Joshua Gayou - Commune - The Complete Series - A Post-Apocalyptic Survival Box Set (Books 1-4)

We’d wrapped up for the day and were just filing out of Oscar’s house, discussing what we’d done, how it had gone, and who needed to tighten up, when Jake’s answer to improving morale began to make itself apparent. It had been timed perfectly, just when my group was finishing up as well as when the final scavenging team had returned for the day and were busy washing up (but before they’d had a chance to begin unloading the truck).

As we stood around in a loose circle chatting, the sound of talking and laughter came from behind us, back in the direction of the garage. It sounded off somehow, as though it was filtered, and the voices came from people I didn’t recognize. The sound was jarring, and there was only enough time for Amanda to say, “Hey, what is that?” before the funky, laidback sound of a bass guitar line accompanied by clapping and what I suspect must have been a cowbell rolled out across the field.

We turned in unison to regard the garage, which had its roll-up door opened all the way, and saw the muted glow of the overhead leds shining from within as well as the edge of a picnic table just poking out through the door, bisecting the opening. From our left, folks from the scavenging team were slowly walking up the path as though they were sleepwalking while others still came foggily from the campers on the opposite side of the field, southwest of the cabin.

From some thirty yards away, I heard Otis say, “Hey, is that—?”

Before he could finish, a falsetto, ghostly voice echoed out from the garage. I didn’t understand what that voice said at the time because the quality of the music as it issued from the garage was too distant and distorted, but I learned later from Fred that the song’s opening lines were, “ I used to go out to parties, and stand around …”

It turned out that Jake’s solution to a group morale problem was to rub some Marvin Gaye on it… which, I suppose, is not such a bad idea at all.

“That’s right!” Otis shouted, unable to contain his laughter. “ Got to Give It Up !”

People were moving faster towards the garage, now, and I had to remind my group that they were still carrying rifles and that they needed to continue practicing some kind of muzzle awareness, despite the fact that none of them had seated mags. They all listened with one ear, moving towards the garage as though called by hypnosis. It was like trying to get a group of kids to wash their hands before diving into a birthday cake.

Whether planned or not, everyone arrived at the garage door at about the same moment, so we all saw the same thing at once. A folding table loaded with a variety of food had been set up close to the open roll-up door. The Super Duty was absent, having been parked around the side of the garage earlier that day, and it appeared as though the palletized provisions had been moved upstairs to clear out floor space. The trailer that was usually connected to the Ford by virtue of a ball hitch was centered to the rear of the garage. Another of our folding tables had been set up on the trailer—on the table was one of those large boombox CD players; it appeared as though the unit’s speakers had been detached or otherwise removed and there were two larger cabinet speakers (standing about as high as a man’s knee) set on the floor to either side of the trailer with red and black speaker wire leading back to the player. An orange extension cord ran from the back of the folding table to the solar battery array in the back of the shop. Jake was up on the trailer, too, sitting in a folding chair behind the table. As soon as we came in, he waved at us and shouted something, though we couldn’t understand what he was saying due to the volume of the music. I looked back over my shoulder and saw a line of adult faces all reduced to a state of childhood wonder. A few of those faces had wet eyes and glistening cheeks.

Jake had stepped down from the trailer and was approaching us still talking, his voice barely understandable with the music blasting in the background. I shook my head at him vigorously and closed the distance. Wrapping my hand around the back of his neck, I put my mouth close to his ear and shouted, “Okay, try again!”

Rather than leaning in for just me to hear, he ratcheted his voice up as loud as it would go and hollered, “This is going to be a pretty pathetic dance party if none of you guys actually dance!”

The sound of screaming laughter erupted from behind me, made small by the overpowering thump-thump of the music, and I stood rooted in place, bemused, as several people including Monica, her daughter Rose, Rebecca, Otis, Maria, and Amanda all filed out to the center of the floor. They began moving at a walk, like normal people, but something happened to them as they came closer to the center of the floor. Their spines went loose while their hips wobbled around under them. Their knees bent, lowering their centers of gravity, and never quite straightened up again, while arms extended out, fingers snapped, and eyes closed. I had just been working with some of these people only a few minutes ago, helping to refine their skills in small arms and fire team tactics (in other words, we were all practicing getting better at shooting people we didn’t like) and now here they were, shaking their asses like a bunch of teenagers.

More people followed these brave trailblazers out onto the floor before I knew what was happening. Otis’s son Ben had Lizzy by the hands, and they both bounced around happily. George kept a death-grip on his cane with one hand while holding onto Barbara’s fingertips with his other; both of them executing a subdued and refined adaptation of what looked to me like an old-fashioned Two Step made only slightly ungainly by George’s bad knee. Only a few people hung back on the sidelines, including Jeff and Davidson. Fred was nowhere in sight, probably still keeping to himself in embarrassment for his earlier display.

Looking at Jake, who smiled mildly at the group of dancing, laughing people, I shouted, “You sneaky, cagey fuck!”

He snorted, but the sound was lost to the music; a visceral beat that you could feel through the souls of your boots. He leaned closer to me so he wouldn’t have to yell as much and said, “They look happy, don’t they?”

I jerked my head at the table and said, “How much of the food did you lay out for this?”

He shrugged and said, “More than we could spare but not so much that it’ll hurt immediately. We should still be okay by the time you get back.”

I grimaced and said, “You know, we’re fucked if I don’t find anything, right?”

In answer, he pinned me with one of his trademark Jake stares and said, “Sure, but this isn’t going to make it any worse. We need to get their minds off of food right now. The best way to get peoples’ minds off food is to fill their bellies.”

I shrugged, not disagreeing with him but not fully subscribing to the idea, either. To me, the whole thing felt like a hell of a gamble. I’d had a day to think about the plan (well, less than a day, I suppose) since we’d finished working out the details the previous night and, no matter how many times I rolled it over in my head, the whole thing felt like one hell of a Hail Mary pass.

Jake heaved his shoulders in an exaggerated sigh and waved me over to a position towards the rear of the shop just removed from the impromptu DJ table he’d built for himself. Around the side of the trailer was a tarp draped over some sort of box. He pulled the tarp off to reveal an electric box cooler, which he opened and leaned into while I stood behind him, dumbfounded. He straightened up holding a beer bottle, which he slipped under an opener screwed into the side of a nearby workbench and popped the cap off onto the concrete floor. He held it out to me and said, “Have a drink,” though I couldn’t hear a damned thing because we were right next to a speaker; I had to read his lips.