The cold seemed to have shaken everyone up. Matt’s community projects like building shelters were put on hold as everyone concentrated on their own situation. Trev spent most of the next week dividing his time between helping Lewis gather fodder for the shelter group’s animals as well as his own promised kid doe, hunting and gathering and preserving all the food they could, and chopping firewood and gathering deadfall.
Everyone who could helped out, even the young kids like Terry and April’s boys and the children from Jane’s group. They gathered up armfuls of cut meadow grass, picked up sticks, searched for edible plants, and were handy to run errands and deliver messages.
Mary’s birthday was October 10th, a week after Ned’s visit. The family had planned a subdued party for her, recognizing that turning 18 was an important milestone even with the world the way it was. But to prevent the party from being too big a distraction from their work, the night before her birthday Lucas called everyone together in the Halsson cabin for a serious discussion about what the winter would mean and what they could do.
They’d talked about it almost nonstop for the last few months, of course, but it didn’t hurt to lay the situation out clearly.
Trev sat with Linda and Jim on Mary’s cot, while his cousin shared her parents’ bed with her mom, Trev’s mom, and Deb. The others were scattered around the room or seated on the floor, with Lucas occupying a comfortable chair near the stove.
His uncle’s cough had steadily worsened over the last week, going from occasional explosive bursts to sustained episodes that lasted a few seconds. Trev was a bit worried, and he knew everyone else was too, but Lucas had insisted that a cough was nothing to worry about unless he started seeing other symptoms. He was getting plenty of rest, at least, although Aunt Eva and Lewis had to constantly battle him on the issue when there was so much to do.
“I’ve got insights to offer, as I’m sure we all do,” Lucas began once everyone was settled. “But since we’ve got two people here who’ve actually lived through a pretty brutal winter I’ll turn things over to my son and nephew.”
Lewis nodded and stood. Trev had agreed his cousin should lead the discussion, and he’d chime in where necessary. Lewis opened his mouth to begin, then paused to wait patiently while Lucas coughed a few times in quick succession.
“Don’t mind me,” his uncle said when he was done, taking a sip of water. “Blasted cough’s turning into a real nuisance. Go ahead, son.”
“All right,” Lewis said quietly. He was obviously pushing down his worry to stay on topic. “We all know we’re facing a hard winter, but not an impossible one. Trev and I spent last winter up in the hideout, and given the difference in elevation and snowfall I’m guessing what we face down in this valley will be about as severe. We came through it all right, and there’s no reason the family can’t now. We can give you an idea of what to expect, and teach you some of the lessons we’ve learned.”
“Lesson one,” Trev cut in dryly. “Don’t expect to get out much. We’ll be facing snowdrifts deep enough to bury our house, and bitter cold temperatures. Don’t be surprised if you’re walking in snow up to your waist after a fresh snowfall, and any crust that forms afterwards will almost be worse, since it probably won’t hold your weight. Even with the option of bundling up enough to handle the cold, by the time we’re halfway through this winter most of us will prefer relieving ourselves in buckets to trudging twenty feet to use an icy cold outhouse.”
“Fantastic,” Linda muttered. “Thanks for sharing.”
Lewis gave the young woman a steady look. “If you have trouble even hearing about it, consider when you’ll have to live it. We’ll do the best we can to make things comfortable and allow for privacy, which is why we’ve built lean-tos against the back doors of both cabins, fitted with benches with holes to put the bucket beneath. We’ll use our proven trick of heating stones against the stove to carry out there when we need to use the space. With them the temperature should be tolerable, and while you’ll still have to bundle up and head outside to empty the bucket and clean it out, it’s better than doing your business in the cold.”
Linda pouted a bit at the mild rebuke, but subsided.
“And that’s just the first of the hard realities we have to face about what’s coming,” Trev said, motioning for Lewis to continue.
In his usual thorough, orderly fashion his cousin laid out ideas to make handling living in the cold more workable. Everything from priorities when it came to cold weather gear, what signs to look out for when it came to frostbite and other cold related medical issues, to storing, protecting, rationing, and cooking their food.
One of the biggest considerations outside of food was firewood. They’d gathered up a huge store, both from cut and split logs and from all the extra bark, wood chips, and other detritus left over from construction, and they continued to add to their woodpiles. Since they’d now been using the wood burning stoves for so long, they had a good idea of how much they needed to keep the fire burning consistently for long periods of time. Given that, they were confident they had enough to keep them going through even a winter that lasted more than half a year.
There was also the option that if the weather wasn’t too bitter they could head out and chop down more trees, although unseasoned wood didn’t burn very well so they might be better off gathering deadfall. That would be tough since most of the deadfall within miles of town had already been dragged in, but with sleds they could venture farther afield and might even have an easier time moving it.
But whatever the situation of their firewood, as a rule Lucas wanted them all to strike a balance of using just enough fuel to keep their cabins tolerable during the day, and if possible damping the stoves and relying on blankets and shared body heat at night. Even if they had enough wood to last them more comfortably, that fuel represented labor and the less they used the more time and energy they’d be able to put to other things long term.
“So don’t expect to be hanging out in shirtsleeves, even indoors,” his uncle finished wryly. “Either bundle up, stay under your blankets, or get used to hanging out a foot from the stove doing whatever work you can find to fill the hours.”
For Trev most of that work was going to be making bullets with Lewis. Now that his cousin had what he needed and they were all set to go, they’d be able to fill the winter months with a mindless, repetitive task where they were motivated to produce the best quality possible because lives could literally be on the line.
Trev could barely conceive of what those reloaded cartridges could mean for them. Lewis now had enough casings, powder, primers, and lead and jacketing material for thousands of rounds. Aside from their families never having to worry about running out of ammunition again, the profit they could make from selling the surplus should be enough to feed them through the next winter, if not longer.
And his cousin intended that to be only the beginning. While closing the deal with Ned he’d mentioned to the trader that he might keep an eye out for more reloading materials. If he managed to find any he’d always have a buyer in Aspen Hill willing to pay a fair price.
Lewis had even spoken more than once about his dream to ultimately open a large-scale bullet factory and become a major manufacturer. Trev wasn’t ready to think quite that long term yet, considering they were still barely past figuring out how to use the reloading equipment and had almost no practice at it.
Still, it was a good dream. Going from scrambling to survive in a post-Retaliation world to securing a prosperous future, not to mention greatly benefitting the town and the remnants of the US at large with what they produced. Most people were still at the point of scavenging what they needed, so anyone willing to go a step farther and actually make useful products would help get them all that much closer to restoring the society they’d known.