“We were out hunting up supplies. Didn’t occur to us that someone would find their way back here and make themselves at home. We figured it was well hidden.”
“Well, as to that,” Billy said apologetically, “I knew this place was here because it’s actually my home.”
“Say what, now?”
“This is my home. From before. I bought the land and built the place from the ground up. Been working on it for years. I was planning on retiring here. You guys must have just stumbled across it.”
“Hey, what the fuck is this?” another voice from the group spoke up. It was hard to tell where from, but he sounded like he was on my left. “Any asshole could claim that shit—how do we know this particular asshole…”
The original speaker of their group interrupted, “Hold on, Doug. Just calm down. Ain’t no call to go there just yet.” Addressing Billy, he said, “My rude friend does have a point, though, right? You could just be some random couple of guys, couldn’t you?”
“You fellas have spent some time in the house, haven’t you?”
“Yes, yes we have.”
“Get a good look at any of the pictures in there?”
“Gawd damn!” a third voice said from the right of the group. “I knew I recognized him; he’s that guy that was in the picture with the Terminator!” A few other voices muttered at this, betraying recognition.
The first speaker was silent a while before he said, “Emmet, kill those lights.” They did so, placing the porch in sudden darkness. Off to the left, Jake turned on an electric lantern we had hanging off a nail from one of the eaves. Everyone was bathed in a soft, muted glow and the men before us were suddenly a lot less menacing. They looked like a group of regular people that had been living hard on the road, just like us, with various layers of all-weather clothing and a motley assortment of firearms. Some of them didn’t even have decent rifles; they stood there with revolvers or whatever else they had managed to pick up on the road.
“Well…shit,” said the original speaker, who I could now confirm was in the middle of the group. “Look, what’s your name?”
“Billy. This is Jake.”
The man nodded and gave a small wave to both. “I’m Howard. Look, uh, I’m not quite sure where to go from here. We never really counted on the original owner of this place coming back for it, you know? The problem is we were all counting on this place for our survival. It’s not just the house; the location was a big piece of this. Being set back and hidden the way it is in this valley, I figure it will escape the notice of any passersby.”
“Yap, I getcha,” said Billy but offered no more.
“Yeah, well, right now things are kind of quiet with the exception of the odd evil asshole you run into on the road, but I have a feeling things aren’t going to stay that way. Just look at my group, here.”
“You guys are a bunch of evil…?”
“No, no, that’s not what I mean,” said Howard, waving his hands. “What I meant is that we all sort of gravitated to each other over time, see? I was on my own when this whole thing kicked off. Then I ran into Emmet, Trey, and Paul. Later, after that, we picked up Doug and his boys. Point is, people were scattered for a bit, but they’re going to start collecting back into groups again, building up their strength and such, like we did. I have a feeling we have some serious Mad Max shit in store when some of these groups get bigger. All depends on who ends up in charge.”
“And your point is you’d just as soon wait the whole process out in a secluded area to see if your theory is right or not,” Billy finished for him.
“Well, yes. More or less.”
There was a beat of silence as Billy processed this and I noticed something during this space of time. There was a subtle gap of space in the group of men down by the trucks, as though there were actually two groups instead of one. The group on the right were standing behind Howard, and the group on the left seemed to be crowded around who I assumed was Doug. I also noticed that, as Howard discussed their reasons for choosing the valley with Billy, the people in Doug’s group fidgeted, sighed, and rolled their eyes. These people had a rift, and it looked like blossoming into something ugly.
On top of this, I disliked the fact that there were no women with them. With a woman in their company, I would have been better able to gauge what kind of men they were; if the woman or women looked healthy, relatively happy, and unharmed, there was a good chance that the men were okay. Without that indicator, I wasn’t excited about Lizzy and I suddenly becoming the only females in such a large group of strange men, some of whom appeared hostile. I prayed silently that Billy could see all this and that he had reached the same conclusions as me.
Billy finally said, “The thing is this: you all seem well enough, but we don’t actually know you. I get where you’re going; you’re suggesting we partner up. We’re not opposed to that, but I don’t think we’ll be jumping in head first without looking either. I think it’s best if we get to know each other.”
More sullen muttering from Doug and his group.
“I understand,” Howard said. “What do you suggest?”
“This isn’t the only house in Jackson,” Billy said. “There are hundreds out here in these hills that are open to any who happen by, many of them nicer than my place—I wasn’t the only guy interested in retiring in this backcountry. Why don’t you boys go set up at one of these places for the next little while? I can mark a few nice ones out on a map for you. We’ll meet back here next morning, maybe have some breakfast, and talk it over some more. Kind of work things out over time and see what happens.”
Howard was nodding his head at this like it made sense, but Doug wasn’t having any of it, apparently. Unable to contain himself, he finally burst forth.
“Can anyone explain to me why we’re standing around discussing this bullshit? It’s late. We’ve been driving all fucking day…”
“God damn it, Doug, will you shut your fucking mouth for once?” Howard shouted.
“Hey, fuck you, Howie. I’m about over this. I’m in no God damned mood to go out looking for another bed in the middle of the motherfucking night when I know good, and God damned well that we have some right here.” The divide between the two groups of men began to widen during this exchange. “Now, I see two assholes on that porch and seven of us. Someone explain that fucking math to me. Someone explain to me why we don’t just subtract these dickheads right now.”
“God damn it, Doug, you fuckwit…”
Jake chose this time to break his silence. “I really think it best if you all head out of here.”
One of the men in Doug’s group swiveled and pointed a handgun toward the house off to my left and said, “Hey, put that fucking rifle up, asshole!”
Billy leveled his shotgun at the man holding the pistol. In response, the rest of the men had their guns up with the muzzles jerking between Billy and Jake…all of them except Howard.
“GOD DAMN IT, STOP!” he shouted, standing between his group and ours with his palms extended out toward both. “We don’t have to do this! You just be patient for a bit, and no one has to get shot up.”
“Been plenty patient with you so far,” said someone next to Doug in a deep voice. “Not much to show for it.” This seemed to puff Doug up even more.