The Journal: Ash Fall (32 page)

I couldn’t help it, and I started laughing. A
moment later, Mark was laughing too.

“Mark, you need to understand that I’m a
touch-oriented person. I’ve been a massage therapist for over
twenty-five years; I have a need to touch and be touched. John was
right, he knew I wouldn’t do well without company, without someone
to give me a hug when I needed it,” I said seriously, searching his
face. “And you’re right, that’s why I came to you this morning. I
needed that contact.”

“I do understand that, Allex,” he smiled
gently at me. “Do you need a hug now?”

I nodded. He reached for me and I laid my
head on his shoulder, inhaling his scent. Closing my eyes, I could
feel myself relax as the heat of his arms warmed my back and his
own unique musky scent warmed my heart and soul.

Mark’s unshaven jaw was so close to me I
could feel the roughness as I pulled back a slight bit. Without
thinking what was about to happen, I touched his lips with mine.
His response was instant. His hold tightened and loosened at the
same time as the strength and depth of the kiss changed. It felt as
if he was drawing something out of me, demanding a raw passion I
hadn’t experienced before, not even with John. I plunged forward,
out of control.

My breathing came in ragged gasps when I
stepped back, breaking the contact.

“Whoa,” Mark said his breath as erratic as
mine. “Ever since that first kiss on your birthday, I haven’t been
able to get our chemistry out of my mind, Allex. This time, this
was different, way more powerful. What are we going to do now?”

“Nothing, Mark.” I released my hold of him.
“I needed that kiss and I think you did too. I also need to wait
that full two weeks before we… well, before we explore our feelings
any further. I couldn’t live with myself otherwise.”

“It’s going to be a long nine days, Allex,”
Mark sighed. “No crawling in bed with me, and no more kisses
either. Maybe we should limit the hugs too.” He sat hard into the
kitchen chair, clearly shaken.

“Okay, doctor, I will restrain myself,” I
snickered as I worked the French press and made our morning
brew.

While Mark munched on another muffin, I
noticed my black medical bag sitting on the side bar.

“Have you had a chance to look through the
medical bag yet? I think you should adjust what you prefer is in it
so you don’t have any surprises at an inopportune moment.”“Not yet,
but there’s no time like the present.” He pulled the bag to sit in
front of him, and started going through the exterior pockets first.
“This is a purse isn’t it? A woman’s purse? This might ruin my
image you know, especially with the brass studs on all the
pockets.

“First end pocket, band aids; second end
pocket, eye dropper, Neosporin and Darvocet?” He set the pill
bottle aside. “A good idea, I want to replace it with fresh though.
“Front pockets: individual alcohol wipes; gloves in a baggie and
surgical masks in plastic baggie.” He looked up at me. “That’s a
good idea to have them on the outside and immediately
available.”

He unzipped the main compartment and removed
everything from inside the bag. The stethoscope, ace bandages,
surgical items and finger blood pressure machine, plus all the
miscellaneous things I tucked in there were all laid out.

“What’s with the red wash cloths?”

“It came from a discussion that it might be
easier on a child when wiping blood,” I explained. “If the cloth is
already red, seeing blood will be less traumatic.”

“Interesting idea, I’ll have to remember
that,” Mark mumbled. “All this is remarkable. What’s with the
shoelaces?”

“A tourniquet or a sling,” I replied.

“They would work in a pinch,” he allowed.
“And certainly takes up little room.”

“Is there anything missing, doctor?”

“Very little, Allex, I’m impressed.” Mark sat
back in his chair, reaching for his now cold coffee.

“‘Very little’…” I probed. “What’s missing,
Mark?” I really wanted to know. I had worked hard on that kit.

“It needs updated pain-killers and
hypodermics, and that’s about it.”

“Hypos are just not something I had available
to me, sorry.”

“Don’t apologize, Allex. If this was all I
had available to me, I’d be well prepared for most situations. You
did very well.” He smiled broadly, getting up for the coffee pot.
“By the way, where did you get the surgical items, the sutures,
clamps and scalpels?”

“The internet. You can find just about
anything if you keep looking long enough,” I answered and then I
thought I would save the military field medic bag for another
time.

* * *

At noon my FRS squawked.

“Mom, are you there?”

“Yes, Eric, I’m here.”

“I’m sending Emilee over for her next baking
lesson,” he replied. “She’ll be coming to the greenhouse door;
out.”

I watched out the large recently replaced
picture window until I saw Emilee crossing the road. She had white
garbage bags on each leg and carried a shorter version of Jason’s
umbrella bubble. Once inside the outer room, she shook the
remaining gray ash dust off her smiley-face umbrella and stepped
into the greenhouse, and only then did she pull down her face
mask.

“Dad and Uncle Jason have been very strict
with me about how I dress when I come over here, Nahna. They can be
a real pain in the butt!”

“You have to do what they say, Emi. It’s for
your own good. Don’t worry, though, this won’t last forever.”

“How much longer, Nahna?” she asked, clearly
exasperated with all the extra precautions she was now required to
do.

“I have no idea, Em, no one does.”

* * *

We made up a basic batch of bread dough,
adding several eggs to the mix plus a tablespoon of cinnamon. I
looked on and supervised while Emilee mixed the additional items
into her now familiar recipe for bread, and I let her knead the
dough without my help.

“This feels different, Nahna.”

“It’s because of the eggs, Emi, they add a
different texture.” She’d been an excellent student and that
reminded me of teaching the boys to cook when they were younger.
Neither one had been very interested in baking though. And now
having her to teach was a delight, plus it was keeping my mind off
of Mark.

While it was on the first rise, I had her
pick out what she wanted to put in her sweet rolls.

“They must have sugar and more cinnamon and
nuts and raisins! And some of that white frosting stuff!”

“That white frosting stuff is a powdered
sugar glaze,” I instructed her as we collected all the items from
the back pantry and lined them up on my butcher block topped mobile
work island.

After the short first rise was done, we
rolled the dough out, filled it with her selection of nuts and
raisins plus more cinnamon sugar. Emi’s little hands had some
trouble rolling the dough so we each took an end. She cut the
dough, placed the sweet spirals close together on a cookie sheet
and then draped it with a light cloth towel.

“Just another half hour of the dough rising,
Emi, and we can bake!” She squealed with delight. I punched the
pre-heat button on the stove, and then remembered we didn’t have
power back yet.

“I guess we need the generator.”

“If you show me how, Allex, I can be doing
that for you,” Mark offered.

I got a wave of deja vu and mentally heard
John making the same offer last December. I smiled to cover my
memories and led Mark out to the deck.

* * *

An hour later the house was overflowing with
the sugary sweet aroma of fresh baking. As much as I steered away
from sweets, this luscious scent was making me hungry.

“Oh, my, that smells wonderful,” Mark
announced as he returned from sitting on the deck, reading.

Emilee beamed. “Would you like to try one,
Dr. Robbins?”

“I would love to share one with you and your
Nahna. We certainly don’t want to hog them all! You need to take
most of them back home with you,” Mark teased her, as he cut one of
the confections into three pieces, placing the biggest piece in
front of me.

“I think you like Nahna,” Emilee announced,
embarrassing Mark. Shyness was never one of Emilee’s drawbacks.

He looked up and smiled. “Yes, I like your
Nahna very much,” he replied, looking at me from beneath his long,
dark lashes.

“Well, I know she likes you, too. I can
tell,” Emi stated quite matter-of-factly. “She gets all quiet when
you’re around, like she used to do with Grandpa John before he left
us.”

The room was suddenly quiet.

“I think it’s time to get you back home, Emi,
so you can share your goodies while they’re still warm,” I told
her.

I wrapped the remaining sweet rolls in a sack
cloth towel, then into one of the few remaining white plastic
shopping bags, and then into one of the cloth bags that we’d been
using to send things back and forth.

Instead of her bag-leggings, I put Emilee
into one of the small bio-suits. She still needed her face mask and
the umbrella. She was more protected, and looked and acted more
grown up now.

“Eric, are you listening?” I asked over the
FRS radio.

“I’m here,” he replied.

“I’m sending Emi back across.”

Just as she made it to the road, a red pickup
truck came careening out of nowhere. Emilee fell to the ground just
as the truck passed her and kept going. Moments later I heard a
loud crash.

“Mark!” I yelled, slipping on the eye-shield
face mask and running out the door, forgetting the rest of the
protective wear.

I knelt down beside my granddaughter.

“Emi,” I said gently. She looked at me
through the plastic umbrella with tears in her eyes. “Are you
hurt?”

“No, Nahna, but that bad truck scared me, a
lot. Dad taught me to watch everything when I crossed a road, and
when I saw that truck coming I waited. When it got closer and I
knew it wasn’t slowing down and it was too close to me, I jumped
back and I tripped and fell.”

I hadn’t seen them arrive, but Eric and Mark
were suddenly both there, kneeling in the gray dust. Eric was both
angry and distraught, as he hugged his little girl, fire showed in
his blue eyes.

“Do you feel any pain anywhere, Emilee?” Mark
asked gently.

“No, but I think I squashed some of the sweet
rolls.”

“Did the truck hit you Emi?” Eric wanted to
know.

“No, Dad, I jumped out of the way like you
told me to do. You said if I ever thought I was in danger, to
listen to myself and to move out of the away. That was right,
wasn’t it?”

“You did good, Bug. You did real good,” Eric
reassured her, using his baby-name for her.

All the time they were talking, Mark was
tenderly feeling her legs and arms for any broken bones. He gave me
a smile with the slightest shake of his head, sending a slight
dusting of ashes cascading over his eye shield.

“No broken bones for you, young lady!” he
announced. “As for those damaged sweet rolls, perhaps I should
examine them further?” Mark’s joke got Emi giggling as he helped
her stand.

“Eric, are you armed?” I asked and he nodded
yes. “I think you and Mark should check the crash site for
survivors.”

I walked Emi back to their house, remaining
on the porch since I was still covered in ash.

“Is she okay, Mom?” Jason asked worriedly
once Amanda had taken Emi into the house.

“As far as Mark can tell, yes. I’m worried
about Eric though. He’s so angry. I’m going to the crash site to
make sure he doesn’t do anything… unnecessary.”

The red pickup truck was lying half in the
ditch, half around the “curve-in-the-road” sign near the end of the
road. Steam rose from the ruptured radiator, and the smell of gas
was prevalent even with the mask covering my nose.

Mark and Eric were kneeling beside something
in the dust covered grass. A body. I came to a halt a few yards
away, and walked up slowly to not startle my agitated son.

Mark looked up first, and stood. He stopped
me short of the scene.

“Leave him be for a few moments, Allex,” Mark
suggested. “When we got here, this guy was half out of the truck,
thrown out by the impact is my guess. I saw too many of these kind
of accidents down in Saginaw.” That cloud passed over his eyes
again, and was quickly gone. “He was struggling for breath. The ash
is my guess, so either way he was already dead. I asked Eric to end
the suffering.” He looked over where Eric was still kneeling.

“He’s an interesting young man, Allex. In
anger or protecting his loved ones, he has no remorse, but
euthanizing another human being, he couldn’t do it. Once I told him
I believed there was no malice behind the near accident and that it
was quite likely the old man was in panic not being able to breathe
and that he probably didn’t even see Emi, Eric’s whole demeanor
changed.”

I came up behind my son and laid a hand on
his shoulder.

“Come, Eric. This gas is about to go.”

The three of us quickly lifted the crash
victim into the bed of the pickup truck. Mark removed the elderly
man’s wallet from his denim jacket, while Eric said a prayer.

We were halfway back down the silt covered
asphalt road when the truck exploded into a funeral pyre.

* * *

“Will this tragedy ever end, Mark?” I slumped
in the wooden chair, a finger of rum left in my glass. The bagged
blocks of ice I had made while the power was on were almost gone,
but there was still enough to chip for cooling a drink. “It seems
that every time things start to even out a bit, something else
happens to throw us off balance again.”

“It does seem to be never ending, doesn’t
it,” he replied. “How are you holding up, Allex?”

I gazed at the man across the table from me.
“I’m getting weary, doctor. How about you?”