The Last Tribe (29 page)

The morning proceeded with breakfast. 
None of the children under 10 wanted to tour the city.  Emily and Todd decided
to give the kids a pass.  The previous day was a long drive, filled with
excitement and meeting new people.  If the kids wanted one day of playing on
the White House lawn or watching television, that was okay.

Emily and Solange spent the morning
touring the White House, while the men put together the pizza oven.  Melanie and
Matt set up a short term coop and pen for the animals. 

Melanie and Matt also checked the
White House garden for salvageable vegetables.  Mel minored in botany at Yale,
and Matt, mildly obsessed with farming, tried to learn as much as he could from
her.

Peter had yet to make an
appearance.  He hinted at spending a morning alone, a well earned day of rest
after months of looking after children. 

The sun was shining, and it was
warm by 10am.  Late March weather was unpredictable, and the day was on the
‘great’ end of the spectrum.  By 10:30 Jake, Jackie, and Casey walked back to
their apartment to retrieve shorts and t-shirts. 

Lunch was served outside the RV. 
Emily and Solange located tables and chairs during their tour of the White
House press room, and pulled them outside for a picnic.  The pizza oven was
assembled, and had a fire burning.  Todd made pizzas with dough and fresh
goat’s milk mozzarella.  Peter arrived in time to eat pizza with real cheese.

“Who wants to drive around and haul
up fresh Maryland crab for an old fashioned crab boil tonight?”  Peter asked. 
Craig’s hand flew up at the hint of fishing.  Matt and John joined him.  Todd
assumed kid watching duty for the afternoon.  Melanie came with Solange and
Emily on the second half of their tour.

The women walked to the second
floor of the White House to tour the bedrooms. 

“Casey has really taken to you,
Melanie.  You have done an incredible job as her mother.  I see you still have
a ring on your finger.  Did your husband die during the rapture?”  Emily felt
comfortable being candid under their current situation.  In the old world, she
never would have asked such a personal question.

“No, he was killed by a drunk
driver last May.  I don’t know if that saved him from the rapture, or if he
might have been immune.  I was still in shock when the pandemic hit.  I wasn’t
back to work at the hospital yet.  I saw the insanity unfold from the
television in my apartment.”

“I’m sorry.  We’ve all lost so much
from the rapture, we don’t think about all the tragedy before.  How long had
you been married?”  Emily felt bad for prying, but now that the door was open,
it would have been impolite to stop talking.  “Unless you don’t want to talk
about it.”

“No, no, it’s okay.  I’ve had a
long time to think about him.  Peter is wonderful, and has been incredible with
the Jones twins and with Casey, but he’s not someone I talk to about personal
thoughts.  We are a team, and I trust him without reservations, but he’s not a
girlfriend kind of talk person.”  She smiled at the women as they examined the
Lincoln bedroom.

“My husband, David, and I were
together for over 10 years.  He was in finance, and I was driven by my surgical
career.  We decided to start a family at this late age, and were glowing with
my pregnancy.  When he was taken away, well, it was hard.”

“Pregnancy?  You were pregnant? 
You lost your baby and your husband so close together?”  Emily asked with
confusion.

“Well, I lost David, and my family
helped me through the rough time, and then I gave birth to our son, David
junior, prematurely, in September.  He was six months along, and had a hard
road ahead, but he was doing well.  The rapture took him before he had a
chance.”  Melanie sat on the bed.  “I still hurt from the loss, and it’s why I
have bonded so well with Casey, Jackie, and Jake.  I needed children, and they
needed a mother.  I’m glad for the help now.  I’m so tired.  I will always love
them for helping me through my own loss.”  She looked down at her feet before
picking her head up.  “I almost felt selfish, caring for the children.  They
were in need of a mom, a parent, an adult, and they thought they were taking
from me, but the whole time I was using them to fill up the holes in my heart. 
I needed them so much more than they needed me.”  Melanie’s eyes grew glassy.

“After a few months, you know,
Christmas, I realized, this is hard damn work.  I’d earn their love.  I
deserved their love.”  She laughed.  “It may have been selfish at the
beginning, but by the end, wow, I had no idea how much time and energy it takes
to raise three kids.  I was only prepared for one!”

Emily sat down next to her on the
bed, putting her arm around her.  “I know it doesn’t help, but if your son died
from the rapture, your husband most likely would have passed too.”

Melanie looked at her.  “My baby
didn’t die from the rapture, he died because of it.  He died in my arms.  I
spent every day with him at Johns Hopkins, and he was close to being able to
breathe.  All the chaos, all the craziness, and he fought, and I took care of
him by myself.  The nurses died.  The doctors died.  The other babies were long
since gone.  He and I made it through, until the damn power went out.” 
Melanie’s eyes dropped large tears onto her shirt.  “The god damn power went
out.  I could have taken care of him until he was ready if the damn power had
stayed on, or I had been able to move a generator into the room, or if one
other person had been there to help me, but it was only me, and I didn’t know
what to do.” 

She was sobbing now, her shoulders
heaving up and down.

“So the power went out, and I
pulled him out of the respirator cube, and he couldn’t breathe.  His little
lungs weren’t strong enough yet, they needed more time.  I pumped the hand
respirator for him, I breathed for him.  I pumped for almost a day and a half
before I collapsed and passed out.”  Melanie looked at Solange.  “And when I
woke up?  I woke up in the glider chair in the ICU.  It was dark, and the moon
streamed in from a skylight.  My precious baby, my son, the only thing I had
left from my husband and marriage?  He lay motionless in my arms.”  Melanie put
her hands up to her face and covered her eyes. 

Solange sat down on the bed, and
pulled Melanie towards her.  “It is alright.  You are okay.  You were as strong
as you could be, there was nothing you could do.”  Solange rocked the woman
gently. 

Melanie cried in the young
stranger’s arms for several minutes before withdrawing.  She went into the
bathroom and cleaned herself up.  “Wow, I look horrible.  My eyes are red and
puffy from crying.”

Emily wiped tears from her own
cheeks.  “Mel, I am so sorry, I had no idea.  Peter told us you were caring for
a baby in the NICU.  He never said it was your own son.”

Melanie sniffed in her nose.  “He
doesn’t know.  He is a sweet man.  He doesn’t need my baggage.  He needed my
help.  I told him why I was upset, but didn’t tell him the whole truth.” 
Melanie started to chuckle as if something was funny.

“So I bet when you agreed to let
the new girl on your White House tour, you didn’t expect such high drama in the
first room.  Huh?  I’m sure you’re both like ‘who let this one come with us?’ 
I swear, I’m not this emotional, you’re the first women I’ve spoken to in six
months.”

“And you’ve known us all of 15
hours, so of course you open up and bear your soul, that only makes sense.” 
Emily laughed.  “I expected this.  Didn’t you Sol?”

“I thought we would be braiding
hair and talking about boys by now.  Maybe in the next room?”  Solange’s joke
shocked the older women. 

Melanie and Emily stopped laughing
and looked at her with their mouths agape.  “You’re funny too?  You’re
beautiful, resourceful, hardworking, and now you’re funny?  This is not going
to work at all.”  Emily shook her head.

They laughed at their jokes. 
Melanie laughed so hard she started crying again and had to return to the
bathroom to wipe her face. 

The White House visit was more fun
than the women expected.  They laughed, they picked up mementos, they saw rooms
not on the official tour.  It was an afternoon of female bonding.  They emerged
as the sun sank in the western sky.

The kids were exhausted.  Casey’s thumb
was in her mouth as she sat under a blanket on Todd’s lap. 

Todd was in a folding chair on the
lawn, enjoying the warm weather.  He found a large pot in the White House
kitchen, and constructed a brick stove above a fire.  He stacked the bricks,
allowing for vents on all sides, so that the pot was just above the flames.  He
left one side open to feed the fire wood.  He saw the technique on a cooking
show by a famous American chef who made paella over an open flame.  The large
pot was filled with water, waiting for the crabs.  A box of bay seasoning
rested on the ground near the brick tower.

He looked at the smiling women as
they laughed and joked with each other.  “That must have been some White House
tour.”

Emily walked to her husband.  She
leaned over and gave him a kiss.  “We have found wonderful people.  Thank you
for letting me spend the afternoon with them.”

“I’d claim the kids were trouble,
but really, they have been playing nicely and independently all afternoon.  I
swear, it’s like we have new kids.  They played tag, soccer, tag again, hide
and seek.”

“The other men are not back?” 
Solange looked for Peter, John, and Matt.

“I bet they couldn’t get Craig to
stop fishing.  It’s why I started the fire.  He said they were coming back by
five.  I want this pot boiling so we can drop the crabs right into the water. 
I have the pizza oven going to roast the fish.  It should be a tasty meal
tonight.”  Todd’s mouth watered at the thought of fresh seafood. 

“Did Matt tell you we found garlic,
onions, and herbs in the garden?”  Melanie asked.

“He did, and along with the dried
chorizo we scavenged, I am planning a big paella party tomorrow night.  Now
that I know we can catch fish, it should be fun to make.  I’ll have bread to
sop up the sauce.  Tonight?  Crab boil.”

“Where did you find this one?  I
loved my husband, but he didn’t cook.  Are there any more around like him?” 
Melanie asked.

“Stay away from him, he’s mine. 
Besides, he’s fixed, he can’t help repopulate.  I figure that keeps him tied to
me.”  Emily put her arms around Todd’s shoulders as he sat in the chair.

“Fixed?  Did you drink on that
tour?  I feel like a piece of meat.”  Todd feigned indignation.

“What does fixed mean?”  Casey
asked Melanie.  She listened intently from her spot on Todd’s lap.

Brian ran up, “Can we watch a
show?  We’ve been outside all day.  Please?”  Todd refused the request all
afternoon.

“If you wash your hands, and get
ready for dinner, you may put a show on.  No movie, just shows.”  Todd replied.

“Yes!  Hey guys!  We can watch a
show!  We need to get ready for dinner first!”  Brian ran into the RV to wash
his hands.

Solange looked at the tables they
used at lunch.  Todd set them with disposable plastic tablecloths, napkins, and
plastic flatware.  “You made the tables?”  She said to him before looking at Melanie. 
“He is a keeper.  He cooks.  He sets up the table.”

“Okay, that’s enough from the two
of you.  He is going to get a big head.”  Emily was smiling, her arms still
around Todd.  She liked hearing how great a catch she had.

Todd saw the SUV turn a corner in
the distance and head towards the entrance gate.  “Dinner has arrived.”  He
said, jumping up from his chair and walking towards the RV.  “And just as the
pot has started to boil, now that is timing.”  He entered the RV to drop boxes
of New Orleans style dirty rice into water he was boiling on the stove inside.

As the sun set and the night
temperature dropped out of the 70’s, the day of playing caught up with the
children.  Jake, Jackie, Brian, Jay, and Casey were exhausted, and whined to go
to bed.  They were told they could sleep in the RV using sleeping bags or extra
blankets.  Casey jumped on the couch, and the other kids gladly slept on
camping pads.  Melanie promised her children she would stay at the White House
location for the night.

John turned to the rest of the
adults, “Solange, Matt, and I have done our time.  We are going with Peter to
the apartment.  Todd?  You and Emily get the early shift tomorrow morning. 
Craig and Matt can come with me.”

“Are you leaving now?”  Todd asked.
 “It’s still early.”

“If Peter will take us over there,
I wouldn’t mind.  Craig is tired, I’m tired.”

“I’m tired.  I never got back to
sleep.”  Matt whined like the younger children.  “I’m a growing boy.  I need my
12 hours a night.”

Peter was out of his chair.  “Okay
with me.  I can sleep all the time if you let me.  Mel, this is our first night
apart in a long time.  I hope you will be okay.”

Melanie smiled at the kind man. 
“I’ll try to make it through, Pete.  I’ll see you in the morning.  We’ll have
breakfast going for you tomorrow, if you can make it over before noon this
time.”  She gave him a wink.

“I’m going to take advantage of my
second retirement.  You’ll see me when you see me.”  He waved to the group.

Emily turned to her new friend. 
“Is he as nice as he seems to be?”

Melanie nodded, watching the
elderly man walk towards the apartment with the three others.  “He is.  These
three kids, they owe him.  He could easily have turned the other cheek.  He’s
not 80, but he’s not 45 either.  It’s been hard work keeping them alive. 
Keeping them educated.  Keeping them warm.  He made decisions for us, stepped
forward to say what was right and wrong.”  She turned to Emily and Todd.  “I
wouldn’t be alive if it weren’t for him.  I probably would have killed myself. 
He gave me hope, showed me compassion.”