September 15, 2010
Having Morgan Jones around proves far more useful than just having another adult on the property. Shane is grateful the man's a tradesman, better skilled than he is by doing such work for a living instead of learning as he goes for home repair like Shane did.
Case in point is the fact that they are sweating their ass off installing a six-foot by ten-foot steel storm shelter underground near the fence at the road.
Shane never considered an in-ground shelter because of the water table on the property. Morgan studied the various paperwork from the property purchase and the later replacement of the ancient septic system. He even went so far as to perform his own perc tests in multiple spots, an activity that fascinated both Duane and Sophia.
"If I realized I was going to sweat my balls off putting one of these in, I think I would have paid for installation years ago," he says, waiting as Morgan mixes a new batch of concrete in the tow-behind mixer.
Morgan laughs. "Probably would have cost you eight grand or more back then. And just think, we're installing two."
Because they're doubling as root cellars, really their primary purpose, two seemed reasonable enough when Morgan mentioned seeing two of these steel bastards among construction equipment for a new subdivision one county to the south.
"Don't remind me." Shane finishes off his water bottle. Despite the official start date for fall being right around the corner, Georgia weather rarely gets that memo. Feels more like July or August today.
But they're collecting more than can be stored in the house, even allowing for converting both of the unused bedrooms. Storing scavenged canned food outdoors in sheds just reduces its shelf life due to temperature extremes. The steel storm shelter will avoid the leak potential of a concrete one, but it still has to be weighed down so it doesn't float right out of the ground if the water table rises.
They've got the thing anchored and insulated. Now they're making it heavy as hell. The second unit is sitting in a neighboring yard, waiting on them to survive installing this one.
Laughter from the kids up on the deck draws both men's attention. The kids are installing an irrigation system in the raised beds from one of Sophia's purloined library books.
"How long do you think it is going to take before Duane figures out Fee is a girl?" Shane asks.
That gains him an amused look from Morgan. "Considering it took me four days and a slip on her part, it could take a while. Children are notorious for not looking below the surface."
Sophia volunteered her bedroom for the father and son pair, setting up a camp cot at the foot of Shane's bed. Thinking the two are good people didn't make either of them feel comfortable being separated with strangers in the house. Finishing this project will give them more bedroom space again, even if they have to retrieve a bed from somewhere for Sophia.
"Can't say I object to him being confused." Duane's younger than Sophia by eighteen months, younger than Shane's initial estimate. But he was an eleven-year-old boy once, and lack of 'teen' attached to age doesn't mean lack of interest.
"She is a skilled mimic. If you didn't tell me otherwise, I would never guess you've been her guardian for such a short time." Morgan pauses in his work to finish off his own water bottle.
"Fee's a smart girl. But the mimicry, that's from being raised up around an absolute bastard. She's hardwired to adapt fast."
"You never mentioned what happened to her parents."
Shane flinches, just a little. Ed deserved the beating he gave him, and more, but there's no doubt he died due to being separated from the rest of camp during the attack due to his injuries
"Her daddy died when our camp got swarmed. I pulled him off her mama earlier that day and finally beat the fear of me into him like I should've done earlier. Walkers got him while he was sulking in his tent instead of coming to supper."
"Can't say I blame you for beating his ass. Been many a time I wanted to do the same. How did her mama react?"
"Like most women stuck in that situation. Cried for me to stop. Tended to him after."
It's a frustrating cycle Shane witnessed far too many times as a deputy. Women who don't believe they'll be safe if they leave, so they placate the abuser. Damned restraining orders are no better than toilet paper most times.
Only ones Shane's witnessed escape and make it stick seem to be the ones with family far away, or when the asshole's criminal in other ways that gets him sent off for a long stint in prison.
"Her mama's still living?"
"Was last I saw her, middle of August. Timid little woman, barely willing to speak her mind even with her husband dead and daughter missing. Hopefully she's still with the rest of the group and not separated off."
While he still doubts Rick could keep the whole group alive, and he'd be spread too thin to protect Carol as well as his own family, Shane meant it when he told Sophia that if Carol's with Daryl Dixon, she's probably alive.
"Missing?"
Morgan's puzzled look reminds Shane just how sparing they've been with information on how they got lost from the main group. He's not yet ready to tell then man his own story, but Sophia's is badass. He relays the tale with a grin, including his own recovery due to her nursing.
"Damn. I can't imagine Duane on his own for that long. I understand more about why you were willing to recruit us now."
"You didn't have to save Rick. Figured that got you halfway toward being a backup guardian for Fee if anything happened to me."
"And the other half?"
"Watched you with your boy. You know the realities we live in now and don't overprotect him. You didn't object to her weapons."
"Sounds like there's a story behind that."
Concrete mix ready, the men return to work pouring it before it sets. It gives Shane a breather to figure out how to answer that.
"Rick's wife didn't want Carl having any survival training that was more serious than Cub Scout level. Especially dangerous because the boy's the wandering, overly curious type. If he were the kid wandering the woods? I doubt I would have found him alive because he's been too protected from the realities of the world, before and after the dead rose."
"Rick never would have left him alone and told him to run."
Shane freezes at the matter-of-fact statement, looking over at Morgan.
The older man simply shrugs. "You know your own kid's strengths and weaknesses. I don't think I can even comprehend why he left the girl when no one knew she had any survival skills either."
It's one of the things that plague Shane, now that he's separate from the situation and more objective. He never would have trusted Sophia to run to safety, not back then. Why did Rick?
"I got no answer for that, man, and I've known the man since kindergarten."
It's a friendship that started when an older kid pushed Rick off the swings. Rick shared his bigger box of crayons with Shane earlier that day, so Shane owed him. Shane got a paddling for punching the second grader, but he didn't care because it also got him a best friend.
"Less time to adjust to this world, I suppose. He did not witness it fall like we did. Doesn't understand how far a man needs to go to keep his family safe." Morgan's guilt over Sophia putting Jenny down has not yet abated.
Morgan's likely right on that. By the time Rick lost Sophia, he had less than two weeks awake in this new world. Shane can barely remember the first two weeks that the world spent falling, too blurred with fear and grief over Rick's coma.
"Could explain it." Shane hopes his continued absence from King County is due to searching for Sophia. He doesn't want his prediction that Rick will get his family killed to come true.
Morgan tips the mixer back upright and assesses their progress. "One more, I think, and then we let it cure before we bury it."
Shane checks his watch. It's not the really good model he wore before, but it does its job. "Have to start on the other one tomorrow."
"We could take a break. Neither the shelter nor the excavator will go anywhere."
"Fee has been wanting to search out the farms around."
With the fences here reinforced and enhanced with Morgan adding electric wire charged by solar like the gate, Shane thinks they could probably risk more chickens, at least. On their most recent trip to gather off Gloria's gardens, some of her chickens reappeared.
Now the coop's been relocated here, along with four hens, eleven half-grown chicks, and a rooster with a pissy enough attitude to make the cat look sweet. If any of those chicks turn out to be roosters, Shane's making the asshole into chicken and dumplings. They get enough eggs off the three hens that aren't sitting a nest to expand their diet every few days.
"That's something we should do sooner rather than later. If the herds do move out of the cities, smaller farm animals might not survive those numbers."
Considering Shane's seen what can happen if they get a cow down due to injury, he agrees with Morgan. His property couldn't support a cow, not enough grazing, but chickens or a goat or two, maybe.
"I can think of a few places we should check. Small farms. Even an animal rescue next county over that had some livestock among the exotics."
"Exotics could be dangerous, if they get loose or were turned loose."
There's a thought Shane could do without. Place had tigers, among other big predators. He can't see walkers doing much damage to those.
"Don't think I could bring myself to shoot any of them, if they've survived this long."
"Me either. We will have to hope for the best."
With the last batch of concrete poured and settled, Shane steps down into the darkened interior of the shelter and drops a digital thermometer inside. They'll observe it over the next two weeks to see if Morgan's predictions hold true that it should drip into the sixties inside once the earth is back in place.
The kids can chart it. It'll be a good science lesson to add to what Morgan already explained about why root cellars were buried back in the days before refrigerators and climate control.
"We should also harvest what gardens we find along the way," Morgan suggests as they head for the house. "Between the four of us, surely we can figure out that canning monster Fee brought home."
Shane agrees with a laugh, because between Gloria's house and the library, they do have a wealth of learning material. The pressure canner is one of the biggest Shane's ever seen, nothing like the little stock pot his Grandma Jean used for making jellies.
"Your crops are coming in nicely, Fee," Morgan calls out.
They really are. If the weather holds to the usual pattern of decent warmth through October, they'll harvest plenty of field peas, turnips, and winter squash.
Sophia grins and waves, going back to whatever soil test the kids are doing.
"How opposed would you be to your back deck becoming a greenhouse?" Morgan muses. He's glancing between the railing and the house, with that same calculating look he wore planning the underground storage.
"Other than needing the airflow when it's hot, none at all." The nights are more pleasant now, the only real sign of September.
"Between you and me, I'm sure we can rig it to keep airflow during the hot months. The plants won't need to be sealed inside then, just the winter."
Shane thinks of how structures like chicken houses and greenhouses at garden centers all seem to have sides that can be raised and lowered and nods. "Fee will love the idea. Didn't want to risk tomatoes and peppers with colder weather being unpredictable."
"We'll check out that garden center first. Might as well see if their greenhouses can be repurposed before reinventing the wheel."
Morgan reaches out to snag a fig off one of the four potted trees that inhabit the side deck. The dwarf trees are in whiskey barrel style pots and usually roll inside down to the workout room during the winter. They may not have that kind of space this year.
The fruit trees that were still struggling along at the garden center are planted, some here and others on neighboring properties. They might not see fruit off those next year, but Shane finds the idea of planning for a fruit crop they might not see for two or three years comforting.
"How did you end up with these?" Morgan asks. "Not too often single men with a busy job bother with potted plants. These have been here a while, not like Fee's houseplant collection."
"Housewarming gift." He's still a little baffled why Lori talked Rick into the first potted fig tree. She can't have believed he would keep the damn thing alive. But he liked it enough after it survived the first year to buy it a few friends.
"Ah. A woman's idea, I imagine?"
Shane just nods, not wanting to think of Lori even in the sense of the time when she was nothing more than his best friend's wife who invited him for Sunday dinner on the regular as payment for keeping Rick from accidentally destroying their house in the guise of home repairs.
The fact that his house now has over two dozen houseplants of all shapes and sizes is the better sort of memory. Once she was assured he meant it that not all her gathering needed to be useful, Sophia rescues every surviving potted plant she sees.
Nursing those plants back to health brings her joy. He'll live in a goddamned jungle to make her smile.
Morgan snags a few more figs. "My dearly departed mama had a recipe for a fig cake that would make you sell your soul for another piece. Wonder if we could find its twin in any of those cookbooks?"
Shane snorts, accepting the two figs passed his way. "Tell Fee you're craving it and she'll run it down."
"Hey, Shane! Go check the crockpot." From the far end of the deck, Sophia holds up grubby hands as proof she's still busy while he's not.
"I'll make sure our supper's viable if you want first shower," he offers to Morgan.
The other man accepts easily. He and Duane are still reveling in the idea of clean, running water after months without. He heads down the hall, while Shane washes his hands and lifts the lid to the big pot.
The red kidney beans are definitely at the perfect stage, seasoned with salvaged vegetables, spices, and a precious half pound of sausage from the freezer. Eventually, they've got to figure out how to make sausage from wild game. Shane always gave the bits best for sausage to Gloria in exchange for getting half back after she worked her magic.
If Morgan thinks he can rig a smokehouse, maybe Shane can hunt a feral pig for the freezers. Bacon won't be the same as farm raised, not enough fat, but bacon is bacon.
He starts the rice cooker borrowed from a neighbor's collection of dusty kitchen gadgets. They'll eat well tonight, with leftovers for tomorrow or the freezer.
By the time the kids come inside and wash up and Morgan returns from his shower, Shane's got the table set except for drinks. The food ladled into the bowls smells heavenly.
Lucius bitches for his own serving of rice. "Cat, you're supposed to be a carnivore," Shane grumbles, even as he tips a spoonful of rice into the cat's bowl on top of his kibble.
The tom cat ignores him, picking delicately in the bowl for the begged portion and leaving the actual cat food. At least it's not just Shane that Lucius dislikes. The cat's as likely to take a swipe at the other two males as him. Sophia's his only person, although he sleeps on the foot of Shane's bed in a fashion that makes Shane think he's guarding the girl while she sleeps.
Arguing with the cat gets him laughed at by both kids, but he doesn't mind. Morgan just shakes his head as the other man sets glasses of iced tea on the table at each place.
When Duane offers grace, Shane no longer hesitates to link his hands with the children on either side. One day soon, he's got to tell Morgan all he's done, but for now, he's just glad not to be alone in knowing the harsh realities of keeping children safe in their world.