The Oasis (3 page)

They drove silently down the road she knew led away from her small town, away from everything she had come to know as a survivor. Now all she had left were the clothes on her back and what she could fit into a bag. To call themselves survivors felt too surreal; instead she thought of them as explorers, off to discover what awaited them in the distance.

Chapter Three

Only a few miles out of town, Jasper pulled Lena’s car down a small beaten path before coming to a stop. His closed-bed truck was pulled onto the side of the road in a ditch as if it had crashed there.

“You can never be too careful,” he said before she could ask what had happened. It was evident by the care he had taken to make it look like some random crash that he had done this before. He reached around and grabbed their bags then unlocked his car for her. It was a black truck that had obviously been taken care of, which suggested Jasper was the kind of man who knew what was important. Without a good vehicle, you could get stuck out there with no protection, which could be very dangerous.

She opened the passenger door and slid in. The inside was as clean as the outside, with a small cooler behind his seat and a case of water behind hers. He started the truck and pulled gracefully out of the ditch. He pushed in a CD and began driving west. “We’ll stop before the sun sets and find a place to sleep for the night.” He didn’t take his eyes off the road.

There wasn’t much to watch. Randomly overturned cars were everywhere. Trash filled some streets and silent houses watched them like strangers. It was eerie. It had been a long time since Lena had been outside the safety of her home and an even longer time since she had been in the open like this.

Jasper seemed unfazed. “Where are we going?” she asked, barely taking her eyes off of his face, afraid to continue to look at the emptiness of the streets. Grocery stores had been raided in some areas. Other areas had homes that had burned down.
Perhaps other survivors looking for shelter
, she thought, but knew better than to start thinking about other normal people. She had seen the
others
searching for food too. Just because your mind was gone didn’t mean that you didn’t need to eat. That was made quite clear by this morning’s attack. It seemed so long ago that she was living peacefully on her farm. Was it just yesterday she had spent the morning milking Bertha and gardening? The music in the car suddenly felt foreign to her. She had been living off the land only yesterday and now… Now what? She was traveling across the country with someone she had only just met.

“Lena,” Jasper whispered, rousing her from her thoughts. “West. We’re headed to Coronado.” He didn’t add any more. He wasn’t one to give away his life story too easily and she knew it, but her curiosity was piqued. Living alone and on the run for so many years had shut down a part of him. Death can do that to someone.

“Come on, Jasper,” she whispered back. “It’s naïve to have all those silly notions of a ‘safe place out west’ where people are starting over.” She hesitated as his knuckles tightened on the steering wheel. She hated to break the news to him but she had to. “It isn’t real, Jasper. That’s just…” she stopped.

He pulled the car into a grocery store lot and parked as close as the piled-up cars in the lot would allow. “I’m…” he started to speak but then shook his head, letting her think what she wanted about him. His work with the SEALs had taught him to keep his mouth shut, ears to the ground and his eyes open no matter what, and luckily his knowledge of the O.A.S.I.S. could change everything.

Lena wanted to know more, but knew that in time the answers would come. There was no going back to her farm now. For now she resolved to find out the truth when the timing was better.

“Come on.” Jasper grabbed his gun and got out of the truck.

Lena hesitated before following, her own gun ready. “Where are we going?” she asked.

“To get some dinner,” he said as he made his way into the grocery store. The doors were torn open, showing signs of not only the mass hysteria that had occurred as the virus spread but numerous attacks by
others
as well
.

While she hesitated to follow, he went right in, poised as anyone with his training would be for an attack. Lena slowly made her way inside. The smell of rotting food was not as potent as she would have thought but she could still smell the stench of time and violence. She waited at the entrance while she heard him scuffle through the building. The sun hadn’t fully set yet which helped them to see inside. She looked around the counters, reading magazine headlines instead of looking for bodies. The place was mostly empty but her eyes couldn’t help but wander to the decomposed body of a store worker lying casually on the floor.

“Aw, shit!” Jasper cursed loudly, breaking Lena’s fixation on the body. She lifted her gun quickly and thought about pulling the trigger to scare off whatever could be attacking Jasper.

“What is it?” she asked nervously, trying to see where he was in the store. She quickly considered her options. She decided against going back to the car. Instead she tiptoed around the corner. Jasper leaned over the shelves examining something closely.

“They’re all out of cobbler!” He stood up, a smile on his face.

Fighting the urge to slap him, she lowered her gun and started searching the shelves herself. “You’re an ass, you know?” She couldn’t help but smile at herself as he walked past her. She watched his back as he went to grab his bag. When he turned back to her their eyes met and he paused. In a way, it helped that he found levity in their situation.

“Grab what you need,” he said, pursing his lips as he turned away to grab some water.

She looked around, trying to force her brain to remember what she might like to eat. Being in this store made her miss the fresh eggs and milk on her farm. But wherever they were going was hopefully going to be safer than her farm right now. She grabbed a can of fruit and decided to show her companion that she knew a thing or two about making a cobbler.

He’d already filled his bag with supplies when she met him at the truck, her arms full of a few toiletries and everything she needed to make a peach cobbler. He nodded at her as she jumped into the car. His hesitation made her again aware of their predicament. She was no longer in the safety of her farm. He remained by her door, looking around as if he knew something she didn’t. She watched intently, looking between his stern face and the surroundings. Everything was quiet.

Her fear broke as he turned to smile at her, his face already covered with a few days’ growth of beard. He stepped into the car and started the engine. They drove on in silence.

They drove for miles, neither of them talking as they navigated the obstructed road. Abandoned cars filled the highways making their venture slow and more difficult. They covered much less distance in several hours than they would have if the roads had been clear. When Jasper turned off the highway, Lena perked up. “Are we getting close?”

His chuckle filled the cab of the truck, warming her. “Close?” he asked not slowing his pace.

“To wherever it is we are going.” She hesitated, realizing that she had no idea what was in Coronado—or what Jasper expected to be there. “What’s out there, anyways?”

His smile spread to his eyes and she could feel a blush coming across her face. “Well, right now we are going to stop for the night.” Deliberately, he avoided her question and pointed down the road. Her eyes followed as her questions were replaced with her concerns about their shelter. A hotel. Up ahead was what looked like a once very nice hotel. “Not the hotel,” he said like he was reading her mind. She frowned, confused.

“Too many places for someone to hide out and sneak up on you in a building like that.”

Lena sat silently for a while. “How long have you been on the road?” It was a question she had wanted to ask for some time. Something she knew she
should
know, but had been too afraid to ask, and now it was out there. The question hung between them as she watched his profile. He concentrated on the road but she saw his knuckles clench slightly on the wheel.
What was he hiding?

He pulled the car past the dark hotel and drove past a sign that showed campgrounds ahead. Somehow she thought camping wasn’t the best of ideas either, but with the setting sun might come dangers she wasn’t even sure she knew about.

He pulled into an empty lot at the far end of the campsites. A small cottage rested among the bushes and she had a sudden thought that he had been here before. Jasper unloaded his camp sack from the truck and grabbed his pistol to take a look inside. Lena hesitated by the car, wondering if she should follow him into the cabin with her own weapon. There was no sound from the woods; even the birds seemed to have gone to bed.

He came out of the cabin, pistol in hand, and nodded in her direction. “All clear,” he said, grabbing the cooler out of the truck. She nodded at him but continued to listen to the forest. Back at her farm Bertha and the chickens had always made noise, hiding the silence that reminded her of the desolation of her situation, but now all she heard was Jasper. It felt too quiet.

“Don’t worry about it,” Jasper said as if he had read her thoughts. “The birds have gotten smarter since the end. They don’t make too much noise in the evenings.” Lena turned to follow him into the cabin. “And the
others
tend to stick to cities as far as I’ve seen. I’ll go out after you get settled in and take a look around.” She knew the
others
he spoke of weren’t other birds but people like those who had tried to kill her back home.

Although Lena felt somewhat reassured, she was still skeptical. How was it he knew so much about the
others
?

Taking a look inside the cabin, she was again reminded of how good she’d had it back at the farm. There was a small single bed against one wall and a small kitchen. With no working plumbing and no electricity, the bed seemed to be the only thing useful in the room.

“It’s got a fireplace.” Jasper nodded to the corner. “It’ll keep us warm tonight.” The cooler was next to the fireplace, and he had already grabbed the few blankets that were in the cottage and tossed them onto the bed. “Well,” he said, as she stood in the middle of the room, unsure of what to do next. “I’m going to take a look around.” He took the pistol from her hand and checked the chamber before handing it back. “Stay inside and stay low for a bit. I’m going to move the truck and I should be back before dark.”

He left before she could say anything. His departure left her feeling cold and lonely, a surprising feeling in light of how little time they’d spent together. She turned to consider the cabin again, but there wasn’t much else to explore. She opted to dig out one of the books she had tossed in her bag before she left her home. Lying on the bed, she read until her eyes couldn’t stay open any longer.

* * * * *

It was dark when Lena finally woke up. Sitting up quickly, she fought panic as she remembered where she was. A quilt had been placed on her. It was heavy and beautifully stitched. Someone had put a lot of love into this blanket. The temperature had dropped significantly and even with the small fire that Jasper had made the room was still cold.

A small pot was set to the side of the fire and Lena’s curiosity got the better of her as she grabbed the potholder to lift the lid and see what was inside.

“It’s water for coffee.” Jasper’s voice startled her, making her jump.

“Jeez, you scared me,” she admitted and laughed, trying to push aside her fear.

He casually walked into the room and placed a bird over the fire. She wasn’t sure what kind of bird it had been but it had been cleaned and readied to be roasted.
Impressive,
Lena thought. It had taken her a long time to learn how to pluck a chicken and get over her squeamishness at doing so. Even then, her chickens had never been as clean as this bird. Jasper was an expert.

Come to think of it, Lena hadn’t seen anything that Jasper wasn’t good at. His shots were precise, his sense of direction was perfect, and he was quieter than anyone she had ever met. Although it frightened her to think that this man was fully capable of killing her before she even knew he was present, she felt safe.

Jasper knew what she was thinking and he hated it. It had been a long time since he had had someone trust him completely. In these hard times, it was difficult to not cling together, but he was sure what he knew about the end of days could turn her against him. Trust was something he just couldn’t afford. She was beautiful and it had been a long time since he had spent time with such an astounding woman but in the end he knew that she would be better off without him.

He sat down next to the fire, leaving his coat on. Even though they were inside, it was still cold. He kept the fire low and used wood that didn’t emit too much smoke. When he finished setting up the bird for a roast, he would go out and gather some dead wood at one of the campsites so Lena wouldn’t freeze.

Jasper looked over at Lena and smiled. Her eyes twinkled in the light as she adjusted the blanket around her. He slowly got up and walked to sit next to her. He lifted his jacket off his shoulders and wrapped it around her. “Oh no, I couldn’t,” she protested, but he held her hands in his.

“I’ll get another from the truck if I get cold,” he said, trying to talk his body into going back to where he was sitting before. She looked up at him with those sparkling eyes and smiled, not taking her hands from his. Slowly, he bent his head and took her lips into his, rubbing lightly. She smelled like lavender and he breathed her in. Her hands slipped from his and went to his shoulders. Thinking she was trying to push him away, he instinctively backed up. When their mouths parted, he saw with a new rush of desire that she continued to watch him, licking her lips.

Growling in the back of his throat, he pushed his hands into her hair and pressed his lips to hers again, wanting the taste of her. He wanted to get closer to her. Wanted to be inside her.

She pressed her hands to his chest as he stroked the back of her neck. Parting her lips slightly, she let his tongue slide into her mouth. The kiss was full of passion and heat, something that she hadn’t felt in a long time even before the end of days. He started to press her back onto the bed before he pulled away, breathless from their kiss. He rested his forehead on hers as he closed his eyes, strain visible on his face as he pulled away from her.

She sat up, leaning on her arms, and watched as he moved back to the other side of the fire.

“We should get some sleep.” He cleared his throat before getting up to head to the car for another coat. All Lena could do was watch as he walked away, her lips still warm from his kiss.