February 25, 2011
~*~ MD ~*~
Merle studies the walls in the council room. Carol's idea to turn the walls into corkboard to hold the various information needed is a good one. One wall is nothing but a crop calendar now, with each month sectioned off with colorful tape. Index cards with crops, location, amounts, and estimated production are littered among the oversized calendar. It'll make it easier to plan for extra help on the farm areas, as well as redirecting workers for kitchen staff when crops need to be canned, freeze dried, or otherwise stored.
The winter, despite the snowstorm, never turned bitterly cold like it can some years. They kept several winter crops going in various stages of experimental, between open fields, hoop houses, and greenhouse growth.
Hershel laughs softly. "Easier back when it was just a family or two to plan for, wasn't it?" The older man is the first to arrive for the council meeting after Merle.
"Yeah. Hell, I could probably keep my family and yours going for a few years without growing a thing, based on just what I had stored up in the shelter below the house." Merle knows most of the people aware of the expanded, secure section of his basement think it's just food storage, not a fully-fledged bomb shelter. He built it as an experiment, because he had some work contracted where people were asking for safe rooms and such, but considering what happened to the world? He's glad it's there.
"Lenore's really happy with the crop progress out there right now. Says everything's aligning just right for a good harvest of the cool weather crops."
The official time past first frost isn't until March, based on those Old Farmer's Almanacs the farm folks and Carol keep perusing, but his crew has the materials put aside to put in emergency hoop houses if the farming estimate that frost isn't really a danger this year proves false. The soil temperatures definitely supported early planting.
He can already see the wheels turning for Carol's work schedules thanks to Lenore's careful notes of such things like 'peas, expect 5,000 pounds per acre' or 'broccoli, expect 8,000 pounds per acre'. It sounds like a massive number, until you realize they're feeding two hundred people and it takes about forty or fifty pounds of peas or broccoli for a single meal as a side dish. Since there's ten acres planted of English, snap, and snow peas right now and five of broccoli, it's a good thing those crops harvest as others need to go in the ground next month.
"She still wanting to move back to her place come early summer?"
"The security is less, obviously, but she thinks it might be more convenient for everyone to at least have the house back up and running to do meals down there instead of coming back up here for lunch, or even supper on a day with a lot of work needed."
"Extra property gives a little more of a buffer, I suppose. And watch can certainly rouse anyone down there as quickly as they can here. She'll need to practice evacuation though, worst case scenario stuff. Scout'll crawl the walls otherwise."
"Maggie too." Hershel looks thoughtful. "She's invited me to live there, but I don't want to uproot Beth and Patricia and the kids."
Merle turns to look directly at Hershel. "You know they're all welcome to stay with us for as long as they want to, Hershel. You're all family. I wouldn't be alive to be offering without you looking after me back in Atlanta."
The older man waves that off, as he always does. "I'm sure your daughter would have cobbled it together, especially with Lilly to help her."
"Difference is, she didn't have to, because you were there to guide her. That's not a debt that can be repaid."
"All things considered, Merle, I'm just especially grateful that my family will never be alone should something happen to me. I'm not exactly a young man anymore."
The potential mortality of his friend isn't something Merle wants to consider, although he knows it's always a possibility they could lose men like Hershel, Dale, or Arthur Eldridge unexpectedly early. Dale's already being monitored for a heart condition no one's entirely certain they can treat in the long-term, without any cardiologists at hand.
"That's a sentiment that goes both ways," is what he settles on finally.
Hershel just gives him one of those knowing smiles before reaching for his notes as the others start arriving. Tyreese is freshly showered, as he led the crew laying in a new warehouse next to the biofuel building. They've got enough of a crew between them now to split up tasks more, so Merle led a smaller team to continue laying fence along the river's edge to the east on the new expansion.
With twenty-five of the Eldridges' forty acres currently available for crops, they'll be okay, but he's glad of the expansion area bringing another two hundred plus acres potentially under farming and eventual settlement. The new area isn't fully fenced yet, but he's reasonably certain that the Etowah will keep the walkers out, at least until they finish. He won't risk a drought dropping the river low enough those dead bastards might cross.
Patricia and Carol enter together, not an unusual sight since the blonde has been returning to work after her maternity leave. Matty's not with her today, but he imagines the little fellow is off with Beth or one of Patricia's older kids. His wife brushes a kiss across his lips in greeting, settling into the chair near the one he isn't sitting in yet that has his own notes.
That leaves Scout and Shane, who show up looking half-grubby but washed up enough for the meeting. He knows they were working on Glenn's cabin today as a little surprise to the younger man, since their off-days and Glenn never really align.
With everyone here, Merle takes a seat himself, smiling as Patricia opens her notebook to start the meeting. He missed her no-nonsense approach these last few months.
"I know we've had some requests for the school that have been very nicely fulfilled and set as lessons for the kids to boot," she begins, "but we think it'll expand on what we're teaching with the garden and the fruit trees on the playground if we also add a greenhouse."
The school teachers requested a garden area to teach the kids about the process. It was a simple enough job, so much so that Merle turned it over to Sophia and a few helpers to put in fencing next to the school house's playground and to teach the kids to build raised beds to make it easier to learn about enriching the soil. His youngest daughter damn near glowed at being put in charge of that project and her own miniature work crew.
Now the kids have peas, broccoli, onions, and potatoes planted outdoors, with seeds started inside the warm school house for peppers, tomatoes, eggplants, and okra. It'll be years before there's fruit, but Patricia expanded the idea of learning about food growth by planting a pair of plum trees on the playground.
"Well, we've got an acre reserved for the school and any expansion." Merle mulls it over, picturing the site in his head. No one was considering any builds that close and he doesn't expect to have more than the forty or fifty kids the school can currently handle anytime soon. "Plenty of room for a greenhouse and still leave space to double the school's size later if we need to."
"If you think it's a viable suggestion, I would like to request it be another teenager-led project. It really benefits the kids to see the teens at work, and a greenhouse isn't so complicated that it really needs an adult work crew."
Merle looks to Carol, since she's most familiar with where the teens are needed right now. She flips into her notebook and assesses for a minute.
"Need more than just Sophia and Al for a project like that," she suggests. Having just the two younger teens putting in fencing and building raised beds with the kids' help was easy enough, especially since the fencing is that assembly stuff like they're using around the cabins to form small play yards for children. "Could you spare Noah for a few days? I can reshuffle the teens a bit, taking the ones normally sent to your crew. Noah's got the experience to oversee it. If they start Monday, that'll give him Jimmy and Miguel the first day, Carl and Sophia the next, and if they aren't finished in two days, Jazz and Ron to finish it off."
The big greenhouses, the ones meant for large-scale production, usually took close to a week, but he doesn't think a school-sized one will take that long. He nods. "Good experience for Noah. I'll allot the supplies and have Sophia and Jimmy bring them up as part of their shift tomorrow."
That settled, they turn back to Patricia. "This one's less the school's needs and more a motherly one. Jimmy's been working heavily with the building crew lately and he's decided that's what he wants when he has his birthday next month. Can you take on another apprentice?"
Tyreese exchanges a look with Merle and nods. "He's a hard worker with a good head on his shoulder when girls aren't around, might even be a really good match for apprenticing to Henry first," Tyreese says. "And we could definitely use someone with full training there, instead of the patchwork training you and me and a couple others have with the plumbing."
"We'll talk it over with him tomorrow, Patricia, as far as exact details on him apprenticing, but he can be noted as official on it if that's what he wants. No need to wait for his birthday, if Carol can spare him off her rosters."
His wife consults her notebook. "He's already with the builders three days a week, so I'll find a substitute for the day he does his rotation with the farm animals and we can do without an extra on supper duty if we have to, although he's got the option to log extra hours there if he wants."
Merle isn't sure the teenager will. He's a good kid, but he doesn't have the drive that Beth and Jazz do, where they do their assigned hours on top of their apprenticeship to Hershel. Hershel logs their hours with him as extras for their future credits.
They aren't the only two to apprentice early, since Allen and Donna's boy Ben's been working with Arthur on the farm since well before his eighteenth birthday in November, along with the oldest orphan from Grady. Patrick beat his older foster brother to an official apprenticeship, but the kid's always been attached to Caleb after traveling with the doctor's group before Homestead. Him opting to join in the nursing studies didn't surprise Merle a bit, and Carol's got nothing but praise for the shy teenager.
Patricia's signaling for Hershel to take over. The older man slides a handful of the index cards like are already tacked to the wall toward Carol, along with a sheet of paper. "Planting schedule for the fields that are ready in the new area. Lenore and Arthur say to keep everything considered experimental, because neither of them has any experience growing grain crops. Paper lists their current plan for rotating the crops based on best guess to avoid problems."
"We'll get at least three crops per year on most of this," Carol comments. "One grain, two not."
"That's the plan. They're putting in peas in most fields to enrich the soil and hopefully pad out our pantries, with some experimental fields with sugar beets. Then plant the fields a mix of sorghum, peanuts, and soybean. When those harvest, we'll follow up with onions in the sorghum fields and canola and oats in the others. It could take years to really establish it a pattern, but hopefully we'll get it settled before we start running out of stored flour and sugar. And fields will have to rotate fallow periodically, but with us fencing more acreage, that's not an issue."
Merle looks over Carol's shoulder at yield estimates. "At some point, we're going to have to consider silo storage."
Hershel agrees. "But that would be at minimum a project for the fall or winter."
"Easy translation is that if the weather holds proper and there's no drought, we're not in any danger of going hungry even ignoring the stored foods," Tyreese says and Hershel nods.
"We will run into an issue of needing more room for livestock over time, but again, also something that'll occur more towards the fall."
As Hershel turns to Scout, this is where Merle knows everyone's going to flinch a bit.
"As soon as the Terminus folks are safely settled, I want to change up the run team pattern," she begins. "I want to still have Glenn and Daryl gathering and pushing further north and east since we're encountering nothing in those directions. They're low population too, even if some of the Atlanta and Athens walkers wander that way. We should be seeing more herds than we are, and I'm beginning to think its due to more active human populations south of Atlanta."
"Like the man who sent folks after the nursing home?" Carol asks.
"I'm hoping he's the exception to any settlements we found. But with the information out of Virginia, that they have at least four surviving pockets of population that close to a massive metro like DC tells me we're missing something here. And I don't like having a danger sitting to our south."
Shane nods. "We needed to wait, to get people settled and trained, but now we think it's time to look for the bastard and make sure he's not slaughtering other communities. I'd hate to set Terminus back up and have him come out of nowhere on them, or him come across one of our smaller teams out."
"Guy down at the nursing home didn't know an exact location," Merle reminds them. That's another reason they waited, because the sole survivor who lived to be questioned was too new and untrusted to even know the exact location of the place he was killing people for. He mainly knew direction from the sun moving as they drove.
"That's why I don't want to take a big group down as we look. More likely to be herds, too. Just two teams, three at most. Lay out a grid to mark for future supply runs and find the bastard. Guy said a lot of the people there weren't trained, so we can't just raze the place to the ground." Scout looks frustrated, but determined.
Marshmallows is what their captive actually called the people of the town. "I'd feel better with three teams, not two," he acknowledges.
The vote goes around and three of the color teams are designated for the hunt for the madman while the other four work with Daryl and Glenn's teams. It's a search that could take months, because their section of the state, north of Atlanta is big enough as it is and they haven't covered it all yet. South of Atlanta? That's a hell of a lot of real estate.
Since the trips won't necessarily be day trips, Carol will have to rearrange run schedules. Merle thinks of Anaya and Judith and sighs. He suspects Scout and Shane will work something out with Carol on that, so that both of them no longer go out at the same time for the longer trips.
"I've got a less worrisome proposal," Tyreese begins. "We've batted around the idea of actual tournaments to give folks a break from running or PT for a while. Think it's time, especially to give the kids some extra structure when adults may be working longer days with the spring."
"We already have the little field by the nursing home. What sports did y'all settle on?" Merle knows Tyreese has been working with the kids a few weeks on this.
"To start with, soccer, lacrosse, and volleyball. The field works already for the first two, and volleyball can be played on grass. If everything works out, maybe we can look at a basketball court."
"One that doesn't involve the parking pad at the equipment barn?" Carol teases. Most games of basketball here involve the hoop attached to the barn, which works well enough as a half-court.
"Exactly. Make it multi-sport too, double for tennis and such. I know some of the ladies miss it."
"No football or baseball?"
"Maybe baseball later. By the time we modify football for the team sizes we can do here, we might as well just stick to the other field sports."
"Next run out, we'll have them finish cleaning out sports equipment at the sporting goods store." Carol makes the note. "Get me the team brackets and we'll get it underway. Is everyone playing?"
"As long as it's low key, yeah." Tyreese smiles. "Twenty-four teens and thirty-seven school kids, plus I figure on some of the young adults playing. We'll use youth rules for the team sizes to get multiple teams. Maybe set one day for games?"
"Go with tradition and pick Saturday, I think. I've got to tweak work rosters anyway. Make sure everyone has Saturday afternoons free." Carol's suggestion meets no objection from Scout or Shane.
It means eliminating Saturday runs, but they've got to consider going beyond the bare minimum anyway.
"Everything is stable on my end," Carol ventures. "I'll have the new rosters worked up by tomorrow at supper."
"Any changes on the medical front?" he asks, looking between Carol and Hershel.
"Maggie's back to limited duties on property, but with the farm gearing up, it's actually good that they have extra help." Hershel explains. "Denova, Cricket, and Amy have no limitations at present, and Michonne's good to stay on her run team until such time her balance starts shifting. We don't have any major changes on the elderly, and Dale's heart condition is responding positively to the new medication combination the doctor at Hilltop recommended."
"Any status on the insulin production?" Scout asks.
"Eugene managed around nine hundred usable milligrams with the lambs that were culled. We're alternating the manufactured insulin doses with the homemade ones. We should be able to keep up with Robyn's needs, even when the insulin runs out." Hershel looks downright happy.
"We'll still keep an eye out for surviving refrigeration when we hit the new areas," Shane offers. "Not reason not to collect it up and maybe more vaccines."
"How's the new doctor settling in?" Tyreese asks.
"Rather well, actually. She and Cricket seem to team up well as study partners. I don't think she'll be performing surgery anytime soon, but hopefully our need for that will remain low. She's also hosting a weekly group session for the women from Grady and Terminus starting this week after individual meetings with several. Might be worthwhile to set her up in the old mobile unit as an office."
"I'll have Jim bring it over and set it up for her by the infirmary," Merle offers. "Then maybe she can spend some time with some of the kids, too."
Even though most of the kids are adjusting well, many still have nightmares. Logan's doing well so far during the day, although he's never far from a Dixon and only attends school because both Abby and Anaya are there.
"I'll set that up with her." Hershel closes his notebook. "Anything else before we head out to supper?"
"Gareth wants to start taking teams over to do garden prep at the prison," Scout says. "Shouldn't take more than a week, but it means they're going to want to get moved over by end of March."
"As much as we'll miss their extra help and company, I imagine having their own space again is appealing. I'll set it up." More notes for Carol.
"Alright. Let's go snag some food before it's all gone," Merle suggests.
He almost laughs when the room clears out about as fast as school kids at recess.
~*~ CP ~*~
Carol barely gets her toothbrush in her mouth before a wave of nausea makes her gag and drop it. She does make it to the toilet in time, but doesn't actually throw up.
"Darlin'?" Merle appears and rubs at her back while she dry heaves. "You okay?"
"Toothpaste just threw me for a loop," she says. The nausea subsiding lets her analyze what she just said and she manages a weak laugh. "Guess what I couldn't stand the smell and taste of when I was pregnant with Sophia?"
Realization dawns for Merle too, and she finds herself dragged into his lap right there on the bathroom floor. Unfortunately, he's brushed his teeth already, so she fights off another round of nausea.
"Tell you what. Go snag Christian's extra toothpaste from the hall bathroom and brush your teeth while I find a test?" She isn't late yet, not until tomorrow, but it can't hurt to check.
He very carefully helps her to her feet before heading off to retrieve the bubblegum flavored children's toothpaste she knows she can tolerate the scent of. It gives her just enough time to pee on the finicky little stick and sit it capped on the counter between their sinks. Merle rinses her toothbrush, but the smell lingers, so he simply tosses it in the trash and opens a new one for her.
By the time they're done getting rid of the offensive minty toothpaste odor, the timer on Carol's watch beeps. While part of her doesn't need to look, another needs the confirmation.
Merle leans in when she can't quite look. "Well, that's certainly easier than lines or plus signs."
She doesn't need to ask what it days, because he's grinning and he would never look that happy if it's not the news she wants. He kisses her chastely on the lips, holding her close as if she's the most precious thing on the planet.
It's such a contrast to Ed bitching about the cost of feeding a brat that she feels herself tear up. It fills her with a content happiness.
"Hey, now, those better be happy tears."
He's so earnestly concerned that she cups his face and kisses him far more thoroughly than he initiated. "I love you so damned much."
That gets a grin and he cups a big, calloused hand over her belly. "Love you too, Mama."
~*~ SW ~*~
Judith hit a cranky stage the last two days, probably a growth spurt, and cluster feeding so often Shane can't help but wince for Lori. There's no mistaking that Lori's exhausted out of her mind from lack of sleep. But when Judith won't settle, her crying from the living room wakes Lori up and starts the exhaustion cycle again, even now that she doesn't want to nurse every half hour or so.
"There's milk," Lori says. "In the freezer."
It takes a minute to translate what her sleep-deprived statement actually is offering - or requesting. Shane isn't sure whether to be delighted or terrified.
"She's taken a bottle for me," Daryl says. "No problem at all. Tried to let Lori sleep a bit." While theoretically, Lori should always be available to nurse, there are going to be times she can't, so once her supply was declared established, so was the go ahead to try a bottle feed or two.
She nursed less than an hour ago, so there's three hours before she'll be hungry again, even if she doesn't sleep. Add in another few hours, even if Lori wakes out of habit to pump, and that's a lot more sleep than the new mother's gotten the last two days.
He doesn't have to look at Scout, who is rocking the grumpy infant in the glider rocker. He knows her answer, and both of them are off tomorrow.
"There enough milk if she starts up again?" With only six hours since the cluster feeding stopped, he's not trusting it yet. Just because he can walk her back across the small yard doesn't mean he wants her to wait.
"Yeah." Daryl's plucking the little plastic bags of milk out of the freezer and placing them into an insulated bag. Shane checks the diaper bag Lori uses when she leaves the cabin, finding enough supplies for probably two days in the bag.
Lori's swaying on her feet, so Daryl gently redirects her down the hall. He returns in a minute, looking tired himself. "Girls are both asleep."
"We'll leave Anaya here then." Shane gathers up the two bags, taking the bottle Daryl offers and tucking it in the diaper bag. "Just heat the bag in warm water and slide it in the bottle, right?"
"Yeah." Daryl smiles tiredly. "And try not to look so terrified."
Shane smothers a laugh, not wanting to startle Judith when she's quiet for a moment, even if she's not sleeping. Scout holds her easily, much more experienced with infants than he is. Daryl stands at the back door, watching them cross to their own cabin. It's not until Scout and Judith are inside that the younger man shuts the door.
Judith's been in their home before, but always with Lori. He stores the milk in the freezer, smiling as Scout transfers the baby to his arms. The tiny girl stares at him with those solemn dark blue eyes, holding her head up for a brief moment before it wobbles back to his chest.
"She's getting so alert," he says softly. Although she lost weight like many breastfed babies, she gained it back swiftly and packed on some extra, although she isn't quite seven pounds yet.
"She's fascinated with your voice. After that last crying jag, it was when you came back down the hall that she hushed."
Maybe Scout's right. "You like to hear Tåta ramble on, baby girl?" Judith blinks up at him wriggling so that he worries about her neck and shifts her to the crook of his arm instead. "Maybe I should tell you the story of how Tåta met Nåna? Because your Daddy is the one who gets to explain him and your Mama because we're all confused on the particulars of that. I suspect it involves your big sister, Abby, though."
Scout's grinning at him from where she's sprawled on the couch. He ignores the mischief in her expression in favor of Judith's ongoing attention. "Did you know I thought your Nåna might shoot your Uncle Rick when we all met? To be fair, he was being a bit of an ass, so he might've deserved it a little."
Judith actually coos, waving a tiny fist randomly. He nods sagely. "You'll understand that most men probably risk being shot for that when you're bigger."
Now his wife is laughing, but as long as Judith is responding, he's just going to keep rambling on to his baby girl.
Having her for the night no longer seems quite so intimidating, when she is so content to be in his arms.
