“You weren’t even talking to me.”
“So you start screwing the local slut?”
“Don’t you call me that,” Kayla said.
“Don’t take this out on Kayla,” I said. “This is between you and me.”
“There’s nothing between you and me,” she said. “Nothing. You get that? Now go home and leave us alone. We have a shit-ton of work to do and the last thing I need is the two of you.”
“We should help,” Kayla said. “Fiona and Gwyneth deserve a nice place to stay.”
“Don’t bother,” Sara said. “Just get out of my sight.”
Kayla grabbed my elbow, like she was wanting me to back her up.
I wanted to…
“Let’s go, Kayla,” I said. “If people want to put themselves at risk that’s their deal. I’m not going to support this stupidity.” I spun around and starting walking home. “Good luck, Robert,” I said. “You’re going to need it with that bunch.”
Kayla seemed hesitant to leave. I wasn’t about to wait on her. I just kept walking.
“I’m sorry, Sara,” I heard her say. “I didn’t want things to go like this.”
I did my best not to feel sorry, too.
Kayla and I stayed in my bedroom for most of the day.
I tried not to listen in to the sounds of the horde coming in to pack up all the clothes and food and dishes.
We were losing three and keeping five, assuming that Matt was sticking around and not planning to camp out in the bushes outside the old Williams’ cottage. I’m not sure how they were planning on divvying things up, but for whatever reason I didn’t want to know.
Kayla and I watched Anchorman: The Legend Continues and we laughed more than we oughta, since we were both doing our best to show that we were happy and perfectly unaffected by outside events.
After the movie, I told Kayla about the first time I’d watched the second Anchorman, in a theatre in Pembroke, Ontario, with three buddies whose names I sometimes forget. I’d eaten the Perogy Pizza at Boston Pizza along with downing a few too many beers, and then we walked over to the East End Mall and saw it, and it was pretty good.
That movie is practically ancient now, and I was about the same age then as Kayla is now.
It’s funny how a thought like that can be so impressive and so depressing at the same time.
Today is Sunday, January 6th.
The two Porter children showed up just after midnight. They’re pretty young, the boy around ten and the girl maybe thirteen, so in my mind they’re nowhere near old enough to be wandering around on their own at any time of the day.
The dogs had started barking before they’d even knocked on the door. As we’d practiced since the Lamarche brothers had shown up, Lisa and I went to the kids at the front door while Graham watched the side porch with his pistol.
I could see who it was through the window, of course, but I opened the door with my gun in hand anyways, just in case.
“What’s going on?” I asked them.
The girl was upset while the boy seemed almost giddy.
“My Dad’s caught someone,” the girl said. “In the basement.”
“Shit,” I said.
The boy started to giggle.
I turned to Lisa. “Who’s staying here?” I asked. “You or Graham?”
“I can stay,” she said.
I turned back to the kids on the porch. “Wait here,” I told them.
I unlocked the chest near the door and pulled out a couple of vests and helmets.
Graham came up beside me. “Isn’t that overkill?” he asked.
“Not these days it isn’t,” I said.
He didn’t argue further as we both got dressed. Once we had our helmets on, we headed out the door.
“We’ll take the truck,” I said. It felt like the right kind of emergency.
When we arrived at the Porters I noticed nothing unusual on the outside. Graham stayed back in the truck with the kids while I went in first, making sure that there wasn’t anything amiss.
Justin and Rihanna Porter met me at the door. They looked shaken but okay.
“What happened?” I asked, lifting the visor on my helmet. “Where is he?”
“In the dining room,” Rihanna said. “Matt’s watching them.”
I rushed into the dining room without another word. The two thieves were bound to chairs with zip ties, Matt standing over them holding a hunting rifle. They were younger than I expected, a boy and a girl, both around Fiona’s age. The two of them were native and they looked completely terrified.
“They’re from New Post,” Matt said. “Those bastards have been robbing us blind.”
“What the hell are you doing here?” I asked.
“The Porters asked for my help.”
“And you kept it all pretty quiet.”
“That’s my fault,” Rihanna said. “I thought we were being a little overzealous and I didn’t want to alarm anyone… but I guess you can see that we weren’t overreacting about New Post.”
I took a closer look at the prisoners, at the scrapes and cuts on their faces. “They’re bleeding,” I said. “What happened here?”
“There was a scuffle,” Matt said. “Not a big deal.”
“They’re kids, Matt… you do realize that?”
“They’re thieves,” Justin said. “We caught them with a bag filled with painkillers and first aid stuff.” He pointed to a canvas bag lying on the floor and the spilled loot beside it.
“More than just a box of salt,” I said. “So let’s take them home so their parents can deal with them.”
“I don’t think so,” Rihanna said.
“You have a better idea?”
“They stole some of our food and now they’re after our medicine. That’s a big deal.”
“And?”
“And they need to make it up to us. They need to bring it all back and then some.”
“Restitution,” Justin said.
I wasn’t sure I had reason to disagree.
I walked back out to the porch and waved Graham in.
“You’re making some pretty big assumptions if you think everyone at New Post isn’t in on it,” Matt said to me on my return.
“Don’t worry about me and my assumptions. Let’s worry about the fact that somebody actually thought it was a good idea to let you hold their rifle.”
“It all seems clear to us,” Rihanna said. “New Post has been stealing supplies from us for months.”
“You sure it’s New Post? And not just a couple of kids?”
Justin held up a tablet. “Sugar, salt, baking soda, olive oil, yeast… not what you’d expect a couple of teenagers to steal.”
I walked over and grabbed the tablet. “There’s something odd about this list.”
“Were you even listening to me?”
“No flour on the list. No rice, no beans, no potatoes…”
“Maybe those are next week’s targets,” Rihanna said.
“Maybe,” I said. “But if I had over a hundred mouths to feed, I’d be focused on the staples. Sugar and salt are nice to have, but I doubt they’re the most important things to be carrying back home.”
“So they probably have enough flour,” Graham said as he checked out the zip-tied kids. “Maybe they found some old grain… all they’d have to do is mill it.”
“They don’t have a mill,” Matt said. He looked over to me. “Right?”
“Not that we know of,” I said. “But they could be doing it by hand. But even then… everything else they’d need. I know they have some gardens at New Post, but they don’t have enough to grow it all.”
Justin walked over to the kids, almost shoving Graham aside. “So where do you get your flour?” he asked them.