Sandra took a sip of her tea and held onto the mug as she let it warm her hands. The boys were still asleep and she was glad to have a few minutes to herself. It wasn’t that she minded having them around, she was actually quite glad they were, but it was the first time anyone had lived in the house other than her since her parents died. It was going to take her some time to get used to having people around, but she was glad it was Nathan.
The sun crept over the top of the barn and the first few rays hit her face. Sandra just closed her eyes and sighed as it warmed her.
Sandra was a little worried about the people that had kept walking… she hoped they would be alright. She knew it wasn’t her place to tell them what to do, but she felt like she didn’t insist hard enough that they stay on her farm.
“You alright?”
Sandra jumped a little and turned her head to the left. Nathan was standing a few feet away from her. He smiled, raised a cup to his lips and took a sip of coffee.
“Yeah… why?”
He smiled at her and shrugged.
“You had a worried look on your face. Were you thinking about those people?”
She nodded and took a sip of her tea.
“You can’t.”
“What do you mean?” she said.
“They’re gone, you need to forget about them.”
She frowned and took another drink of tea. Sandra wasn’t sure what Nathan was trying to get at, but it seemed a harsh thing to say about people who could have used her help.
“Sorry,” he said. “I know it’s probably not what you wanted to hear… but I’m trying to be real with you. You did all you could… you tried to get them to stay and they chose to go on.”
“But… it’s my fault.”
“It’s not. The shotgun may have scared them a little, but if they couldn’t see the kind of person you are… well, that’s their problem. You are a kind soul who was ready to take in people you had just met and give them a life they might never have another chance of finding.”
Sandra wanted to believe what Nathan was telling her, but she found it hard. She felt like she condemned them to death by letting them leave.
“I… I guess.”
“The world is a different place, but you’re exactly the same. You’re still the caring young woman I met years ago when I came to work on this farm.”
That brought a smile to her face as she took another drink of tea. She was glad to have Nathan there… he brought with him a sense of familiarity that no longer existed in her life.
“Thanks.”
He put his hand on her shoulder and Sandra felt a surge of heat pass from him to her. Nathan slowly pulled his hand away and Sandra heard the door open and close as he went back inside. She took a deep breath and closed her eyes again as the sun climbed high enough in the sky to warm her entire body.
Sandra drank the last of her tea and set the empty cup down on the porch next to her. She had plenty to do… she wanted to get some of the seeds planted and knew it would take a decent part of the day to get the field ready, but she also felt like she needed to take a walk. It was something she hadn’t done much in the past months, she always seemed to find something pressing that required her immediate attention, but walking always helped clear her head.
She stood up, stretched and walked down the steps. Sandra went down the driveway and toward the road. She turned to the right and started to walk down the edge of the road out of habit. She chuckled, realizing the chance of there being any traffic was beyond remote. The road had been completely deserted for days.
She let her mind wander as she walked, but tried to take Nathan’s advice and not think about the people she didn’t help. Her mind danced around the image of them, hesitating on the children for a brief moment, and she forced herself to think of anything else.
A deer ran through the field on her right and Sandra stopped to watch it. A calm feeling passed through her and she felt relaxed for the first time in days. Sandra wondered what the coming days, even weeks, would hold… she wondered where life would take her next.
She started walking again as the deer ran over a small hill and disappeared from sight. She reached the gate at the bottom of a neighbor’s driveway and stopped. She hadn’t seen the McCarthy’s for a few months, but she had always liked them. They were a nice, older couple who worked the farm alone, none of their kids had shown any interest in taking it over… but they loved the land much like her parents had.
She started to walk again, but something made her stop. Sandra felt like she should go check on the McCarthy’s… either to see if they were alright or if they had left. She knew it was the right thing to do.
Sandra pushed open the gate and walked up the driveway. She noticed the front door open just a crack as she reached the front porch, which worried her a bit. It was possible they had forgotten to close the door, but she knew it was fairly unlikely. Sandra took a deep breath, pushed the door open and stepped inside.
The moment she stepped into the living room she saw the body on the floor and she turned away. It was Mr. McCarthy, face down, and she could tell he had been there a while based on the putrid smell that followed her back outside.
Sandra stumbled over to the porch swing and sat down as she tried to force the image out of her mind. It was the most horrific thing she had ever seen. She stood up and stumbled down the stairs.
She couldn’t bring herself to look over her shoulder as she made it to the road and started to walk back toward her house. The sick feeling started to fade as she made it home, but it was still there.
Sandra climbed the steps of her house and opened the back door. She stepped into the kitchen and saw Nathan cutting up an apple. He looked up at her and the smiled faded from his face when he saw her.
“What’s wrong?”
She shook her head and walked out of the kitchen. Sandra couldn’t think about what she had seen, let alone repeat it to Nathan. She walked over to the pantry, opened the door and found the bottle of whiskey she had been saving for a rainy day. She set it on the table, pulled a glass down and sat. She poured a half a glass of the caramel liquid and set the bottle back down, not bothering to screw the cap back because she had already decided it was going to take more than a few drinks to calm her down.
“Mind if I join you?” Nathan said.
Sandra shrugged as she lifted the glass and let the whiskey slip between her lips. She took another sip and set the glass down. Nathan got a glass and sat down next to her before pouring his own whiskey.
“What happened?” he said.
Sandra shook her head and looked out the window as she took another drink.
“I haven’t been forward with you,” Nathan said.
She frowned and continued to look out the window. Sandra finished her whiskey and poured herself a second glass. She could already feel the alcohol working its magic as she started to relax.
“Clearly you saw something today. If you want to tell me what it was or not… that’s your business, but I need to tell you what’s really going on out there. I didn’t intend to really keep it from you… it’s just that it’s horrible enough that I hoped I could shield you from it.”
Sandra took a deep breath and looked over at Nathan. He was a good guy and she was glad he was there, but she wished he had been honest with her from the beginning.
“You should have told me the truth from the start.”
Nathan nodded and took a drink. He shuddered and forced the whiskey down. It was way too early to be drinking, but he wasn’t going to let Sandra get drunk alone.
“You’re right… I should’ve, but you have to know I did what I did with good intentions.”
Sandra nodded and glanced over at Nathan, who was staring at his half-full glass of whiskey.
“The thing is,” he said, “is that I saw some things on my way here that I never needed to see… things that I will see every time I close my eyes for the rest of my life.”
She finished her second glass of whiskey and reached for the bottle. Nathan grabbed it first and moved it out of her reach.
“Sandra, just… please listen to what I’m going to tell you.”
She frowned as she turned toward him. She wanted to get drunk and he was actively stopping her.
“We passed through Greeley on the way here… and it was horrible. People were rioting and looting whatever they could from stores. The mayhem spread and homes were broken into. I watched, unable to do anything, as a group of ten people broke down the front door of a house. They stole whatever they could from inside and lit the house on fire. They had beaten the people inside unconscious and I had to watch as they burned alive inside their own home.”
Nathan poured himself another glass of whiskey and pushed the bottle back to Sandra. She lifted it to pour another drink and changed her mind, setting the bottle back on the table.
“It was the most horrific thing I had ever seen. I wanted to stop them… to try and help the people inside the house, but there was nothing I could do. I’m going to have to live with that… and I don’t want to ever see anything like that again.”
Sandra sighed and looked into his eyes. His pain showed on his face and she had to look away.
“I… I went for a walk,” she said, “and I found the body of my neighbor. He had been killed in his home and his body left there.”
Nathan reached out and put his hand on hers. Sandra dropped her head as tears rolled down her face. She didn’t care about being tough in that moment… she just wanted to cry.
“I’m sorry. That’s something you should have never had to see, but it probably won’t be the last time. I only know what I saw in Greeley, but… if things are that bad everywhere… well, things really are never going to be the same again.”
Sandra nodded. She knew Nathan was right and that scared her. The future was uncertain, but she was glad that at least Nathan would be there to help tackle whatever life threw their way.
“What happened?”
“I don’t know,” he said. “All I know is what I told you. On the trip here we didn’t see any kind of law enforcement, local or state, and people were acting like it was the end of the world.”
Sandra blinked a few times and looked at the window while trying to process what Nathan had told her.
“What should we do?”
“That’s not a whole lot we can do,” Nathan said. “I would say we should just focus on making sure we can provide a safe place for any who might need it and see to everything that goes along with that.”
Sandra stood up and took a deep breath. She wanted to do her best to be prepared for whatever might come next… and she knew that started with making sure they could at least feed the three of them in the coming months. Her mind raced as she thought about everything they needed to do.