Stan Morris - Surviving the Fog

“I really liked Jackie,” he began.

“The girl who was murdered?” she asked.

“Yes. I really liked her. She was older than the rest of us, and the things we talked about were adult things. She told me that she had sex with her older boyfriend, one night, when she was just fourteen. Two weeks later, she missed her period, and she knew that she was pregnant. She told me that she cried and cried. She was terrified. She knew absolutely nothing about how to find help. Then her period came. It was a false alarm.

“After that, she swore off sex until her senior year in high school, and when she started having sex, she made sure that she was on the pill first. She made this guy date her for three months before she slept with him. She wanted to get to know him before they had sex. She wanted to see if she could trust him.

“She said that she came to the camp as a counselor, because she wanted to teach younger girls how important it was to wait until they were older to have sex, not just until they thought they were ready. She said that a young girl can’t know when she’s ready to have sex until she understands the emotions of a relationship, and that you have to be older to understand those emotions.

“When I talked with Jackie, I felt older and more mature. She was a woman among all these girls. I felt like I was falling in love with her, but I was mostly just infatuated.

“But then this fog thing happened. At first, she tried to pretend that nothing had happened. Then, I don’t know why or how, she changed. Something happened in her head. I wonder if it was the responsibility. Then she was murdered. I think I went a little nuts after that. I stopped eating. It was like losing my sister all over again. Every day, I went down to her grave, and I just sat there. But then Hector came. Someone from outside the camp. Somehow, that made me wake up and get myself together. Strange.

“And now I’m here with you. I feel like I have something to live for again. Like I have something, someone, several someone’s to protect. Being with you is a little like being with Jackie, but better. My feelings for Jackie were like a crush on a favorite teacher. My feelings for you are like the feelings I think your husband must have felt. Not just feelings of desire, but feelings of caring and cherishing. I suppose it’s wrong, but I can’t help feeling like Comet and Star are our kids, not just yours. I hope you’re not offended by that, Mary.”

Mary could not respond at first, so she shook her head and laid her head on his shoulder. She used a finger to daintily wipe moisture from the sides of her eyes. Finally she collected herself and spoke.

“I’m not going to lie to you, Ralph. I do have feelings for you. I care about you very much. I love the way you interact with my children. I can see how much they mean to you. But I’m troubled by these feelings. I’m still mourning my husband. I need more time to come to terms with these feelings I have for you.”

“I’m fine with that,” he said, and he bent and kissed her lightly on her cheek.

Prudently, they parted and went to bed.

After that night, Mary felt as though the air was cleared between her and Ralph; that even though she was unwilling to further their relationship, they had reached an understanding about their future. Her mood lightened considerably.

And she was busy. She was determined that when the kids emerged from the Lodge, she would be there to feed them. She baked loaves of bread and froze them. She scrounged her house for every container she could find and then scoured and washed them, and she filled them with soups which could also be frozen. She knew that the taste and texture of frozen milk changed for the worse after a few weeks, so she waited until two weeks before April’s arrival before she began freezing milk. But until then, she skimmed the cream off the milk, and she made plenty of butter in her blender.

On the first day of March, she had the boys empty the containers in the solar room and refill them with fresh dirt. Then she planted them with tomato and cucumber seedlings. She had grown chard and spinach all winter, and what the members of her household did not eat, she cooked and froze. She made the boys catch as much trout as possible. They didn’t mind catching the fish, but they sure minded cleaning them. She had separated the potatoes when they were harvested, and she had soon replanted the thumb sized ones. Now the leaves of those tubers were poking through the snow. Except for meat, she thought that she could feed the campers for a month. After that? She would deal with that when it happened.

Mary welcomed the advent of spring. There was still snow on the ground, heavy in some places, but the sun had shone for much of March, so far, and now the plants would get more than twelve hours of sunlight. Soon she would need to get the plow ready to till the earth. She needed to get down to the camp to see if there was any available land that could be tilled. Mary intended to put as much land as possible into production this year. She knew that the amount of land she could cultivate would depend on the amount of fuel that could be spared. Hector had told her about the fuel tank at the logging camp. She needed to convince him that the best use of that fuel would be for food production.

For the kids, it was a great relief to get out of the house. Even chores were welcomed, if it meant getting out in the sun. Most of the chickens and rabbits had survived the winter. Fishing was fun, even if they had to clean what they caught. Ralph enjoyed walking over the fields, marveling at the hardy potato plants, and throwing the spears with the twins when they practiced.

One morning, he allowed Comet and Star to accompany him. They wandered around the fields, before heading toward the water tank to see how it had fared during the winter.

“Carry me, Daddy!” Comet demanded when he grew tired.

Star glanced at Ralph, but she said nothing. She had grown used to her brother’s endearment for the young man. Ralph picked up Comet, and he set the boy on his shoulders. As they walked toward the water tank, he asked Star what she knew about her mother’s plans.

“Mama thought that we could grow beans out here,” Star explained. “We were going to use that black plastic stuff to drip irrigate the plants. I know that we have a lot of seed. But mama never got around to it last year.”

“What kind of beans does she grow?” Ralph asked.

“I think they were more like peas,” Star replied. “I know she talked about peas from China and snapping peas. Then she said she was going to try to grow black eyed peas and green beans. But she didn’t think that green beans would grow very well here.”

“Chinese and snap peas,” said Ralph thoughtfully. “That’s right. They’re supposed to grow well in cool weather.”

“Oooo… a tiger,” Comet exclaimed.

Ralph and Star laughed. “You see a tiger, Comet?” Ralph asked.

“There,” Comet replied, pointing to the water tank.

Star gasped, and Ralph stopped. It was not a tiger, it was a mountain lion. It was pacing towards them, head lowered. It seemed to be limping slightly.

Ralph lowered Comet to the ground. “Let’s go back,” he said.

“I want to see the tiger, Daddy,” Comet complained.

Ralph and Star took Comet by his hands, and they began pulling him towards the house. The lion’s stride towards them quickened to a slow lope. The trio had only moved a dozen paces before it became clear that the animal would soon catch them.

Ralph stopped, and he placed Comet and Star behind him. He was frightened. The animal’s coat was dirty, and its ribs were showing. Ralph wondered if the animal might be starving. He wondered if it would attack. How can I stop it ? It will surely go for Comet .