RABs Ch. 02

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Jerry

Numbness; that was all I felt as Sandy and I walked away from the wall after our adventure. I didn't know how to feel about anything. Truthfully, I hadn't been thinking or feeling anything. I'd just been reacting. I felt like a bottle cap thrown around by waves on a beach. The water coming in was far too powerful for me to do anything but go with the flow. I was tossed and turned in any direction the waves chose.

I couldn't believe that all of these events had transpired over so short a period of time. To begin with, I'd gotten jealous of my wife's reaction to a newcomer. Less than twenty four hours later, that jealousy had been proven to be valid when I walked in and caught him fucking her in our home. That had shattered our relationship to the point that I wanted out of it.

Surprisingly, Dana claimed that she didn't. The problem was that I no longer trusted Dana. I guess at that point I'd decided that Dana and I should simply go our separate ways. I'm not a saint but I simply couldn't imagine hurting her even after what she'd done to me. I guess down deep inside I still had some degree of feeling about her.

The newcomer Diego on the other hand, was different. Almost from our first sparring session where he'd demonstrated a total lack of honor, I'd wanted to kill him. That in itself was unusual for me because I'm normally not that blood thirsty. There are so few human beings left on the planet and there are very few if any children being born anymore. So ordinarily, no matter how bad a person is, I try to imagine some way that they can help our community. I guess I try to see the good in people. But in Diego, that didn't happen.

As big and strong as he is, there are several ways that he could help out around here, but I look past those and think only of my personal need to see his blood spilled. If that makes me a bad person, so be it.

The next big thing that happened was the discovery that a large pack of the Zombie-like creatures we call RABs had completely surrounded our compound. On the surface, this is relatively scary, but there is almost no chance that the creatures could get inside of our walls. There's only one gate in and out and it is manned twenty four hours a day by a crew of people we trust immensely. There are also stations along the wall at various intervals to make sure that no breaches of the wall occur in spots other than the gate.

There is no short term danger from the RABs outside of the gate. The long term danger though is that while we're trapped inside of the walls, we risk running through all of our provisions and supplies, while no more come in. We are a trading community. Our life's blood comes from our scouts who go out and bring in new provisions and also what we can trade with communities like ours in other places.

While completely surrounded, not only can we not get out, but supplies can't come in. As long as the occupation doesn't last more than a few days or a week, we'll be fine. If it lasts any longer than that, it could create a problem.

I was summoned to the wall to find out about the RABs. Sven our leader and I were discussing whether or not they were being directed, which would be a new and possibly deadly situation for all of us. I was showing Sven the shooting prowess of one of our newest citizens.

Sandy amazed Sven with her ability to shoot long distances. I was proud of her, partly because I'd rescued her and brought her here, and partly because I'd been the one to give her the chance to serve as a shooter. I called her my girl. In retrospect, it may not have been the most apt choice of words, because my wife Dana had expressed jealousy over Sandy's crush on me. At the time, I'd enjoyed seeing the look on Dana's face when I called Sandy, "my girl."

A few moments later, Dana had snapped and pushed Sandy over the wall. Now, both Dana and Diego were being considered for expulsion from our community. As Sandy and I headed for our separate homes, my mind was heavy.

Sandy stopped in front of me. I'd noticed that she was walking with a slight limp. I was sure that she'd suffered some type of injury in the fall from the wall.

"So when are we getting married?" she asked. "And how exactly does that work. I've studied how they did that in the old world, you know before everything went to hell..."

I smiled at her. From the very first moment that I'd seen her without the covering of dust and road grime, I'd felt strange about this woman. Now with her standing in front of me and very close to me, the feelings were even stronger.

"Sandy, do you really want to marry me?" I asked. I asked her because I hadn't taken it seriously. The whole thing from my side had simply been another way to twist the knife in Dana for her cheating on me. But the more I thought about it, the better an idea it seemed.

"Of course I do," she beamed. And there it was again. That smile, it just lit up the world around her. It made me feel that no matter how shitty things got, the two of us would find a way. "I just want to understand how marriage works in this community. In some of the places I've been, being married just means that you share living space, but you both still do whatever the hell you please otherwise. I don't want that kind of marriage. I want the old fashioned kind, where you and I are faithful to each other and don't have others involved."

"But, isn't that the way it's supposed to be in a marriage?" I asked. She shook her head.

"Humanity is getting desperate," she said. "In a lot of places, they're so desperate for children that anyone can have sex with anyone else just hoping for the right combination of genes to produce healthy children."

"Okay, I like it the way that you do," I said. "From this moment on, I belong totally with you..."

"And I belong totally to you," she smiled. Then she tilted her head and looked at me slyly. "So where are we going now?"

"What do you mean?" I asked. She smiled at me again and tilted her head. "Am I going back to the house that all of the single women who cook share, or are we going somewhere...together?"

"Oh, we're going somewhere together," I smirked. "We're going to the medical center to get your leg checked out..."

"It'll be fine," she said. "Can I ask you something?"

I nodded and smiled at her. She stopped walking and turned to face me. "Why the hell did you do that?"

"Why did I do what?" I asked her.

"You jumped over the wall to help me," she said seriously. "At the time, I didn't think about it. But why did you...? I mean who does that? You could have been bitten along with me. What if...?" There were tears gathering in the corners of her eyes.

I couldn't resist it. I hugged her. I pulled her close to me and wrapped my arms around her there in the streets. She hugged me back and sobbed. "Why do you keep doing that?" she asked through her tears.

I had no answer, I just let her cry. I knew that a big part of it was how close we'd just come to, if not dying but becoming something that was no longer really alive.

"And your wife is so fucking stupid," she gushed. "She has no idea what she gave up. That man she was with is the worst. I told you what he..." I rubbed her back.

"Yes Sandy, you told us," I said.

"I'm going to kill both of them if I get the chance," she said.

"Diego is mine," I said as I rubbed her back. As we stood there in the streets holding onto each other, a few people, then a few more, gathered around us. After a moment or two, her mother pushed her way through the crowd.

"She's fine," I told her. "We're on our way to the med center to let them have a look at her leg."

"Oh, I'm not worried about her," she smiled. "I knew that if she was with you that she'd be fine. What I wasn't expecting was to hear about you jumping off the wall to go after HER. I came to see if the two of you wanted something special to eat. We should celebrate the fact that you two came out of that terrible ordeal safely. We should also celebrate the fact that we're all here, safe and sound."

"Anything you make is fine," I said. "But I really do like that cake you made the other day..." The crowd started laughing after that. I took Sandy to the medical tent and they got her up onto a table and checked her over.

Aside from being shaken up, she had a couple of minor sprains and a big bruise on her hip. I took her back to my house. I sat her down at the kitchen table while I heated some water in a huge pot in the fireplace. I went into the bathroom and started the tap in the bathtub. The water in the tub took a little while to fill up. The water in the fire place heated up rapidly over the flames. I poured the almost boiling water into the tub and got the cauldron back over the fire. I dropped a few herbs into the water in the tub and led her into the bathroom.

I looked in the bathroom closet and pulled out a plastic wrapped package and handed it to her.

"What's this?" she asked.

"It's a robe for you," I said. "I scavenged a place last fall with lots of them. I think we have about ten or twelve of them left."

"But there are two robes already here," she said.

I snatched one of them off of the hook on the door and threw it into a pile of clothes in the corner of the room. "That one is Dana's," I said. "I'm going to take all of her stuff to her. I want you to have your own things." She smiled and took the package.

"So what do I do now?" she asked, staring at me.

"Now, you stick your hand in the water and tell me if it's warm enough for you and..." she looked at me strangely.

"I'm going to have a bath with warm water?" she asked.

"Well, there are herbs in the water to make it smell better and to help you heal," I said. "And there's soap so it'll be foamy so you won't have to worry about me seeing..." She interrupted me by laughing.

She reached into the tub and told me the water was fine. "I'm heating more so if it starts to get cold, just call me and I'll add a bit more hot water," I said.

"Call you?" she asked. "Aren't you going to be here while I'm..."

"I'm going to be in the house," I said. "But I want you to just relax and soak in a warm tub and think about all of the things that happened today and realize that we're okay. We came out of it just fine. I want you to soothe your mind while the warmth of the water and the herbs soothe your body. I'm going to hop over to the cooking area and bring us back something to eat, okay?"

She nodded and then smiled and shook her head.

Less than a half hour later I made it back to the house. I had a cart with two plates of food on it and desert as well. Sandy's mom had insisted on helping me with the food. As we went through the door, she placed the food on the table and looked around my cozy yet comfortable house.

"Where is she?" she asked.

I pointed towards one of the bedrooms. She looked inside and shook her head. "Maybe she thought that I'd sleep in that room and she could have the other one," I said, pointing at the other room. She shook her head again.

"She's probably still in the tub," I said.

"You have a bathtub?" she asked.

"Yeah, but it only has cold water," I said. "The shower is cold too. If you want hot water you have to heat it over the fireplace." She looked at me as if I was insane.

"You have a bathtub?" she repeated.

"Well, you can use it if you want," I said.

"I want," she said. "But not today." She ducked her head inside of the bathroom and came out with a smile on her face. "Come here," she said quietly.

I looked in and Sandy, covered with suds up to her neck was asleep in the tub with only her head showing.

"The water is still warm," she said. "And it smells so good."

"She's probably exhausted after what she went through today," I said. Her mom nodded.

"How long will the food stay warm?" I asked. "She needs her sleep."

"Not that long," said her mom. "I put each plate on one of the hot flat stones that we use for keeping things warm but it won't stay warm for more than an hour. So we're going to have to wake her so she can eat." I nodded.

"Why don't you wake her, while I get the food ready," she said. I started to fidget.

"Uhm maybe you should do it," I said.

"Why?" she asked. "I'm the cook." The way she said it let me know exactly how proud of that title she was.

"You really enjoy cooking don't you?" I asked. She nodded.

"And thanks to you, not only am I alive in a world that is very hostile to women in general and women my age in particular, but I get to cook for a living again. So yep, I enjoy cooking and preparing food for people, so you should let me do it."

"But, she's going to be sleepy and confused about her surroundings and she'll probably need help getting into her robe," I said.

"What robe?" she asked. I explained the whole robe thing to her too. She shook her head again.

"So help her get her robe on," she said.

"You should probably do that," I said nervously. She looked at me and then burst out laughing.

"You haven't seen her naked yet?" she asked. She started laughing again. "Jerry, don't ever change," she smiled.

"What do you mean?" I asked.

"Jerry, Sandy has been crazy about you since the day you pulled us into that car and got us away from those RABs. She always said that if she could end up with a man of her own ever, she'd want it to be you. Everywhere we've gone, the world has gone to hell. Every person we run into wants something for everything. No one does anything just out of kindness anymore. And when you're a woman...it's far worse. Every place we've been in before this it was always the same. If we wanted to eat, or have a place to sleep, we had to pay for it. A lot of the times they'd expect sex of one kind or another."

I shook my head. "We always avoided it when we could," she said. "Sandy hasn't had to do it very often, maybe three or four times in all. But there were a lot more times when she had to let some nasty old man look at her or touch her, or have her touch them."

"I'm sorry," I said. "I guess I never thought about it."

"No, Jerry, you're missing my point," she said. "And there are two points, I guess I expected that the two of you would have done something by now because hell, you saved us. If it wasn't for you we'd be dead or we'd be RABs. Then you got her that assignment shooting. You gave her the chance to do what she loves most. So I was sure that the two of you had probably uhm...hooked up after that. My second point is even easier to understand and even funnier. I've already told you that my daughter loves you. Have you ever noticed the way when she talks to you she gets right up in your face? You're the only man she does that to. She wants you to see her and smell her. I think that for the first time in her life, Sandy actually wants to have sex with someone. So I just kind of assumed that the two of you had..."

"Well, we're not married yet," I said. "And technically I'm still married to..." That brought about another huge gale of laughter. Sandy stirred in the tub as she heard her mother laugh but didn't wake up.

"Jerry, the world doesn't work that way anymore," she said. "Maybe for us in this wonderful place it does, but only because we believe in the rules, not because anyone has the authority to enforce them. And even if they did, Dana betrayed you in the worst possible way. It's gotten all over camp already. No one would think any less of you for finding someone else."

"I know that," I said. "But if we want our rules or our laws to mean anything, the people responsible for them and for enforcing them have to abide by them too. Otherwise, they don't mean anything. And..."

"And what?" she asked with a smile on her lips. "If I did anything with Sandy before my divorce, people might think less of HER and I wouldn't like that. Sandy is just..." She tilted her head and looked at me.

"She's what?" she asked.

"She's...special," I said. Her mom's smile got even broader.

"She's...hungry," said Sandy. "Where's my robe?"

I left the room and her mother shook her head. I busied myself arranging the food. I got another plate out of my kitchen cabinet. I redistributed the food onto three plates instead of two. I just couldn't bring myself to split the cake though.

A few moments later, Sandy came out in her robe. My jaw dropped open. I'd always loved seeing Dana fresh from the bath in just a robe, but this was completely different. Sandy with her wet blond hair streaming over her shoulders awed me. She'd pulled the robe closed and belted it, but it did nothing to make my erection less painful. I could see more cleavage in the V of the robe than Dana ever had. Sandy's breasts were much bigger than I'd ever suspected and they rolled around under the robe like cats fighting under there. The robe nipped in over her tiny waist and then moved back outwards deliciously.

And there it was, the smile was back with a vengeance. It was almost as if only the two of us were in the room. If anyone had asked me even years later what was the exact moment that I knew that I loved Sandy as much as she loved me, it wasn't really while the two of us were alone defending ourselves against that RABs, it was that moment. Sandy barely standing there leaning against the table with her hair wet and that big terry cloth robe tenting out over her girl parts, giving me that look that said all of those parts belonged to me now.

"Jerry, you didn't have to do that," said her mom. "I brought this food for the two of you. I'll probably eat with "MY" girls." She looked at me with a look that told me I was missing something about the way she said HER girls.

"Well, it's a lot of work, feeding all of us," I said. "You should sit down and enjoy it sometimes. And over the last few days with Sandy on the wall, the two of you probably haven't seen as much of each other."

We all sat down to eat together and Sandy's mom suddenly burst out laughing again.

"What's so funny?" I asked.

"Remember how I told you that everyone always wants something for everything nowadays?" she said. I nodded. "I'll tell you what I was laughing about if you give me one of those robes."

"Terrycloth or silk?" I asked. Her eyes widened.

"You have silk," she asked. "Real silk, not rayon...?"

"Uh huh," I said. "It was a good store."

"What's silk?" asked Sandy, cutting a bit of her meat.

"It's the smoothest softest material ever," said her mom. "It feels so good next to your skin that you..."

"Why didn't I get silk?" asked Sandy.

"I'll save you one for after we're married," I smiled.

"Yeah that might get to be a problem for him right now," said her mom.

"Why?" asked Sandy, innocently.

"Okay," I said, trying to change the subject. "You can have any robe you want."

"Okay," said her mom. "You just talked about the two of us not spending any time together since she stopped cooking. Actually, we get along better and we're both happier since she's not cooking."

Sandy's face dropped as her mother kept laughing. "I wasn't that bad Mother. I just didn't have my mind on cooking," she said.

Her mother was laughing so hard her face was turning red. "Jerry, do you remember the day you came to get her? We had her seating people the way they used to do in the fancy restaurants. There's no need to seat people who can sit anywhere they want. We just had her do that to keep her from cooking. The girl can't even boil water without burning up the bottom of a pot." Seeing that her daughter was becoming upset she changed the subject.

"So where's my robe? I'm taking it with me," she said.

"In the cabinet along the back wall of the bathroom," I offered. She got up and went back into the bathroom. She moved quickly for an older woman. I was impressed.