White Wasteland, Jeff Kirkham [ebook reader with highlight function TXT] 📗

a former Navy SEAL, and nobody discounted his value to their survival. But Audrey had divorced him in the old world when no one spared a thought about the value of a man’s ability to protect his family. Chad’s contribution to the Homestead did nothing to make Audrey feel like she belonged.

Audrey had been doing therapy with Jacquelyn since she arrived. Jacquelyn poured every ounce of emotional strength into Audrey she could, desperate to loan her reasons to live. But then her daughter had died and the tsunami of grief overcame the weak tide of therapy. Jacquelyn hadn’t a clue what to do for her.

“Where’s Chad?” she croaked between sobs.

Jenna Ross cried too. “I think he’s with her in the infirmary. I don’t know…”

“We just buried Samantha…” Jacquelyn collapsed into Jenna’s shoulder and cried until Jenna’s coat soaked through. They didn’t notice Emily Ross approaching.

“Mama.” Both women looked up, startled at the intrusion. Emily Ross stood calf-deep in the snow, eyebrows raised at the scene. She wore her military kit, a sidearm and a rifle slung around on her back. “I’ve been looking all over for you. What’s wrong?”

Jenna Ross straightened her coat and turned to her daughter. Jacquelyn stared at the snow on the ground. She knew her face must look like a death mask and it’d alarm the girl. Nothing could be done about it. She covered half her face and her dripping nose with the back of her hand.

Jenna told her daughter the news. “We lost Audrey Wade. She took her own life.”

“Oh no,” Emily wept. “Why?” she shouted. But, they all knew why.

“I don’t think we’ll ever understand Audrey, darling.” Her mom said. The college girl trudged through the snow and leaned on both her mother and Jacquelyn, loosing a deep sob. After a long time, Emily pulled away and wiped her nose on her jacket sleeve.

“You were looking for me?” Jenna asked, still holding her daughter’s hair.

“Yeah. It’s important.” Emily glanced from one woman to the other, seeming to reach a decision. “I have a little baby.”

Jenna stepped back and put her hand on her cheek. “You’re pregnant?”

“No, mama.” Emily smiled and wiped her eye. “I have a baby. Right now. A real baby. He’s maybe one year old. A boy.”

Jenna looked confused. “Where?”

“He’s taking a nap. I didn’t want anyone to know, so I put him down in a bedroom in the empty Schaffer house. I need to go check on him pretty soon.”

“Where did you get a baby?” Jacquelyn asked.

“Somebody down at the Lower Barricade put him in my OHV when I wasn’t looking.”

A jolt of concern shot through Jacquelyn. Jenna reached out for the girl.

“Sweetie. We can’t take in children. The committee made it clear that nobody gets added to the Homestead. Nobody. We all agreed; if anyone brings a person in without committee approval, they’ll be asked to leave. We can’t share food. We can’t share anything. I’m sorry, darling, but you have to take him back to the barricade. Right now. I couldn’t live if you were sent away.” Jenna’s emotions grew thick, probably at the thought of losing another child. Three of her children never made it home after the Black Autumn collapse. They’d disappeared.

“Take us to him.” Jacquelyn swam up from her sadness. “Take us to the baby before we decide.”

Jenna turned to her. “Decide what? The committee voted three times already, and we simply don’t have the food. They won't vote on it again.”

“I don’t know, Jenna. Something tells me we should go see him first.”

“Okay. I guess,” Jenna conceded, but worry lines lashed her forehead and spread out from her green eyes.

The women picked their way through the forest snow, across the white-mounded vineyard and out a side gate to Emily’s waiting OHV. Jacquelyn glanced about. No one appeared to take an interest in their departure. They drove around the bend in Crestview Drive and pulled into a large, white-brick house. Emily parked where the OHV couldn’t be seen from the road.

“The Schaffers disappeared right before the crash. We think they went to their family land in Wyoming,” Emily explained. She unslung her rifle and posted security while the women made their way through the side door of the abandoned home.

“It’s freezing,” Jenna remarked as they stepped inside. “You left a baby in here?”

“I buried him under a bunch of blankets.” Emily said. A hearty squawk of a baby rang out from the master bedroom. The sound drew the women like moths to a flame.

Jacquelyn covered her mouth when she saw the toddler, sitting up in bed, mounded in a pile of blankets. “Oh my god. He’s beautiful.”

Jenna stepped in and picked up the baby, shucking off the blankets and wrapping her coat around him. “Why is he so healthy?”

“I don’t know,” Emily answered as she pinched his cheeks. “It’s how he showed up. Somebody took good care of him.”

“Then why did they leave him?” Jenna wondered. “Who would leave their child to strangers?”

Jacquelyn caressed the baby’s head, feeling more purpose than she had in months. “Someone who wanted him to live.”

“ND.”

The phrase repeated itself over and over in Jason Ross’ mind. “Negligent Discharge.”

He closed his eyes. Those words would dog him to his dying day; those words and the face of the boy he had killed. All the good he’d done in the world, all the prescient decisions he’d made preparing the Homestead for his friends and family, all his accomplishments, all his religious faith, all his skill and knowledge—all ran like water spilled on a desert road. They arrived at this moment and sank into the ground like nothing. Nothing.

Everything he’d ever done for good had been undone by one split-second of shitty judgment.

A Negligent Discharge. A dead boy.

Jason hid in his office most of the morning. He flipped through the faces he hoped to avoid. The face of the boy’s mother. The face of the boy’s sister. The faces of the people he was supposed to lead. The faces of the