4/26/22
What Anna said has been wheedling away at my brain for days now.
I don’t know, what if she’s right? I’ve been so focused on survival I’ve not even thought about rebuilding.
I’ve been thinking about this like it was Afghanistan again — a hell-hole that can’t be rebuilt, not by soldiers.
I’ve just been preparing for the next fight.
Can we rebuild? I suppose at some point society started like this, a bunch of people just trying to survive, realizing it would be better if maybe we worked together.
Or maybe not, I never payed attention in history class.
I wonder if there’s even any libraries left where you could learn this stuff.
Really, we’d have an advantage, because we already know what society looks like, sorta.
But that would mean more people here. The privacy and security of seclusion would be gone. People would know about our little sanctuary here, they would come for it.
That being said, people already know about it: Al, Sheriff Brown, John and Casey’s group, and whoever they told.
Hell, if more people like John and Casey’s group starts travelling around here their gonna find this place anyway.
That could be a problem.
If there’s people here, we could hold off people looking to claim territory.
Though not everyone walking around is a trained fighter. The ones that are ready to fight are probably worse. Putting civilians and psychos in an armed unit sounds like a really good way to get killed.
How many people could we take? Where would they stay? The shed’s got enough room for four people, maybe more if we put up bunks. Maybe we could use the neighboring houses.
Crap, this is more complicated than I thought it’d be. Trying to think about all of it is like trying to catch air with my bare hands.
I wish Dad was here.
He probably wouldn’t know what to do either, but he’d probably make a decision quicker than me. Hell, it’d just be nice to have the company.
The worst thing to think is that it might actually be the best thing for Evangeline. It might not be the safest, but she can’t grow up completely alone.
I gotta choose one way or another, soon. The tomatoes and carrots are already growing and starting to sprout leaves.
Dammit.
I’m gonna try and sleep on it.
I need a cigarette.
4/27/22
Well, I did it.
Talked to Al. Was shit-scared the whole time.
I must’ve blown through half a pack of camels today. Anna wasn’t happy about that. She said compared to all the fresh air up here I smelled like an ashtray.
But I was never a good salesman. Dad used to joke that if I was any good at negotiating I wouldn’t have ended up in the Marines. I just prefer building things — tinkering with cars always made sense to me. Let the salesmen up front deal with prices and the intricacies of closing a sale, I just want to fix things.
That being said, I was smart enough not to pound out any details today. I don’t even know what the details are. He’s gonna come by tomorrow and take a look at the farm before agreeing to anything specific.
Anna and Evangeline are loving it. The two of them walked all around the farm figuring out exactly what it should produce.
Anna, oh my Anna. She’s everything I’m not and more. This is the most excited I’ve seen her in ages. She marched around our little patch of dirt, with Eva on her heels, scribbling down everything her Mom said in blocky, simple handwriting.
My two businesswomen.
Anna even went through after and transcribed everything Eva wrote into more legible script. She’s gonna handle all the negotiating tomorrow. If she can convince a seven-year-old to do homework she can convince anyone of anything.
We make a good team.
Gotta go wash up, she doesn’t want to sleep next to an ashtray.
Part 5 made it up! I’m gonna play with the timing for these things a bit over the next couple weeks, see what works best for people. So, for now, expect the next parts to come, weekly, sometime on “The Weekend”. Follow me on Facebook or Twitter (or just follow the blog) and you’ll catch the announcements I put up when new parts go up.
Check out the rest of the story here!
Part 1
Creative Mine 
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