The Last Tribe (73 page)

“Community.”  Rebecca said.  “Avery
convinced me of the idea that we need to stay close, live in a tight community
rather than spread out.  I’m willing to give it a try.”

“So you aren’t keeping the big
house for just you and Greg?”  Hank looked at Avery.  “You’re good, well done.”

“I usually get what I want.”  Avery
put her hands behind her head as she lay back in the chair and closed her
eyes. 

“Well, I’m still impressed.  We
looked at the houses on either side of this house.  Each home has a separate
guest house and four or five bedrooms.  We can all live very comfortably in
this area.  The farmhouses are more spread out, but the people who want to live
down in the fields will be happy in two of those homes.  They are just down the
road from each other.”

“Hello!”  Greg said, rounding the
corner of the house and into the backyard.  He was dirty with green flora
stains, dirt, and what appeared to be blood.  “I need a little help.  Mighty
hunter bagged himself a pig, or a boar, or something that resembles a pig but
with tusks.  It was mean.”  He held up his hand and showed a cut running across
the back.  The cut was not deep, but it looked painful.

“How big?”  Hank asked.  He walked
towards Greg and made a motion that he would help, holding his arm up above his
head and pointing to the front yard.

“It’s going to feed us.”  Greg
assured him.  “For a few days I suspect.”

A large hairy beast lay in the back
of the truck.  “I would guess it weighs at least forty pounds, maybe fifty on a
good day.  I had a rough time getting it into the truck by myself.”

“Holy crap, Greg.”  Hank was
stunned.  He did not expect the boar to be so big.

“I know.  I’ve gotten pretty good
with the bow.  It still came at me, so I hacked it down with my machete, right
in the head, like it was a zombie or something.”  There was pride in Greg’s
voice.  “I cleaned it in the woods, which lowered the weight enough so I could
pick it up and put it in the truck.”   

Hank put his arm around his
nephew.  “Well, it’s not as big as the moose Paul and I killed, but it’s a nice
sized animal for you.”

“You mean the moose that wandered
into town and stood still while you and Paul shot it twice?”

“Yes, Greg.  The ton of animal with
large antlers that I killed.  The animal that fed all of us for weeks, and is
still feeding us, like the moose fried rice you had this morning.”  Hank could
one up the kid all day.

“I give.”  Greg said.  “Unless I
catch a great white shark, I’m never going to out do you and Paul.  You win.” 
Greg did not care about the good natured ribbing.  The boar was a prized kill. 
Like the fruit around them, and the fish they so easily pulled from the ocean,
this boar was proof that they would not just live on the island.  The group was
going to thrive on the island.

The airplane unloading party pulled
up an hour later.  Tired, sweaty people poured out of their SUV’s.  Emily was
at the head of the pack.  “It is five degrees cooler up here, maybe ten degrees
cooler.”  She found her husband on a lounge chair.

“It’s done.”  She told him.  “Half
of us probably have heat stroke, but it’s done.  All the supplies are in the
truck.”  She sat down on the foot part of his chair.  Todd sat up and crossed
his legs in front of himself.

“The houses are cleared of bodies. 
Greg killed a wild boar.  Avery and Rebecca gathered fruit.  I think we can
relax, if we can figure out where we are sleeping tonight.”

“Where do you want to live?”  Emily
was a mess.  Her hair was pulled back into a tight pony tail that stuck through
the back of a baseball cap she wore to block the sun.  The cap was soaked with
sweat.  A thin white line of salt ran across the brim at the top of the sweat. 
A few strands of her hair stuck to her forehead.  Her arms were streaked with
grease and dirt, as were her legs.

“Hawaii?”  Todd replied.  “Kauai?”

Emily ignored him.  “John is going
to live here, by the water for Craig.  Solange and he are going to stay
together, obviously.  Matt wants to live on the farm.  Mel is going to live on
the farm with Cameron, Jackie, and Jacob.  Kelly is joining them to care for
her animals.  I am leaning towards living down in the valley.”

Todd looked behind his wife to the
ocean.  “All of this is new.  The way we’re going to live will be new too.  I
understand your need for stability.  I know you want a permanent room for the
kids.  You want them to grow up with friends their own age.  What is Bernie
going to do?  She has little ones too.”  Todd thought for a second before
continuing.

“Maybe we live both places. Maybe
the village is where we end up some nights.  If Craig has a big haul, the
farmers will come up here, and instead of walking down the road in the dark,
they stay in this location.  Maybe when Greg kills another boar, instead of
walking it all the way to the ocean, we cook it at the farms, and the ocean
people stay down there.  Jay and Brian need to know how to fish, hunt, and
farm, and be comfortable in both locales.”

“We can’t move them around every
day or week.”  Emily did not like Todd’s answer.

“Then my answer is I don’t know.” 
He took her grimy hand.  He flipped it over and saw blisters on her palm and
fingers.  “Ouch.”  He said to her.  “I might not like the farm.  I might not
like the sea.  The great thing is, I’m telling you we don’t have to make a firm
decision.  We won’t have a mortgage.  We can move.”

“I’d like to try the valley
first.”  Emily took hold of his hand.  She squeezed it like a person in love.

“Works for me.  The real question
is.  Will it work for Hubba?” 

Emily leaned in to give Todd a
hug. 

“Are you nuts?”  He said, pulling
away from her advance.  “You’re filthy.  Go in the ocean or take a shower.” 
Todd let go of her hand.  “Yuck.”

Emily did not back away.  She
pushed her husband onto the lounge chair, grabbing his hands and pinning him
down.  She kissed him.  Todd feigned a struggle, but kissed her back.

“Get a room.”  Melanie said a few
feet away as she toweled off from her swim.  “There are impressionable children
and jealous widows nearby.”

The house was equipped with a grill,
and like the other high end furnishing, it was a top of the line wood drawer
model. 

Ahmed flipped pork chops, now sizzling
above the flames. 

“Fried mango rice for breakfast. 
Ceviche for lunch.  Pork for dinner.  I think we’ve adapted to life in Hawaii
quite nicely.”  Ahmed took a sip from his glass of water.  He held the glass up
to the group sitting in front of him.  “To our first full day.”  

“Hear hear!”  Was the loud reply.

“Our first crop should be rice.  If
corn is possible, we do corn, but I know we can grow rice here.  Right?  We’re
practically in Asia.”  Matt strategized with Melanie. 

“We need a grain, that’s for sure. 
We can grow sweet potatoes or something easy like that in pots.  We’ll check
the books at the library.  It should have local knowledge and information we
could not access in Hanover.”  Melanie listened to Matt while combing Casey’s
hair.  She liked Matt, and knew he would be a great partner.  She needed to
harness his enthusiasm.  Farming was a long term project.  Matt wanted crops to
grow ‘tomorrow.’

Similar conversations occurred
across the lanai, decisions about where people would sleep that night and live
the next day, decisions about what supplies needed to go to the farms and what
stayed at the beach, decisions about how often the groups would gather.

At 6:30 the sun was still high in
the sky, but everyone was exhausted.  The early wakeup by the roosters at dawn,
working in the heat and sun, and the five hour time shift caught up with the
tribe.  Cameron, Bridget, and Wendy were curled up on couches, taking quick
naps before dinner. 

“We need tables.”  Bernie said to
Kelly and Jamie.

“There is one inside.”  Jamie pointed
to the dining room table visible from their seats.

“No, we need a couple of long
tables, and we need a few sets, one set for here and one set for the farm.  We
need to eat together at tables.”  Bernie referred to an ongoing communal eating
area, not their immediate dinner plans.  “I’ll ask Ahmed to find a library or
high school to locate long tables and chairs.  We need our dinners to be social
and in one locale.”

Kelly described the lanai at the
farmhouse.  “It will accommodate tables for all of us, and enforce rule number
two.”

Jamie looked puzzled.  “What is
rule two?  And what is rule one for that matter?”

“Rule two is never go two days
without eating together.  John and Paul are setting up loose tribe rules, and
they want to make sure we stay unified.  We never go more than one day without
gathering for a meal.  We always come together every other dinner or lunch.  We
can eat every meal together if we want, but never two days apart.”

Jamie was tickled.  “I could not
agree more with rule number two.  What’s rule one?”

“It’s more of a way of life than a
rule.”  Bernie told her.  “Rule one is to always remember that we are in this
together.  I believe it is being referred to as the ‘thick or thin’ rule.” 

Jamie understood rule one.  She
survived a bleak and hungry winter in New York City because of rule one.  Her
eyes filled with tears.  She raised her water glass and barely got out an
“amen.”

“That’s my line.”  Bernie chuckled,
clinking Jamie’s glass in agreement.

Rebecca woke to the sound of
roosters.  A week had passed, and she still had no idea how to get rid of the
roosters, or keep them from crowing at sunrise.  She did not move.  She was on
her side in a king bed with her eyes open, staring at the wall.  Greg lay next
to her.  “Just go back to sleep.”  He mumbled.  “They’ll stop in a little
while.”  He pulled a pillow over his head.

“You know I can’t fall back asleep
once I’m up.”  Rebecca sat up in their bed.  She wore a U.N.H t-shirt.  She
brought several of them to remind her of her home.   She put her feet in
slippers next to the bed and left the room. 

It was cool in the mornings,
dropping into the high 60’s overnight.  Rebecca poured herself a glass of water
and walked out onto the Lanai.  She sat in a chaise lounge chair.  The pillow
was cool, but not wet from dew.  She made sure to keep the chairs under the
roof so they were dry in the morning.   The coop she brought from Concord was
in the yard, and several roosters strolled around the fence surrounding her
mainland chickens.  They kept eight chickens at the house for eggs.  She
planned to incubate and hatch dozens of chickens.  She wanted fresh eggs each
morning without making the long walk to the farm.

“Morning.”  She nodded to the
roosters.  One crowed at her before strutting away.  Greg came outside and sat
down in the chair beside her.  He wore an orange hooded sweatshirt.  The hood
was up to keep his head warm. 

Lapping waves and an ever present
wind created a constant din.  The price they paid for living less than twenty-five
yards from the ocean.

He put his hand out, and she took
it, intertwining their fingers.  He leaned back in his chair.  Rebecca and Greg
sat and watched the roosters walk around the yard. 

“I believed you when you told me
we’d make it, that you’d keep me alive.”  Greg’s head was turned, looking at
her.  She focused on the chickens.

“I know.”  She squeezed his hand.

“I don’t know why I did.  You were
some teeny bopper, skipping back and forth from your house to the trash cans on
the street, but for some reason, I believed you.”

She looked at him.  His skin was a
dark tan from the week under the tropical sun.

“Thank you.”  He said to her. 

“Anytime.”  She smiled. 

They heard footsteps come down the
stairs in the front hall.  The roosters claimed other victims.  Rebecca and
Greg did not move.  They held hands and watched the Pacific Ocean break against
the sandy Hawaiian shore.