Not Dead in the Heart of Dixie (39 page)

It's warm and humid outside. I expect thunderstorms
to arrive just about the time Pop predicted.

Someone's coming up the driveway. It's either Dane or the cow-catcher crew 'cause we have no one else off the compound right now and Pop didn't sound the "danger" alarm. See ya later.

3:00 PM...

We have two cows! I have no idea if they're pregnant, but they're mighty fat.

The only thing I know about cows is that a female who's never given birth is called a "heifer," and a female that has given birth is called a "cow." I know that boys with balls are "bulls" and boys without balls are "steers." I also know that they are ruminants, like goats.

That's my cattle knowledge in one fell swoop. Oh, I also know that they have pretty eyelashes, moo, graze, breed, eat hay, chew cud, make milk, and make lots of fertilizer. Plus, they taste good when they come off the grill.

Th
e cows are
huge
compared to our little goats! We put them in a barn stall along with a bale of hay and a bucket of water. They seem happy. Now is the time I wish I had the Internet so I could research how to care for these things.

Every person on the cow-catching crew was covered in black mud and cow manure. It was hilarious. They spent a couple of hours chasing the cows until they got them into a catch-pen near the barn. Then
, they went in and wrangled them up. Everyone spent a little quality time in the mud and muck.

Carisa and Jeremy sat in the bed of the truck and held the ropes to lead them home. When they got about a half-mile from home
, they spotted a cattle trailer at one of the farms on the corner of a crossroad they passed. They plan to get the cattle trailer in case we ever need to move cows or Buttercup. I have no idea why they didn't just drive over and get it when they saw it.

They weren't ashamed that they were covered in cow manure. They said it was a bonus 'cause Pop'll let 'em have an extra shower this week. Thank goodness the Silverado has leather seats. I'm just sayin'...

The younger kids named the cows "Lilac" and "Geraldine." I don't know how they came up with the names.

Dane didn't get back until
lunch was ready. I knew he wouldn't miss a meal. He had two metal barrels full of diesel fuel on the flatbed trailer. He says there are eight more empty barrels behind an auto-shop near the edge of town and he wants to get every one of them filled with diesel fuel.

You should've seen the men trying to get those full barrels off the trailer. It took every single one of them. Mick was chomping at the bit to help but we all knew he couldn't.

Dane backed the trailer up to the hill and shoveled out a flat spot so the barrels can sit level. Basically, the barrels are now stored on the side of the hill where the men wiggled them off the trailer.

I sent Jesse and Jeremy back for more hay. They said there were six more round bales and a lot more square bales
at their recent location. It'll take them this trip plus two more to get it all. I don't think it'll be enough to last through the summer and next winter, so there will be more barn' lootin going on this week.

Elaine made sour cream and it tastes great! We all had a little spoonful on our scalloped potatoes for lunch.

Someday soon, I'll make beef stroganoff over egg noodles with some of the stew beef I have canned. I'll let Elaine know how much sour cream I need a couple days in advance. Those people won't know what hit them when I dish up that beef stroganoff with re-hydrated mushrooms mixed in. Yum!

10:00 PM...

Jeremy and Jesse brought home three more round bales and several square bales of hay before supper. They unloaded them after we ate because supper was ready when they got here and they were "starvin' to death."

Supper was delicious. Hisa and Merry made a huge pot of rice and stir-fried all kinds of canned veggies with soy sauce, coconut oil, crushed pineapple, chunk chicken, and various spices.

We haven't heard from the Masterson family in a few days. I'll send Jeremy over tomorrow morning with a half-gallon of
goat’s milk to check on them.

Mick says we should cut trees for our log fence from the mountainside instead of inside the compound
, and Dane agrees. He wants to keep trees that are close so we don't have to go outside the compound for firewood next winter. Hopefully, we'll be using a gas oven this summer.

We're having thunderstorms with lightening and high winds right now. Pop was right.

The wind is blowing the rain sideways and the trees are swinging and swaying. The storm is whoopin' up on everything out there. I'll bet Lilac and Geraldine are glad to be in the barn and Buttercup is glad to be in the tractor shed.

The rain'll make a great
lullaby as long as the wind behaves.

I'm going out to sit on the porch and watch the lightening for a while. It's my favorite things to do during thunderstorms. I wrap up in a blanket and sit in the middle of the covered porch, hoping the wind will blow the rain sideways just e
nough to gently spray my face. I guess I'm "easily entertained."

Bye for now.

Sunday, March 2

We had
pancakes and canned fruit for breakfast. Everyone here loves pancakes, and we still have a good bit of the mix we looted from the restaurant. Hopefully, everyone got their bellies full.

Jesse and Jeremy plan to finish getting the hay from the barn where they found the cattle. They'll head out when Jeremy gets back from the Masterson place. Our hay requirements have doubled since we got Buttercup, Lilac, and Geraldine.

Dane and Jason headed off in the Silverado to pick up two more metal barrels and find enough diesel fuel to fill them. Dane wants to check the big rigs at the truck stop, just in case one of them wasn't completely empty when the driver pulled in to refuel.

Nana told Pop that she needs
him to "run down to the elementary school and pick up books" so she can use them for teaching Michael and Amber. He just looked at her like she was nuts. Uh, sorry Nana, Pop isn't allowed to "run down to the elementary school." They will
eat him
at the elementary school.

Hisa told me
in confidencethat Valerie isn't pregnant. She went to His
a
for feminine products last night. That's a relief!

Nana just stuck her head in the door and told me that Jeremy is back from the Masterson place and he's upset. See ya later.

2:00 PM...

When I saw Mrs. Masterson digging around in the yard, she wasn't digging a garden, she was digging a grave. Mr. Masterson passed away. He became ill and died within 24 hours. She thinks he died from the flu because "he's always had frail health and had trouble if he caught something as simple as a cold."

They buried him in the front yard. He didn't rise back up and try to bite them
, so I'm pretty sure it wasn't HDI.

Hisa's furious that they didn't come to her
for help. She doesn't know if she could have helped, but she would have "damn sure tried." Hisa's been around us southerners too long.

Mrs. Masterson, Rebecca, and Deuce are the only three living in the big house with the pond now. I don't know if there's anything I can do to help them
, but I'll offer.

Jeremy's upset that Rebecca didn't let him know
, and he's worried that there's no "man" there to protect them. My snarky mouth wanted to say that there probably hasn't been since the "help" left, but I kept it shut and should have slapped myself for thinking ill of the dead.

Jeremy plans to spend more time there
, and Mrs. Masterson's all for it. I bet Rebecca will be pleased.

He says he won't shirk on anything he's promised to do he
re and he'll make Deuce help. That’s not what I'm worried about. He feels like a son to me now, and... Oh... never mind.

I’m gonna help Nana ‘cause she’s putting together a casserole
of some kind to send over to them. That's what we do when friends, family, or neighbors have lost someone. If you're reading this sometime near the year 3,000 or so, I hope you didn't let that tradition die along with the rest of them.

See ya later.

10:30 PM...

Dane and Jason came home with both barrels full of diesel fuel. They backed the truck up to the hill and wiggled the barrels off to sit with the others. They brought something else with them.

No, it wasn't a person, but it may make a huge difference
for us. It's a set of keys on a fat key ring. Dane says it's a set of keys to unlock underground gas tanks!

It was
getting dark when he and Jason made it to the truck stop to check for fuel in the big rigs there. Bodies from "restaurant haul day" are lying all over the place. Dane was walking past several HDI bodies when he noticed something shiny on the belt of a corpse wearing a uniform with the name of the truck stop on one side and the name "Chuck" on the other.

He looked closer and noticed that the shiny object wa
s a set of keys. He grabbed the key ring and pulled them toward him. Along with the keys, he got Chucks belt. He'd pulled it right through Chuck's broken body.

He unhooked the keys and flung the belt to the ground. He said he almost had to call Ralph because th
e open body cavity of Chuck released “the most god-awful smell he's ever smelled in his life." He had to walk away to catch his breath and “settle his gut.”

It was getting darker by the minute. He couldn't read what was written on the keys and didn't want to use the flashlight in case bad guys were nearby. He stuck the keys in his pocket to check later.

He got about ten gallons of diesel fuel in total out of three trucks. They'd been running on fumes when they pulled in to refuel.

The truck stop looks and smells horrible
, so he and Jason finished lootin' what fuel they could find and headed home.

Dane brought the keys inside and the men examined them closely with light from the solar lantern.

Dane swears they’re keys to the underground tanks, and he can't wait to go there tomorrow morning and find out if he's right.

We pray he's right. We
pray there is fuel in the underground tanks and the cashier was lying when he told Diane's dad they were completely out.

Jesse and Jeremy
brought home the last of the hay from the farm where they found the cattle. I hope we can find enough room for what we need to store. The loft looks mighty full right now.

Jeremy's staying at the Masterson place tonight. He says they have plenty of empty bedrooms and there are fireplaces in most of them. I'll worry about him all night.

Everyone's sleeping except me. I'm turning in now.

I hope those keys work and I hope there's something left in those tanks.

Bye for now.

Monday
, March 3

7:00 AM...

I can't help myself. I'm going with Dane to find out if the keys work. Mick's jealous because he wants to go. That's what he gets for kicking Jason out of the truck and leaving me to worry when the horde came through! It's payback time!

Carisa said she'd watch out for him while I'm gone. I told her to ask "When do you think Mom's gonna get back
?" every 15 minutes or so.

Elaine wanted to go
, but she has breakfast duty. I told her I'd take care of her man. I was just kidding around but I don't think she appreciated it one bit. She knows that she has nothing to worry about because I adore Mick.

Regardless, I'm
gonna be the second one to know if those keys work. I'll letcha know what happens when we get back.

See ya later.

3:00 PM...

The keys work and there’s gasoline and diesel fuel at the truck stop! That's the "good" part of our experience this morning. I'll start at the top.

Dane and I headed out with a
set of keys and a lot of hope.

Neither of us ate
breakfast before we left. We took a thermos of coffee along. It took about ten minutes to get to the truck stop.

When we pulled in, I could see bodies everywhere. I knew we didn't kill that many HDI's when we looted the restaurant. Someon
e else has been there, killing HDI's. I was almost too nervous to get out of the truck.

Dane got ou
t and waited for me to join him and I told him what I was thinking. He went into defense mode and reached back to grab his rifle to go along with the pistol on his hip.

I looked down to make sure I wasn't dreaming when I strapped my Glock on this morning. When you get older you'll understand that, sometimes, you have to check on things two or three times just to
reassure yourself.

There were two tanks on the east side of the building, and two on the west. There are 21 keys on that key chain. "This is gonna be interesting," I thought to myself.