I never thought that I'd be excited to find two working batteries. Yet here I am happier than freshmen on movie day, when all the seniors take their exit exams. I know high school wasn't that long ago, but everything from before feels like a whole different world let alone life time. My days follow a fairly standard routine. Up before sunrise, use the toilet, and either eat a fresh pack of mre's or lick clean the previous days pack. Once there's enough light to see the rungs and the ground I go down the ladder and tend to the garden. Some mornings I have to stop and fix the plumbing before I can go down. If the sink piping isn't leaking it's the toilet piping clogging up. At first it was really hard to get the sink to stop leaking for more than five minutes, but with time and repeated fixing I got the hang of the funky plumbing we have. Which is why I know that hitting the toilet just right with a hammer works better some days than the plunger. In the evenings if I'm not to tired I read one of the few books I found that are legible at the junk yard. One of the books is on cooking. Sometimes it's hard to look at the pictures, because they trigger memories of walking down the sidewalk and the aroma of fresh pizza wafting from the corner pizzeria, or curry from the Indian restaurant. Those memories, and the hunger pangs they trigger are the reason it took me two moon cycles just to read the first chapter of the cooking book. The other three books include a book on chess with a bunch of brain teaser puzzles. A book on home maintenance and repairs, which only proved a tiny bit helpful as the sink and toilet were not put in using traditional plumbing methods. Yes all 31 shelters were constructed in less than 72 hours, that does not mean they are anything close to a traditional home. The final book I found is a toddlers picture book which reminded me of my favorite preschool teacher Mrs. Umpshaw. The type writer I got in trade from some thugs who'd been waiting for me one evening and wanted to know what I would give them to keep them from beating me up and taking my furniture. I'd caught a parrot that knew a few words and an edible snake, more foster parent weird stray knowledge, on my way home from fishing that day. I offered only the snake at first, but then their boss caught site of the parrot and offered a trade. Since a type writer was probably more useful to me than the parrot so I accepted the offer. All I have to do is get the keys unstuck and figure out a way to untangle the ribbon. Since that day I haven't really seen anymore small animals, but I see plenty of signs that they're around. Makes me wonder what ever happened to the scientist, how their arctic expedition went and if they ever tried to foster kids again after they got back. By the fourth moon cycle, and people either not being able to get to the pass out of the valley or being turned back by the military folks started opening up a small bit. I'm not going to claim undying devotion to anyone, or that I'd lay my life down so that yet another person can try to sneak past the military outpost, but I am very slowly getting folks to see that I really am not some rebellious trouble maker like the commander made me out to be. One teen girl started gushing over my green eyes. I slammed the brakes fast on her just because her parents were okay with her talking to adults didn't mean I wanted to be tied to a teen who hasn't finished maturing yet. Five days out of the week, in addition to doing as much as I can to learn and document about the valleys fish and plant life, I work at the mausoleum as do about a quarter of the towns residents. None of us talk to each other, our tasks are clear and set out. The ground above is to frozen to properly dig out graves. When folks do pass away, everyone is to scared to touch the bodies, so our work is more about recording as many details as possible; name, gender, and as many details on how they passed away as possible. So far it's mainly elders passing of old age. About the wild life. Besides signs of small animals and birds I have also founds signs that deer and wild horses have tried to get into my green house to eat the plants. I've caught a few sightings of the deer and horses. Besides being very skittish of people they seem to be in good health. That means that they're finding enough food through foraging to survive. As I've had success with my indoor garden, I've realized I had no place to store anything. Sure I had a rusted out fridge upstairs, but it stunk up the place bad anytime it was opened so I needed a different solution. By talking to my small network of connections, and I use the term loosely, a solution presented itself just not how or what I was thinking of. As to my loosely termed network it consists of the two Handy's neither of whom like me enough to share their first name, the Silver woman, the Grimes head of house, and the woman from the Davilla house who braids her hair every day. Imagine my shock when Davilla, or Annette as she's called by her family, showed up at my place. "We have a cabinet you can have, but I need you to promise me something in exchange." Annette "I would really like a cabinet if you really can spare it, but I'm not comfortable with a blind promise of a favor. I would happily offer you first choice on edible produce if you like. I'm getting perfect berries off of some of the plants." I countered "Will you hear me out on what I would like in exchange!" Annette countered. That I was willing to do, and her request was a doozy, which made me really glad I'd not blindly agreed to anything. We came to a compromise, that we could both live with, and I got the needed storage cabinet which wasn't easy to move, and so got put into the green house. Just as Annette had lived up to her half of the agreement I lived up to mine. By arrangement I met Annette at the park. With a nod of her head I understood that the younger woman with the loose hair was the daughter she wanted me to meet. Autumn was almost ten years my junior and very grumpy. I was happy that I had only promised to get to know her and nothing more. I know what Annette wants and is hoping will happen, but I've never been fake about anything in my life, not even when I wrote my application to university, and this is not the time to be fake. Because Autumn was reluctant at first I suggested joining Carole Funke, who was about Autumn's age on the hopscotch court. Not as invigorating to me as a jog or a game of hoops, but both women had fun and I got to know both of them a little better.
As the sun shifted and it got closer to my work shift I promised both women to another game of hopscotch in a few days time.
2 Comments
Addy
5/2/2020 04:52:23 am
Another good chapter! Plenty of things kept him busy: gardening, repairs, thugs and trades. Whether the "arrangement" means he'll take Autumn as his partner or not, it's nice seeing him meet people and turn their impression of him around.
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Mama Dragon
5/2/2020 10:10:22 am
{in my best River Song voice} Spoilers ;)
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