“Yes, everyone here is a part of our group. And thank you for your hospitality.”
“Ah, it’s nothing. My wife—you know, the girl I was dating my senior year—is an up-and-coming chef. She had two cookbooks on Amazon and was picked to be on one of those reality cooking shows. You know the one. Anyway, she loves people and living in a town of less than 600, I’m sure she would love the company while I check on the big guy. And our little girl, Izabella, loves new friends but doesn’t meet too many around here. How many pounds is your dog, anyway?”
“154,” I said, ready to get past the small talk. “Can we take him to your place now?” I asked, not worrying if I was direct.
“Oh yes, sure. Right this way.”
* * * *
He directed us to a side road before the barricade, where he stopped briefly to talk with the men guarding it. We drove slowly down a curved mountain dirt road, due to the steep grade, towards a lush valley below.
“Wow!” said Jake. “I’ve never been up here. It’s beautiful country.”
“Yes, that is true,” said Vlad, smiling. “The kind of country where an old Russian might start over, maybe even raise a family, no?”
“Maybe so,” I said, petting Ringo. “Almost there, buddy,” I whispered in his ear. “Hold on.”
The farm was small but efficient, sitting next to a picturesque stream where a trout would come to the surface of a pool after an insect every few minutes.
“Make yourself at home,” Carl said, as we got Ringo off the truck.
He caught me watching the fish in the deeper holes.
“Yeah, there are a few big ones in there,” he said. “You all can fish it if you want while I take a look at this big guy.”
“Yes, Daddy!” said my boys. “Let’s catch a lot of fish!”
“We’ll talk about it in a minute, guys,” I told them, feeling bad I would have to break up their excitement but not wanting to miss a teaching opportunity. “Come on over, boys,” I said, once Ringo was inside. We walked to the edge of the river with them all asking to go get their poles. “Okay,” I said, getting on one knee. “Is this a big or small creek?”
“Kind of small,” replied Hudson.
“Yes, son, that’s right. And there are only so many fish in a small creek. When I was a boy of maybe 12 years old, my friends and I would start up the river and follow it down as it wound its way through several farmers’ properties. We pulled trout out of the fishing holes on their property, and in return they would shoot at us with shotguns!”
“Did you die?” asked Jax.
“Well, no. They used something called rock salt that would leave a good bruise if you got hit.”
“That wasn’t very nice of them,” added Hudson.
“Maybe so, but we were the ones on their properties, taking home fish that didn’t belong to us. It means more even now up here, because the folks living around here can’t just go to the grocery store to buy food anymore. This, what’s close by, is what they have to live on. These fish here will provide food for the people who live here—maybe tomorrow or months from now, but it will happen, I’m sure of that. We have freezers full of fish already, so we will play a fun game instead. Everyone tries to catch a grasshopper. We will have a contest when we throw them into the creek, and whoever’s grasshopper gets hit by the biggest fish wins.”
“What are you saying, Daddy?” asked Jax. “We can’t go fishing?”
“Yes, son, not here is what I’m telling you.”
“We’ll just throw them back in, and they can stay alive,” said Hendrix.
“That’s a good plan, my little man, but not every fish returned to the water stays alive. Sometimes they get hooked wrong or just get too tired from the fight to swim again. These people here need to fish this creek, not us.”
“Awe,” they all said.
“Don’t look,” I said, pointing across to the house. “That’s Izabella over there, and she could maybe use some playmates. Wait! I said don’t look!”
Too late, they were full speed towards the tire swing, something no young boy can pass up.
“Y’all got lucky this time,” I said in my best exaggerated Texas drawl, adding, “there’s some fishermen in that bunch!”
“Talking to fish, huh?” said Mike, putting his hand on my shoulder. I probably would have jumped a week or even a few days ago, but I was getting used to him appearing out of nowhere.
“You going fishing?” I asked, seeing him with a pole and hearing Javi calling, “Wait up, Daddy!”
“Well, I was until I overheard your little speech to the boys—you’re right, and now I’m not. Go play with the boys on the tire swing, Javi,” he said. “I’ll be over in a few.”
* * * *
We both sat down, facing the river, Mike and me.
“Thanks, man, for what you did,” I told him.
“Ringo is a part of the family,” Mike replied. “And besides, those other things were not dogs anymore—they were killers.”
“I appreciate that too, but I meant back at the lake. You took a village of people with no hope and turned them into, I don’t know, a village of promise, at least. Does that make any sense?”
“Yeah, I don’t know what will happen, but they are on a level playing field, at least.”
“What are you going to do when we get to Saddle Ranch?” I asked.
“What do you mean?”
“Out here on the open road, there is always something to watch out for or fix. Won’t you be bored there?”
Mike smiled. “I keep hearing that,” he said. “The short answer, I guess, is there is always someone who could use some help, and from what I’ve seen so far there is no shortage of A-holes, pre- or post-apocalypse.”
“That’s the short answer, huh?” I asked.
“Yes, the longer one is what I came over
