The Last Tribe (14 page)

“Yeah, I know, school is rough no
matter how you do it, same age group or advanced.”

They sat in silence for a few
moments before Greg asked another question.

“So why did you really decide to
come up to Hanover?  What was your thought process?”  Greg liked the way
Rebecca thought, systematically and logically.  He was curious why she changed
her mind about leaving their current location.

“You’re right.  I don’t think your
family is alive.  I’m sorry, but it doesn’t make sense.  I hope they are, but I
don’t think they are.”  She stopped, the timer dinged to take the eggs out of
the water.  She used a slotted spoon to pull each egg out and put them in paper
bowls.  She would use the hot water to wash clothes later.

She placed the bread to toast on
the wired rack sitting above the fire.

“Make sure I don’t burn the toast
while I’m talking, okay?”  Rebecca asked.  Greg nodded in response, though he
knew she could multitask.

“I like our current digs.”  She
continued.  “But there are flaws in the location.  This house is new.  It’s not
colonial.  We already modified it to trap warmth with the blankets.  It isn’t that
cold yet.  When the temps drop low, I have no idea how cold this house will
get.  It might get too cold for us to use.  The homes in Hanover?  There is as
strong possibility we can find one much older, brick, set up for the
extremities.  We might find a woodstove, bigger fireplaces, bedrooms with
fireplaces.  We might improve our situation.“ 

She flipped the bread and
continued.

“I’d also like to find a place near
water.  We don’t have water here.  We were going to have to move in the
spring.  Why not make a move now?  We can re-assess in the spring in Hanover. 
Eventually I think we’ll end up somewhere other than New England, but if we are
going to find out the truth about your family, we are going to stay in the
north for at least the next 9 months, right?” 

Greg nodded in response. 

 “I know you won’t ditch me, but I
won’t make you suffer.  If I know we are going to leave this house anyway and I
have questions about its viability, well, it makes sense to leave this house
now.  Hanover seems to be a decent place.  We’ll have a river, lakes to fish,
mountains to hunt.  There are stores we can use to find things we might need. 
As long as we can get up there safely and we take all my food, I decided it was
not only a viable option, it’s probably the right option.”  She used metal
tongs to take the bread off the toasting rack.

“Wow.”  Greg said.  “I’ll be
honest.  I thought you were going to say you agreed because I’m cute.”  He took
his piece of toast from her outstretched hand.

Rebecca blushed.  She did not
expect his response. 

“You keep your ego in check, Greg
Dixon.  We have a lot of planning to do, and being cute is not going to help
you through a long Hanover winter.” 

He laughed, and cracked the eggs onto
his toast.  They sat across from each other.  She was on the fireplace hearth
while he sat on one of the couches.  There was a coffee table between them. 
She mixed orange juice concentrate for them during his turkey hunt.

“Do we have a large truck?  Did
your store have a delivery van or anything like that?”  Greg was not going to
let Rebecca do all the heavy lifting with regards to the planning, although he
knew she probably had their trip planned in her head.  He was hoping to be more
than just the “labor” part of the equation.

“That’s not a bad idea.  I left our
van at the store.  We can take all the food, and fit the chickens in the back
along with of our blankets, bikes, that kind of stuff.  The less we have to
scavenge, the better, particularly in the short term.  We want to be able to
get our bearings for a few days before we have to start looking for supplies.”

“My father told me to go to the
house he grew up in, an old brick house.  I know where it is.  It has a wood
stove and like four fireplaces.  There is a pond right down the street.”  Greg
took a bite of toast.  “My family has a small cottage on another lake, but it’s
remote, way outside of town.  We would be stuck if it snowed.  It’s winterized,
sits on a lake.  It has a woodstove that heats the entire place.  If we had our
food with us, it would work, but I’d rather stay in town.”  Greg was contributing
for the first time.  It made him feel good.  He relied on Rebecca’s work since arriving.

“Let’s walk over to my old store,
figure out what we want to take, and start packing up the van.  It takes
diesel, but the tank is full.  Hanover is not far away.  We will have enough fuel
to get there and back here if something bad happens.  Worst cast, we scavenge a
vehicle up there.  I’m sure there are plenty of cars.”

Rebecca pulled out a legal pad and
started making a list of items she wanted to take.  

“Could you put ‘Greg’ and ‘Greg’s
backpack’ on there?  That has my contributions covered.”

Rebecca smiled, but she was not
amused.  Serious things were serious.  Joking while working was not her thing. 
She focused and got her jobs done.  She knew Greg would get his work done, but
probably not as quickly or as efficiently as she got her work done.  Part of
Rebecca’s wiring made her serious. 

Greg was focused and determined,
but he was 14.  He acted like a sophomore in high school.  He made jokes,
goofed around, procrastinated every once in a while.  Greg was considered the
serious one of his friends, his family, pretty much everyone he knew until he
met Rebecca.

“You clean up.  I’ll keep working
on the list.  We know what we need.  I’m making this so we can check things off
when we put them in the truck.”

Greg let her do her thing.  He put
the paper plates and plastic forks into a bag and walked out to the trash.  It
was a cold and gloomy day, classic weather for New England in November.  It was
well past the first frost.  All the leaves were off the trees.  Their newer sub-division
had no trees and no leaves to rake.  As Greg’s eye moved towards the older
neighborhoods he saw the yards and streets covered in browns, yellows, reds,
and oranges that should have been raked, bagged, and picked up long ago.  Tall
grass poked through the leaves, evidence that the lawns were unkept before the
leaves fell.

Greg turned to go back inside.  He
neglected to wear a coat, and the short walk outside gave him a chill.  Rebecca
was on the porch in her coat holding car keys.

“Now that I don’t have to conserve
fuel, let’s take the car.  It’s not far to the store, but it’s cold and I don’t
want to walk.”  She jiggled the keys.  “I also need to practice my driving if
I’m going to make it all the way to Hanover.”

“Practice?”  Greg replied in a tone
that relayed question as well as concern.   

“Just get your coat and let’s go. 
We’re burning daylight.”

Greg did as he was told.  He grabbed
a coat, jumped in the SUV, and buckled his seatbelt.  The garage door was
closed.  Rebecca sat in the driver’s seat.

“Well?”  She asked.

“Well what?  I’m here, ready to
go.”  Greg told her.

“I can press the garage door opener
as many times as you’d like.  It’s not going to work.  Could you please pull
the garage open so we can leave?  I mean, is chivalry dead?”  She looked at him
impatiently.

“Oh, yeah, hey, let me get it.”  He
unbuckled and jumped out of the truck to open the door.  When he was back in
his seat he apologized.  “Okay, sorry, now we’re good.”

Rebecca turned the key and put the small
SUV into reverse.  She slowly took her foot off the brake and the vehicle
backed out of the garage.  There was a small down slope to the driveway and the
SUV picked up speed.  Rebecca did not panic, but she did not respond quickly
enough.  She spun the wheel to turn the speeding car towards the store.  She
and Greg rocked to their side, out of control as the SUV spun.  Rebecca slammed
on the breaks and the teens whipped forward.  Greg almost hit his head on the
dash.

“Whoa.”  Greg blurted.

Rebecca maintained her composure.  “Sorry
about that.  I’m a little rusty.  To be honest, I’m also not that great a
driver.  Now you know the real reason we rode the bikes to the barn.”  She gave
Greg a shoulder shrug before sliding the gearshift into drive and pulling her
foot off the brake. 

They jerked forward and backwards
as Rebecca practiced her driving.  The store was a mile away from their house. 
It was a good sized grocery, but not the size of the large box stores.  Greg was
reminded of the family owned marts that served island and beach communities up
and down the southern coast, stores with six aisles, a meat counter, and basic
items. 

“I already took everything out of
the store, we just need the van.  It’s pretty dark in there, or I would show
you around.  I used to work in it with my parents almost every day after school
or volleyball practice.  It’s nothing fancy, but it made a living.  My father
loved feeding the community, talking to people about the local happenings.  It
was a great store.”  Greg looked for sadness in her voice, but Rebecca was
happy when she spoke of her old life with her parents.

She parked the SUV next to the van,
and walked over to the delivery truck.  The keys were on the seat where Rebecca
left them.  A sofa cushion was propped against the back of the driver’s seat.

“The seat doesn’t move and I can’t
reach the pedals.  Don’t worry, I can drive it.  I’m actually better at this
truck than I am that SUV.  It has less power.  I don’t jerk forward and back as
much.”  She cranked up the van, told Greg to jump in, and they were on their
way back to the house. 

Rebecca was right.  She was better
at driving the van than she was the SUV.  The progress was slow but smooth.

She backed the van against the
garage, and they spent the rest of the day loading food, water, and a spare
chicken coop into the back.  A metal ramp extended from the bottom of the truck. 
Greg was strong enough to pull large dollies of goods into the back. 

Greg convinced Rebecca there was a
bike store and five or more camping/outfitter stores in the Hanover area. 
Food, animals, clothes, blankets and a few days of firewood were the only necessities. 
They worked quickly and had the van loaded by late afternoon.   

They sat down on the hearth to
enjoy dinner, Rebecca with her back to the fire, Greg on the couch opposite
her.  It was 6:30pm.  The sun was down.  They were ready to leave tomorrow,
ahead of Rebecca’s schedule. 

“I’ll miss my hometown, but I’m
glad to be leaving.  There are too many memories here.  I need a new start.” 
It was another reason she agreed to move to Hanover.  Concord reminded her of
her parents and how their bodies were in a house just a few blocks away.

“I don’t think this is a mistake
for team Greg and Rebecca, I really don’t.  If it doesn’t work this winter,
we’ll figure something out before next season.” 

“You don’t have to keep convincing
me.”  Rebecca replied.  “Let’s eat our fried rice, get some sleep, and hit the
trail tomorrow.” 

Greg improved the food quality
substantially since his arrival.  He made bread from the pantry ingredients to accompany
their soup most nights.  He made spaghetti with flat bread his second dinner. 
Tonight he used eggs for ‘fancied up’ packaged fried rice.  He loved to cook. 
Now that he had ingredients and a frying pan, he could work his magic. 

Rebecca was a utility eater.  She
took the path of least resistance to calories.  Soup and cereal were staples in
her diet.  She enjoyed more involved meals.  She just did not want to cook
them.

It was hardly gourmet fried rice in
front of them.  Greg made a packaged fried rice mix, let it cool, and cooked
eggs and dried chorizo sausage.  He re-introduced the previously cooked rice
into the proteins, stirred, and voila.  It had good flavor and maybe too much
heat.  He was happy with himself.  Rebecca was happy to not eat soup.

“Look, if you want to pass on the
gin tonight, I totally understand.”  Greg said in reply to Rebecca’s idea of
going to bed after dinner.  “I mean, you’re down, well, a lot, and I wouldn’t
want to keep losing.  Losing isn’t a lot of fun.  I’ve lost before, not to you,
but in the past, and…”

“You’re hilarious.  Look, it’s a
card game, based on the cards I’m dealt, and the guessing of which cards to
keep and throw.  The skill level is very low.  It’s mostly luck, probably why
you are so good at it.”  Rebecca did not like to lose, and she rarely did.  Greg’s
teasing stung.

“Oh, okay, well, we can try luck
some other night then.  I didn’t mean to get you upset or anything.”  He smiled. 
“It’s not all the much fun to win all the time.  Maybe a break would be best.”

“You clean up your rice pan, I’ll
shuffle the cards.  We are going to play until I win a hand.” 

“Wait, we have to get to Hanover
before the first snow.  How about we play until you don’t lose so badly?” 

That was the last straw.

“Just wash the pan before you
become team Greg again, all by yourself, walking to Hanover in the dark with a
backpack and cold cans of beans and franks.  Actually, I still have that cat
food.”

Rebecca did not win until the
seventh game.  She still did not like to lose, but she enjoyed playing cards
with Greg.  His company was a fair trade for losing.  Her worm would turn, and
she would be the lucky one.  At least she hoped her worm would turn.  They clicked
off their lanterns at 8:30, exhausted and excited for a new adventure.

The chickens were not excited to
leave their coop.  They had no choice, but they did not go quietly or nicely. 
Greg wore oven mitts to corral them into cages for the trip.  He kept the mitts
on to transport the cage to the van as the chickens pecked at him furiously. 

The teens ate their eggs, cleaned
up the living room, and left a simple and informative note on the door;

Two people, alive on November
19, heading to Hanover, N.H.

Highway 89 North is breathtaking
with rolling hills, scenic valley overlooks, rivers, and mountains.  Everything
one would expect and want of a New England drive. 

Rebecca was not a confident highway
driver.  The 60 mile journey took over three hours.  She hunched over the
steering wheel the entire trip, focusing on the road and her speed. 

Greg encouraged her when possible,
but kept quiet for most of the ride so she could concentrate.  He had not
spoken in over an hour when he noticed the exit for West Lebanon, New
Hampshire, a town bordering Hanover. 

“Stop here, on the overpass.”  He
asked.

“What’s up?” 

“This is Lebanon, the town next to
Hanover.  It has shopping malls, an LL Bean, Home Depot, all the box stores and
specialty shops we need.  I want to see if the stores are okay.” 

The van rolled to a stop on a
bridge.  Greg looked out both windows.  “It looks good, doesn’t it?”  He did
not wait for a response.  “We’re close.  One or two more exits and we’ll be
there.”

“I know I’m driving slowly, but I
feel like I’ve got the hang of this.  Don’t you?”  Rebecca held the large
steering wheel, turning it back and forth slightly.  Her small thirteen year
old hands barely wrapped around the black plastic.  She put a second seat
cushion behind her that morning.  She was sitting on eight inches of truck seat.

“You are driving great.”  Greg
replied absently, still looking at the shopping malls.  He did not want to hurt
her feelings.  She was a terrible driver.

Rebecca patted the wheel before
slipping the van into drive.  They rumbled up and down several hills before
exiting the highway, crossing the Connecticut River and driving up a steep hill
on Wheelock Street into Hanover, N.H. 

The sun was shining as they reached
the center of town.  They stopped at the top of a hill where Wheelock Street
intersected with Main Street.  Downtown Hanover stretched towards their right. 
Dartmouth College began to their left and front.  The Dartmouth College Green sat
off their left front bumper.  The Green was a large open area slightly larger
than a football field and in the middle of the campus.  The normally trimmed
grass grew out of control. Deep drifts of leaves covered the open field and
much of the campus.  Aside from the landscaping, the college and town were
intact.  There did not appear to be looting or destruction.  Hanover was
pristine and preserved.

They idled at the corner of
Wheelock and Main Street for a few minutes until Rebecca spoke.  “It looks like
people fled or died in their homes.  I don’t see any looting or damage.  It
just looks empty.”

“There aren’t that many people up
here.  If the tourists didn’t come, and the college students weren’t here, it
would just be the people of the town, and, again, there aren’t that many of
them.“  Greg visited his grandparents in the summer between terms at the
college.  The town was not crowded when the college was out of session. 

“It’s only noon.  We have a lot of
time to find your father’s house, and most importantly find more firewood.  We
need to stock up immediately.  We can live off the food in the truck all
winter, but we have to find firewood to survive.”  Rebecca turned to Greg while
she spoke.  He was staring straight ahead, down Wheelock Street.

Greg’s face was long.  He was
silent as he looked through the van’s windshield.

“What’s wrong?”  Rebecca asked.

“I’m trying to get my bearings.  I
think we take a left here, or the next street, I mean, this is a one way.  Not
that we have to worry about going the wrong way.  So, yes, take a left here.” 
Greg stumbled through his words as he fought back emotions.

“Seriously, what’s wrong?”  Rebecca
asked again.

Greg blinked his eyes before
turning to look at her.  A tear rolled down his face.  His other eye was
glassy.

“I thought someone would be here. 
I didn’t think I’d be the first one.  I thought my Dad would be up here with my
brothers.  I thought there would be a sign at the top of this hill or smoke
visible from a house.  I don’t know why, I just thought, you know, if he was
alive, he’d be up here.”  Greg’s eyes dropped tears down his face.  “They’re
dead, aren’t they?  I’m the only one alive.  Everyone is dead.”  He sat
expressionless, tracks showing on his dirty face.  Greg realized for the first
time he may be the lone survivor of his family.

“I don’t know.  Your dad said he’d
be here in the spring.  It’s only November.  Maybe it didn’t kill everyone in
South Carolina right away and he couldn’t leave.  Maybe he got caught by the
police.  We don’t write them off until summer.  Remember our deal?  You believe
for the both of us.  I keep you alive.”  She put her hand on his leg.  “We can
do this.  We need to find the house and set up.  It’s going to be cold tonight.
We need fire.  We need to get ready for winter.  It could snow tonight or this
afternoon.” 

She squeezed his knee gently. 
“Greg, I need you.”

He sniffed his nose loudly. 
Rebecca reached into her pocket and gave him a tissue.  “Okay.”  He sniffed
again.  “Okay.  Drive up to the next road on the other side of this field and take
a left.”  Rebecca followed his directions.  Greg recognized the Medical school
as a landmark.  “Take another left, then take that catty corner.”

“What’s a catty corner?” Rebecca
asked.  Her face scrunched up like he was talking gibberish.

“What do you mean?  It’s a hitch in
the road.  You see it up ahead.  This road stops and then continues but five
feet to the right.  That’s a catty corner.”  Greg was stunned she had never
heard the expression.  It was so common to him.

“I think you’re making that up, but
okay.” 

They drove a short way down the
road.  A pond was on the right.  Tall tan field grass surrounded the water.  The
pond was still free of ice.  Greg instructed her to take a left at the bottom
of the hill.  Two houses up the road was his father’s childhood home.

“I can’t believe I found it so
quickly.  I mean, it’s not a big town, and I’ve been here a bunch of times, but
I thought I might get lost.”

“So this is it, huh?  Wow, it
certainly is big.”

The house was enormous, a giant red
brick home on a corner lot.  It looked old.  There were two chimneys visible. 

“My grandfather worked at the college. 
This was the house they gave him.  It’s old, old enough to have lots of New
England winter essentials.  I mean, I guess, that’s what my dad told me.  I’ve
never actually been in the house.”

Rebecca turned to him.  “What?  You’ve
never been in this house?  You brought me up here and you have no idea if the
fireplaces are gas?  You don’t know if it’s been remodeled inside, and not
suitable for a non-electric winter?  Are you crazy?”

“Calm down, it’s like you said,
there are other houses we can find if this one doesn’t work.  I know our family
cottage will work if this one doesn’t.  The cottage is small, heats well with
the wood stove, is on a lake in the woods.  I have a back up.”

Rebecca could not hide her anger. 

“I’m sorry.”  He conceded.  “I wasn’t
trying to hide it from you.  I didn’t think about it.  I am following my
father’s instructions, I just blindly assumed he would lead me to a good house.” 

“Greg, we are all we have.  It’s
you and me.  We have to make decisions together with all the available information. 
This is life and death.  We’re in serious stuff.”  Rebecca, all of thirteen,
understood the gravity of the situation.  Playtime was over.  Greg had to
realize chasing turkeys and not telling her everything about a new location was
unacceptable.  It was life threatening.

“Got it.  Lesson learned.  Let’s
move on and check out the house.”  Greg understood.  Before he became a team he
could make mistakes like falling asleep in the SUV during his hike from
Andover.  He was only hurting himself.  Future mistakes put Rebecca at risk. 

They backed the van into the
driveway, put on coats and gloves, and got out to investigate.  Greg opened the
back of the van to let the chickens breathe fresh air and see sunlight. 

They clucked angrily from their
cage.  One chicken lay motionless in the cage.

“Damn.”  Greg muttered.  “One of
the chickens died.” 

“It was going to happen in the
move.  If we only lose one, I’ll be happy.”  Rebecca looked at the other birds
for indications of stress or illness.  “I factored in the risk when we moved. 
I assume we’ll lose all of the chickens.  They are finicky animals, prone to
illness, stress, whatever.  I knew taking them from their home would do this.”

“You didn’t tell me the chickens
would die.” Greg was surprised.  “Why did you agree to move?”

“Like I said, I was moving anyway. 
They would have died anyway.  Maybe they die sooner because we came to Hanover,
I don’t know, but you were coming here with or without me.”  She shrugged her
shoulders and moved passed him towards the backyard.

The house’s lot was sloped showing
three stories from the front, and four stories from the back.  The basement was
built into the hill.  The center of the house encompassed the four stories.  Two
story sections flanked the main house. 

An attached garage on the right had
a sunroom above it.  A railing on the roof of the sunroom suggested a deck. 

The left flank was brick with a
turret of stairs to the second floor. 

The basement was a walkout spanning
the entire bottom floor of the four story main house.  A roof covered a back
patio area. 

 “It looks dark in the basement.  Let’s
grab some flashlights.”  Greg went back to the truck and got headlamps and
floodlights.  Rebecca tried the back door.  It was locked.

Rebecca tried a second door on the
back of the house towards the left side. The door did not have a window.  It
was also locked.

“What do you want to do?  Break the
door?  We can’t do that if we want to live here.  Break a window?  I’m not sure
that is a good idea either.”  She looked for potential ways into the house.

“Let’s try all the doors and
windows before we jump to conclusions about how to get into the house.”  Greg
walked towards the left side to try the door at the top of the brick turret of steps.

“Duh, yeah, that makes sense,
sorry.”  Rebecca followed him around the house.  The grass was long and leaves
covered the ground.  “We have to rake the leaves.  That’s going to take time.” 
She looked at the yard.

“I don’t know why we’d clean up the
yard, but if we do, I’m using a leaf blower.”  Greg could tell Rebecca did not
do yard work.

“I don’t care about appearances, if
that is what you are implying.  We have to clear space for the chickens to
scratch.  We should have a clean yard for planting in the spring, to keep
animals out of the yard, to make sure we don’t slip and fall on the wet
leaves.  This is where we live.  The outside and the inside are going to be
clean, livable spaces.” 

As they rounded the corner to go up
the stairs they saw a bank of windows.  Greg and Rebecca beamed their
flashlights into the darkness. 

“It’s a kitchen.  Weird, why would
it be in the basement?”  Greg shook his head in confusion.

They walked up the steps to the
side door.  There was a storm door which opened, but the knob on the inside
door was locked.

They went back down the stairs and
looked into the basement again.  The windows were above a counter.  Greg tried
to slide each of the windows open. 

“Are you sure you don’t want to try
the front door first?”  Rebecca asked.

“We’re here.”  Greg responded with
a grunt as he pushed up on the second window.  It slid open with a creak.  “So
why not try?” 

Hanover was a safe town with almost
no crime.  The window was left unlocked in perpetuity as a way for the
occupants to get into the house when locked out. 

“Do you want to go in first?”  Greg
offered.

“I’m good.  You go ahead.”  Rebecca
wanted Greg to go in first.

He slid onto the counter, jumped
down, and helped her do the same.  Greg opened a door next to the counter and
saw a half bathroom.  The long kitchen stretched out before them.  A swinging door
at the end of the room was open and they could see the dark rooms on the other
side.   A windowless door, similar to the one on the outside of the house, was
in the middle of the right wall. 

“Is this the windowless door on the
outside that was locked?”  Rebecca asked.  She walked over and turned the
knob.  The door exposed a dark room.

“Jackpot!”  She said happily. 
“It’s a firewood room, and it’s stocked.  How sweet is this?  You can load it
from the door on the other side, and wood stays dry in here.  We won’t have to
go outside in the snow to get wood.  I bet we have enough for a long time, not
all winter, but if we get snowed in, it’s enough for a month, maybe more.” 
Rebecca did not realize it was an old coal storage room with separate access
for the coal truck and the homeowner.  The room was converted into wood storage
to service the multiple fireplaces and woodstove. 

“I guess we know they have at least
one wood burning fireplace.”  Rebecca concluded from the storage room.

“Hey yeah, that’s right.”  Greg
replied. 

They walked out of the kitchen and
into a large room in the center of the basement.  There was a second room
straight ahead, and a corridor to the right that led to the backdoor.  Rebecca
walked down the corridor and unlocked the door before joining Greg in main
room.  The floor was tiled and did not contain furniture.  The only light came
from the kitchen behind them and windows on the back of the house.  The wall on
the front of the house had no windows.  There were two doors leading off the
room.  Greg and Rebecca opened both and shined their lights.  Each room was
filled with boilers, hot water heaters, furnaces, and other mechanical devices. 
The rooms and equipment were worthless.