Surviving the Fog (12 page)

“Where are we going to find more material to
make dresses?” Makayla asked.

“We could use the tablecloths,” Desi
suggested.  The boys began to get restless and bored, so the
girls agreed to discuss this later.

"I have a new rule," said Mike when their
attention turned to him again.  The whole group groaned.

"What now?" Kevin moaned.

"From now on, no one can piss in the Porta
Pottys."

There was a chorus of outrage.

"Listen," Mike said.  "We don't have any
way to empty them.  And they are almost filled up.  You
know they stink.  You have to use the bathrooms behind the
dining hall to piss, or else you have to go in the forest.
 And try to use the bathrooms behind the dining hall for
number two, too.  In other words, don't use the Porta Pottys
unless you absolutely have to.  Hector said that he would use
his truck to empty them in a few days.  He's got to find a
place, and when he does, he'll need help."

"Oh, and another thing," he added to another
chorus of groans.  "The paper towels are off limits.  You
will have to use a real towel to dry your hands."

"Why is that?" a camper demanded to know.

"We need to save the paper towels for toilet
paper," he explained.  There was dead silence and not a single
protest.

One day, some of the kids approached Mike,
and they asked him why they didn't have any church services on
Sunday.  Mike was non-committal about the idea, but he
announced that on Sunday there would be a service in the dining
hall for anyone who wanted to attend.  There was a lot of
argument about the idea of a church service.  Some argued that
it was a good idea.  Some argued that it was a bad idea.
 Some liked the idea, but they did not like how it was
arranged.

On Sunday, late in the morning, Mike waited
at the podium for the kids to come to the service.  John,
Desi, and Yuie were in the dining hall waiting.  The time for
the service came and went.  No one appeared.

"Where is everyone?" Mike asked, mystified at
the lack of attendance.

"They're probably not coming," Yuie told
him.

"Why?"

"Some of them didn't want to do this anyway,"
said Desi.  "And most of them are holding their own service
down in the meadow, across the river from where we buried Jackie
and Pete.  Luis is saying the words."

"Ahmad did a thing on Friday," said John.
 "He got his blanket, and he put it on the floor of his cabin.
 He was trying to figure out how to point it to... um..."

"Mecca," Yuie finished.

"Yeah, Mecca," John agreed.  "And Jacob
did his thing yesterday."

"And Rasul shares my little shrine I built
next to the cave," said Yuie.  "He prays to his Gods, and I
pray to Buddha.  I wish I had a little statue of Buddha.
 I take my picture of my parents and my sister there, and I
lean it against a rock while I pray.  And I'm trying to make
prayer beads."

"I don't think anyone is going to come to
your service, Chief," John said.  "Remember these were
American kids.  Still are."

"What's that got to do with it?" Mike
asked.

"They are Americans, Mike.  They aren't
going to a government church."

"What?"

"True. Here, you are the government, Chief,"
Yuie explained.

"Yeah, he's the Government Chief," joked
John.  The others rolled their eyes and groaned.

"Well, what do you want to do?" Mike asked,
as the strains of 'Amazing Grace' came wafting up from the
meadow.

"Let's play cards," Desi suggested.

"All right," agreed Yuie.  "What about
Spades?"

"What about Hearts?" John said.

"How about Strip Poker?" Mike joked.

"You wish!" Yuie answered, as she shuffled a
deck.  "With your rules, it'll be a long time before you get
to see a girl naked."

Mike glanced furtively at Desi who gave him a
small smile.  Mike blushed, and he looked down at his
cards.

The work of building the Lodge continued.
 By the middle of August, the log wall was almost complete.
 In the last rays of the sun, many of the kids would sit on
the grass below the unfinished wall and enjoy the breeze and their
free time.

Erin and three of her friends could often be
found there, enjoying the late afternoon sun.  They talked
about many things, and one of their favorite subjects was boys.
 They compared this one and that one, and they discussed their
few good points and their many bad points.

"What about Hector?" one of the girls
remarked.

"He's cute," said another.  "But he's a
little old."

"And Mexican," added a third.

"What's that got to do with anything?
 Are you prejudiced?"

"No!  But what if he's illegal?"

The other girls laughed.  "I don't think
that matters anymore," Erin said.

"Well, I think Hector's really cute in a
Latino sort of way.  Maybe I'll make a play for him."

"Oh, yeah?  Maybe he would rather be my
boyfriend."

"I think Latino's prefer girls with bigger
breasts," Erin said with a grin.

"Ha! Just because you are such a Moo
Cow."

"I am not," exclaimed Erin.  "I'm just
right."  The girls continued to jibe at each other, except for
Kathy.  She remained quiet and thoughtful.

The next day, she found Hector working on the
wall as usual.  She was one of his regular crew.  Their
task was to carry buckets of thick mud from a low wet spot in the
meadow up to the wall, and then they would pour the mud onto the
highest log, so that when Hector put the next log on the wall there
were no air spaces between the logs.

Kathy approached Hector at the end of the
work period.  The other kids were hurrying away, glad to be
free at last.  She handed Hector a bottle of water and waited
as he used a bandanna from his rear pocket to wipe his face.

"Thanks," he said, and he took a big swig
from the bottle.  "Ah...you wouldn't think that you could get
so hot at this altitude."  He was breathing hard.
 "You're...?"

"Kathy. I'm Kathy.  I work on your crew.
 I'm fourteen.  And a half."

"Kathy.  Well, thanks for the water,
Kathy."

"Um...I was wondering if I could talk to
you."

"Sure, Sweetie. Talk."  Hector leaned
back and poured part of the bottle on his face.

"Um...I was wonder if I could work with you.
 Not just carrying mud I mean.  I don't mind that.
 But I was wondering if I could help you.  I mean, I want
to learn to work with the wood."

Hector used his bandanna to
wipe his face again.  He gave her a good
look
.  She's a pretty
girl
, he thought.  Kathy was blond and
blue eyed.  Her body was just now developing, but it was clear
that, one day soon, she would be a lovely young lady.  She
wasn't tall so, since Hector was not a tall man himself, she stood
just below his shoulder.

"You want to work with the wood?  You
mean you want to learn carpentry," Hector said.

"Yes," replied Kathy.  "I used to help
my Dad a lot.  He wasn't a regular carpenter, but he worked
with wood a lot.  Mostly he built bird houses and things like
coat racks, but he built the fence around our house, and he built
our garage.  I helped him with that.  Once, I helped him
build a big tree house for one of our neighbors."

"That's more experience than most of these
kids have," Hector agreed.

"And I have an idea."

"Yeah?" he said skeptically.  "What is
it?"

"I was thinking about these braces," she
said, motioning to the heavy iron straps that Hector had retrieved
from the logging camp.  "You’re going to make wooden pegs to
hold them to the logs, right?  But you can't get the pegs
perfectly round, right?  So there's bound to be gaps,
right?"

"Right so far," Hector responded, humoring
the girl.

"I was thinking that, since we don't have any
wood glue, we might be able to use the sap from trees to fill the
gaps," she said.

"Now that's an idea, uh...Kathy," Hector
answered slowly.  He thought about it.  "That is an
idea."

"And since the sap is sticky, it might make
the braces stronger.  That would make the wall stronger,
right?"

"Si," Hector answered.  "That's not a
bad idea at all, Kathy."

"I was thinking that if we heated up the sap
and then rolled the pegs in the stuff, it might be easier to cover
the whole peg."

"Damn, that is a good idea," Hector exclaimed
enthusiastically.  "Uh, sorry."

Kathy gave him a sweet
smile.  
As if I don't hear the 'F'
word every day
, she thought.

"So can I work with you?" she asked.

"Uh, sure.  Why not?" he answered.
 "Tomorrow I'll explain what I'm planning to do here.
 But you might have to carry mud some times," he
cautioned.

"I don't mind," she answered happily.
 She walked with him down to the dining hall.

The next day, Hector sent her exploring for
tree sap.  Kathy spent most of the day gathering samples, but
at the end of the work period, she was at the wall with a bottle of
water for Hector.  That evening, she and Hector whittled pegs
and melted sap trying to find a combination that would be as
effective as glue.

For the next week, they worked closely
together.  They finished building the wall, and they
discovered that the sap covered pegs worked.  Now that the
wall was completed, it was time to dismantle the remaining cabins
on the other side of the river, and move them over to the work site
where they would be reassembled on top of the wall and the rock
ledge.

But before they began to reassemble the
cabins, Hector took the bus up to the logging camp, and he filled
it with old branches, scrap timber, and the ends of logs.  He
drove the bus back to the camp, and the kids stacked this wood into
the space between the wall and the ledge.  They would use this
lumber for firewood during the winter.

Hector was impressed with Kathy's
intelligence and her knowledge of wood.  And she was a fast
learner.  He could show her something once, and she would
quickly understand.  He showed her how to place braces under
the floors of the cabins using log posts.  She found some
string, and she used it to measure the distances for the rest of
the posts, thereby speeding up the work.

He found himself spending a lot of time in
her company discussing the construction of the Lodge.  Once,
when she was scrambling along some scaffolding that he had built,
he told her that she looked like a cat.  They laughed
together, and after that he started calling her, Kat.

He liked spending time with Kathy, he
realized.  He wasn't that much older than some of the kids,
but he didn't feel that he had much in common with them.
 Sometimes he felt lonely.  With Kathy, he had someone to
talk to about something that he enjoyed.

And she was nice.  It seemed like she
always had a bottle of water for him after work.  And when he
was exceptionally busy and was reluctant to pause for lunch, she
always had a sandwich handy.  It was usually peanut butter and
jelly, his favorite.

"Where are you from?" Kathy asked one
afternoon, as they shared their dinner.

"I was born in Zacatecas,” replied Hector.
 “In Mexico.  I worked with my father who is a carpenter.
 But there wasn't enough work, and my parents have five other
children.  So, when I was twenty one I rode the bus to Ciudad
Juarez, and I snuck across the border.  From there I made my
way to California.  I got a job on this logging crew.
 They work all over the west.  They needed workers, and
they didn't ask questions.  They usually paid us in cash.
 What about you, Kat?  Where do you come from?"

"I was born in Concord, California,” she
replied.  “I lived in a small place called Clayton Valley.
 My Dad told me that it used to be a quiet country area, but
now there are houses everywhere.  There's a mountain nearby.
 Mount Diablo.  It's not that high, and you can drive all
the way to the top.  I used to go there with my family, and we
would have picnics."

He thought about that one evening after he
had retired to his cabin.  It was the last one standing on
that side of the river.  The others had been disassembled and
reassembled on the wall.  He was thinking that Kathy was
unlike the other girls.

The other girls are much
sillier
, he thought.  She wasn't
athletic like Yuie, but she was strong.  She could carry those
buckets of mud tirelessly.  She wasn't bossy like Desi could
be, but if he needed her to supervise other kids, she could get the
job done.

She wasn't like Erin, of
course.  Erin had those magnificent breasts.  Kathy was
still developing.  But she was perfectly formed. And she did
have a really cute face.  He liked her lovely blue eyes.
 He loved the way those beautiful blond bangs fell down
sometimes and covered her face.  She really needed a haircut.
 And once, he had seen her in a towel coming out of the
showers.  Her legs were exceptional.  She certainly had a
cute butt.  He could tell from those tight designer jeans that
she was always wearing.  He wondered.
How would it feel to caress that cute butt?
 He wondered.
How
would it feel...?
He was jolted back to
reality.  
What are you thinking?
 She is only fourteen.  And a half.
 He was twenty three.  He couldn't be thinking of
her that way.  He sternly told his body to settle down.
 Way down.

Unfortunately, in the following days, it
seemed as if he was more aware of her physical presence than ever.
 And she was always inadvertently touching him, putting her
hand on his shoulder or chest or back, or leaning back against him
when he helped her lift a section of wall.

It started to drive him crazy.  Once,
when her denim covered bottom backed against his groin, he had to
take off his cap and hold it over himself while pretending to be
deep in thought.  He began to think that he would either have
to grab her and hold on for dear life, or else flee back to the
logging camp.  At night, in the privacy of his bed, he
futilely tried to think of someone else.  He tried being less
familiar and more formal with her.  Then, for some reason, she
stopped wearing those tight jeans, and she switched to her skirts;
her short skirts.