Chapter 7
Barb led Cathy up the gravel drive. The sun hung low behind the ridge, casting long shadows across the fields.
Everything looked familiar, yet the silence remade it into something foreign.
Without the hum of power lines, the distant rumble of trucks on the highway, or the soft pulse of electronics inside the house, the world felt hollowed out.
Even the breeze seemed quieter, brushing the tall grass with hesitant motion.
Cathy clutched Barb’s sleeve with trembling fingers. Each step she took felt heavy, like her legs belonged to someone else. Her breath came in tight, uneven pulls, kept in motion only by Barb’s gentle guidance.
“Stay close. We are almost inside.”
“Nothing makes sense.”
“I know,” Barb said. “You’re safe now. Let us get you inside.”
The house looked small against the quiet sky. Its age showed more clearly in the absence of modern distractions. The missing trim, the cracked paint, and the weakened hinges on the door. Barb pushed the door open. The hinges groaned in the stillness.
Cathy took two steps inside and collapsed onto the bare floorboards as if her body couldn’t carry another ounce of grief.
Her knees hit the wood with a soft thump.
She leaned forward, shoulders shaking, her palms pressed flat against the floor.
“He was alive this morning. I don’t understand how a day can change like this. ”
Barb placed a hand on her sister’s back. “Let it come. You held everything together while we were moving. You can let go now.”
Cathy cried with a rawness Barb had never heard from her.
Each sob came like a sudden wave, rising without warning, collapsing with force.
She folded into herself, forehead touching the wood, her grief spilling into the quiet house that had not yet been lived in.
Barb stayed with her, silent and steady.
Outside, the animals shifted uneasily. The cows lowed softly in the pasture. The goats paced near the barn. The silence changed the entire landscape, making every rustle louder, every sound more pronounced. The absence of engines and machines stretched across the valley like a heavy blanket.
Barb helped Cathy sit upright. “You can cry as long as you need. I’m right here.”
Cathy wiped her face. “What are we supposed to do? How are we supposed to live like this?”
“We start small,” Barb said. “We figure out what we have. Then we figure out what we need.”
“I don’t even know where to begin.”
“You don’t have to,” Barb said. “I’ll handle that part.”
Cathy leaned her head against Barb’s shoulder, exhausted.
Barb held her there for a long moment. Her mind, however, was already shifting.
She lifted her gaze toward the kitchen, toward the pantry shelves and the half-finished walls.
Resources hovered in her mind like items in a catalog.
Danger zones mapped themselves without effort.
“I need you to rest,” she whispered.
Cathy nodded. “I’ll try.”
Barb helped her stand and guided her to the old sofa pushed against the wall. Cathy lay down slowly, curling into herself again. Barb covered her with a blanket and waited until her breathing softened into the heavy rhythm of exhaustion.
Barb rose and stepped into the kitchen. The air smelled of dust, cold metal, and the faint lingering scent of the morning’s coffee grounds.
She lit a candle from the emergency supply box she had already positioned on the counter.
The flame flickered, casting uneven light across the unfinished cabinets.
She opened the pantry and scanned the shelves.
Bags of rice, beans, rolled oats, salt, coffee, sugar, and canned goods filled the lower levels.
She counted each item mentally. Enough for months if rationed carefully.
She checked the drawers next. Hand tools, first-aid supplies, spare matches, rope, and utility knives.
The inventory she had been building with discipline felt essential rather than excessive.
She crossed the room to the window, testing the wooden frame.
The lock clicked uselessly. The hardware was too rusted to secure anything.
She pressed her palm against the thin glass.
It would break with a single hard strike.
She added the weaknesses to the growing list in her mind.
She walked outside into the cooling air.
The barn loomed in silhouette, already more fragile than she wanted to admit.
She approached the structure, her boots crunching through dry grass.
Next, she checked the animals. The cows lifted their heads toward her, their ears flicking nervously.
They sensed the shift in the world as keenly as she did.
The goats paced along the fence, restless from the sudden stillness.
Barb checked the water trough, the feed bins, and the fencing along the perimeter.
The evening insects began their song, filling the valley with a new kind of rhythm.
Without the hum of electricity, the natural sounds took up the full space of the air.
It made the property feel bigger and smaller at the same time.
She kneeled near the water pump and ran her hand along the metal handle.
The one piece of recent technology that needed no electricity.
She tested it with a slow pull. The water flowed steadily and was clean.
She checked the fuel stores next. The lantern oil, the propane tank for the small outdoor burner, and the firewood stacked behind the shed.
She sorted through each pile, arranging items by necessity and accessibility.
Inside the house, Cathy cried again in short, exhausted bursts.
Barb took one step toward the door, then paused.
“I can’t do this without him.”
Barb swallowed tightly and continued assessing. She checked the locks on both houses next. The main door of her own house latched weakly. The second house where Cathy had collapsed had no functioning lock at all. The back door drifted open when the wind pushed. She ran her fingers along the frame.
She crossed the porch and checked the roofline, scanning for weak shingles. Then she looked toward the tree line, evaluating sightlines and blind angles. The property sat open on the east side. Anyone approaching from the town road would be visible only at the last moment.
Her mind continued to build operational lists the same way she once planned investigative arcs in political dramas or survival sequences in thrillers.
Except there were no editors to correct her, no deadlines to shift, and no safety net beneath the story.
She returned to the house. Cathy sat upright on the sofa, her face blotched from crying.
“How are you feeling?”
Cathy shook her head. “I don’t know how to exist. I feel like the floor disappeared under me, and I can’t stop falling.”
“You don’t have to understand everything tonight.”
“What if I can’t do this? What if I can’t survive in this new world?”
“You will,” Barb said. “You will because I will show you how.”
“How do you know what to do?”
“I’ve spent years studying this kind of scenario for work. I wrote about it long before it became real. I know the order of events. I know how people react. I know the timeline before desperation reaches places like ours.”
Cathy wiped her cheeks. “You sound so certain.”
“I am,” Barb said. “We have a narrow window. Maybe a week before people from town start searching for food or help outside the valley. We need to secure the houses, the animals, and prepare for unwanted visitors.”
“I can’t think about any of that right now.”
“You don’t have to. I’ll do the thinking. You stay close to me.”
“I’m scared of everything.”
“It’s all right to be scared. Fear doesn’t mean you’re unsafe. I’m here. I’m not going anywhere.”
“Tell me what happens next,” Cathy said.
“We begin tomorrow,” Barb said. “Tonight, you sleep. Tomorrow, we work. That’s how we move forward.”
Cathy nodded against her shoulder, exhausted. Barb stayed beside her until her breathing softened again. She didn’t offer comfort she couldn’t guarantee. Outside, the newly silent world waited.