Surviving Day by Day (Book 3): Still They Come (17 page)

Beth started putting everything away, “You’re right, Tabitha. How about you go get started and see what everyone wants and I will be out shortly?”

Tabitha jumped up off the bed and was out the door when she stopped as she heard Beth’s voice, “Hey, Tabitha?”

She took a few steps back and peeked into the room where Beth was standing, “Thanks Tabitha. We will fix up a mess of something to take to our new neighbor.”

Tabitha smiled sweetly, “You got it, doc!”

Ceara ran over to the barn, Colt and Charlie looked up just as she reached them. Charlie was grinning at her, “Survived, did’cha?”

Ceara poked him in the side, causing Charlie to jump, “Hey, quit it… that tickles.”

“Does it really... hmmmm,” Ceara said with a teasing tone.

Ceara began stalking him, Charlie jumped into a stall and shut the gate, “Ceara, come on, we have things to get done!”

Ceara stopped at the gate, “You really didn’t think your plan through. How hard would it be for me to climb over this?”

Colt watched the two playing around, “Ceara, come on... we need to get these traps done. You can torture Charlie later.”

Ceara turned, marching over to Colt, “Don’t you dare start lecturing me again!”

Charlie got back to the bench, “Whoa, Ceara, he isn’t lecturing... he’s right. What is going on with you? It isn’t like you to be mean.”

Ceara grabbed a handful of deep sea fishing lures, “Nothing, it’s between me and Colt. He knows what he did.”

Charlie looked to Colt for an explanation, and Colt shrugged, “Let it go for now, dude.”

Charlie was uncomfortable with the silence, “So where did the guy get these big ass hooks?”

Colt forced a laugh, “He had so much odd shit in there. I think some of the guys that lived around here were retirees, they must have taken trips to Galveston.”

Charlie nodded but the silence fell again.

Niz walked into the kitchen joining Tabitha, “Would you like some help? I can’t do a lot of two handed jobs but for a one handed jobs, and I’m your guy.”

Tabitha got a smirk, “You sure you don’t want to re-word that? Upside, none of the guys were in here to hear you.”

Niz blushed but laughed, “Yeah, I guess I should re-word that in the future. Anyway, I will be happy to help if you need it.”

Beth made her way out into the kitchen and was very pleased to see how well that Niz was doing. “I am glad to see you up and around, Niz. How’s the soreness this evening?”

Niz looked at her arm and back to Beth, “It is stiff more than anything else and it does have its moments of pain but I guess that is to be expected.”

Making her way over to examine Niz’s shoulder, Beth was very gentle, “Honey you don’t have to sit down, you can remain standing.” Very slowly, she guided Niz’s arm upward just about an eighth of an inch when she saw the reaction Niz made then stopped. “That still sore, I take it?”

Niz rolled her eyes then smiled slightly, “Ummmm ya.”

Beth chuckled then guided her arm back to the comfortable position that it was in before. “You’re going to be just fine. In about two days, you will be able to move just a little better. Here is what I want to do tonight. I haven’t given you anything for the pain in hours and tonight after dinner, since you're still under my care, we will get you a nice bath and clean your dressings, then right before bed, I am going to give you a very small dose of painkiller, along with some muscle relaxer that I do have. The tension that you are feeling is from not moving the muscles and we need to keep it as loose as possible. The movement will get easier every day. Within a couple of days, you will be off of everything and from what I can see, you are doing remarkably better.”

Niz smiled, but she really didn’t like the idea of being drugged again, “Do I really need all of that stuff you want to give me?”

Beth looked at her then over to Tabitha. She continued speaking to Niz very calmly and soothing, “Niz, honey, let me try to explain this as simple as I can. First of all, the surgery I did on you was not under the normal circumstances. Secondly, I want to give you this so that tomorrow when you wake up, you will begin to feel like trying to move the arm a little easier. When the Chief comes by to check on you, he will be happy to see you not suffering as bad or making the faces that you make when you have pain. Does that make sense to you?”

Niz made a bit of a sour face, “It’s just that my people are more into the natural healings. I don’t mean any disrespect at all; I just want to make sure I understand the need for it.”

Beth nodded her head, conveyed with a smile, “I totally understand Niz, I want to know if you need it and I haven’t seen you needing it all day. That’s why I haven’t given you any. However, when I lifted your arm, I could feel the tightness. When you reacted the way that you did, it told me that your body needs just a little help. Trust me Niz, you are not disrespecting me at all and if I thought you didn’t need it, I wouldn’t give it to you. Fact is, you are really only forty eight hours out of a minor surgery and have only had a couple of shots. You’re doing quite remarkable. Trust me honey, after tonight and you get some rest, you will feel much better in the morning and you may be able to move your arm easier. Then tomorrow night if all goes well, we will do a nice salt water bath with no pain meds or muscle relaxers.”

Niz shook her head with a smile that was so sweet it made Beth feel comfortable, “Beth, I thank you so much and I am fine with most of that. I would really like to go home today, but tomorrow for sure. I do have to admit that it is tightening up off and on, but I just thought that was to be expected... so whatever you say, my friend. As for dinner, I would really like to help.”

Beth began looking in the cabinets, “So I take it that you're hungry?”

Niz eagerly responded, “Yes, VERY!”

Beth looked over to Tabitha, “Well you heard the lady... best we get to cooking!! I bet Alden is as hungry as a bear, along with everyone that went out today.”

Alden had gotten the reloading equipment all organized so that he could easily keep track of what he was working on. Taking his crutch, he grabbed a ball of string and walked back out heading to the table. He looked to the barn and called out, “CHARLIE, BRING SOME OF THOSE STAKES OVER HERE.” Turning he sat down and pulled his leg up on the bench.

Charlie looked at Ceara and Colt, “I need to go. Whatever is going on between you two, get it worked out. We can’t have bad feelings going on. Alden has always said its poison to the group.”

Charlie picked up a stack of sharpened stakes and headed out to the table.

Alden motioned for Charlie to place the stakes near him. “Watch what I do here. I want to bind those stakes together four at a time to make them look like a jack lying on the ground.”

Charlie looked confused, “A jack? What like the jack on car?”

Alden looked up at him, “You’re kidding me, right? You do know what a ‘Jack’ is? I mean hell; didn’t you play Jacks when you were a kid?”

Charlie shook his head, “I have no idea what you are talking about.”

Alden looked down then back up, “It’s no wonder everything has gone to hell. People became to depend it on electronics and technology and never learned how to amuse themselves with a simple ball and some metal jacks.”

Charlie still looked confused. Alden looked at him, “Take a seat cupcake, school time.” Alden reached in his pocket and pulled out his notebook. He quickly drew a crude picture of a jack. “This is a jack. It has points that weren’t sharp. You'd have a dozen or more. You bounce a ball and pick up one at a time. As the game progressed, you had to pick up more and more on each bounce.”

Charlie looked at him “Sounds kinda stupid.” Alden flipped his notepad over and wrote Jacks and a ball on his next shopping list. He then looked up at Charlie and frowned, “Let’s move on.” Alden reached down and grabbed about 5 stakes. He held them with the points all facing out in different directions and then began to wrap the string around the middle. It took just a few minutes and the stakes were bound tightly.

“Now we cut the legs to make these points reach up to about waist high. We place these along the fence around the corral; this will help keep the wanderers from getting to the horses. We take a few more single ones, making them short enough to go through the calf and place them in an angle in a zig-zag pattern. These wanderers ain't smart, so they should walk right into those. Granted none of these methods will kill them, but they could damage them enough to make them crawlers rather than wanderers and a crawler is an easy kill.

Ceara looked to Colt, sneered as she rolled her eyes. Colt threw up his hands, “What the hell is your deal? I said one damn thing and you have treated me like shit since!”

Ceara tried her best to cock her eyebrow like Alden, “You all but said that I killed Heath and Maximus.... fuck that, you did say it! I guess I am just supposed to be ok with you thinking that? Well, all I got to say is, Jessica and Beth must be the most patient women in the world to put up with you!”

Colt got a shocked look, “Wow, well to let you know, yes Jessica was very patient and Beth has had to put up with a lot from me BUT.... Guess what?” Colt’s voice was deadly quiet, “Neither have ever done the stupid shit you have. Both were and are intelligent women that actually think. Something you seem to lack!”

Ceara slammed her stuff down, “Go to hell! I don’t have to prove shit to you, you are nothing to me! How dare....”

“ENOUGH!” Charlie shouted. He stood there glaring at both of them, “I swear to God you work this out or I will get Alden in here!”

Colt’s ears were red from him trying to control his temper, “Get Alden, I don’t give a damn; I’m not going to be talked to like that from a snot nose...”

Ceara laughed, “Snot nose? You have a lot of room to talk, you damn geek! You are doing sooooo good at this survival stuff because you played all those online games, am I right?”

Charlie had enough, and this was getting out of hand quick. Charlie looked over his shoulder, “ALDEN, BETH! Get out here PLEASE!”

Alden grabbed his crutch making his way over, as Beth came running out the back door, “What’s wrong?”

Ceara started to head to Spirits stall, and Colt looked to Charlie, “Big surprise, she is running away!”

Ceara shot him a look, “I ain’t running, I just prefer to get as far from you as I can!”

Alden looked at Ceara, “Come on back here cupcake; we need to get this shit straight now.” Ceara turned and stormed back to Alden’s side, “FINE!”

Charlie sighed and shook his head, “Keep it up you two, I can see Alden handcuffing you two together!”

“Not a bad plan, kid! You two want to explain what the hell is going on?”

Beth stepped up right beside Alden, “That’s something I would like to know too!”

Tabitha leaned on the barn door, watching the show, “Tell you what guys, you have all of sixty seconds to start talking or I will give a blow by blow of the ride to town.”

Both Ceara and Colt turned to give Tabitha a look, Ceara looked to Alden, “He is an ass, pretty simple what my problem is.”

Colt rolled his eyes, “Yeah, I’m an ass because I am worried that she will have a repeat of what happened in the canyon. When I am the one with her.... I tend to have issues with that!”

Alden came forward, “So, let me get this straight. Now, feel free to correct me if I’m wrong on anything. Colt, you are worried that mistakes will be repeated?”

Colt nodded, then Alden looked to Ceara, “And you are pissed about being judged?”

Once more Alden was given a nod, “Seems like we have a dilemma, cupcakes, I guess one or both of you need to leave and make your way on your own.”

Colt and Ceara were not the only ones with a shocked look, everyone started talking at once. Alden shrugged and held up a hand, “I don’t know what you thought I would do, I ain’t here for your comfort or to be your priest, I ain’t here to fix everything. So you hate each other, it’s simple, just leave...”

Ceara couldn’t believe Alden would kick her out of the group, “I didn’t say I hate him...”

Colt looked lost, “Yeah, I never said I hated her either...”

Alden shrugged again, “If you can’t stand the sight of each other, well that appears to be hate to me.... so you better start showing something else real quick. I don’t have time for this bullshit.”

Ceara looked to Colt, “Fine, I don’t think you have any right to judge me or make me look so damn stupid. You make it sound like I can’t do anything right. I have done pretty well for a while. All of us have made mistakes, you included!”

Colt swallowed hard, “I never said you were stupid, I did say that you don’t think things through. I have made my share of mistakes. I admitted that in the car. I even apologized for saying anything... so seems to me you are the one that can’t let things go!”

Tabitha stepped up, “Red, he did tell you he was sorry, why the hell are you holding on to this... what’s really up your ass?”

Charlie walked over to Ceara, “I think I can answer that, Ceara is worried that Colt was right. I don’t even know for sure what happened, but I do know her fears.” He looked to her, “Am I right?”

Ceara started to breakdown.... “I don’t want to get anyone else killed! I don’t trust myself and then he goes and says he doesn’t trust me either!”

Alden looked to Charlie then Ceara, “Cupcake, if you don’t trust yourself, how can you expect us to trust you? You need to get that trust back, but only you can do that.”

Alden turned and looked at the rest of the group, “We’ve done fair so far. There’s been times when I, myself, almost decided to leave and let you all have at it your own way. I stayed for reasons of my own and one that I have heard over and over again.” He looked at Tabitha, “We’re a family now and family’s fight every now and then. It doesn’t matter to me that much. At times like this, you all want to go to blows with each other and piss on each other boots. That’s fine, but Goddamn it, when the shit hits the fan, you all better remember who has kept you all alive since we met.”

Charlie was standing next to Ceara; Beth was next to him with Colt on the other side. Charlie looked at Beth and they turned and spoke in unison, “It was you, Sir.”

Alden glared at them, shouting “NO, YOU DUMBSHITS, IT WASN’T ME. IT WAS ALL OF YOU WORKING TOGETHER FOR EACH OTHER.”

The sound of Alden’s voice made everyone jump and the horses got nervous. Tonto simply sat by his side and looked at them. “SO FUCKING FIX IT OR I SWEAR I’LL HANG ALL YOUR ASSES OVER A RAIL AND LET YOU FIGHT IT OUT LIKE CATS.”|

Alden turned and looked at Tabitha, who was still standing by the door. She had a look of fear in her eyes. She had never seen Alden get this mad at any of them. “Tabitha, you come with me. Your dog ain’t in this fight.”

Tabitha walked out first followed by Tonto, then Alden who slammed the door behind him. He looked at Tabitha with a grin, “I almost took Charlie’s advice and hooked those two together with handcuffs on a pole.”

Tabitha looked up at him, “Why didn’t you?”

Alden was limping back to house, “Cause there’s been enough hanky-panky around here without me teaching them how to be kinky.”

It was all Tabitha could do to keep from bursting out laughing.

Beth stood there quiet as a church mouse with her arms folded across her chest. Looking at both Ceara and Colt, the only thing that she could do was shake her head in disbelief. Finally she squatted down on the ground and began to speak with a very firm tone. “Now let me say this nice and clear, no one and I mean no one,” ending on that comment looked right towards Ceara, “We have all made some major mistakes, while others have made minor ones. I don’t give a shit who made them. All I want you both to do right now, is stop making the biggest mistake you’re both doing right now, in front of my eyes.”

Standing back up, Beth continued with a much sterner tone; “I have been the one that has stitched you all back up.... and for what?? Why don’t I just go get my scalpel out of my kit and you all can do it the right way? Fact of the matter is this, it is rough out there, and together we have bonded and even formed new alliances with the Chief. That man must of thought highly of us or he wouldn’t have given us the time of day, let alone be out there right this very minute trying to ward off these infected from coming in here.”

Beth turned and looked right at Colt, “Colt, I remember everything you talked to me about over the past weeks, now that I think about it, months. You loved your wife and when the world went to hell, you kept right there like a wonderful husband should have done. You stayed until the very end, and then some. But honey, you're wired tight and maybe you're taking your emotions out on other people instead of communicating them.”

Ceara kind of chuckled and Beth immediately turned around and snapped, “What’s so damn funny, Ceara? You too have made costly mistakes. Everyone has given you the time to really have for yourself, but damn it girl, Alden is right. If you don’t trust yourself, then how the hell do we go about trusting you? Then you get mad at Colt because he has basically said this in a roundabout way? Well it looks to me that you all need to take a hard look at who you're hurting in this. Look, this isn’t kindergarten, we are all adults. This is our family, THIS IS OUR LIVES!” Beth shouted.

Beth took a deep breath, “I have had to do surgeries and with all the follow up, I have hardly had anything to eat, let alone sleep. But why do I do this??? Hmm?? Anyone?”

Beth gave them both questioning looks, “The reason that I do it is, because whether you believe it or not, I love all of you. Now you two nit picking on each other is really beginning to piss me off.”

Beth then looked over to Charlie, “Charlie, I get how you are trying to understand Ceara and her fears, but instead of understanding them for her, try to help her see them for herself and she will see how damn good she is. Now, if you all want to keep fighting, you all go ahead. This is my family too and like Alden said to Tabitha, ‘My dog ain’t in this fight,’ but the people I care about are and you damn well better start caring too or what the hell is it we are all working for?”

Beth turned around and slammed the barn door behind her.

Charlie walked to the door, he looked over his shoulder, “You guys work through this, I don’t care what happens but there are wanderers on the way and we need to all be back to normal by then.” Charlie walked out the door closing it behind him.

Ceara climbed into Spirit’s stall totally ignoring Colt. He stood for a few minutes waiting for her to start talking, he finally turned to leave.

“Hang on, Colt.”

“Nothing like pulling teeth...” Colt turned to face her and just waited.

“Can you just come over here... please?”

Colt walked to the stall and leaned on the gate, “So how do we fix this?”

Ceara sighed heavily, “I don’t know, but I don’t like Beth and Alden yelling at me.”

“You? I think that was an us... not a you.”

Ceara gave a little smile, “I just figured you were used to Beth yelling at you.”

It was Colt’s turn to grin, “Believe it or not, she hasn’t yelled at me too damn often... well not in anger,” Colt said as he raised his eyebrows and smiled.

Ceara turned beet red, “Wow, TMI dude!”

Colt started to laugh, “Ok, so we are talking, so let’s get this crap between us worked out.”

Ceara opened the stall and walked out to the bench, Colt followed and sat with her. He knew she had something she wanted to get out, so he just waited for her.

She took a deep breath, “Ok, here it is... and don’t stop me either, just let me finish. All my life I have been a screw up that just did things on the spur of the moment. My dad use to say they invented the crap at checkout lines for me. He and mom always had to bail me out of stupid shit I did. Once I got in a wreck because I was drinking. No, I didn’t always drink and drive, but my friend called and needed help. I didn’t think about the consequences, I didn’t think about who else was on the road, or who I might hurt. I just reacted and jumped in my car and left. I rolled it three times. Thankfully, I was the only one hurt, but trust me my dad made sure I knew how stupid I was and how I didn’t think before reacting.”

Ceara shifted on the bench looking at Colt, “When you said what you did, it made me feel just like I did then. I know what I did both then and now was stupid. I can’t promise I will never do anything without thinking it through. I can promise that I will never put my own wants and needs ahead of this group.”

Colt put his arm around her shoulders, pulling her to him, “Ceara, you are young, the rest of us with the exception of Charlie have had life experiences and have learned from them. Sweetheart, you have a lot harder life to learn the same lessons with. You are going to make mistakes, we all are but all I ask is you start listening to us, instead of always thinking we are trying to judge you.”

Colt kissed her head, “Trust me, if I start being too much of an asshole, Beth will get me back in check. If you remember what you said in the truck about telling Beth on me?”

Ceara nodded, smiling, “I will too!”

“Yeah, I know you will, and trust me, that will keep me in check.”

Alden made it to the patio table and sat down placing his leg on the ottoman. “God, I’ll be glad when this damn thing is healed.”

Beth walked by Alden and looked at him, “It will, you old fart, if you stay off the damn thing.” Beth scurried into the house before Alden could respond.

Charlie made an immediate left turn towards the shed as soon as he heard what Beth said, not wanting to be anywhere nearby, in case Alden was still pissed. Charlie walked around the back; he started to move more of the junk that was just lying there. Reaching down, he grabbed a tarp. Pulling it, it moved just a few inches, then got hung up. Charlie kept trying to yank on it, but when the tarp moved it pulled everything else around it. Walking back to the pile, he began to pull the smaller items off. There were broken boards, some scrap metal bars, and busted cinder blocks. Finally having that cleared, he pulled again, but to no avail.