To get back through the seam at the rear of the warehouse, I had to take off the roll of wire and push it through first. Once we were both outside, we worked on disguising the spot where we’d entered the warehouse. We brushed snow over our tracks, and I broke off a huge chunk of the nearest dead bush, planting it in the snow directly in front of the spot we’d broken open.
Getting over the car wall was difficult enough carrying nothing. With a backpack loaded with nails and a huge coil of wire, it was almost impossible—well, for me, anyway. I watched as Darla flowed to the top of the wall seemingly effortlessly, marveling at her strength. She stopped at the top, motionless, waiting for the sentries to pass. When she gestured for me to follow, I huffed and puffed my way up, slipping once and nearly tumbling backward off the exhaust pipe I was clinging to. Jumping down on the other side was no fun either—my collar of wire left a huge bruise across my neck and shoulder, and the nails jingled alarmingly in my backpack. But either no one heard or we were long gone by the time they got to the spot where we had crossed the wall.
The next day, Darla and Uncle Paul worked on bringing another wind turbine online. Max and Anna went to the nearby stand of pine trees to harvest more bark. It may have tasted terrible, but it was helping to keep us alive. Alyssa and Ben went to search for edible soybeans or corn, while Ed and I took the truck to drag another big metal tank to the wind farm to serve as the core of the heating system for the second greenhouse. every abandoned farm nearby had tanks they had used for storing liquids—pesticides, fertilizer, or fuel, according to Darla. The trick was finding a farm with old tanks; the new ones were mostly made out of plastic, and we needed metal for its heat conductivity. I was still concerned about pesticide residue, but Darla insisted there was nothing to worry about.
When Ed and I finished procuring the tank, we started disassembling another farmhouse, collecting glass, pipes, wire, and lumber to build the second greenhouse.
I wanted to start our new living quarters—the longhouse, as we were calling it—but Darla had a point. With only one greenhouse, any failure could cripple our homestead. With two, we had a chance to survive a disaster.
For a few weeks, we teetered on the edge of starvation. Pine bark was filling but not very caloric. We had eaten all the food Dr. McCarthy and Rebecca had given us—even the cans of dog food. (If I ever have to eat pet food again, I hope it’s dry cat food. Alpo is absolutely disgusting.) And I found out why Darla had taken the leather belts. Cut into small pieces and boiled, they were edible. Sort of.
Just when I thought I would have to go back to Warren to beg for more food, Alyssa and Ben got lucky. Along the top of a high ridge about a mile east of our camp, they found a field with corn that hadn’t yet molded. I sent half our group to dig corn but told Alyssa and Ben to keep prospecting for soybeans. Two days later they returned to camp again triumphant, carrying a bag stuffed with fuzzy seedpods containing soybeans. I wasn’t sure how to process or cook them, but Darla knew. Our food situation got better.
It was easier not to worry as we watched the plants in our greenhouses sprout. Those tiny green shoots meant life and hope. When the largest kale plants hit two inches, I plucked one leaf from each of the best-looking plants and shared them with everyone. If pine bark had vitamin C, then it’d prevent scurvy, but I had no idea what its nutritional content was. I figured we had better add kale back into our diets as soon as possible.
After dinner one night, Darla pulled me aside. She led me into the greenhouse. I hoped she wanted to make out. When we got through the double doors, I took her in my arms and gave her a kiss. She broke it off after only a few seconds. “We need to talk.”
Well, crap. At least she wasn’t pulling away from the hug.
“The kale at the lowest side of the greenhouse isn’t sprouting,” she said.
“I noticed that,” I said.
“It’s too cold over there, too far from the tank.”
I nodded. “What do we do?” If there was one thing I was certain of with Darla and a technical problem, it was that she wasn’t bringing me just the problem. She would have a solution in mind, and it would be something that required my help, or she would have already done it.
“I want some flexible tubing and a pump. We’ll bury the tubing out around the perimeter of the greenhouse and use the pump to circulate hot water through it.”
“Sounds good. Let’s do it.”
“There was a full roll of flexible tubing in the warehouse in Stockton.”
“No! Absolutely not.” I let my arms drop from her sides. Darla, however, kept her hold on me. “And there were a couple of pumps that might work.”
“Can’t we raid one of the abandoned farmhouses around here? They have tubes, right?”
“They’re called pipes. And they’re not flexible. Yes, I might make that work—the pump would be a bigger problem, but maybe we could find a sump pump that I could make work.”
“Fine. Do that.”
“I’ll need connections and fittings. Solder and flux if I use copper pipe. The only place I’ve seen that stuff around here is at Furst Distributors in Stockton. So either way we need to go.”
“Forget it. If we keep going back, we’re going to get caught.”
“How? We’ve been over that wall twice now. It’s easy.”
“How would I know? Bad luck is usually something you aren’t expecting. And anyway, it’s stealing.” She raised her eyebrows at me. “I mean, a little wire we can’t get anywhere else, I can live with. But we can’t keep looting their supplies.”
“Like Red cares? He steals all our food, and you’re going to get squeamish over a few plumbing and electrical parts he’s not even using and will probably never miss?”
“What Red does is his business. What I do is mine. Theft is theft—”
“We need—”
“Maybe it’s excusable when it’s done to survive and no one is hurt by the loss of the goods. But we’ll survive without the flexible tubing or pump.”
“Maybe,” Darla said thoughtfully. “But if we’re going to get the first greenhouse producing as much as it should, build the second, and a longhouse? We’re going to need access to supplies. If not Stockton’s, then someone else’s.”
“We’re not. Going. Back. To Stockton.” I lifted her hands from my shoulders and left the greenhouse. Darla could usually talk me into anything. But not this time.
Two nights later we were back in Stockton. Darla had sworn we would play it safe, she would do everything I asked her to, we would take our time getting back in, and blah, blah, blah. So I made us wait in the snow outside the wall for two hours, making sure the guards hadn’t changed their patterns. They hadn’t.
We slipped over the wall fast and easily, two black-clad ghosts flitting into the city. The seam at the back of the building was exactly as we had left it. We wormed our way inside where it was dark and quiet. Nothing had changed. The shelves of hardware were the same as we’d left them, except for a thicker layer of dust.
Chapter 30
Two nights later we were back in Stockton. Darla had sworn we would play it safe, she would do everything I asked her to, we would take our time getting back in, and blah, blah, blah. So I made us wait in the snow outside the wall for two hours, making sure the guards hadn’t changed their patterns. They hadn’t.