the wine
cellar.

“To us, brother, to us.”  Hank
said, drunk, but lucid enough to toast their luck.

“We can ring in the new year next
week, but I am glad to put this one in the rearview.  Despite a pleasant
holiday with you, this has been the worst year of my life.”  Paul, also drunk,
tipped his glass and took a sip.

Hank tipped his glass, paused, and
responded.  “I have never known pain like I did this year, but you know what? 
I’ve never had to stop my life like I have this year either.”  He poured himself
more port.  “You and Megan, you lived your lives differently than I did.  You
travelled.  You spent your weekends working on the house or at shows, movies. 
You lived.”

“We didn’t have kids.”  Paul
replied.

“I know, I know, and I loved the
girls, but that’s not what I mean.  These last days, sitting in this house, not
working or worrying, decompressing about the last months, about my last 50
years, it’s been incredible and cathartic.  I cannot do anything right now. 
Literally, I can’t do work, there is no way for me to get to Hanover.  I have
enough food, water, and fuel.  I don’t need to gather anything.  I can’t get to
the mall.  I can’t call anyone.”  He sipped his port.  “I don’t have work
tomorrow.  There isn’t a college football game on TV.  I have been forced to
stop.  I have to sit back and enjoy my time with you.”

“And” Paul asked.

Hank sipped his port.  “I don’t
know.  I still have an urge to ‘do.’  I feel like we need to prep for
something, but I don’t know what.  We can’t plant.  We can’t build.  I am
socked in by a storm, perfectly comfortable and with months of provisions. 
It’s made me slow down.  I’m not taking stock of my life, or saying I have
regret in how I lived my life, but this pandemic, it’s brought a new kind of
order to my mind.  It’s simplified everything.”  Hank continued to drink.

“I’m rambling, because I’m a little
drunk.  What I think I’m trying to say, what I think I’ve realized is, the
rapture has created a world where I can enjoy a game of cribbage with my
brother.  Before all of this destruction, my mind was always half somewhere
else.  I was thinking about work, or mowing the lawn, or whatever.  I’m free of
that now.”  He paused, took another sip of port.

“The price was too high, but I had
to pay it, you know?  I feel like I should make the best of the bargain, make
the best of the situation.  Yes, this is the worst Christmas I’ve ever had.  My
life’s partner, my four girls, they are all dead, but there’s nothing I can do
about that.  To honor them, I will take the gift I earned from their deaths and
savor it.  I’ll enjoy my life.”

Hank smiled.  “This is great
port.”  He raised his glass to the sky.  “Thank you Steve and Nicole for your fantastic
taste and hospitality.”  Hank and Paul, having found the hotel’s ownership
information, frequently thanked their presumed dead benefactors.

Hank started again.  “Do you know
how many people I fired during my time at work?  I didn’t keep track, but it
was north of thirty.  That’s how I lived, climbing on the backs of others. 
It’s how it used to be.  Life isn’t like that anymore.  Life is pretty simple
for us now.  Eat, keep warm and dry, protect each other, go to sleep.  Do I get
to play golf?  No.  Will I miss a lot of things?  Absolutely.  But there is a
purity to my life today.”

Hank leaned forward, rolling the
port around in his glass as he spoke.  He watched the maroon liquid swirl.  “You
know why I burned my house and crawled in a hole for two months?”  Hank did not
look up from the glass. 

“You told me, to avoid the government.” 
Paul put his hand on Hank’s knee.  He patted it, smiling at his drunk brother.

Hank looked up to meet Paul’s eyes. 
“I wanted to die.  I burned my old life to the ground and crawled into a grave
next to my family.  I never expected to come out of my tomb.  I’m not sure I
wanted to come out of my tomb.  I debated killing myself, kept a gun in my
hand, in my mouth, to my head almost every day.”  Tears rolled down Hank’s face. 
He sat back, arms stretched out to either side.  He and Paul sat by the fire on
the highest holiday of the year, warm, dry, and fed.  They had much to be angry
about, but much to give thanks and praise for as well.

Hank sniffed in his nose loudly. 
He used his sleeve to wipe tears from his face as others streamed down.  “As I
said, I paid all I had for this new life.  I don’t want it, but it’s mine now,
and I am going to accept it, enjoy it, and savor it while I can.”  Hank gulped
the last of his port. 

 “You think anyone else is alive? 
You think Greg is making it through the winter, wherever the hell he is?”  Paul
thought of his nephew every day.

“I know they are, Paul.  I know
they are, and just like us, they are sitting around a fire cursing and giving
blessings for the year.”  Hank placed his empty glass on the table before
leaning onto his side and putting his feet on the couch.  A loud drunken snore erupted
almost instantly.

“Merry Christmas, Hank.”  Paul whispered. 
He stood, steadied himself, and put two logs on the fire.  He went back to his
couch, still fully dressed like his brother, rested his head on his pillow and
fell asleep. 

John, Matt, and Craig sat in the
Charleston harbor fishing.  It was brisk out, but their desire for fresh fish
outweighed their discomfort.  They also felt the need to get out of the house
after three days of rain.  They used a boat for inlet fishing, one of many left
along the harbor.  It was early, 10:30am, and they already had two good sized
sea bass.  John wanted one or two more fish before he called it a day.  The
cold weather made him lean towards going in with his current haul.

“I got one.”  Craig said
excitedly.  “Big one too.”

“You’re going to feed us all today
little brother.”  Matt smiled and looked over at his father.  If Craig landed
the one on his line, he was responsible for two of the three fish.

Craig reeled in his catch, another
sea bass.  It was almost double the size of the first two.  He quickly baited
his hook to recast his line.

“I think that’s enough for one
winter’s morning,” John said to his son. 

Matt reeled his empty line in ten
minutes earlier in hopes of heading home to a warm fire.  “I think you’d sit
here all day fishing if we didn’t stop you, Craig.”  He told his younger
brother.

“Just one more?”  Craig asked.

Matt and John looked at each
other.  Matt shrugged his shoulders with a ‘what else do we have to do’
expression. 

“Okay, but hurry up and get another
one.  I’m cold.”  John smiled.  He reached over to a bag and pulled out a bottle
of water.   In the few months the harbor was free of boat traffic, the fish
made a tremendous jump in population.  John knew it would not take long for
Craig to catch another fish.

They found Craig pedaling towards
Myrtle Beach all those months ago.  He was thirty miles from their house, a
valiant effort for a young boy on a bike with only six gears.  John hugged his
son as Matt put the bike in the back of their SUV.  Craig cried.  He kicked. 
He screamed.  He hit his father. 

“You’re letting Greg die like you
let Mom die.”  Craig yelled.  John hugged him tightly.  “I hate you, and I’m
running away again tomorrow, and the next day, until I save my brother.”

But Craig did not run away again. 
Matt spent an hour with his younger brother that evening.  They spoke behind a
closed door, away from their father.  When Matt came downstairs he assured John
the days of Craig fleeing were over.

 “You’ve had a rough few months,
Matt.  I have too, but you’ve had it worse than me.  You lost your best
friends, your football team, you girlfriend, of what?  Two years?”

“Almost two, it would have two
years at New Year’s” Matt replied.  He sat on the couch next to his father. 
Craig was asleep upstairs, exhausted from his long day.

“Greg is lost in Massachusetts or
New Hampshire, your other brother keeps running away, and to top it all off,
your mother died.”  John paused.  “I’m your father, and I will always be your
father, but I need a friend as much as you do.  I need a second in command, a
partner to raise your brother, a partner to get us to Uncle Todd’s, a friend to
confide in when I don’t know the answer.  This isn’t a great thing to ask of my
17 year old son, barely old enough to drive, but it’s something I have to ask
of you.  You’ve had a bad few months, and I can’t promise things are going to
get better, but consider today the day you become a man. “

Matt was serious since his
girlfriend’s death.  His sense of humor was gone, and he seemed to be muddling
through life.  Before the rapture Matt was a happy person, willing to laugh and
joke through any situation.  The end of the world snuffed out his spark.  John
needed to light it again.

“You need to snap out of your haze,
your depression, whatever is bothering you.  I need you to start helping around
the house, food gathering, cooking, wood gathering.  You have to be a better
influence and role model to Craig.”  John looked directly into Matt’s eyes.

“And above all else I need you to
be my friend.”  John stopped and let his words sink in.

Matt stared at his father.  He
nodded slowly.  “Okay, I get it.  Okay.”  John could tell when Matt was lying,
telling him what he wanted to hear.  Matt had been lying for weeks.  Tonight
was not one of those times.  In the last two minutes, John broke through the
wall building between father and son since the beginning of the pandemic. 

“I can still call you Dad, though,
right?”  Matt knew the answer, and asked with a partial smile.  It was his
first joke in weeks.

“I’ll always be your dad, but we
have to fast forward our relationship about ten years, where I realize you are
too old for me to boss around, and we become friends.” 

They stayed up late into the
evening, talking about plans for the winter.  Every day was a ‘long day’ after
the rapture.  Matt was tired.  He yawned, stood up, and said he was going to
bed.  He picked up his solar lantern and went to his room. 

Matt sat on the edge of his mattress
for a few minutes.  He pulled a backpack from under his bed and started to
unpack his things.  It was a large hiking pack he scavenged from a neighbor’s
house.  Matt planned to leave Charleston to find Greg, abandoning his father
and younger brother.   After the conversation with John, Matt realized he was
not leaving to save Greg.  He was leaving to run away from himself.  He was
running away from his dead friends, girlfriend, and mother.  He finished
unpacking and shoved the empty bag back out of sight.

Matt fell asleep the instant his
head hit the pillow.  Unlike previous nights, when he lay awake and planned his
escape, Matt’s life had a new purpose.  His spirit was renewed, and his
conscience cleared.  He slept soundly for the first time in months.

John found Matt’s backpack earlier
that week.  He knew his son was planning to leave.  John could not stop Matt. 
He could stop Craig, but Matt could drive, all he needed was a car.  Matt had
to want to stay.  Matt had to want to help.  John knew Matt had convinced Craig
not to runaway by telling him he was leaving to find Greg. 

When John found the empty pack
under Matt’s bed the next day, he knew their talk had worked.  Every word of
their conversation was real, and John held up his end of the bargain.

Months later, as they sat in a boat
in Charleston Harbor, John continued to treat Matt as an equal.  Craig caught
two more fish, a fourth sea bass and a flounder.  Matt turned the key on the
whaler and powered the boat towards the pier.  “Great fishing Craig.  You know
the rule.  He who catches, cleans…” 

“Man, I hate cleaning the fish when
it’s this cold out,” he lied.  Craig loved everything about fishing, the bait,
the actual fishing, the cleaning.  He even enjoyed eating fish. 

They pulled up to the dock, and
Craig grabbed one of the fish, jumped onto the pier, and walked toward the end
to clean his catch.  He was a skilled angler, and cleaned the first fish
quickly.  Matt tied up the boat, and John put the other fish on the pier for
Craig to clean.

“I like the flounder.  You don’t
have to clean them.  Just filet and eat.”  Craig smiled at his father.   He was
becoming a resourceful young man.  John feared Craig would lose his childhood
to the plague, but in spite of everything, Craig still had the wonder of a 10
year old.  He flicked the fish guts off the dock and watched the sea birds and
small sharks fight for the meal in the water below. 

The water was eight feet below them
and deep.  When a larger shark, 8 feet long, lunged through the surface for the
fish guts, Craig laughed in excitement.  “Dad, Matt, there is a huge shark
right at the end of the pier.  You have to see this!”  The two men rushed over
to watch the giant fish.  It was a fitting end to a fun morning. 

They stood on the pier until John
broke the silence.  “We’ll eat the flounder as soon as we get home, smoke the
smaller bass, and ice the big bass for dinner.  Sound like a plan?”  John was
excited for fresh fish.  They had not fished for a week due to rain and cold
mornings.

The Dixons grabbed their gear and
walked to a truck parked next to the dock.  John found the small Toyota in
town.  It was perfect for hauling to and from the harbor.  The Dixons moved out
of their family home to escape their memories.  They scouted Mount Pleasant,
the town north of Charleston, landing in one of the island communities near the
ocean.  The family settled into a house with five fireplaces built in the style
of an old southern mansion.  It was convenient to the fishing piers, and away
from any main roads. 

John was not concerned about
rapture survivors finding and threatening his family.  During the outbreak,
when scientists were studying the disease, the rapture was determined to be
99.99999% communicable.    The chances of surviving were one in a million. 
South Carolina’s population was around four million.  There ‘might’ be one or
two others in the state. 

Probability suggested there were
only 300 to 350 people in the entire country who ‘might’ have survived the
disease.  Had all of these people been healthy otherwise?  Had all of these
people been old enough to survive on their own?  Had any of these people needed
medication to stay alive?  Medication that was now gone?  Had any of these
people been old enough to pass away naturally since the disease began?  John
estimated there were at most 200 people alive in the United States.  He guessed
half of that 200, maybe more, travelled to California, Texas, or southern
coastal areas to stay warm through the winter.

John felt secure in Mount Pleasant,
squatting for the winter months in a mammoth house near the ocean.  His family
was fifty miles from Interstate 95, the main artery of the east coast.  If
there were large bands of roving survivors, they would skip the mild climate of
Charleston for the warm temperatures of central and southern Florida.

The truck was loaded and the fish
were cleaned.  Matt drove back to the ‘mansion,’ as they called it.  He parked
and immediately walked around to the house’s deck to start the grill.  He was
hungry, and lighting the fire meant he was closer to a flounder lunch.  They
would transfer the coals from the grill into the smoker after lunch, smoking
and preserving the meat of the smaller sea bass.

John and Craig made sure the rods
and fishing gear were clean before they exited the garage and walked into
house.  John was washing his hands in the sink when Matt came in from off of
the deck.

“Fire is going, we should be ready
to cook in a few.”  Matt said.  “I’ll put a pot of water on so we can have rice
or noodles.”

“Craig is putting the fish on
ice.”  John looked out the window as he rubbed his hands together.  They kept
lemon scented liquid soap at the sink to rid their hands of the fish smell. 
Their house was several rows away from the water, but he could see the harbor
from the kitchen window.  “Let’s do rice.  It goes better with fish.  Don’t you
think?”

They considered several locations
and homes.  All of the homes had some kind of generator or back-up energy
system.  This particular house had two, a gas generator they used occasionally
and solar panels that powered a few items during the daylight hours, including
a water pump and water heater.

Initially, after moving into the solar
house, John and the boys lived like they did before the rapture.  They kept
multiple lights on, played video games, plugged appliances in all the time, and
used the garage door opener.  They learned quickly that plugged in appliances
use power, and their solar power cells were consistently drained each evening. 
Their gas generator would turn on and burn precious fuel. 

The only appliance plugged into a
wall socket was the refrigerator.   When they needed light, they used one lamp
or they lit candles.  They set a limit to television, movies, and video games. 
As the days grew colder and shorter, energy was conserved for electric
heaters. 

The solar panels allowed them to
keep parts of their old life during the day, and kept them attached to their
old humanity.  Learning to conserve energy taught them the new life of finite
heat and light.

Four five gallon coolers of water
sat on the counter next to the stove, boiled and purified the day before.  The
kitchen looked like a sporting event, as the yellow and red coolers were
mainstays at soccer, baseball, and football games.  Matt pressed the white
spigot at the bottom of the cooler by placing his thumb on the button.  He
measured four cups into a pot and walked outside to boil the water on the
grill.  He rarely used the indoor stove.  With the water started, he went back
inside to select a packet of ‘just add water’ rice from the hundreds stored in
the kitchen pantry. 

“I feel Caribbean today.”  He mumbled
to himself, pulling a green box from the shelf. 

Matt typically cooked fish on
aluminum foil.  It was an easy clean up.  He poured olive oil on the foil, put
the filleted and skinned flounder down, and generously applied seasoning.  He
waited for the water to boil and the rice to cook before he started the fish. 
Flounder cooked in just a few minutes. 

It was Monday.  Matt and Craig had
school.  John established a school schedule once their lodging and food were
secured.  Craig could not continue through life with a fifth grade education. 
Craig did not need to learn much more, but he did need basic math, physics, and
better reading and writing skills.

Matt was a senior in high school. 
He had a firm base of education to get him through the rest of his life.  One
of his new roles was to tutor Craig.  John was too far removed from school to
be an effective educator.  One day a week all three of the Dixons learned and
practiced basic survival skills like starting a fire without matches and making
snare traps. 

Monday meant a visit to the local
library, located just three blocks from their house.  Matt found books on math,
engineering, physics, survival, and most importantly, farming.  He was obsessed
with planting crops and setting up irrigation systems once he travelled to
Hanover.  New Hampshire had a short growing season.  He studied which
vegetables he could grow, how to harvest the seeds after the season, rotating
the crops, watering the crops, pest control.  He studied canning, and how much
food they would be need for a group of ten or more.