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His lips part slightly as he stares at me. I’ve clearly surprised him.
“Is this something you need to do alone?” I ask, lifting my eyebrows and pleased by how lofty I sound.
“No, but I don’t need company. Surely you’ve got something better to do.”
I’m already settling myself in the seat and buckling my seat belt. If he wants me out of this vehicle, he’s going to have to come around and drag me out himself. “Nope. Not a thing. Just finished my work for the day.”
There’s always more work to do, but I’ve completed my required duties. Anything else I do in the afternoons is because I want to fill the time or be helpful.
He narrows his eyes and gives his head a little shake, but he doesn’t argue.
I’m both pleased and surprised by his easy acceptance. “So what exactly is this message you’re leaving?”
He explains to me that Jackson told him yesterday about some kind of loosely connected help network that people have set up in the region. There are drop spots for messages as well as safe houses. People in need can ask for assistance, and those with resources can offer help.
“So someone comes by to check the drop spots?” I ask, fascinated by this new development.
“That’s what he said. Someone will get the messages and then make connections to match up needs and resources.” He’s more talkative today. Spending the afternoon with me yesterday must have loosened him up.
“That’s kind of cool. So is our message asking for help?”
“No. We don’t have any urgent needs right now. It’s offering help.”
“Oh.” I smile as I process this. “Oh, that’s great. I guess we have a lot of things that other people around here don’t have.”
“I talked to Dave and some of the others yesterday, and they’re not willing to give away too much of our stock. But what we do have is plenty of spare rooms in a very safe bunker. If people are looking for a safe place to live, we can help them with that. Plus it would help us since we could use some new folks in our community. The more people we have, the more we can do and the safer we’ll be.”
“Faith yesterday was showing me the new bunkhouse they built on the farm. It added like forty new beds, and they’ve almost got it filled already.”
“Exactly. There’s no reason we can’t do what they’ve done.”
I’m actually excited about doing something good, and it’s been a long time since I’ve felt that way. “If the network is really big, we might get deluged with people pouring into the bunker.”
“Yeah, we thought of that. I don’t actually know if that would happen, but I don’t think it’s safe to send out a general message saying where we are and what we have. Dangerous sorts could end up hearing about it too and try to take what they want by force. So I wrote out the message saying we’ll accept people on a case-by-case basis, meeting up with them at an arranged location and then taking them to the bunker ourselves if they’ll be a fit.” We’ve already cleared the gravel path that leads through the woods from the bunker, and now Grant turns the Jeep onto the first paved road.
“That sounds like a good idea. You think bad people are likely to attack us?”
“I know for sure they would. The only reason they haven’t yet is because they don’t know what we have and where we are. But Jackson said the word is starting to get out about the bunker. People are going to be looking for it.”
“Ugh.” The thought makes my stomach churn, but I try not to dwell on it. We’ve got guards posted. We’ve done drills ever since we came out of lockdown. If someone attacks, we’ll get warning from the guards and we’ll all run into the bunker as fast as possible. The locked bunker door is basically impenetrable. It would be bad to be trapped down there again, but we’d be okay. For a while at least.
“I didn’t mean to scare you,” Grant says in a softer tone. He’s giving me a sidelong look. “It just makes sense to play it safe and be prepared.”
“Of course it does. I wasn’t scared.”
“Uh-huh.”
I make a face at his dry tone and don’t reply.
* * *
It takes about fifty minutes to get to the drop spot, which is in the ruins of an old gas station quick shop. I help Grant lift a toppled beverage cooler so he can slide his note underneath it, and then our mission is accomplished.
“Well, that was easy enough.” I wipe away a light layer of perspiration from my forehead with the back of my hand. It’s warmer out today.
“I told you it was a one-person job.”
“Maybe I just wanted to go. You think I enjoy being trapped in one place for the rest of my life?”
