Story Up On Hartford Ridge
- Thread starter Kathy in FL
- Start date
Jeepcats27
Senior Member
So you never did say what was in the original letters from the other wife's when Uncle Mark gave them to Kay-Lee. Are Uncle Forrester's kids robbing Kay-Lee and Sawyer blind? or setting them up for the Inspectors thinking the low life's will get their home? The latest letter from Uncle Mark should be a dowsey!!! Just wondering???
patience. Lol
kyrsyan
Has No Life - Lives on TB
Don't have none. Nope. Want to know. Want Sawyer and Heuly home for them. And maybe some buckshot in some backsides for the *$%u#$*) who are causing even more problems.
juco
Veteran Member
That’s easy for you to say….ROFL
sssarawolf
Has No Life - Lives on TB
Wonderful gift from you today, thank you.
Griz3752
Retired, practising Curmudgeon
Apparently your readership is split: some fall on the side of "need/want to know, now" but others are more about "it will be revealed as needed, in a timely fashion".
I can admit to be being on both sides from time to time but, there's only so many hours in a day. If I get it all today, what do I read tomorrow? I can ration fuel, grub even chocolate but, a good story seems to draw me along, creating a vortex I can't slip out of until it ends naturally.
In your own time and, at your own pace Ma'am.
Thank you for all this, so far.
juco
Veteran Member
If I had unlimited access to new chapters from Kathy and a never-ending supply of Dove Dark, I would never get anything done and be too big to fit in my computer chair. On the other hand, I'd be fat and happy! lol
DIMDAL
Contributing Member
SNORT! I thought Dove Dark was a new author
Reposted from another forum:
For those of you that are new to Cliff's presence on these threads, a few tips. Find yourself a good paraglider harness. Pad and adjust to your personal comfort. Make sure you keep your hydration system filled, some 'hanging time' gets a little long. Have a bag with assorted pinions, grapples, carabiners, and cordage to hook your harness to the cliff. Sit back and enjoy the view. Since there are usually several of us close together on the cliffs, bring extra snacks to share.
For those of you that are new to Cliff's presence on these threads, a few tips. Find yourself a good paraglider harness. Pad and adjust to your personal comfort. Make sure you keep your hydration system filled, some 'hanging time' gets a little long. Have a bag with assorted pinions, grapples, carabiners, and cordage to hook your harness to the cliff. Sit back and enjoy the view. Since there are usually several of us close together on the cliffs, bring extra snacks to share.
Sammy55
Veteran Member
No. I won't go paragliding. I don't like heights at all. And I specially hate cliffs and Clifs!!
Might as well give up, Kathy. God has been trying to teach me patience for many many years. If He can't do it, no one can. Not even you. So, since I haven't learned patience very well, then either you have to hurry up. Or I have to suffer.
I think the answer is that I will suffer TWICE. Once because of patience and the other because of Clifs!
Might as well give up, Kathy. God has been trying to teach me patience for many many years. If He can't do it, no one can. Not even you. So, since I haven't learned patience very well, then either you have to hurry up. Or I have to suffer.
I think the answer is that I will suffer TWICE. Once because of patience and the other because of Clifs!
Chapter 113
I’d give a lot for either Harley or Davey to pull this blasted sled, but the two dogs are becoming as tired and lean as the rest of us. I left them sleeping in the kitchen with the others. The fact they didn’t make any noise when Davis and Benedict were in the yard worries me. They are either getting too tired, getting doggie colds, or they’ve gotten too used to the Hartford scent. Makes me wonder exactly how close that Bud and the rest of them have been to the house. Or if they’ve been playing the dogs up. Sawyer isn’t going to be happy that’s for sure.
Wondering about it all I also made a mental list to count the chickens and ducks … the ducks were my own addition. Actually they were Burt’s addition, he just hadn’t known what to do with him. He caught them with a fishing net of all things. Same way he caught some blackbirds. Barbara and I turned the blackbirds into what we joked around and called a Mother Goose Pie. Turns out Barbara says it was a real thing and not just a children’s rhyme.
Sing a song of sixpence,
A pocket full of rye,
Four and twenty blackbirds
Baked in a pie.
When the pie was opened
The birds began to sing—
Wasn't that a dainty dish
To set before the king?
Sigh. The worries just won’t leave me tonight. They are eating at me. From what I learned, I prefer both dogs to stay with Barbara and the kids at the house. They might hesitate if a Hartford comes around, but if even a Hartford scares the three of them, they’ll turn killer and I hope the idiot cousins remaining around here have more sense than to try something. They won’t even hesitate if it is anyone outside Sawyer’s family.
As a way to ignore the newest letters until I could focus on them properly my mind wandered back to what we’d learned from Donnelly.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
“Fine. Be that way. I’ll just be leaving,” he said sounding like a four-year-old throwing an attitude and about to take his ball home.
Quietly Barbara said, “Oh no you won’t.” All three of us heard her taking the safety off the pistol in her apron. “You have news of our husbands. You are going to share that news.”
Donnelly got real surprised … and real pale. “You … you wouldn’t … can’t …”
“Can. And will. If you push me. No one and nothing is going to stand between me and Huely. I’m sure that Kay-Lee feels the same way. You act like you are … or have … thrown us out of the Hartford Clan. You gonna find there is two sides to that decision.”
Realizing that Barbara was close to being way too emotional I said, “Donnelly, she’s pregnant and you’ve threatened her and her child. Speak up before things go any further.”
“I did not!”
Trying to explain to him like he was the one that had gone through the SLD side of the school I said, “Yes, you did. You’ve admitted you know something about Huely … and Sawyer. You know we are alone … and maybe you have had something to do with people making sure we are that way.”
“No!”
“Yes,” I said despite his denial. “Because whether you admit it or not this is a lot like what I’ll just call the Propane Incident. That was started by Jamison. You play at being stupid, but you aren’t, though you do act it when it suits your purpose. Let me put it in simple terms. You are making the choice to follow Bud and Jamison and whoever else has decided they are in charge. A willing choice. Maybe even an eager choice. But put your wife in our position. How would you feel about it? What would be likely to happen to her under these circumstances.”
“No,” this time less vehement and more like he’d started using his head for something other than a place to put his wool cap.
“No what?” I asked.
“No. It ain’t like that. It won’t go that far.”
I sighed. “It already has. There’s already people using this land for their own purposes. A few of them giving off pretty hostile vibes. And don’t deny it. I already caught you hunting here … and you say Cutter was here as well. It would explain why this area is getting hunted over. Has any of that, even a small portion, been left for us that actually own this land? The answer to that is no. Has anyone offered us any help for any reason? No. Not even Tommy thinks to do much more than ask if we need some wood brought up from the pile. And all he did was blink when we had to tell him there isn’t a ‘pile’ because the Harvesters confiscated it.”
“They … they took all your wood?”
“What thieves didn’t take.”
“Thieves?!” this time expressing some outrage.
“Yeah. We had a little bit left after the harvesters were finished and that grew legs and run off one night a couple of months ago. Sawyer and Huely try and cut wood for us when they are here but it kept running out and they aren’t here all that often. And when they are the inspectors refuse to give them permission to cut any trees and the few downed one near the house were hauled off with the wood pile. They also confiscated what was left in the propane tank though there wasn’t much of that. The only wood we can get these days is tree trash. Or do you think I cook out here in the yard, regardless of weather, ‘cause I think it is fun and for entertainment of the inspectors and harvesters to see and make fun of us for. Calling us Goobers. Taking all the domesticated field and orchard crops and not leaving anything. I’m stealing from myself just to get a few falls off the ground in the dead of night and now even that is gone … and they raked what was left up rather than …”
My throat was tightening up and I had to stop to calm myself for a moment.
Donnelly just kept shaking his head like the picture I painted wasn’t aligned with what he thought he knew. Then he said, “That cain’t be the way it is. That’s not what we’ve been told. Y’all are rich. You’ve got the Chief Inspector protecting you. The drones are over here all the time.”
Barbara called him something rude under her breath and while I agreed I ignored it. “Stop listening to people whose best interest it would be for that to be true. We weren’t given any gleaning rows. I didn’t even know there was such a thing until recently. Now you tell me you all are still getting commodity boxes and we haven’t gotten one in a month while you all get them weekly … and why you would think I would get one to begin with I don’t know. They go to pregnant women and children.”
“Old folks and those that are special needs get them too.”
Sarcastically I asked, “And which category do you think I fall into? I’m not old … several years younger than you as a matter of fact,” I said making him blanch. “And I’m not special needs. Yes, I was on the SLD side of the school and won’t ever deny it, but it was only because it got the school more money. I certainly wasn’t made any allowances for it except for it to be harder to find a family in foster care that would take me on for a few weeks at a time. Don’t believe me? Ask Tommy or Linda. Now enough. Just tell what you know about our husbands, and you can escape back to whoever it is that is telling you what to think and how to think it … and when to think at all. You’re obviously more comfortable living that way.”
He looked at me then at Barbara. He was upset and angry but I got the feeling that maybe it wasn’t all at us anymore. “There was a riot …”
Barbara gasped. I turned and said to her, “Sit down before you fall down please.” I turned to Donnelly, “At least come up on the porch. If you can’t abide me there, I’ll stay down …”
“No!” Barbara said. “We aren’t going to start that nonsense. He can explain it to us both at the same time.”
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
It was like pulling teeth to get him to start and then once he did I had to hold Barbara while she puked in the azaleas. When she finally caught her breath I said, “Well at least the blooms will be pretty come spring time with all the acid they’ve been getting.” She chuckled wetly and let me get her sat in a chair with a blanket over her lap.
I glanced at Donnelly and he was looking at me like I was a puzzle.
“What?”
“You’re taking care of her. And the kids too I bet.”
I wasn’t sure whether to ask him whether he was crazy or just what, but Barbara answered for us both. “Of course she is. Let me guess, someone has run their mouth about that too. Probably some of the same ones that went blabbing to the county saying Sawyer was stealing the kids inheritance but forcing them to eat grass and other stuff like that to starve them to death.”
“I … I don’t know,” he said but I could tell that either that was a lie, or he really didn’t know but suspected.
I was irritated. “For the last time, the Judge in the case is who decided what money went where. Mrs. Penny’s care, God rest her soul, took a good chunk of it. Rissa’s portion was put in a medical trust by the Judge, and we haven’t had anything to do with any of that since then. The only thing I have ever asked of the Chief Inspector was if our mailbox could be moved further to the end of our drive rather than on the county road and the request was denied and I have to make the walk all the way down and across to check on things to see if a letter has come from her residential facility.”
“Has it?”
“Has what?”
“A letter come.”
I sighed. “One came when Sawyer was home last … last month … and they said it was going to be the last one for a while. The facility’s population was being moved out of Atlanta, maybe down to Chattahoochee in Florida or this place called Menninger in Houston, TX. If I let myself think about her too much …” I struggled then shrugged. “They are supposed to let us know and if they don’t in a couple of months Sawyer and I are going to petition the Judge to at least be allowed to know where she’s been moved to even if they don’t let us know what is going on with her treatment. Those were the terms that were agreed to so we could get her the help she needed. But they were keeping us in the loop anyway … mostly ‘cause of some grant that she and Mason were a part of that required at least some family participation so they could have a baseline or something.”
“Oh.” He’d looked at the stars and then jumped like he’d been stung on the butt. “I gotta go.”
“Donnelly,” I said, trying to at least act civilized even if part of me wasn’t feeling it. “Don’t bring us more trouble. Our business is our business. Since all the family seems to have their faces set against, no matter how Uncle Mark and Uncle Ned try to make it seem as they protect us from the truth,” he made a guilty face once again. “We don’t need everyone knowing stuff that they’ll just use against us. Leave us alone. We don’t need more of what people are already treating us to.”
“You don’t want me to carry any of this to the Aunts and others?”
“No.”
“You’re angry. Uncle Mark said you weren’t.”
I snorted. “I love Uncle Mark but his opinion on women’s mental capacity, and female Baffa’s in particular, never has been high. And that might not be his fault. I got treated to some female Baffa myself. Good Lord, no wonder things were in the state they were in when I first come up to the Ridge.” I shook my head. “I don’t know what I am exactly and that is the truth. I don’t know what to call it if it is anything anymore. I don’t have the energy to waste on it. I certainly won’t spend any energy on the stupidity called vengeance. That’d be a bigger waste of time than being angry would be. And I may not have gotten much church before I came to the Ridge but I’ve gotten enough since then to know that God is real doesn’t take kindly to any of it either since all of that is supposed to be His job as the Chief Judge of His creations. I just don’t have any extry to give if people try and add more to what they’ve already done to us.”
“None of the family …”
“Don’t,” I said with finality. “The Aunts and Wives gave it away the day of the big blow up. At least some of them knew that others – in the family or not, but they made it seem like in – had tattled to the county people, and they were protecting their identity rather than letting them be held accountable for it. In turn, that gave the county and their inspection teams an excuse to come up here and get in everyone’s business. They wound up not being able to do anything to us when we passed their infernal pop inspections but not everyone can say that. I’m sure someone has tried to blame us for it, but we weren’t the ones that involved the County. All we wanted to do was to adopt Burt and Jolene so we could stop worrying that the County would take them away from us.” I sighed. “That same week is when they started surveying up here with drones and all the rest of it. Don’t try and convince me otherwise because I’ve been keeping a calendar and other proof. Thank you Jesus, as Aunt Dump used to say, that the Judge finally signed off on the right papers and that I have proof they’ve been filed with the State and got the raised seal and all the rest even if we didn’t have to go swear at the court house.”
“They did? When did that happen?”
“Right after Sawyer and Huely got taken off the Chief Inspector brought the papers like he was doing us some huge favor. Of course he hands them to me in the envelope that had been addressed to Sawyer that someone had already opened and rifled through.”
“They’re getting into your mail?!”
I shook my head and rolled my eyes. “They’re getting into everyone’s mail. Whether it is legal or not. How do you think they know so much about people’s private business? Bank records. Legal records. They’ve pulled civil/criminal checks on everyone … here and in town. They’ve pulled credit checks on everyone too. They want to know what everyone’s assets are and what they might be trying to hide. Or did you think someone has been feeding them gossip that would cover all that?”
“Uh …”
Barbara had another not nice thing to say about his intelligence. I said, “The government has been able to do that all along. At one time they’d allow the courts to tell them no publicly but I hope you aren’t dumb enough to thing that stopped them. But now that they’ve gotten war time powers, not even the courts can pretend to stop them, not even the US Supreme Court that seems to be on their side anyway. Didn’t Gramps warn everyone to keep their business to themselves or did he underestimate what was going to happen too?”
“Uh … mebbe.”
At least he was willing to go that far but I’m pretty sure I don’t want to know why. I added for good measure, “Whoever was out for revenge didn’t just dig two graves, they dug all of our graves up here on the Ridge … and all I can do is try and keep those under this roof from being pushed into the one they’ve tried to dig for us. So, here’s a bargain … you keep your mouth shut on our business and I’ll keep mine shut on Bud being here and not out at the oil fields like everyone is supposed to think he is. I won’t even say anything about Jamison though I don’t know whether he is supposed to have left the area and gone to his wife or not. Deal?”
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
I’m sure he thought I was more than a little disturbed but he shook my hand when I held it out. He had brought word on Sawyer and Huely no matter how thoughtlessly he’d done it.
I’d give a lot for either Harley or Davey to pull this blasted sled, but the two dogs are becoming as tired and lean as the rest of us. I left them sleeping in the kitchen with the others. The fact they didn’t make any noise when Davis and Benedict were in the yard worries me. They are either getting too tired, getting doggie colds, or they’ve gotten too used to the Hartford scent. Makes me wonder exactly how close that Bud and the rest of them have been to the house. Or if they’ve been playing the dogs up. Sawyer isn’t going to be happy that’s for sure.
Wondering about it all I also made a mental list to count the chickens and ducks … the ducks were my own addition. Actually they were Burt’s addition, he just hadn’t known what to do with him. He caught them with a fishing net of all things. Same way he caught some blackbirds. Barbara and I turned the blackbirds into what we joked around and called a Mother Goose Pie. Turns out Barbara says it was a real thing and not just a children’s rhyme.
Sing a song of sixpence,
A pocket full of rye,
Four and twenty blackbirds
Baked in a pie.
When the pie was opened
The birds began to sing—
Wasn't that a dainty dish
To set before the king?
Sigh. The worries just won’t leave me tonight. They are eating at me. From what I learned, I prefer both dogs to stay with Barbara and the kids at the house. They might hesitate if a Hartford comes around, but if even a Hartford scares the three of them, they’ll turn killer and I hope the idiot cousins remaining around here have more sense than to try something. They won’t even hesitate if it is anyone outside Sawyer’s family.
As a way to ignore the newest letters until I could focus on them properly my mind wandered back to what we’d learned from Donnelly.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
“Fine. Be that way. I’ll just be leaving,” he said sounding like a four-year-old throwing an attitude and about to take his ball home.
Quietly Barbara said, “Oh no you won’t.” All three of us heard her taking the safety off the pistol in her apron. “You have news of our husbands. You are going to share that news.”
Donnelly got real surprised … and real pale. “You … you wouldn’t … can’t …”
“Can. And will. If you push me. No one and nothing is going to stand between me and Huely. I’m sure that Kay-Lee feels the same way. You act like you are … or have … thrown us out of the Hartford Clan. You gonna find there is two sides to that decision.”
Realizing that Barbara was close to being way too emotional I said, “Donnelly, she’s pregnant and you’ve threatened her and her child. Speak up before things go any further.”
“I did not!”
Trying to explain to him like he was the one that had gone through the SLD side of the school I said, “Yes, you did. You’ve admitted you know something about Huely … and Sawyer. You know we are alone … and maybe you have had something to do with people making sure we are that way.”
“No!”
“Yes,” I said despite his denial. “Because whether you admit it or not this is a lot like what I’ll just call the Propane Incident. That was started by Jamison. You play at being stupid, but you aren’t, though you do act it when it suits your purpose. Let me put it in simple terms. You are making the choice to follow Bud and Jamison and whoever else has decided they are in charge. A willing choice. Maybe even an eager choice. But put your wife in our position. How would you feel about it? What would be likely to happen to her under these circumstances.”
“No,” this time less vehement and more like he’d started using his head for something other than a place to put his wool cap.
“No what?” I asked.
“No. It ain’t like that. It won’t go that far.”
I sighed. “It already has. There’s already people using this land for their own purposes. A few of them giving off pretty hostile vibes. And don’t deny it. I already caught you hunting here … and you say Cutter was here as well. It would explain why this area is getting hunted over. Has any of that, even a small portion, been left for us that actually own this land? The answer to that is no. Has anyone offered us any help for any reason? No. Not even Tommy thinks to do much more than ask if we need some wood brought up from the pile. And all he did was blink when we had to tell him there isn’t a ‘pile’ because the Harvesters confiscated it.”
“They … they took all your wood?”
“What thieves didn’t take.”
“Thieves?!” this time expressing some outrage.
“Yeah. We had a little bit left after the harvesters were finished and that grew legs and run off one night a couple of months ago. Sawyer and Huely try and cut wood for us when they are here but it kept running out and they aren’t here all that often. And when they are the inspectors refuse to give them permission to cut any trees and the few downed one near the house were hauled off with the wood pile. They also confiscated what was left in the propane tank though there wasn’t much of that. The only wood we can get these days is tree trash. Or do you think I cook out here in the yard, regardless of weather, ‘cause I think it is fun and for entertainment of the inspectors and harvesters to see and make fun of us for. Calling us Goobers. Taking all the domesticated field and orchard crops and not leaving anything. I’m stealing from myself just to get a few falls off the ground in the dead of night and now even that is gone … and they raked what was left up rather than …”
My throat was tightening up and I had to stop to calm myself for a moment.
Donnelly just kept shaking his head like the picture I painted wasn’t aligned with what he thought he knew. Then he said, “That cain’t be the way it is. That’s not what we’ve been told. Y’all are rich. You’ve got the Chief Inspector protecting you. The drones are over here all the time.”
Barbara called him something rude under her breath and while I agreed I ignored it. “Stop listening to people whose best interest it would be for that to be true. We weren’t given any gleaning rows. I didn’t even know there was such a thing until recently. Now you tell me you all are still getting commodity boxes and we haven’t gotten one in a month while you all get them weekly … and why you would think I would get one to begin with I don’t know. They go to pregnant women and children.”
“Old folks and those that are special needs get them too.”
Sarcastically I asked, “And which category do you think I fall into? I’m not old … several years younger than you as a matter of fact,” I said making him blanch. “And I’m not special needs. Yes, I was on the SLD side of the school and won’t ever deny it, but it was only because it got the school more money. I certainly wasn’t made any allowances for it except for it to be harder to find a family in foster care that would take me on for a few weeks at a time. Don’t believe me? Ask Tommy or Linda. Now enough. Just tell what you know about our husbands, and you can escape back to whoever it is that is telling you what to think and how to think it … and when to think at all. You’re obviously more comfortable living that way.”
He looked at me then at Barbara. He was upset and angry but I got the feeling that maybe it wasn’t all at us anymore. “There was a riot …”
Barbara gasped. I turned and said to her, “Sit down before you fall down please.” I turned to Donnelly, “At least come up on the porch. If you can’t abide me there, I’ll stay down …”
“No!” Barbara said. “We aren’t going to start that nonsense. He can explain it to us both at the same time.”
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
It was like pulling teeth to get him to start and then once he did I had to hold Barbara while she puked in the azaleas. When she finally caught her breath I said, “Well at least the blooms will be pretty come spring time with all the acid they’ve been getting.” She chuckled wetly and let me get her sat in a chair with a blanket over her lap.
I glanced at Donnelly and he was looking at me like I was a puzzle.
“What?”
“You’re taking care of her. And the kids too I bet.”
I wasn’t sure whether to ask him whether he was crazy or just what, but Barbara answered for us both. “Of course she is. Let me guess, someone has run their mouth about that too. Probably some of the same ones that went blabbing to the county saying Sawyer was stealing the kids inheritance but forcing them to eat grass and other stuff like that to starve them to death.”
“I … I don’t know,” he said but I could tell that either that was a lie, or he really didn’t know but suspected.
I was irritated. “For the last time, the Judge in the case is who decided what money went where. Mrs. Penny’s care, God rest her soul, took a good chunk of it. Rissa’s portion was put in a medical trust by the Judge, and we haven’t had anything to do with any of that since then. The only thing I have ever asked of the Chief Inspector was if our mailbox could be moved further to the end of our drive rather than on the county road and the request was denied and I have to make the walk all the way down and across to check on things to see if a letter has come from her residential facility.”
“Has it?”
“Has what?”
“A letter come.”
I sighed. “One came when Sawyer was home last … last month … and they said it was going to be the last one for a while. The facility’s population was being moved out of Atlanta, maybe down to Chattahoochee in Florida or this place called Menninger in Houston, TX. If I let myself think about her too much …” I struggled then shrugged. “They are supposed to let us know and if they don’t in a couple of months Sawyer and I are going to petition the Judge to at least be allowed to know where she’s been moved to even if they don’t let us know what is going on with her treatment. Those were the terms that were agreed to so we could get her the help she needed. But they were keeping us in the loop anyway … mostly ‘cause of some grant that she and Mason were a part of that required at least some family participation so they could have a baseline or something.”
“Oh.” He’d looked at the stars and then jumped like he’d been stung on the butt. “I gotta go.”
“Donnelly,” I said, trying to at least act civilized even if part of me wasn’t feeling it. “Don’t bring us more trouble. Our business is our business. Since all the family seems to have their faces set against, no matter how Uncle Mark and Uncle Ned try to make it seem as they protect us from the truth,” he made a guilty face once again. “We don’t need everyone knowing stuff that they’ll just use against us. Leave us alone. We don’t need more of what people are already treating us to.”
“You don’t want me to carry any of this to the Aunts and others?”
“No.”
“You’re angry. Uncle Mark said you weren’t.”
I snorted. “I love Uncle Mark but his opinion on women’s mental capacity, and female Baffa’s in particular, never has been high. And that might not be his fault. I got treated to some female Baffa myself. Good Lord, no wonder things were in the state they were in when I first come up to the Ridge.” I shook my head. “I don’t know what I am exactly and that is the truth. I don’t know what to call it if it is anything anymore. I don’t have the energy to waste on it. I certainly won’t spend any energy on the stupidity called vengeance. That’d be a bigger waste of time than being angry would be. And I may not have gotten much church before I came to the Ridge but I’ve gotten enough since then to know that God is real doesn’t take kindly to any of it either since all of that is supposed to be His job as the Chief Judge of His creations. I just don’t have any extry to give if people try and add more to what they’ve already done to us.”
“None of the family …”
“Don’t,” I said with finality. “The Aunts and Wives gave it away the day of the big blow up. At least some of them knew that others – in the family or not, but they made it seem like in – had tattled to the county people, and they were protecting their identity rather than letting them be held accountable for it. In turn, that gave the county and their inspection teams an excuse to come up here and get in everyone’s business. They wound up not being able to do anything to us when we passed their infernal pop inspections but not everyone can say that. I’m sure someone has tried to blame us for it, but we weren’t the ones that involved the County. All we wanted to do was to adopt Burt and Jolene so we could stop worrying that the County would take them away from us.” I sighed. “That same week is when they started surveying up here with drones and all the rest of it. Don’t try and convince me otherwise because I’ve been keeping a calendar and other proof. Thank you Jesus, as Aunt Dump used to say, that the Judge finally signed off on the right papers and that I have proof they’ve been filed with the State and got the raised seal and all the rest even if we didn’t have to go swear at the court house.”
“They did? When did that happen?”
“Right after Sawyer and Huely got taken off the Chief Inspector brought the papers like he was doing us some huge favor. Of course he hands them to me in the envelope that had been addressed to Sawyer that someone had already opened and rifled through.”
“They’re getting into your mail?!”
I shook my head and rolled my eyes. “They’re getting into everyone’s mail. Whether it is legal or not. How do you think they know so much about people’s private business? Bank records. Legal records. They’ve pulled civil/criminal checks on everyone … here and in town. They’ve pulled credit checks on everyone too. They want to know what everyone’s assets are and what they might be trying to hide. Or did you think someone has been feeding them gossip that would cover all that?”
“Uh …”
Barbara had another not nice thing to say about his intelligence. I said, “The government has been able to do that all along. At one time they’d allow the courts to tell them no publicly but I hope you aren’t dumb enough to thing that stopped them. But now that they’ve gotten war time powers, not even the courts can pretend to stop them, not even the US Supreme Court that seems to be on their side anyway. Didn’t Gramps warn everyone to keep their business to themselves or did he underestimate what was going to happen too?”
“Uh … mebbe.”
At least he was willing to go that far but I’m pretty sure I don’t want to know why. I added for good measure, “Whoever was out for revenge didn’t just dig two graves, they dug all of our graves up here on the Ridge … and all I can do is try and keep those under this roof from being pushed into the one they’ve tried to dig for us. So, here’s a bargain … you keep your mouth shut on our business and I’ll keep mine shut on Bud being here and not out at the oil fields like everyone is supposed to think he is. I won’t even say anything about Jamison though I don’t know whether he is supposed to have left the area and gone to his wife or not. Deal?”
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
I’m sure he thought I was more than a little disturbed but he shook my hand when I held it out. He had brought word on Sawyer and Huely no matter how thoughtlessly he’d done it.
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sssarawolf
Has No Life - Lives on TB
Thank you, great.
Jeepcats27
Senior Member
Whooooaaaa, a lot unsaid!! When are Sawyer and Huely coming home? I can see some so called Hartford blood being shed over greed!!!!!! Thanks for the chapter, Moar please????2 What did he say that had Barbara barfing in the bushes?
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Lake Lili
Veteran Member
There are times when the family tree needs pruning...
Kathy, you wrote "So, here’s a bargain … you keep your mouth shut on our business and I’ll keep mine shut on Burt being here and not out at the oil fields like everyone is supposed to think he is." Should that be Bud and not Burt? - thanks again!
Kathy, you wrote "So, here’s a bargain … you keep your mouth shut on our business and I’ll keep mine shut on Burt being here and not out at the oil fields like everyone is supposed to think he is." Should that be Bud and not Burt? - thanks again!
Old Gray Mare
TB Fanatic
Sounds like someone is spreading the fertilizer wide and deep. It also sounds like that someone has enough pull to control the narrative and isolate and sell out Barbra, Hurley, Key-Lee and Sawyer for "favors".
It is also someone(?) the family wants to believe. The plot thickens!
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Griz3752
Retired, practising Curmudgeon
I think you're on the right track. I also think there might be a nasty end lined up for such a person; just saying.....
Old Gray Mare
TB Fanatic
With Mother Hen's stories you don't know where you're going till you get there.
Is it when or if?
Chapter 112 said:
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Sammy55
Veteran Member
Thanks! And the plot thickens!
I, too, would like to know what he said about the riots.... Whatever he said that had Barbara puking in the bushes.
I notice as I read that all of this could very well be what's coming towards us. The government getting into all of our business, taking on war powers, taking anything and everything they want from people, conducting surprise inspections, etc. Makes me worry about what may be coming up for all of us. Lots to think about.
I, too, would like to know what he said about the riots.... Whatever he said that had Barbara puking in the bushes.
I notice as I read that all of this could very well be what's coming towards us. The government getting into all of our business, taking on war powers, taking anything and everything they want from people, conducting surprise inspections, etc. Makes me worry about what may be coming up for all of us. Lots to think about.
Griz3752
Retired, practising Curmudgeon
Yeah picked up on that a while ago; like the 2nd piece of hers I read
Chapter 114
I had raked up the last of the walnuts and put them on the sled. I saw a stand of red sumac drupes in the moonlight and started cutting them and putting them in a cheesecloth bag I bring along just in case I find something like that.
Someone cleared their throat, but I recognized the sound having listened to it almost every morning as he announced he was coming into the kitchen for breakfast for nearly a month.
“Uncle Ned?! Everything okay?” I asked, more than a little worried to find him out and about this late at night.
“Was about to ask you the same thing Baby Girl.”
I realized something. “You followed the boys over here. Does Uncle Mark know?”
He snorted. “He’s the one that asked me to. He wanted Davis to have someone to cover his back … just in case. Take it you ain’t seen Mark’s letter yet.”
“I have it in my pocket,” I said, trying to take that awful look off his face.
Uncle Ned seemed to relax. “So they did deliver it. And the boxes?”
“And the boxes and two other letters. Were you worried if they would?”
“Not Davis.” He sighed. “Not really Benedict either, not after his father fell on him like a three-story river rock fireplace. But, better safe than sorry. Couldn’t tell for sure and then when Little Burt acted as he did ...”
“If you were that close you should have come to the house. I would have warmed you up some green broth if nothing else.”
He chuckled and pulled out a insulated flask from his pocket. “This ain’t holdin’ ‘shine Baby Girl. Got me and Forrester fixed up with our own broth after hearing from Thomas it was your habit to offer him some when he come by.” The smiled drooped and he said, “Don’t rest your head until you read the letter. Important stuff.”
“It have to do with Sawyer’s family?” I asked trying not to sound stiff.
“Mark’s right. You Baffa whether you know it or not. But you listen here … you’s also claimed by the Hartfords. Uh uh, get that look off your face and try and get it out of your heart sooner rather than later. Some might have made mistakes but they’s coming to know it. Might have been the hard way but they’s coming along. And Sawyer will set the rest to rights when he gets ta home. And they’ll listen if they got any sense a tall. And if they don’t have any sense maybe they are the ones that need to be cut out. You still have faith on that.”
“Faith is about all that holds me up these days. How’s Brother Don?” I asked to change the subject from what he wanted from me and what I don’t know if I’m capable of giving … now or later.
He let me do it and answered, “Fair to middlin’, about like the rest of us. He still won’t talk, and the man has a right to privacy. Hopefully people will leave him alone about it and stop makin’ it eat at him.”
“Well if you do see him, or have reason to send him a message, let him know from me to him … what he taught from the pulpit helps me to get through the day. Every day. And I’m thankful for him and what he freely gave even though I’m not from around here and didn’t have much teaching on the subject of God before Sawyer started to take me to his church. Maybe it will mean something to him. Maybe not. But either way it is the truth.”
Uncle Ned nodded then pointed to the tree and I blinked to see a large buck strung up and field dress and already drained out.
“You got a fine one,” I told him.
“Uh huh. And I want you to take it home and do with it what you can. It’s ready for it.”
“But …”
He sniffed and scratched his nose and wouldn’t look at me directly. “I was never inclined to marry. The one girl I had thought about it with died when we were still ta school age. She made the mistake of getting into a car with her brother and his friends who’d been drinking and she never made it home that night. And I ain’t had no kids either. And didn’t think I’d have any. But along comes this Little Girl that is as rode hard and hung up wet as I am and … and maybe God done give me something in my old age I didn’t do the work for in my younger years. And I says it’s a fine thing to have someone you can leave your knowing to. You’re doing me proud. And Forrester thinks it is a fine thing that you and Sawyer are taking care of Huely and his bride. And that they’ve both finally gotten rid of whatever was ridin’ them even if it happened the hard way. You tell Barbara he prays over her and Huely both every mornin’ during his quiet time and at night before he lays his head down. And no you don’t, don’t you go bawling. I didn’t mean to cause it. Just figured that we aren’t promised tomorry and I’d rather say the words in person than have to leave ‘em in some letter that might not get delivered. Tell Barbara the same thing from Forrester. He wants to come see her but … he just ain’t able to Honey.”
“Is … is he getting worse?”
“Oh, as to that, on the one hand he is some better but things are what they are and no one knows the time or day we meet our Judgment. Just better to have it said before it might not be heard as the truth.”
Both of us sensed it at the same time and Uncle Ned went to protect me.
A young voice in the dark said in a whisper, “Don’t freak out. This is for the lady. Dad said to tell her that the one called Bud got caught at one of his sleeping spots and took off by the National Guard. And I’ll tell you mister from me since you helped Dad when he got treed by that bear. If you got any connected to that Bud that he could tell a story on, you better hide ‘em. They took him to the place that they interrogate people at. He might tell them things if they promise to release him.”
We both heard the boy leaving quickly and Uncle Ned asked, “I can guess but you know who that is?”
“I think it was a boy that … well he ate a couple of pokeberries and his father didn’t know how to help him. It was the middle of the night and not too far from here.”
“His father musta been a man that got treed I run up on a couple months ago. Tell me you ain’t making friends with them types,” he asked in concern. “They from that land that ajoins the old Penny place.”
“I can’t tell one type from the other out here in the dark, they don’t exactly wear light up badges explaining what side they are on, so I ignore them all and would have ignored him then if my conscience would have let me. The ones I can see in the daylight I’m no fonder of as they have strings that run back to the Chief Inspector who I’m beginning to think is more of an enemy than even I counted him to be, and maybe not nearly so stupid either.”
“Just read Mark’s letter and pay heed to it. I need to get back, specially if there are patrols in the area.”
I told him, “They stick close to the roads. Seems stories of spooks and hobgoblins have them careful for some reason. Burt and I haven’t seen any sign of the military on this acreage.”
“But you’ve seen sign of something?”
“Once I knew what I should be looking for and what my feelings meant I found a few … we’ll call them hidey holes … which I dismantled and disposed of what was in them. It didn’t take who ever it was long to learn not to do it anymore. Fish and turtle guts and cranky snakes make pretty good stay off the grass signs.”
He pursed his lips but I could tell he was fighting a grin. “I’d hep you get home if I could Honey. Let me get this meat down at least.”
After the meat was wrapped in a sheet and loaded onto my skiff I told him gratefully, “Go. You heard the Little Troll.” At Uncle Ned’s raised eyebrows I explained, “That’s what he looked like in his get up that night of the pokeberries. It has been easier just to think of him in my mind like that since then, rather than be too curious about any other kind of identity.”
Uncle Ned faded away and I decided my foraging was over for the night except for that clump of chickweed I’d already marked off. I still had a lot to think on.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
“Don’t cry Barbara or you’re going to get me to crying. And I don’t cry pretty. I’ll put the chickens off laying.”
She chuckled to a stop. “You’re just awful. You know that?”
I grinned. “Maybe so. And maybe it is just a relief. They’re alive and they’re together.”
“And being beat on. Huely …” She looked green and I made her sit down.
“Huely is tough. He can take a lot.”
“I don’t WANT him to have to take anything at all.”
“Well maybe taking it isn’t what I meant. Sounds like he and Sawyer both dished out a bunch and came out on top even with it being a bunch to one. They protected the big truck they were driving. Enough to make those that took them consider them to be on ‘protected asset’ status.”
“Whatever that means,” she responded going from crying to angry in a single breath.
“It means that they’ve got some protection. That they’re wanted for a good reason. Whether they can appreciate that protection or not is another story. But maybe they’ll get fed better … or at least not have to sleep in shifts so much. You know how they were when they were home last. Sawyer was having dreams of being back in prison. He said if Huely wasn’t there he’s not sure he could take it. He’s not sleeping well.”
“Huely isn’t either. Said almost the same thing about having Sawyer there.” She gave a quiet moan. “I can’t stand to see him like this. I can’t stand not seeing him either. What are we doing to do?!”
In all honesty I gave the only answer that I could. “Keep ourselves busy until an opportunity presents itself.”
“What could that be?”
“I … I don’t know. But …”
“Kay-Lee?” she asked knowing me well enough to get suspicious.
“The Chief Inspector is doing this on purpose. With a purpose. I’m not sure why, have little proof it is even true but I know it is. If he realizes we’ve gotten his number, I’m … I’m concerned he could do something worse than just keeping them on the work crews.”
“Is he even still in control if they’ve been taken on by the Feds?”
“That is a concerning question. I … want to believe Donnelly but …”
“I’m with you. How about we believe him until we have better information?”
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
And the confirmation had come from none other than the Chief Inspector’s clerk. The Chief Inspector had been ill … guess he’d finally “tested” something that didn’t agree with him … and had sent his clerk out with a driver to pick up several crates of things left for him by the harvesting crew.
I’d been keeping tabs on him because he wasn’t much older than me and liked to try and pose and get my attention. Similar to Cindy’s brother Clay but at the same time, not quite that bad. He was just a little excessively friendly when the CI wasn’t right on top of him. I copped to their play, as one of my old foster parents used to say. The CI was … maybe encouraging is a little strong a word for it … but bottom line he was encouraging the guy to treat me nice in a regular sort of way. I never took advantage of it and knew how to head it off and since he never took it too far I didn’t have to do much in the way of anything that might hurt his pride.
I thought he was doing the same thing that day. He had his tablet set up and open for anyone in the world to see until I realized it was me he was wanting to see it. But I was neither biting nor accepting what was getting too obvious.
He finally whispered, “Look at the screen.”
“No. It’s against the rules. You won’t catch me breaking them either so stop trying.”
He rolled his eyes and I saw him take a good look at the guy that was loading the crates. He said, “Geez, he’s got you figured.” Huffing, he went over and told the man to load some of the other crates first so it would be easier to unload. Then he walked back to me. “Look, this isn’t anything that the CI is doing. I just owe you and I pay what I owe. I’m being re-deployed back to Baltimore tomorrow and it was making me uncomfortable. If not for you, I would have been triaged and probably lost the finger. You cleaned it out and splinted it. I owe you for that.”
“I didn’t do it to get owed.”
“I know. You’re crazy but that only makes me owe you more.”
“Now who is crazy.”
He shrugged. “My mom would say me, but here goes. Look, I was able to find out your husband and hers are okay. But they’ve been requisitioned by the Feds. It is like a civilian draft.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means they aren’t volunteers anymore. And the CI can’t … look, just watch out for any paperwork he tries to get you to sign. Read it well. Especially any addendums that might be attached. But the CI might get reassigned. He T’d off the DC delegation that was here and it … look, I can’t say anything more about that and you better not ask any questions to let you know you have him figured out.”
“I don’t know what you are talking about.”
“Suuure you don’t. And you just keep on not knowing. It’s safer that way.”
When I had told Barbara she’d gotten green and puked from the bushes for the leventy-dozenth time.
“I shouldn’t have said anything,” I told her while handing her a wet rag for her face.
“Oh we aren’t even going there. You won’t hide nothing from me,” she told me sounding like she was daring with with an “or else” attached to it.
“I’m not going to lie to you but …”
“No. Buts. We’re in this together.”
And so it was agreed. I still worry about her getting so stressed out and it is another situation like Delly. If I have to say something scares me, that’s really it. I can and will do what I can to help physically but I don’t know if I can really do much else. And I can understand it when she said it is the not-knowing that is worse than knowing.
And gosh, Uncle Ned blessed me with the deer but how on earth am I supposed to get it all taken care of before it ruins? And the chickweed and all the rest? I was hoping to let everyone sleep but I need their help, even Burt’s.
I had raked up the last of the walnuts and put them on the sled. I saw a stand of red sumac drupes in the moonlight and started cutting them and putting them in a cheesecloth bag I bring along just in case I find something like that.
Someone cleared their throat, but I recognized the sound having listened to it almost every morning as he announced he was coming into the kitchen for breakfast for nearly a month.
“Uncle Ned?! Everything okay?” I asked, more than a little worried to find him out and about this late at night.
“Was about to ask you the same thing Baby Girl.”
I realized something. “You followed the boys over here. Does Uncle Mark know?”
He snorted. “He’s the one that asked me to. He wanted Davis to have someone to cover his back … just in case. Take it you ain’t seen Mark’s letter yet.”
“I have it in my pocket,” I said, trying to take that awful look off his face.
Uncle Ned seemed to relax. “So they did deliver it. And the boxes?”
“And the boxes and two other letters. Were you worried if they would?”
“Not Davis.” He sighed. “Not really Benedict either, not after his father fell on him like a three-story river rock fireplace. But, better safe than sorry. Couldn’t tell for sure and then when Little Burt acted as he did ...”
“If you were that close you should have come to the house. I would have warmed you up some green broth if nothing else.”
He chuckled and pulled out a insulated flask from his pocket. “This ain’t holdin’ ‘shine Baby Girl. Got me and Forrester fixed up with our own broth after hearing from Thomas it was your habit to offer him some when he come by.” The smiled drooped and he said, “Don’t rest your head until you read the letter. Important stuff.”
“It have to do with Sawyer’s family?” I asked trying not to sound stiff.
“Mark’s right. You Baffa whether you know it or not. But you listen here … you’s also claimed by the Hartfords. Uh uh, get that look off your face and try and get it out of your heart sooner rather than later. Some might have made mistakes but they’s coming to know it. Might have been the hard way but they’s coming along. And Sawyer will set the rest to rights when he gets ta home. And they’ll listen if they got any sense a tall. And if they don’t have any sense maybe they are the ones that need to be cut out. You still have faith on that.”
“Faith is about all that holds me up these days. How’s Brother Don?” I asked to change the subject from what he wanted from me and what I don’t know if I’m capable of giving … now or later.
He let me do it and answered, “Fair to middlin’, about like the rest of us. He still won’t talk, and the man has a right to privacy. Hopefully people will leave him alone about it and stop makin’ it eat at him.”
“Well if you do see him, or have reason to send him a message, let him know from me to him … what he taught from the pulpit helps me to get through the day. Every day. And I’m thankful for him and what he freely gave even though I’m not from around here and didn’t have much teaching on the subject of God before Sawyer started to take me to his church. Maybe it will mean something to him. Maybe not. But either way it is the truth.”
Uncle Ned nodded then pointed to the tree and I blinked to see a large buck strung up and field dress and already drained out.
“You got a fine one,” I told him.
“Uh huh. And I want you to take it home and do with it what you can. It’s ready for it.”
“But …”
He sniffed and scratched his nose and wouldn’t look at me directly. “I was never inclined to marry. The one girl I had thought about it with died when we were still ta school age. She made the mistake of getting into a car with her brother and his friends who’d been drinking and she never made it home that night. And I ain’t had no kids either. And didn’t think I’d have any. But along comes this Little Girl that is as rode hard and hung up wet as I am and … and maybe God done give me something in my old age I didn’t do the work for in my younger years. And I says it’s a fine thing to have someone you can leave your knowing to. You’re doing me proud. And Forrester thinks it is a fine thing that you and Sawyer are taking care of Huely and his bride. And that they’ve both finally gotten rid of whatever was ridin’ them even if it happened the hard way. You tell Barbara he prays over her and Huely both every mornin’ during his quiet time and at night before he lays his head down. And no you don’t, don’t you go bawling. I didn’t mean to cause it. Just figured that we aren’t promised tomorry and I’d rather say the words in person than have to leave ‘em in some letter that might not get delivered. Tell Barbara the same thing from Forrester. He wants to come see her but … he just ain’t able to Honey.”
“Is … is he getting worse?”
“Oh, as to that, on the one hand he is some better but things are what they are and no one knows the time or day we meet our Judgment. Just better to have it said before it might not be heard as the truth.”
Both of us sensed it at the same time and Uncle Ned went to protect me.
A young voice in the dark said in a whisper, “Don’t freak out. This is for the lady. Dad said to tell her that the one called Bud got caught at one of his sleeping spots and took off by the National Guard. And I’ll tell you mister from me since you helped Dad when he got treed by that bear. If you got any connected to that Bud that he could tell a story on, you better hide ‘em. They took him to the place that they interrogate people at. He might tell them things if they promise to release him.”
We both heard the boy leaving quickly and Uncle Ned asked, “I can guess but you know who that is?”
“I think it was a boy that … well he ate a couple of pokeberries and his father didn’t know how to help him. It was the middle of the night and not too far from here.”
“His father musta been a man that got treed I run up on a couple months ago. Tell me you ain’t making friends with them types,” he asked in concern. “They from that land that ajoins the old Penny place.”
“I can’t tell one type from the other out here in the dark, they don’t exactly wear light up badges explaining what side they are on, so I ignore them all and would have ignored him then if my conscience would have let me. The ones I can see in the daylight I’m no fonder of as they have strings that run back to the Chief Inspector who I’m beginning to think is more of an enemy than even I counted him to be, and maybe not nearly so stupid either.”
“Just read Mark’s letter and pay heed to it. I need to get back, specially if there are patrols in the area.”
I told him, “They stick close to the roads. Seems stories of spooks and hobgoblins have them careful for some reason. Burt and I haven’t seen any sign of the military on this acreage.”
“But you’ve seen sign of something?”
“Once I knew what I should be looking for and what my feelings meant I found a few … we’ll call them hidey holes … which I dismantled and disposed of what was in them. It didn’t take who ever it was long to learn not to do it anymore. Fish and turtle guts and cranky snakes make pretty good stay off the grass signs.”
He pursed his lips but I could tell he was fighting a grin. “I’d hep you get home if I could Honey. Let me get this meat down at least.”
After the meat was wrapped in a sheet and loaded onto my skiff I told him gratefully, “Go. You heard the Little Troll.” At Uncle Ned’s raised eyebrows I explained, “That’s what he looked like in his get up that night of the pokeberries. It has been easier just to think of him in my mind like that since then, rather than be too curious about any other kind of identity.”
Uncle Ned faded away and I decided my foraging was over for the night except for that clump of chickweed I’d already marked off. I still had a lot to think on.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
“Don’t cry Barbara or you’re going to get me to crying. And I don’t cry pretty. I’ll put the chickens off laying.”
She chuckled to a stop. “You’re just awful. You know that?”
I grinned. “Maybe so. And maybe it is just a relief. They’re alive and they’re together.”
“And being beat on. Huely …” She looked green and I made her sit down.
“Huely is tough. He can take a lot.”
“I don’t WANT him to have to take anything at all.”
“Well maybe taking it isn’t what I meant. Sounds like he and Sawyer both dished out a bunch and came out on top even with it being a bunch to one. They protected the big truck they were driving. Enough to make those that took them consider them to be on ‘protected asset’ status.”
“Whatever that means,” she responded going from crying to angry in a single breath.
“It means that they’ve got some protection. That they’re wanted for a good reason. Whether they can appreciate that protection or not is another story. But maybe they’ll get fed better … or at least not have to sleep in shifts so much. You know how they were when they were home last. Sawyer was having dreams of being back in prison. He said if Huely wasn’t there he’s not sure he could take it. He’s not sleeping well.”
“Huely isn’t either. Said almost the same thing about having Sawyer there.” She gave a quiet moan. “I can’t stand to see him like this. I can’t stand not seeing him either. What are we doing to do?!”
In all honesty I gave the only answer that I could. “Keep ourselves busy until an opportunity presents itself.”
“What could that be?”
“I … I don’t know. But …”
“Kay-Lee?” she asked knowing me well enough to get suspicious.
“The Chief Inspector is doing this on purpose. With a purpose. I’m not sure why, have little proof it is even true but I know it is. If he realizes we’ve gotten his number, I’m … I’m concerned he could do something worse than just keeping them on the work crews.”
“Is he even still in control if they’ve been taken on by the Feds?”
“That is a concerning question. I … want to believe Donnelly but …”
“I’m with you. How about we believe him until we have better information?”
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
And the confirmation had come from none other than the Chief Inspector’s clerk. The Chief Inspector had been ill … guess he’d finally “tested” something that didn’t agree with him … and had sent his clerk out with a driver to pick up several crates of things left for him by the harvesting crew.
I’d been keeping tabs on him because he wasn’t much older than me and liked to try and pose and get my attention. Similar to Cindy’s brother Clay but at the same time, not quite that bad. He was just a little excessively friendly when the CI wasn’t right on top of him. I copped to their play, as one of my old foster parents used to say. The CI was … maybe encouraging is a little strong a word for it … but bottom line he was encouraging the guy to treat me nice in a regular sort of way. I never took advantage of it and knew how to head it off and since he never took it too far I didn’t have to do much in the way of anything that might hurt his pride.
I thought he was doing the same thing that day. He had his tablet set up and open for anyone in the world to see until I realized it was me he was wanting to see it. But I was neither biting nor accepting what was getting too obvious.
He finally whispered, “Look at the screen.”
“No. It’s against the rules. You won’t catch me breaking them either so stop trying.”
He rolled his eyes and I saw him take a good look at the guy that was loading the crates. He said, “Geez, he’s got you figured.” Huffing, he went over and told the man to load some of the other crates first so it would be easier to unload. Then he walked back to me. “Look, this isn’t anything that the CI is doing. I just owe you and I pay what I owe. I’m being re-deployed back to Baltimore tomorrow and it was making me uncomfortable. If not for you, I would have been triaged and probably lost the finger. You cleaned it out and splinted it. I owe you for that.”
“I didn’t do it to get owed.”
“I know. You’re crazy but that only makes me owe you more.”
“Now who is crazy.”
He shrugged. “My mom would say me, but here goes. Look, I was able to find out your husband and hers are okay. But they’ve been requisitioned by the Feds. It is like a civilian draft.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means they aren’t volunteers anymore. And the CI can’t … look, just watch out for any paperwork he tries to get you to sign. Read it well. Especially any addendums that might be attached. But the CI might get reassigned. He T’d off the DC delegation that was here and it … look, I can’t say anything more about that and you better not ask any questions to let you know you have him figured out.”
“I don’t know what you are talking about.”
“Suuure you don’t. And you just keep on not knowing. It’s safer that way.”
When I had told Barbara she’d gotten green and puked from the bushes for the leventy-dozenth time.
“I shouldn’t have said anything,” I told her while handing her a wet rag for her face.
“Oh we aren’t even going there. You won’t hide nothing from me,” she told me sounding like she was daring with with an “or else” attached to it.
“I’m not going to lie to you but …”
“No. Buts. We’re in this together.”
And so it was agreed. I still worry about her getting so stressed out and it is another situation like Delly. If I have to say something scares me, that’s really it. I can and will do what I can to help physically but I don’t know if I can really do much else. And I can understand it when she said it is the not-knowing that is worse than knowing.
And gosh, Uncle Ned blessed me with the deer but how on earth am I supposed to get it all taken care of before it ruins? And the chickweed and all the rest? I was hoping to let everyone sleep but I need their help, even Burt’s.
Yes it should. Let me fix it.
Jeepcats27
Senior Member
Thank you for another great chapter!!! Things are heating up. Glad Uncle Ned is helping. Just worried about Bud causing problems!
Sammy55
Veteran Member
Super!! And thanks!!
I worry about the uncles...well, the "good" uncles, I guess. And I worry about Bud and his mouth.
Please send another chapter so my worries go away. There's enough going on in the world that I shouldn't be worrying about these people in this story who, by the way, are so lifelike and in a story too scaringly lifelike to the times we now live in. Have pity on my worries, dear Kathy.
I worry about the uncles...well, the "good" uncles, I guess. And I worry about Bud and his mouth.
Please send another chapter so my worries go away. There's enough going on in the world that I shouldn't be worrying about these people in this story who, by the way, are so lifelike and in a story too scaringly lifelike to the times we now live in. Have pity on my worries, dear Kathy.