There was a body lying on the gravel.
The front door to the house was wide open.
He feared the worst.
His heart started to pound.
His hands and feet felt ice-cold.
“What is it?” said Jessica.
Jim didn’t answer.
He couldn’t answer.
His mind was flooded with fear.
This was the moment that he’d feared above all else. The moment that he hadn’t even admitted to himself that he feared.
If he went in there and Aly was dead on the floor, her skull smashed in, or her body riddled with bullet holes, what would he do?
He was a strong man in a lot of ways, but if that happened, he’d collapse and be incapable of anything at all.
If the attacker was still there, he doubted he’d even be able to fight. Sure, in the movies the man always became filled with rage and sought his vengeance with fervor and delight.
But this was real life.
And real life didn’t work like the movies.
“Jim?”
Jessica had her hand on his shoulder.
Strangely, it was reassuring.
“You OK?” she said.
Jim shook it off.
He got himself under control.
He gave her a stiff nod.
He had his Ruger in his hand, and he motioned for Jessica to follow him through the door.
Jim moved swiftly.
He was through the doorway.
“Whoa!”
It was Jordan, holding his hands in the air.
Jim’s Ruger was inches away from Jordan’s face.
“Where’s Aly?” he said.
“In the bedroom. Put that thing away before you shoot one of us.”
Jim was in the bedroom in a flash.
Aly was there, on the bed. She looked fine.
“You OK?” said Jim.
“Yeah,” she said.
“What happened? Is everyone OK?”
“That new guy ran off with our stuff.”
“What stuff?”
“I don’t know. You told me not to get out of bed. And I don’t think I can move…”
“You’re sure you’re OK?” said Jim.
She nodded vigorously.
Jessica appeared in the doorway. “He took off with a lot of our food… our medical supplies…”
“Shit,” muttered Jim.
He glanced at Jordan, who was just standing there dumbly with a sheepish look on his face. There was no point in saying anything to him.
The damage had been done.
And Jordan wasn’t going to be able to undo any of it.
But maybe Jim could.
“You stay here,” said Jim to Jessica. “I barely know what’s going on. We need someone guarding the house.”
And with that, Jim dashed off, heading outside again.
He was determined to get their food and gear back. His immediate fears, of his wife being dead, were gone. But new fears took their place.
Sure, they could fish. They could hunt. They could get food from elsewhere. But there were a lot of people to feed. And they were already struggling on their low-calorie diets.
Jim didn’t think they could go much lower in calories while retaining efficiency.
Jim glanced down the driveway at the dead man.
Who was he?
“Rob?” called out Jim, as loud as he could.
He heard a muffled yell from down by the lake.
That was all he needed.
He dashed off as quickly as he could, running with long strides, avoiding the protruding roots and rocks.
Jim ran through the trees until he could see the water.
And there was Rob.
Down by the water, Rob sat with his knees bent and his head sunk low. He looked utterly defeated, like a broken-down machine that had long been cast aside.
“What happened?” said Jim, his tone snappy.
If Rob had given up, that was that. There wasn’t anything to do about it. Except to keep going and get the stuff back.
“He took off. I thought I could catch him. I’ve failed, Jim. I failed you. I’m sorry.”
“Enough of that,” snapped Jim. “Where’d he go?”
For the first time, Jim saw that Rob was covered in blood. His handgun was still in his hand. Rob’s arm hung limply down, the gun resting partially on the ground.
“The lake.”
“The lake?”
“He took a boat out.”
“A boat?”
“A canoe,” said Rob, not lifting his head up to look Jim in the eye.
“Where’d he get a canoe?”
“Dunno. Next door maybe. I saw him out on the water.”
“Is he still there?”
“Out of view.”
“Where’d he go?”
“Other side, I guess.”
Rob scanned his eyes across the lake. There was no sign of the man or their gear. There was no boat in sight.
There wasn’t time to ask Rob what had happened with the dead man in the driveway. Obviously, Rob had killed him.
He’d have to find out later.
“Get back to the house,” said Jim. “Pull yourself together. The others need you. I’m going after him.”
“You’re going after him? How? There aren’t any more boats. I checked.”
“Don’t worry about it. Just get back to the house.”
Jim didn’t wait to see if Rob would get up and head back. There wasn’t time.
Instead, Jim started running again. Running through the trees. Running with his long stride.
He was full of adrenaline. He felt full of energy, although he knew consciously that it wouldn’t last forever.
His body was doing everything it could to keep him going.
He reached the next house in practically no time.
Sure enough, there were no boats.
Jim stood on the shore, panting, his chest heaving. He was out of breath. He was covered in sweat. His revolver was in his hand.
The sun was shining. The clouds had parted.
The lake had never looked more beautiful. And peaceful.
But Jim’s mind was anything but peaceful. It was a turmoil of thoughts, panic, worry, and expectation.
He needed that gear.
He’d do anything to get it.
As far as he was concerned, that gear was the line between life and death. Not just for him. But for Aly. And others too.
He had to think of them.
He could see the shore off in the distance. It was just a small little line across the lake, with trees rising above it, looking like miniature versions of themselves.
It was a long way off.
But he could get there.
He was a strong swimmer.
Or he had been.
He’d been on the swim team in high school. He’d almost made state his senior year, only missing the qualifying time by a couple of seconds in one of the last meets of the season.
Freestyle had been his specialty.
He could do it.
He kicked off his boots, secured his Ruger in his holster, making sure it was secured tightly.
Next, he stripped off his shirt. It would only weigh him down and increase the drag.
As he moved into the water, a memory surfaced from somewhere far back in his mind.
Many summers ago, when he’d been in fifth grade, or maybe sixth, his parents had sent him to a camp down in Pennsylvania for a couple weeks. They’d always been cautious with their money, and it wasn’t like them to spend on something “frivolous” like summer camp for a kid.
But for some reason, they’d sent him there and paid the bill. Later, his mother had confessed that his father had thought he’d needed to toughen up a lot, and that a work friend of his father’s had once suggested the camp.
And the camp had proved to be tough. It wasn’t something that Jim thought about much, but he supposed that it had given him some of the attitudes he still held to this day.
==
During the first week of camp, he’d learned that one of the camp’s “requirements” was to swim across the lake. All alone.