his stuff that he never came back for so feel free to rip it, or burn it. Just help yourself,” Jessica announces as she
pushes through the crowd at the doorway and drops a box
on the floor at Cooper’s feet.
“Won’t it make you feel uncomfortable?” Cooper
obviously doesn’t want to be the cause of bad memories.
“Nope. Clothes should be worn and besides, they look
so much better on you.” Jessica scans his slightly
overweight frame.
“Thank you.” Cooper says gratefully. “I didn’t really
have anything for farm living packed in my stuff.”
“Oh, that reminds me, babe. All the packed goods are
out in the barn. We just left them there, except for our
suitcases.” I haven’t moved from the bed yet because it’s so
nice to just take a second to relax in the midst of our
world’s potential collapse.
Jessica does a great job of removing the children out of
the room as Cooper gets dressed in a checkered shirt. He
continues to dig and finds a pair of boots at the bottom of the box.
“Will those fit?” I ask curiously.
“Only one way to find out.” He sits down to pull the
boot on and wiggles his foot around.
“Hmm…it might be my style. Should I model it for
you?” he asks cheekily.
“No, I’m good.” I laugh at the image he brings to mind.
“Good, because they’re a little big, but they’ll work
until I can get mine out of the truck.” Cooper holds out a
hand to lift me up from my very comfy position.
“I guess rest time is over. Darn it.” I sigh as I sit next to
him on the edge of the bed.
“We can sneak out tonight and do it under the stars.”
He tries to move his eyebrows in a seductive manner.
I just shake my head. “We don’t want to take advantage
of Jessica, or make her feel uncomfortable.”
“Oh, she’ll never know we’re gone,” Cooper replies
triumphantly.
“If you don’t hurry up, we’ll be late for this meeting
and then she really will be pissed at us.” I walk to the door
and know he’s following as I round the children up.
-----------
The meeting didn’t start off well because they didn’t
trust anything that Cooper had to say.
“How do we know that you’re not just part of the conspiracy?” an older farmer accuses.
“They say they’ve got the military containing the
problem and no one needs to be worried,” a younger man
advises.
I stand off to the side with Jessica, not planning to
speak up, but as the questions continue without really being
answered, I can’t keep quiet any longer.
“Most of you know my sister, Jessica. I only found her
a few months ago and our kids met for the first time
yesterday. I know that they’re saying this isn’t a big deal,
and this is the only city where this infectious disease has
started spreading. I don’t know if it’s a conspiracy, but
what I do know is that a normal woman turned dead came
up to my van with my children in it and clawed at the
windows.”
I sense I have their attention, so I continue. “My
twelve-year-old son had to wash her blood off the side of
my van. I don’t know why it’s not all over the countryside
yet, but I do know that when the folks in the cities realize
what is happening, they’ll try to make it to the rural areas
just like when a hurricane is about to land on the coast.
“Would you rather sit here and do nothing if there
really is an epidemic? Or do you want to be prepared and
keep your families safe?”
Many heads nod in agreement, when Jessica steps up to
emphasize the urgency.
“I wanted you to hear it from two people who escaped
the city. We need to take precautions and make sure that we
have everything we need to survive this. My family and
their farm have been here since before the Civil War. That might be why my house needed so much remodeling.” This
earns her a few smiles and acknowledgements of her right
to be speaking.
have to drive over an hour for, then if something happens
we won’t be out of things like bandages and clean drinking
water. Can we at least appoint a group of people to use the
emergency action plan for the town?” Jessica implores the
group seated in front of her.
“Well, it might be all right if we started a committee to
look into the emergency plan and see if everything is in
working order,” the Mayor suggests.
“Can’t hurt. Even if this isn’t the real thing, at least
we’ll know the plan works,” a grandmother in the crowd
acknowledges.
“All in favor of checking our town’s readiness for an
emergency?” The Mayor asks as a motion for approval.
Many heads nod and call out in approval.
“Nays?” he asks, scanning the room.
A few look as if they might say something, but remain
silent.
“Motion passed. We’ll meet in two days after church
lets out to see where we stand on the action plan.
Dismissed.”
Most of the people file out without stopping to talk to
either one of us.
“Don’t worry, it’s normal for them to be suspicious of you. They have no history with you to know if you’re lying
to them or not.” Jessica whispers to me.
“Nothing we can do now but get the farm ready and
wait for them to figure it out.” Cooper hasn’t taken the
distrust personally like I have.
The next two days are going to be torture as we wait for
a phone call from Martin and the community.
Why do I have to have patience if the world is going to
end?
Chapter 7
Emma
I didn’t want to leave baby Pierce, but things would go
so much faster if I go with the family to gather my parents
and bring them to Jackson Mountain.
My parents live on the outskirts of Memphis, and since
Nana and Pop want all of our family on the mountain,
we’re going to get them before things get worse.
Normally, I’d just call them, but cell service isn’t
working for some reason, and while they’d met some of
Brad’s family at the wedding, they don’t really know them
well enough to just leave everything because his family
says the sky is falling.
The plan was to leave early in the morning and start
along the main interstate to Memphis. Dawson, Haley, and
Cole would be driving with me. I wasn’t sure where Cole
fit into the family tree, but I wasn’t going complain if they
wanted to keep me company on the long eight plus hour
drive.
We decided to take three trucks, and I get to ride with
Haley. I don’t really know her very well, but Andi seems to
have a real distaste for her.
“Hey, Emma, are you ready?” Haley yells from where
she stands next to the big red double cab truck, dressed in
booty
shorts and a classic flannel shirt tied at her waist.
“Sure, just a sec,” I yell back. I need one last kiss from my baby.
“I’ll be back as quick as I can, baby. Don’t grow or do
anything special while I’m gone.” I kiss his little head
before handing him to Nana.
“Now, you run along. He’ll be fine. We protect our own
on Jackson Mountain. You’ve got a long drive ahead of
you and we don’t want you out on the road after dark,
considering everything.” Nana rocks the bundle in her arms
as she tries to console me. “It’ll only be two days and he
won’t even have time to miss you, we’ll keep him so busy.”
With a sigh, I turn and head to the truck. I have to grab
hold of the handles on the side to jump up into the seat.
Haley starts the truck with a loud bang as she shifts into
gear, following the trucks in front of her.
My eyes don’t leave the bundle in Nana’s arms until the
trees obstruct my view. I quickly wipe the tears away from
my cheeks, glad that so far Haley is ignoring me to
concentrate on keeping the tires in the ruts on the dirt road.
“I’ve never had a baby, but I imagine the first time you
leave ’em, it’s the most difficult,” Haley says while
keeping her eyes on the road.
“You’re right. If the world wasn’t falling apart, then I
would have left him with Nana and only called a time or
two.” I grin sheepishly. “Several times I’m sure, until Nana
told me to stop, but this just feels more final.”
“If there’s anything I’ve learned trying to make my way
into the Jackson clan is that they take care of their own.”
Haley pulls out onto the main road, relaxing now that her tires are on the pavement.
“So, I’m curious. Your truck has lots of mud on it and I
know that you and Dawson go mudding, so why are you
driving so carefully?” I glance at Haley as she frowns.
“Nana doesn’t want my truck messing up the driveway.
It was an issue for a while and I try to make sure that I
don’t do anything to cause them to ban me.” Haley shrugs
her thin shoulders.
I give her an appraising look. “So they don’t welcome
everyone into their home?”
“Hell, no. Dawson and I have been together for almost
ten years, and I still have to watch my Ps and Qs around the
family homestead.”
“You don’t look old enough to have been with him for
ten years. Were you, like, five?” I ask without thinking. “I
am so sorry. I didn’t mean to be rude.”
“Oh, honey.” Haley laughs. “If that’s the only rude
thing I’d had said about me while in this family, I wouldn’t
be watching how I was driving. They must not have told
you about me. I normally come with a warning label.”
“Nope, nothing. I don’t know anything except that
you’re married to Dawson and that Andi is your
stepdaughter.” I leave any of the insinuations that have
been whispered about off my list.
“Well, the condensed version is that Andi’s mom,
Carole, was an angel. When she left in the middle of the
night, the family assumed that Dawson had something to do
with it.” Haley waits to see if I’m going to interject anything before continuing.
“Dawson’s a guy, so I’m sure there was something, but
nothing like his family blamed him for at least. Anyway, I
was the babysitter down the street. It was my senior year
and I had watched Andi since she was little. So, when
Carole disappeared on him, they were devastated. Dawson
had a job that sometimes required him to stay gone
overnight and I would come over to watch Andi.
“It had been about six months of this arrangement,
when I forgot my English paper on the printer at their
house. I ran back over to get it and would have been gone,
except I heard a noise and went to check things out. He was
sitting there crying over her goodbye letter.
“When he saw me standing in the doorway, he tried to
be all macho, wiping his eyes, but in the process, he
dropped the letter. I bent down to hand it to him and our
hands touched.” Haley’s face brightens at the memory.
“It didn’t take much before I was on the floor next to
him and we were kissing. I missed class that day, but my
paper got an A so there’s that. I was eighteen, by the way.
I’d always looked up to Dawson, but he’d been married so I
thought it was just a school girl crush until that first kiss
morphed into something more.
“Nobody’s told you any of this? Not even what a “ho” I
am, that I stole him away from such a devoted wife?”
Haley can’t contain her disbelief.
“I just knew that you were quite a bit younger, but that
happens in relationships sometimes.” I’m hoping to stay in
neutral territory with my answer.
“We’re just your classic story of how the babysitter stole the husband and made the “perfect” wife run away.”
She lets out a snort to downplay the hurt still hiding inside.
“What did the letter say?” I question, wanting to hear
the rest of the story.
“You know what? You’re the first person to ask me
that. It said, ‘I can’t do this anymore. I won’t pretend that I love you or men anymore. I’m leaving with my girlfriend
and we’re going to California where we can be together and
people won’t look at us funny. Take care of my little Andi,
she’s going to be amazing.’”
“Wow! So Carole was gay? It doesn’t sound like it was
your fault at all. I’m going to be really nosy here, but why
would the Jackson’s think her leaving was because of
you?” It doen’t make sense to me. She didn’t love Dawson
any more. I can see why the family might point fingers at
them, but really, it was their decision.
“Dawson didn’t want to tell them because a lot of
people in the mountains aren’t very tolerant of a gay
lifestyle. He took all the blame, even though he defended
me the whole time. Andi didn’t know until I finished
college. He still needed someone to stay with her while he
was gone, but Andi and I started to butt heads the older she
got and realized that my relationship with her dad was more
than just being the babysitter.
“I moved in after college because it was too weird to
live at home still, but Andi started to resent me more the
older she got. I never tried to take the place of her mom,
but I guess because I’d always been around it was easier to
make the accusations then deal with the truth.”
“Does Andi know why her mom left?” I look out the window at the passing hills, processing all that I’ve been
told.
“Yeah, she found out when her mom called five years
later on her fourteenth birthday. Her mom didn’t apologize
or invite her to visit them, but from then on, it was a
constant fight.”
“I’m so sorry. I had no idea that this is why Andi is so
upset. When did she move out?”
“When she was a high school junior. It’s not like we
were really strict parents, because Dawson was still gone
several nights a week and I understood because I hadn’t
been out of school that long. I miss her, but it’s been nice to not have the fighting all of the time over the smallest
things.” Haley doesn’t try to gain my sympathy or vote
with her story, but I can’t understand why the family still
has it out for her after all these years.
“Did you ever want kids of your own?” My mouth is
going to get me in a lot of trouble if I don’t stop asking
prying questions.
“We didn’t really feel the need for them. I mean, I’d
been around Andi since she was a baby, and my mom let
me babysit her at our house so that she could make sure the
baby was really safe. When she graduated and went to
college, I was just as proud of her as if I’d given birth to
her. Dawson already had one kid, and with his schedule, it
just didn’t seem fair to have another baby when he
wouldn’t be around to raise it. So I get to travel with him
now when I’m not working, and we make trips up to see
Andi when we can or she’s talking to us that day.”
“I’m sorry. I truly didn’t know the situation. Once she gets a little older and falls in love herself, she may have a
little more compassion toward you and her dad.” I shake
my head at how dumb teenagers can be.
“It still hurts, but I’m used to it now and try not to take
it personally. There’s not much point in trying to do
anything because the family blames me. We just do
holidays, but Jackson Mountain isn’t really a place either
one of us feel comfortable most of the time.” Haley finishes
her story and grows quiet for a few minutes.
Finally, I can’t take the silence any longer. “You should
tell Kathryn. It’s not right to let the world end with this
kind of secret between you and the family that could be
welcoming you in with open arms.”
“What about your parents? What do they think of all
this? If I’m prying, then just tell me to shut up.” I grin
because my nosey ways have always gotten me into trouble
many times before.
“Ha, that’s a laugh. Kathryn wouldn’t listen to anything
I had to say, or Nana either. Andi is the child prodigy so
they’ll protect her no matter what.” Haley slows as the
outskirts of Nashville fill with commuter traffic.