Without Law, page 6
We all left together but separated when we got to the dorms. They headed for the kitchen while I made for the rooms above. I stopped by my room first, grabbed the rifle, loaded it and put an extra ten bullets in my pocket just in case. Then I stripped a thin blue blanket off the bed in another room, shoved it into my backpack, and headed downstairs.
The girls must have moved fast because none of them were still inside when I entered the dining hall. I pulled a roll of duct tape from our pile of supplies, grabbed a couple brooms that sat against the wall, and met up with the others.
Their idle chatter died immediately as they saw me approach. Bailey proudly displayed one of the jugs. “Found em!” she said.
“Good,” I said as I returned the smile she gave me and broke the head off the brooms.
“What are those for?” Tara asked skeptically.
I tossed one to her, and the other to Bailey. “For now they are walking sticks. Though there real purpose is to help us transport the water back here once the jugs are full.”
I doubled checked my gear and picked up one of the empty jugs. “Now listen. From here on out, no one leaves the campus alone. That means no solo trips into town or into the forest. It’s way too easy for one of us to get lost, hurt, or attacked running solo. Even after you grab your buddy, let someone on campus know where you are headed. That way if something happens, and you don’t come back, the rest of us know where to look. Understood?”
No one even stopped to think about it before nodding. They still appeared to get a little nervous anytime I mentioned the possibility of anything happening.
I turned my attention to Bailey. “You get to take point on this one. I’ve only seen this stream once so I bet you have a better idea of how to get there than I do.”
She hesitated and looked from person to person. “I uh,” she hesitated. “Maybe this isn’t the best idea.”
I shook my head and gently nudged her forward. “It’s gonna be fine. Trust me.”
She swallowed hard and turned to face the trees. She scanned them for a moment, nodded, and marched forward. We all followed, and a few minutes later found ourselves surrounded by lush green trees, budding flowers, and distant animal calls. Our hippie trail leader hummed quietly as she almost skipped along the trail. Though not everyone seemed to be as comfortable as she was.
Tara grumbled as, with each step, the jug smacked her in the thigh. The broomstick appeared to offer her only minor comfort on their trek. However, she kept on moving forward and kept her comments to herself.
It wasn’t long before the sound of the stream filled the air. “Almost there,” Bailey said as she looked back at her friends.
“Hold up,” I said as I moved off the trail. I knelt in front of a large tree.
“Something wrong?” Anna asked as she ran over to me.
I shook my head and waved the rest of them over. “Quite the opposite actually,” I said as I plucked a cream colored mushroom from the dirt and held it up for everyone to see. The cap was larger than the step, and was shaped in a form of like an arrowhead or lighter flame, but covered in ridges and pits. “Anyone know what this is?”
“A mushroom,” Paige said as she knelt next to me. She pulled one of her own from the base of the tree and began to inspect it closely.
I passed the mushroom to Anna and picked another. “This is a Morel,” I said. “They are safe to eat, fairly easy to find, and quite popular. You can identify them a few ways. Morel’s generally have a very uniform shape to their caps. These here are prime examples. They are also usually a cream or yellow color. Though the best way to check if it is a true Morel is to check if the cap is hollow.” I pulled out my knife and cut open the cap to reveal the hollow interior.
Anna pulled the cap of her own mushroom open. It was also hollow.
“This is a good time of year to find Morels,” I said. “Keep an eye out for them when you are in the forest. They like to grow at the base of trees.
I turned to see Paige with a magnifying glass. She eyed a new batch of growing Morels, picked a couple more big ones, and checked to see if they were hollow before she added them to a small pile beside her.
“We can eat them right?” Bailey asked as she studied a part of the cap Anna had given her.
“Yeah, but be careful that you don’t pick any false Morels,” I warned. “Those are poisonous. They look very similar, but the cap is more bulbous and wavy, and usually darker than the real ones. Though cutting them open is the best way to be sure.”
Bailey nodded and popped the piece of mushroom into her mouth. She shrugged as she chewed. “They’re not bad,” she said.
“I would imagine they are better cooked,” Anna said.
Paige nodded as she stood, a pile of mushrooms in her arms. “I am not a fan of raw mushrooms myself.”
“Don’t worry, I know a few recipes that make them really shine,” I said.
Tara stood at the edge of the group the whole time. Her nose was crinkled, and her mouth looked to be twisted into a grimace of disgust. “I am, like, totes not going to eat those,”
“That’s no longer an option.” I said as I stored Paige’s collected mushrooms in my backpack. “We are all going to have to step outside of our comfort zones for a while, and that means not being picky about what we eat. If we want to keep our strength up we need to take full advantage of what the land has to offer us. There should be plenty there if we know where to look.”
“Whateve’,” she said. “None of this matters anyway. My daddy’s gonna, like, send someone to rescue us.” Then, without another word, she spun and stomped back towards the trail. “I’m gonna go finish getting water.”
Tara stomped off ahead of us, and I couldn’t help but notice her perfect ass bounce with every angry step she took.
“Maybe so, but we need to be self-sufficient until he does,” I said.
“None of us are having fun with all of this,” Anna said as she ran forward and matched Tara’s pace. “We are just doing what we can until all of this sorts itself out.” She offered her friend a warm smile, but her expression turned to anger as Tara picked up her pace and pulled ahead.
Anna fell back to me. “What the fuck,” she said. “I was trying to help.”
“Let’s let her have a second to cool down. We are in a stressful situation, and it makes sense for people to get upset,” I said.
A few minutes later we arrived at the stream and found Tara already crouched at the edge of the water. The platinum blond shivered as she tried to hold her jug in the rushing water.
“Oh man,” Bailey said when we caught up to Tara. “This looks so good. I just want to stick my head inside and drink until I can’t move.”
“That’s a great idea if you like parasites,” Paige said.
“Parasites?” Bailey asked as she stuck her hand in the icy water.
“We are going to treat the water before we drink it.” I stepped up beside Tara and helped her hold the jug in the water. It had not warmed up much since the start of spring, and I shivered a bit when the water splashed my hand.
“What, you mean we can’t even, like, drink this stuff?” Tara hissed. She let go of the jug leaving me to fill it alone. “What the fuck are we doing here then?”
“No, no, sorry, that’s not what I meant,” Paige said quickly. “We just need to boil it before consuming it. It clearly looks great, and it might even taste fantastic, but if any of us get a stomach parasite, we will die.
“Oh,” Tara said before she let out a dramatic sigh and returned to my side.
“How do you know all this stuff?” Anna asked from where she sat. She held her jug under the water and looked to ignore its cold.
“I was pre med,” Paige said with a shrug and hauled her, now full, container from the water with a grunt. She pulled off her glasses and cleaned the spray of water from them.
“Huh, useful,” Bailey said. “Thanks for the heads up about the water.”
I finished with Tara’s jug, handed it to her, and started to fill my own. “Well we might not want to drink it from the stream but it is still useful in its natural state. I know it’s cold, but this is the perfect place to bathe.”
“Oh thank god,” Anna said.
“Right? I almost forgot what it feels like to be clean.” Bailey replied.
“I kinda wish we had thought about this sooner,” Paige said as she filled her jug.
“At least we can take care of it now. It will feel totes amazing to wash again,” Tara agreed.
“Good thing too, we were running low on baby wipes,” Anna added with a laugh.
I chuckled and shook my head.
“Starting tomorrow anyone assigned to water detail will be sent with soap, shampoo and the cleanest pair of clothes they can find,” I said.
“This is the best news I have heard all week,” Anna said. “I mean, water for drinking is great, but not stinking? Now that is truly a step forward.”
The other girls were quick to agree. I had, for a moment, worried that the coldness of the water might put them off from the idea. It seemed I had never needed to worry.
Five full jugs of water sat waiting to be hauled back to campus, and I gave the girls a minute to admire their work.
“Alright,” Anna said as she clapped her hands together. “Now we have to lug these back.
“Ugh,” Tara groaned. “I almost forgot we had to carry these back.”
“I have something to help with that,” I said as I gathered the broomsticks and pulled the blanket from my pack.
I folded out the blanket, set the two broomsticks on top of the blanket before, and then folded it over them so that the two ends overlapped in the middle. About sick inches of broomstick stuck out on each end of the blanket. I taped the blanket to itself so it would not come loose and then wrapped all four pieces of exposed wood.
“There,” I said as I finished with the tape.
The girls stood around me in silence. They each just stared at my strange rectangular creation.
“Um, what is it?” Bailey finally asked.
“It’s a stretcher,” I stated. “Though today we are going to use it to carry a couple of the water jugs on it.”
“Alright,” Anna said and hefted one of the containers up onto her shoulder. “Why not just carry them though?
“It will better distribute the weight and provide a more comfortable carrying method. Bailey, Tara, you two grab an end,” I said as I patted the blanket.
As they figured out how they wanted to carry the stretcher I loaded it with two of our jugs. As they lifted, the blanket sagged some but held in place between the broomsticks.
“Hey this isn’t so bad,” Bailey said with a smile.
The rest of us gathered our share of the water, and we started the journey home.
Carrying the water was not the most comfortable thing in the world, but, with the help of my broad shoulders, I made it work and once I found the perfect spot to perch it so that the whole set up didn’t seem to weigh much on my shoulders. Anna used her shoulder as well, and Paige just carried it by the handle. I noticed her switch hands a couple times, but she didn’t complain. Ten minutes into our walk back, and Tara began to.
It started with a tired whimper but grew into a stream of obscenities when Tara tripped over a loose stone, lost her grip on of the handles, and she toppled over. The stretcher lurched and the jugs atop it thumped to the ground.
“Are you okay?” Bailey asked.
I turned and noticed Tara had a fresh rip in her designer jeans that revealed a scraped knee.
“Fuck this shit!” Tara screamed as she pushed herself to her feet. She crossed her arms over her chest and stormed off down the trail ahead of us.
“Tara, wait!” Bailey cried as she ran to catch Tara. I held out an arm and stopped the nose ring wearing blonde’s advance.
“Let me handle this,” I said quietly. She opened her mouth as if to speak but seemed to think better of it as she nodded instead. “Take five.” Then I ran down the trail after our distraught companion.
Tara hadn't gotten far, and she stopped to sit on a fallen log. Her face was buried in her hands, and as I approached, I heard her sniffle and hold in a sob. “Mind if I sit down?” I asked.
“Please go away,” she said, her face still hidden from me.
I took a seat anyway, pulled out my personal bottle of water, and set it in Tara’s lap.
She sniffled, wiped her face, and looked up at me. Hey eyes were puffy and red, and mascara was smeared across her perfect face. She almost had the appearance of some ancient warrior woman with her face painted for war. The platinum blond dropped her gaze and opened the bottle of water.
“I, like, don’t belong here,” she said before taking a drink. She left a ring of pinkish lipstick around the mouth of the bottle. It was impressive that she had found the time to apply her makeup and do her hair in less than thirty minutes.
“That’s not true,” I said.
She rolled her eyes and thrust the bottle of water back into my hands.
“I am not good at this shit, and everyone, like, totes hates me,” she said as she looked intently at the ground.
“No one hates you. I have only been here a day but I have already seen how you guys go out of your way to watch each other’s backs. You already work better as a team than some professionals I worked with.”
The platinum blond model sitting next to me didn’t even look up. “They don’t care about me,” she said. I watched a new tear roll down her face. It left a trail of black behind it before dropping onto the forest floor. “Before, like, all of this happened I didn’t even know who these girls were. Now they have to, like, take care of me. What if I just slow them down? I don’t want to really be a drag, but I feel kinda worthless.”
I draped an arm across her shoulders and gave Tara a gentle squeeze. “Look, you have already proven you aren't worthless, and there is no better way to prove to someone how wrong they are than by showing them. I know what we are doing isn’t easy, but it needs to be done. All of us, including me, need your help in all of this.”
She finally looked up after a dozen seconds of contemplation. A small smile tugged at the corner of her mouth. “You know what, you are, like, totally right. This is my chance to show everyone that I am more than they think I am.” She leaned in and kissed me hard on the lips, and I felt a tingle run through my skin.
She pulled away with a grin. “Some things about me they are not wrong about though,” she licked her lips and hopped off the log. “Thanks, Tav.”
I nodded slowly and wiped my mouth with the back of my hand. I looked at it and noticed the pink streak of makeup. I let out a quick breath and stood. If that is how she chose to show me gratitude I would certainly not say no.
The moment Tara returned Bailey was there. She wrapped her friend in a hug and tried to wipe away some of the smeared makeup. “You alright?” She asked.
“Yeah, thanks,” Tara said with a nod. “I didn’t mean to freak out like that.”
“It’s okay,” Paige said as she returned the fallen water to the stretcher. “We all have our moments.” She then moved to her own jug and hefted it off the ground.
Tara and Bailey took up their positions again, picked up the stretcher, and headed down the path.
The athlete waited, her load already sitting comfortably on her muscled shoulder, as I grabbed my own burden. We started after the others.
“Thanks for talking to her. You seem to be good with people. Something about you just makes people want to do what you ask. Shit, even I like how inspired you make me feel.” Anna said.
“I don’t think it’s anything special. People just like knowing they are wanted and appreciated,” I said.
I glanced over and noticed a smirk on Anna’s face.
“Oh I am sure Tara knows just how wanted she is,” the redhead teased. “By the way, you missed a little.” She pointed to the corner of my mouth and laughed. I jabbed at the spot with my free hand and looked to find more pink lipstick smeared on my skin.
Chapter 5
It was only mid-morning by the time we made it back to the campus. The courtyard was bathed in a brilliant light, but the world was still comfortably cool, and I could hear the thud of a hammer in the distance and noticed several of the dorm windows were already boarded up.
I led the group to the firepit where we, finally, dropped off our cargo. “Let's take a break,’ I said, then I sat on the grass, stretched out my arms, and rolled my shoulders. I had rucked heavier loads in the past but I was out of practice. It wouldn’t take me long to get used to the trek or the weight of the jugs, but I would be sore until I did.
“You know, that wasn’t actually as bad as I thought it would be,” Bailey said before she popped open her bottled water and took a deep drink.
“I guess it, like, could’ve been worse,” Tara said and dropped onto her back and stared up at the cloudless blue sky. Her hair fell like a bright halo around her head as she sucked in a deep breath.
“It should get easier every time too,’ Paige added. “Plus, I don’t know about you guys, but the idea of getting a bath makes me look forward to my next trip.”
Anna nodded. “Me too, but what else needs done today?” She asked.
I noticed that she hadn’t even sat down. Instead she decided to crouch beside us. “Relax, we don’t want to burn ourselves out,” I said. I gently pushed her over onto the grass. “If we push ourselves too fast, we will also burn through our water. We need to be mindful of our supplies as we work.”
“Sorry, I just don’t like sitting around,” Anna replied before she let out a sigh and leaned back on her elbows.
“We won’t be down long. Just enjoy the downtime,” I said.
A couple minutes later, as I noticed the girls putting away their water bottles, I stood, stretched out my arms one last time, and nodded. “Alright, let's get back to work,” I said. “Bailey, go grab me the largest pot you can find in the kitchen.”
