Stan Morris: Surviving the Fog

Yuie convinced some of the girls to help her use the barbeque to heat up the canned food, now that the stove had mysteriously quit working. Other girls got exasperated at the mess in the kitchen, and it was swept and mopped. The dishes were done and everyone had clean plates and glasses again.

The group held a meeting every night. Mike always seemed to lead the meetings, and the others seemed content to let him. Gradually, most of the boys started attending their meetings, but except for Yuie and Desi, the few girls who attended did so sporadically. Ralph would usually show up for a few minutes at the beginning to make fun of them. He called them, the Tribe, and he called Mike, the Chief. Ralph’s attitude had gotten worse since Jacob’s return. Mike was sure that, sooner or later, Ralph would cause him real trouble.

It happened one morning while they were throwing their spears at the bales. Mike noticed Ralph coming towards them in a rage. Mike felt a pang of fear. He really did not want to be punched by the older boy, and whenever he was around Ralph, he thought that was a possibility. To Mike, Ralph seemed to exude an aura of violence.

“Hey, Chief Shithead, where’s the part that you took off the stove?”

“I didn’t do it,” Mike protested, and then he immediately felt ashamed. It was his idea. He should have taken responsibility. “But I’m the one who told someone to do it. We have to save the propane,” he offered bravely, although his heart was thumping.

Ralph grabbed Mike by the front of his shirt. “Who did it?” he demanded.

John quickly shoved Ralph away from Mike. “I did it, dickhead,” he yelled.

Ralph pushed John backwards and then, as John tittered off balance, he slugged John in the face. John reeled backwards. Suddenly Mike’s fear exploded into rage. Using the shaft of his spear, he savagely struck the backs of Ralph’s legs. The taller boy cried out in pain, and he fell to his knees. Mike raised his spear, but before he could strike again, Jacob slammed his own spear against the back of Ralph’s head. A thin line of blood appeared. As if it were a signal, the other boys began striking the kneeling boy again and again with their spears.

Ralph screamed in surprise and pain, and then he struggled to his feet while trying to fend off the painful blows. He stumbled away, and then he began to run. For an instant, Mike started after him, and then a premonition caused him to halt.

He turned around, held out his arms, and commanded, “Stop!”

He was just in time. Jacob had his spear cocked back by his ear, and he was about to send it into the fleeing boy’s body. His hazel eyes were angry. Shocked, Mike stared at Jacob, and then he walked back to Jacob and clapped him on the shoulder.

“We’re cool,” he said quietly.

Mike looked at the other boys. Some were still angry; some seemed troubled and startled at the sudden surge of violence. Mike turned his attention to John who was using his sleeve to stanch the blood trickling from his mouth.

“You okay?” Mike asked.

“Yeah, I’m fine. He got lucky.” There were chuckles from the others, more from relief than from humor.

“Right,” answered Mike. “All right, back to practice. Who’s up next?” The boys returned to their task.

Ralph did not bother them again. A few days later, he unexpectedly crossed paths with Mike when the younger boy was alone. They stared at one another for a moment. Mike looked him right in the eyes, not backing down. After a moment, Ralph turned away.

To the younger boys, Ralph had always been somewhat of a bully, and word of what happened quickly spread. One result, that Mike found rather annoying, became apparent the day following the incident with Ralph. Nathan and Kevin, who were brown haired twins, and who were also a couple of the youngest boys, came running up behind him.

“Hey, Chief!” Nathan said.

When Mike glanced back at them, Kevin said, “Chief, we want to go up the river to look for spear shafts.”

“So go,” he answered, puzzled as to why they were telling him.

They looked at one another, and then Mike realized that they were embarrassed.

“Well, we don’t know what kinds of things might be in the woods,” one began.

“Can you send some of the Spears with us?” pleaded the other.

So Mike asked Pete and Eric to accompany the two smaller boys. After that, he noticed that most of the boys and some of the girls took to calling him, ‘Chief.’ When he complained good naturedly to John, the other boy took the situation much more seriously.

“Mike, it’s good that they’re calling you, ‘Chief’,” John said.

“Why?” Mike asked, surprised to hear this.

“Because we need someone to be in charge,” John answered. “We have to get ready, so that we can survive this winter. To get ready, to have rules that get enforced, we have to have a leader. You’re the leader, Mike. I know it’s kind of crazy. You’re one of the youngest kids here. But so far, you are the only one that’s shown any kind of leadership. You think about these things more than the rest of us.”

“But, Jackie…”

John cut him off. “Jackie’s sick, Mike. You know that. You’re the leader, Mike. It’s good that the kids are calling you, ‘Chief.’ Accept it, and use it so we can get on with more important things.”

Mike felt that this was dubious logic, but he didn’t argue. There were definitely more important things to consider, particularly their food situation. The Spears began guarding the food, and they rationed the amount that people could eat. There was some grumbling, especially from the girls, but most of them recognized that they had to conserve, even if it was just until someone came for them.

Every night Mike held a meeting to discuss the day’s progress. Some of the boys wanted to join the Spears. Mike told them that they could practice with the Spears, and if they got good enough, they could join. Most of them just wanted to carry a spear. Few of them actually practiced enough to be allowed to become one of the Spears.

Mike’s core group was John, Howard, Eric, Jacob, Pete, and two other boys that quickly became proficient with their spears, Ahmed and Rasul. Every night, two of the Spears would guard the food supply. One person would guard from midnight until four in the morning, and the other would guard from four until eight. Soon, Mike realized that there were not enough people to keep up this schedule. So he recruited others, who were not officially part of the Spears, to help. In this way, he was able to ensure that the guards would have this duty only one night a week. Yuie was the only girl who was willing to be a guard.

Yuie always came to the nightly meetings. Sometimes Desi came with her. At first, John had escorted them back to their side of the river after the meetings, but Yuie put a stop to that. She and Desi liked to discuss what they had heard in the meetings privately without a boy around.

Yuie was not surprised that Desi took such an interest in the meetings, and she no longer thought of Desi as a bimbo. When she talked with Desi, she realized that the girl had a clear idea about one thing, and that was the need for someone to take charge. Desi realized that they were in a lot more danger than anyone else understood, except for Mike.

Desi had her own ideas about how to survive in this new world. One night, after the meeting had ended, Yuie was about to leave and she called for Desi.

“I’ll come down later,” said Desi, and she gave Yuie a significant smile.

Yuie looked troubled, but she nodded and left. As Yuie left, Mike, John and Desi were standing outside under a cloudy sky. It was the twentieth of June, and the days were warmer although the nights were still chilly.