Epilogue
As each year passes, pre-Impact drinks have become rarer and more valuable.
The Pub still sends crews out to scavenge the wreckage of old bars, convenience stores, and breweries, but everything except the most isolated and obscure has already been looted and then looted again.
In the middle of Year Two we partnered with a local family who’d been brewing moonshine for decades, so our regular drink options now consist of a range of beers and ales made in their still.
But some customers have the resources to spend on the more expensive items, so we keep trying to stock as many drinks from the old world as we can.
One of our crews lucked out last week and dug out the warehouse of a regional food distributor, which had been buried in a landslide caused by the flooding farther east. All the food was deteriorated or inedible, but there was a large collection of surviving hard liquor, plus beer and wine in good condition.
So much beer and wine.
There’s an enormous amount piled in the back of the crews’ trucks, ready for unloading, and we’re having to reorganize our main storage building to make room for it all.
We’ve got several men coming this afternoon for the heavy lifting, but I was tasked with the plan for reorganization.
I rounded up Breanna to help.
Breanna and her sister moved to Monument last year, escorted by Cole of all people. He hadn’t been by this way since before we kicked out the militia, and he wasn’t expecting the town to have survived this long—much less thrived the way it’s done.
Breanna and Del had been barely making it out on the coast, so Cole brought them this far inland before leaving again, still committed to the search for his brother.
I thought I picked up some sparks between him and Del, so I wasn’t surprised when he returned after a few months.
But he only stayed a couple of days and hasn’t been seen since.
I like both women, but I’ve gotten to know Breanna better. She’s smart and strong and funny and gorgeous with vivid red hair.
She’s also a lot bitterer than I ever was.
“This should work,” Breanna says after we’ve sketched out a rough plan for the large storage space.
“If we move that big shelving unit to the opposite wall, we can stack up all the crates on the long wall and make sure to put them in order so y’all can open new ones as needed.
And with all the junk cleared out, there’s plenty of empty shelf space. ”
“I know. They used to be all filled.” It’s not difficult for me to summon a mental picture of this room back in Year One.
It’s been five years, but it feels like it was only yesterday when Cade started coming into the Pub and sitting silently at his table in my section, his eyes following me everywhere I went.
“Good ole days?” Breanna asks with a questioning arch of her eyebrows. She’s wearing jeans and a tank top, and I’m wearing a loose dress and hiking boots.
“No. Well, they weren’t completely terrible, but these days are a lot better than those.”
“That’s for sure.” She shakes her head, staring at an empty spot in the air. “Let’s pray we never have to go back.”
Breanna has never shared her history with me, but my guess is she had to do difficult things to survive. Similar to me, and maybe even worse.
I reach over to put a light hand on her shoulder, a barely-there gesture of empathy. Understanding.
She shoots me a quick smile and shakes it off. “Let’s go ahead and move that shelf.”
“I thought we’d wait for the guys to do that.”
“Why should we? Aren’t we capable of doing it ourselves?”
I look at Breanna, look at the large, solid-wood shelving unit, and then back to her.
Her eyes are sparking with amused challenge.
“Okay,” I say at last. “Let’s do it ourselves.”
Breanna is strong and fit, and I’m relatively so, since I started jogging regularly to regain muscle strength after I was on bedrest for months when I was pregnant with Cassie.
The shelves are built well enough that they’re not wobbly or unstable.
So after we unbolt it from the wall, we scoot the large unit inch by inch until it’s in place and secure against the opposite wall.
Breanna even drives in new bolts so there’s no threat of the shelves falling forward.
I clap when we finish, and Breanna grins broadly.
Maybe it’s nothing, but it feels like an accomplishment, and we did it ourselves.
“Is it safe in there?” The familiar voice calls out from the hallway. “It sounds like you’ve been wrangling a herd of elephants.”
“It’s safe!” I turn to see Pete looking in. His arms are in a strange position, and I assume it’s because he was having to hold Cassie back from barreling into the room on her own. “Come on in, Cassie!”
Cassie squeals and sprints into the room and directly toward me, her long brown braids flying behind her.
She’s almost four with a face like mine, eyes like Cade’s, and a bright, sunny spirit that’s entirely her own.
I crouch down so she can throw herself into my arms, and I lift her up as I hug her, wincing slightly when my back twinges.
Cassie doesn’t notice, but Pete definitely does. He shakes his head at me and then gestures silently toward the shelves we moved.
“It needed moving, so we moved it,” I tell him as I let Cassie slide gently back to the floor.
“Uh huh.”
When Nell’s knees gave out a couple of years ago, she had to take a step back from the Pub. She shifted into a consulting position, and Pete and I divided her management duties between us.
“Mommy, mommy!”
I glance down toward my daughter demanding attention. “Inside voice.”
“Mommy, mommy!” she repeats in a stage whisper.
I try and fail not to laugh. “Yes?”
“Uncle Pete taught me a new game.”
“Really? What was that?”
“Tic-Tac-Toe. And I won!” This time, she corrects the decibel of her exclamation herself and shifts from loud to soft abruptly on the last word.
“Good for you! You’ll have to play with Daddy tonight.”
“I will. I’ll beat him too! Hi, Breanna, do you know Tic-Tac-Toe?”
“I used to play it with my sister when she was your age.”
“Did you win or did she?”
“Usually me. She was never very competitive, so she didn’t care if she won.”
“Oh.” Cassie mulls this over soberly. “I care.”
“I bet you do.”
“Your hair is real pretty. How did it get red like that?”
“I was born with it.” Breanna doesn’t appear at all uncomfortable talking to Cassie, but she doesn’t use baby-talk like a lot of other people. She converses as if Cassie is an adult. “Del’s hair is red too, but a different shade red than mine.”
“Oh. Del’s hair is short. Why is yours long like Mommy’s?”
“Because your mommy and I didn’t cut ours like Del did. Yours can be short too if you cut it.”
Cassie lifts up one of her long braids. “I don’t know.”
“You can think about it,” I tell her. “And decide later if you ever want to cut it.”
“Okay.” Cassie is clearly relieved that the pressure is off her. Then she’s distracted from the topic as she stares around at the neatly reorganized shelves.
She whispers in awe. “Where did all the mess go?”
My back is still a little sore that evening as Cassie and I walk home.
The entire town is behind walls now. A makeshift wall was the first large project completed after we kicked out the militia, and it was fortified and expanded a couple of years ago.
The town has grown in population, and it’s a safe, established community now. We’ve organized communal gardens and a farm with chickens, pigs, and goats. We send out hunting and fishing parties regularly to supplement our provisions, so our rations are almost always comfortable.
I love this town. It feels like home.
And Cade gets voted in as Mayor every two years.
He works a lot during the days, but almost never in the evening and nights. Ever since I’ve shifted to management duties, I don’t have to work many evenings either.
Cade is already home when we arrive, and he’s grilling up pork chops and vegetables on the woodstove.
“Yummy!” Cassie declares, hurling herself at her father’s legs.
He reaches down to stroke her head with his left hand while checking on the chops with the right. “Hey there, peanut. Did you have a good day?”
“Yes! Uncle Pete taught me Tic-Tac-Toe, and I’m going to play you after we eat, and I’m going to win!”
“You think so, do you?”
“Yes, I do! We can play, can’t we?”
“Course we can. After we eat and clean up.”
“Okay.”
“You want to set the table while Daddy finishes cooking?”
Cassie is decidedly unenthused by my suggestion, but she goes to open the utensil drawer and pulls out forks and knives for the three of us.
As she’s carefully setting them at our respective seats, Cade gives me a sharp once-over. “You look tired.”
“I’m not that tired.”
“Then what’s wrong?”
“Nothing’s wrong. My back is a little sore.” When he opens his mouth, I talk over him. “It’s not that bad. I’ll rest it tonight and tomorrow, and it will be fine.”
He glowers at me.
“Don’t give me that look. I’m doing fine.”
He was really scared while I was pregnant. Terrified. He hovered constantly, so much so I had to dream up reasons to get him out of the house. It was touch and go for a while. My pregnancy was at risk, which meant my overall health was also at risk. But both me and Cassie got through it.
Cade and I never made a decision to not have any more children, but we haven’t gotten pregnant again.
I’m sure Cade is relieved. And honestly I am too.
He pulls the pan off the stove and sets it down so the meat can rest. Then he turns toward me and pulls me against him in long, soft hug.
“I’m fine, Cade,” I say into his shirt, breathing in the familiar scent of him, loving him today as much as I did at the beginning. More so.
He nuzzles my hair. “I can give you a massage tonight if you want,” he murmurs, too soft for Cassie to hear.
“I wouldn’t say no to that.”
“What wouldn’t you say no to, Mommy?” The girl has come back over to tug on my dress. “Do I get a hug too?”
“Yes, you get a hug.” Cade lifts the girl, wraps his arms around her, and twirls her around once in a way that makes her squeal. “The order for tonight is hug, dinner, cleanup, Tic-Tac-Toe, story, and then bed.”
“Hurray!” Cassie is beaming up at me and Cade in turn. “I love that plan!”
I smile, and then Cade does.
He says, “I love that plan too.”