I Benedict Forrest am the eldest. Not sure what I am supposed to say about myself. I have my mom's reddish hair and blue eyes, my chin might be my dad's. I like to help out, dad calls me good. I learn stuff fast, mom calls me a genius. I get moody, dad says I am grumpy like mom. I make everyone laugh, and laugh at all the elder jokes no matter how many times I have heard them. Mom's hair went white over night. She sometimes ask's me who I am. The way dad fusses over my little sister, and her eyes being the same as his, I think I'm glad I don't have to be in charge of eventually adding to the family tree. It wasn't to long after mom went white that Buttercup and Buster became teens too. I had everyone help me move the chess table and chairs downstairs so we could have more room upstairs. Mom and dad do not seem to mind the cold. We will move it back inside soon. We all take turns working in the garden. I want to take the others to the park. Mom made it clear to never travel alone. Especially as a teen. She said always have one adult with us if away from the house. Uncle Scott does not come by anymore. I can't ask him for help. Besides mashing berries onto wood for painting practice as mom had called it. We take turns practicing with the old typewriter. I wrote about dad because I remember him best. Brandon and Buttercup both typed up points on why they should be in charge. Bridgette typed up something about mom. Buster did not type more than his practice husks. We also practice introducing ourselves and doing what mom called warm ups. When the moon gets really full we stay inside. Some of the valley residents become mindless from hunger. They try to eat anything they can. Then they get sick everywhere because their tummy can not handle eating frozen tree bark. When dad died we did not know what to do with him. So we left the small box in the garden room. To keep our minds busy we take turns playing chess against each other. Mom spends a lot of time cleaning the counter even though it does not look dirty. I Benedict Forrest am now a full young adult. It has taken me forever on my own, but I finally understand dad's handwriting, which has helped me decipher the books mom said I needed to learn from. The day after I became a young adult I took everyone down to the park mom had shown me. I think a few of the people she started talking to are family, but I'm not sure. I told Brandon and Buttercup that we would have to figure out who was and wasn't related to us before any pairing was done. Brandon wrinkled his nose and reminded me that he wasn't heir. I pointed out that he was the backup if anything happened to Buttercup. He spent the afternoon chasing everyone away from Buttercup, because he did not want her to get sick and die. A woman with a clipboard walked up to me and asked me who I was. I asked her who she was to be asking us that information. She said she was the self appointed census counter. I asked her what a census counter was. She told me that it meant that she counted how many houses were occupied and how many people lived in them. I countered that that couldn't be a very hard job. She admitted it wasn't, and that it was done only once in awhile. A man with a ragged tie and another clipboard approached me. He pulled a random slip of paper off his board and said that since I liked to ask questions I could be a journalist. He then wandered off to hand out more slips of paper. Staring at the slip of paper the word on it, jarn-all-list, was badly handwritten and poorly spelled. I noticed that some of the folks at the park made fun of both of them for what they were doing. I didn't, and when clipboard guy started to get upset I tried to reassure him that I saw the value of what he was trying to do since we still didn't have any definitive leadership. It's really not much but it's work. I don't think that anyone cares that I do most of my writing at home. I've been typing up reprints of dad's pamphlets on how to grow basic plants. I've also been retyping his handout on edible fish. I've tried talking to the people who show up, but so far no one is warming up to me. Every once in a while stuff gets dropped as pay for my supposed work. Since I'm not trying to have our home stand out I have used most of the materials on the lot with the cart. Every so often Buttercup will snag something and figure out how to fix it to the walls or floor. Bridgette and Brandon had their big transition day. Bridgette has mom's reddish brown hair and blue eyes like me. She spends a lot of time at night wrapping sticks around the ends of her hair to make it curl. She's like me and will laugh at any of mom's tired and old jokes. She gets really fussy about how she, and the rest of us look, and will go on for hours about how we're first founding families and have to measure up to dad's achievements. If the guy at the park hadn't handed her a job assignment she would probably spend her time jumping from one idea to the next. Fortunately for me she was assigned to work at what is theoretically a law enforcement station. I walked past her on the way to my work site, hopefully her clumsiness won't be to much of a hindrance in the long run as she improves her body strength. I will give Bridgette credit for being disciplined enough to stick to a routine. She wants to see if she can find a way for people to trust each other more. Brandon, who has murky green eyes, and dark brown hair was overly excited in my opinion when clipboard guy handed him a slip of paper with science on it. Brandon declared that this gave him a chance to try to build on what dad had started. He wasn't worried about wandering around the valley alone, and like Bridgette he had no problems staying focused on certain tasks. Although he tended to leave his bedroll all over the place and liked to lick even the molded bits of mre up from meals. Brandon's biggest hang up was if Buttercup tried to create pictures, using the berries for paints. I really can't tell if he just hates anything labeled as art or is worried about not having fruit for mashing onto our food. I don't know where he found the headphones that he hangs around his neck, but he thinks he can figure out how to make the old technology work if he tinkers with it enough. After what felt like an endless cycle of time Buttercup and Buster finally became young adults too. I don't know why our sisters insisted on hiding in the bathroom for their big transitions but they did. Buttercup has mom's reddish brown hair that she keeps trimmed short, which I've learned is called auburn, and dad's crystal clear green eye's. She wakes up at the slightest bit of noise, and is constantly humming. For some reason she thinks that some of the towns odder residents are the coolest, but hasn't broken any taboos about approaching them. She also tends to cry over the littlest thing, which makes playing chess against her awful. On her first solo foray to the park she came back with a slip that read "art-ee-tect". I looked through the pocket dictionary I found, along with the few books from dad, and help her decipher Architect as the job title. When we found a description of the job in the back of the book on plumbing and basic lumber applications her eyes lit up. Buster has dad's jet black hair and mom's blue eyes. He also has dad's nose.
Buster hates being outside for long, has never won a game of chess, gets overly excited over the tiniest things, and swears that everyone is out to do him wrong. I've caught him trying to spot the wild dogs that run loose, and made it very clear as did Buttercup that we didn't have any way of caring for animals, and that it was better to let them be. I asked Buster if clipboard guy had given him a slip of paper. His response was a paranoid litany of how the guy was just trying to make everyone look bad, and how he would be just fine without the fake job assignment. Later that night Buttercup slipped me the shreds of a slip, that once pieced together read bad guy master. We decided that clipboard guy meant a criminal mastermind. We also agreed that if anyone of us was cut out for something like that it might very well be Buster given his neurotic tendencies.
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With Jullio going senile shortly after his last birthday it is now up to me to document our lives. I'll be honest I don't understand his drive to record what has been happening here in this valley we call home or the world beyond. Part of my daily routine besides trying to understand the way chess pieces are supposed to move is tending what's left of Jullio's garden. I put everything I harvest in the cupboard, and keep it packed with snow. I have vague memories of a hot food called a tamale from street vendors, wrapped in corn husk. I have no understanding of how to take the corn from the cob to a paste, but I did figure out how to dry the corn husks. They are easier for me to write on and store than the big banana leaves. As my belly grows getting up and down the ladder gets harder. Yet I do it if for nothing more than one or two fresh berries to mash into the mre for our daily meal. I don't think my mom explained this to me properly. Holy hellz! Why did I agree to four children if possible before Jullio passes on. A son. I'm naming him Benedict. I wish I could talk to Shavonne to compare pregnancy and birth notes, but my brother Berjes lost track of which house she is staying in. I'm not sure of what to add or not add to this about our daily life. Everything is the same from day to day. Same sandwiches, same lure routine to get Jullio to bed, same chess moves over and over, same plant care. The only thing that changes is our sons diaper. On the upside Jullio loves rocking with Benedict. Really not in love with the whole sick while pregnant. At least I'm helping add to the next generation and the bio diversity of the community. I'm going to try some basic warm up's from when I used to go to pe daily to see if they help with the labor this time. We get a slightly warmer period of time. I discover that Jullio must have planted something outside, when two rows of trees sprout up. No wonder I was so tired with this pregnancy. Twins. I've named them Bridgette and Brandon. I think Brandon might have Jullio's green eyes. I'm starting to understand why Jullio uses the rocker so much. Hopefully only one more time. I'm not really sure Jullio understands what I'm asking about this being the last pregnancy. I only have one book for the babies to share. I wonder if they sleep so much from a lack of stimulation and hunger. Benedict transitioned to what I'll call child stage. It's clear that his eye are from my family. Hellz! Do twins run in Jullio's family?! This makes five babies, no more! Jullio practically snatched Buttercup from me and started cooing "My princess Buttercup". Given I was in the middle of pushing out her twin brother Buster I didn't argue. The only thing I'm sure of besides my complete exhaustion is that there are no doubts that Buttercup's eyes are green like Jullio's. Brandon's are too, but not the clear crystal green, his are more of a muddy green. I can finally try to figure out the chemicals that were brought into the valley from the station at the pass. I wonder how long the fall like weather will last? The weather hasn't shown any signs of warming further. That Jullio is enamored with Buttercup is beyond obvious. When she's to big to cuddle Jullio always responds to her questions with "as you wish". I wish I knew why our youngest daughter makes him remember an old movie, that was a classic before we were even born. With floor space limited I carefully moved the rocking chair downstairs to the garden. Given Jullio still sleeps in it all the time, and the children daring each other to sleep in the garden, it was a good move. Benedict is finally in what could be called his teens. I'm showing him all the stuff his dad showed me when I first moved in. Although the fish are just bone remains now. The annual cycles of warm weather destroyed the snow preservation that Jullio had spent so much time on. Knowing that my time is short. I take Benedict to the park, and try to explain about not talking to everyone. I also take him to where Jullio had set up the cart for sharing produce. I explain that while we don't actually own it or the lot it's on, we're the only family that does maintenance work on it. I point out the small flowering shrub that I'd managed to grow. Time has been flying past me, and before I realize it Bridgette and Brandon are teens too. I make sure to give them all of the same instructions that I gave Benedict. I'm finding myself more and more exhausted each day. I have so many questions with no answers.
I don't think any of our children have a doubt that Jullio intends for Buttercup to be his heir, the way he always addresses her as his princess. Although he's never neglected any of them or treated them any differently than her. Today I caught myself remixing combinations I already knew, and writing notes as if I'd just discovered the combination. I don't think I'm going to be the one to clear up any of the medical mysteries that landed us here, or cause some residents to turn mindless during the full moon. |
Founder - Jullio Forrest
Generation 3 - Cassandra
Generation 4 - Deborah
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