Graham's Resolution Trilogy Bundle: Books 1-3 (15 page)

“Yeah, you can come in,” said Macy.

She was getting the first aid supplies out of the bag as Graham pushed a rubber doorstop under the door to prop it open. “Macy, you and Bang refill those water bottles while I do this,” he said.

He took a deep breath and walked over to Marcy, who hopped on one leg over to the sink. “How’s it feeling?” Graham asked.

“The cut throbs some, but not as bad as before,” she said.

“Well, face the wall. I’ll try to be as gentle as I can,” he said as he washed and dried his hands. He started to peel away the soaked dressing.

She cringed a bit, so he stopped. “It’s okay, Graham, just go ahead and do it,” Marcy said.

Graham exposed the raw looking flesh. He gently dabbed at it with sterile gauze and washed it with more sterile saline. Then he dried it by patting lightly. He applied new ointment and recovered it with a clean bandage.

“I think we should just use the gauze to cover it after we get to the cabin to let more air get to it. Now, let’s get more meds into you and get going,” he said. Graham repacked their supplies and threw the bloody dressing in the nearby gray trashcan.
At this point, that will probably stay there for eternity
, he thought. Then he looped one arm around Marcy’s waist while toting his rifle with the other.

“Graham!” Macy called from the hallway, a little alarmed.

“What?” he said as he turned into the hall.

“Sheriff’s growling at something down the hall.” Sheriff was crouched in front of them in the middle of the hallway, warning them of something beyond, down past the cheerful squirrel cutouts.

“It’s probably a dog, so come on, it’s time to go,” Graham said as he ushered them all to the doorway. Looking to make sure the coast was clear, he opened the door and shepherded them all back to the truck. He held Marcy up with one arm as she hopped on one leg.

“Come on, Sheriff!” he yelled. The dog dropped his warning growl and ran out, but instead of getting back into the truck right away, he ran over to the left of the door and lifted his leg at the nearest bush, all the while looking around for enemies.

Graham shook his head, but got the kids into their seats quickly and then called the dog over. Sheriff jumped into the back as before. Graham held up his rifle and scanned the outside of the building while he edged closer to his own car door.

As they drove away Graham noticed movement in his rearview mirror; someone was running across the street behind them. He stopped, rolled down his window, and yelled, “Hey!”

The young man stopped. Sheriff started barking and the girls panicked. “No, Graham, keep going, please keep going!” they yelled.

“Shhh, he’s just a kid,” he said back to them.

The six-foot figure turned out to be a teen—Graham guessed about eighteen or so. He wore a blue plaid flannel shirt over ratty denim jeans and boots. The boy stared at him through suspicious eyes and dark brown, unkempt hair. Graham started to back up the truck, but the boy ran again. Graham put on the brakes. “Wait!”

The kid stopped once more, but Graham could tell he was ready to bolt at any time.

“I’m not going to hurt you,” Graham said. “Are you okay?”

“I don’t need your help.” The kid looked distraught.

“Okay, that’s good,” Graham responded, then after a few moments of silence with just the sound of the truck’s engine running he added, “We’re going up to Cascade. Do you know where that is?”

The boy paused in thought, then nodded that he did.

“If you want to, you can come up there when you’re ready. Leave me a note at the Cascade post office and I’ll check it when I come into town, once a week or so. Do you understand?” Graham asked him.

“Yeah, but I don’t want to leave them just yet.” For the first time, Graham noticed the boy was armed as he pointed toward his home with a pistol that he’d had hidden behind his back.

“It’s all right, I understand. When you’re ready, you’re welcome. Leave me a note, and stay somewhere safe in town. I’ll check for it.” He did not know why, but he trusted the kid.

He watched the teenager’s eyes light up with momentary interest and turned to see Macy staring out at him from the backseat window. Again, the youth hesitated, looking undecided. “Okay, I’ll probably come, but not yet,” he said, jogging away down a side street.

“Whew!” Macy said.

Graham rolled up his window and moved on down the road. “That was weird,” said Marcy.

“He’s all right,” Graham said. “He’s just scared. Maybe he’ll meet up with us after a while.”

“He had a gun,” Bang pointed out.

“He sure did. I think we’ll see a lot of that now, people carrying guns.” Graham stepped on the gas and the truck moved on. He reminded the kids to find something to eat in the back, and Macy pulled out a package of cheese and peanut butter sandwich crackers and began passing them around. They each had their own refilled water bottle, and Graham reminded Macy to give her sister more medicine. Soon they were silent again, having finished off their light meal and drifting off to their own thoughts without having much to say to one another. The drive made things seem too normal, but at least it gave them time to consider things as they were now.

Night was descending as Graham pulled up to the narrow dirt road turnoff that led to the cabin. He was a little saddened and surprised that he’d gotten this far and only run into the one young man and no other living souls. He felt a little less optimistic about the future.

Graham came to a complete stop and turned on the overhead light to see just how to put this unfamiliar truck into four-wheel drive. This caused the sleeping occupants to stir.

“Where are we?” asked Bang.

“We’re almost there. I have to get this thing in four-wheel drive. The road is always a bit muddy up there. I hope there are no downed trees in the way. If there are, we’ll have to get out and walk,” Graham said. He turned off the obtrusive light and drove slowly on the single-lane dirt path leading up to the family cabin; the truck bounced up and down over unseen dips in the road.

The long day had been difficult. Graham held back the memory of killing a man and having to perform crude surgery to save a life. He never thought he was capable of doing either, nor did he ever want to again have the responsibility of such actions any time soon. His father had been that man, not him. Graham was a math professor—or had been. His father was the brave one, a soldier who’d fought in Vietnam and Korea. Reluctantly, he realized that he was his father’s son after all, and it was a good thing he knew it now because their lives depended on it.

Graham peered through the light beams and saw a few brown deer that stared back at him before leaping away through the ferns and pines. He looked up ahead, noticed a faint light, and had a sinking feeling. He killed the truck’s headlights and, by memory, drove closer. Soon it became apparent that someone was already in the cabin; there was flickering light gleaming through the windows.

He pulled up slowly into the clearing and saw a little red Ford Escort under the brush on the left side of the cabin. “Damn, someone’s here,” he said as he turned off the engine. “I’m going to check it out,” Graham said as he pulled out his rifle. “You guys lock the doors. Macy, can you drive?” he asked.

“Sorta,” she said.

“Good enough. Anything happens to me, you get the hell out of here and go back to that boy we saw today, all right?” Once again he couldn’t explain his trust in the boy.

Sounding confused and scared by his tone, Macy answered, “Okay.”

Graham quietly pushed the door closed and Macy climbed over into the driver’s seat while Bang reached around and locked all the doors manually.

Graham moved around to the side window to peek inside. Through the wavy, dirty glass he could see that someone had started a fire in the woodstove that he and his dad had installed not so long ago. Flames could be seen behind the stove’s glass and ceramic door. No one was walking around in the main room, so he assumed the trespassers were asleep. Quietly and slowly Graham went up the wooden steps so as to not alert whoever might be inside. He tried the front door and found that the lock had been busted, so he pushed it in gently.

Once inside he saw what he couldn’t have seen from out in the yard: the firelight danced on a woman who lay on the couch, sweating and shivering at the same time. She looked to be at least part American Indian and was obviously suffering from the virus—or something similar.

Graham stepped halfway into the cabin, then stopped abruptly at the sound of a rifle bolt clicking back to his right.

“Hold it right there, buddy,” a gravelly voice commanded. Graham remained frozen in place; he couldn’t believe he’d been through this horrible day, only to be murdered at the very end of it in his family’s own cabin.

“Who the hell are you?” the stranger said, coming into view. An ancient man stood before Graham, probably the oldest man he’d ever laid eyes on. His sparse white hair was a striking contrast to his black skin. Graham pulled his right hand up, then lowered his own rifle with his left hand but didn’t drop it entirely.

“It’s all right,” he said calmly as he tried to reassure the old man. “My name’s Graham Morgan, and this is my cabin. My family’s cabin, that is.”

“So you say,” the old man retorted.

“Really, it is. I’ve been coming up here every summer, my whole life. Now please lower that gun, before you hurt someone.”

The old man complied, then Graham asked, pointing to the woman, “Does she have the virus?”

“Hell, I don’t know. Don’t think so. She kidnapped me and took me here,” he said, complaining.

Graham walked over to the woman. Beads of sweat covered her exposed face, and he pulled back the covers a little and saw that she was armed with a handy pistol at her stomach. She was unconscious, so Graham removed the pistol just so there weren’t any accidents and placed it on the floor under couch.

Listening to her breathing, Graham said, “Something’s not right. Her breathing is too clear for this to be the virus. It’s some other infection,” he said.

“I could’ve told you that, dummy,” the old man said.

Graham looked at the old man, irritated. “Do you know her name?” he asked.

“No. Dumb girl said I had to come with her, is all. I don’t know her. She said I had to come on account I wasn’t dying. I told her I couldn’t help it and she dragged me out here anyway.” The old man opened his arms wide, still holding onto the rifle.

“Put that gun down now,” Graham said and realized the old man was short a cell or two and couldn’t be trusted with a weapon.

“It’s not loaded,” the woman said quietly.

Graham looked back at her, surprised by her soft voice.

“Hi, I’m Graham. I can see you’re sick. Is it the virus?” he asked.

She swallowed and looked at him, “No, I had a miscarriage yesterday, and I think there’s some kind of infection,” she said, tears flooding her eyes.

This news hit Graham in the gut. “I’m really sorry to hear that” was all he could think to say. “Do you have any water?” he asked.

“There’s some in my car. I just couldn’t make it back out there after getting him in here,” she said.

“All right, I’ll get you some. Listen,” he said to both of them, “This is my family’s cabin. It’s fine if you stay here, but I want you to know I’ve got kids out in my truck and I need to bring them in here.” Then he added, “I’ll be right back.”

Before he reached the door, though, he strode over to the old man and grabbed the gun, pointing it at him. “You behave, mister,” he said, guiding the cranky geriatric to a nearby chair.

Back at the truck Graham informed the kids of the situation in the cabin. “Don’t be offended by the old man. He’s just cranky,” he said to them. “The lady’s really sick so we need to give her some of our antibiotics,” he said.

When the children finally stepped out into the cool night air, they carried what they could and walked through the tall, dewy grass to the cabin. Macy helped her sister, and Sheriff walked along with Graham and Bang, nose twitching in response to the new smells along the way. The girls stopped at the porch, and Graham handed what he carried to Bang and lifted Marcy into his arms to climb the steps.

By the time they entered, the lady was asleep again. The old man silently beheld the new intruders.

“Them’s just children,” the old man said, a little disgusted, and pointed at them as if Graham promised him something else.

“That’s right, they’re children. And you be nice to them,” Graham warned.

“They can’t fight,” he said.

“Fight what?” Graham asked him.

“This war!” the old man said indignantly.

Macy and Bang stopped behind Graham and stared, astonished.

“There’s no war right now,” Graham said.

“Dat’s what
you
think,” the old man said, rising on his old bowed legs and making his way slowly to the bunkroom at the back of the cabin.

The kids clearly didn’t know what to make of all this and looked at Graham for an answer. He just shook his head with a little smile.

“Man, this has been the longest day ever,” Graham said, realizing he still had Marcy in his arms. He put her down in the chair the old man just vacated.

Sheriff walked over to the sleeping woman, sniffed at her, and looked up at Graham. “I know, buddy, she’s sick,” Graham said. “Marcy, let’s get your leg taken care of first. There’s a bathroom over here to the right.” Graham quickly redressed her wound, which didn’t look any different from that afternoon.

Back in the kitchen, he asked them if they were hungry, but all three said they simply wanted to know where they could sleep. Graham walked them into the back room, where four hefty double-decker bunk beds stood like sentinels on guard. The old man appeared as a lump on the farthest one back on the right. They quietly tiptoed over to the other side, and Macy pulled back the covers on the bottom at the front end of the row, nearest the doorway, and motioned for Marcy to lie down. Graham helped Marcy onto the mattress, and Macy covered her up with a soft blanket he handed her from the stack that he pulled from a big, cedar chest at the end of the room.

Bang climbed the ladder at the end of Marcy’s bed and settled down above her. Macy stood on the edge of Marcy’s bunk for a moment and covered up the boy. “Goodnight, Bang,” she said, and he smiled at her. Graham could tell Macy was the mothering type.

She tucked her sister in again and brushed back her hair, “Goodnight, Marcy,” she said.

“Goodnight, sis,” Marcy murmured sleepily.

Macy got into a lower bunk near her sister, nearest the doorway on the left, and waved goodnight to Graham, who watched all of this from the doorway, wondering how they could perform such a normal ritual after such a hellacious day. They’d lost so much, and yet life went on. Graham walked away, amazed, and into the living area, where another life lay in harm’s way.