Homecoming

I haven't laid eyes on this place in three years, easily. Becca lost her fight with the cough two summers ago, and it was sometime before that we had passed through here to see if there was any last thing we could salvage.

We were still together as a family then. Robert was only eight when we first set out from home, and Rebecca was still by all appearances completely healthy. We had been lucky. It looked like none of us had caught the cough, and once civil services started to decay we set out for someplace off the bones of the grid. We waited one night for the sprayers to finish rolling through the neighborhood and followed them from a distance on foot right out of the subdivision. I carried Robert the entire way, and he was such a trooper. He didn't make a sound, didn't ask any questions. Becca gave him a kiss on the forehead and told him we were going camping. She took him by the hand and we walked up the hill at the end of Norris Road and didn't stop until dawn. When we did we we're about a quarter mile into the state park.

The door looks like it was finally kicked off the hinges. Every single window has been busted out. A branch broke from the top of the elm in the back and smashed in half of the roof where Robert's bedroom had been. Is. I've been watching the house for an hour and haven't heard a peep. The trip in was quiet and uneventful as well. I carefully make my way to the front door and I can tell someone has been living here, or is, by the scuff marks in the entry way floor. Nah. Too old. Dry. This house is vacant. No life.

Becca was always the outdoorsy type. She grew up hunting, camping and fishing and was completely comfortable in the outdoors. Other than teaching I had always been a homebody, but I would follow her anywhere. She never made me go with her, and that was always special to me. When Robert came along, however, no son of hers was going to sit in front of a screen all day playing video games. She taught him everything she knew about the outdoors. Everything safe enough for him to get his hands on he would. By the age of ten he was bow hunting daily for food. That was about the time Becca started to take ill.

The large chunk of tree that caved in the roof over my son's room is bigger than I thought and is jutting halfway down the staircase. I'm going to have to climb through the tiny branches and broken ceiling, wall and stairs to get up to my study.

Robert was already six when the adoption went through. We had always wanted a child of our own and finally took the plunge. He was such a smart young child. I had seen kids like that in my class, the ones that you knew were better than standardized tests and basic curriculums. He picked up on things fast. One night at dinner he explained to us that our official titles would henceforth be 'mom' for Becca, and 'mommy' for me, since no other kids had to differentiate between two mothers. He was seven, then. He helped me pick out a heart shaped locket for Mother's Day to give to Rebecca. I cut out tiny heart-shaped, black and white portraits of Robert and myself to put in it. On Mother's Day the rascal gave us both identical lockets. Like I said, smart child.

This mess is a nightmare. I cut my leg on a jagged piece of tree trying to slide over the mass of sticks without moving them and almost cried out. You can never be too sure, and I don't want to alert anyone who might be particularly cunning or sleeping that I am both here and wounded. I get to my feet and the office door is thrown wide open like every other door in the house. I grab the edge of my desk and slowly drag it as quietly as possible to the center of the room under the broken ceiling fan.

Becca grew up around guns and owned a couple of her own. I had no real issue with it when it was just us but I went on high alert when we adopted Robert. The old argument about safety sprang up again and again, and I yelled quite a bit. She bought a gun safe for our bedroom and put her pistol in it. I convinced her to get rid of her hunting rifle and she agreed. She taught Robert to shoot when he was ten, under her strict supervision, but I still wouldn't let him carry the pistol, ever.

The ceiling fan was broken and hanging from its hole in the ceiling. I have to stand on my tip toes on top of the desk to reach my arm far enough in there to feel anything stashed inside. First I bump my fingers into a box and hear a soft rattle that must be bullets. Next to it I find the gun bag with her rifle in it. Bitch. I am relieved it's here and still feel betrayed that she lied in the first place. Still, she used to say 'You can't plan for everything, babe, but try.' I miss her so much.

She said a lot of things in the final days. The cough brings on a very high fever and most of what she said was nonsense. At one point in the middle of the night Becca's fever appeared to break. I was trying to feed her and give her some water when she told me she had stashed the rifle in my study. A couple of tears streamed down her cheeks as she told me how sorry she was and how she never lied to me about anything, but when it came time she just couldn't get rid of it. She passed the next morning but before she did she gave Robert her locket. I let him carry the pistol from then on. He was a better shot than I was anyway, and it seemed like the right time. We spent most days in silence after that. In the years after the world took sick, staying quiet was key to staying alive, but it felt like we simply didn't have anything to say to one another that wouldn't bring tears with it.

Someone is shouting outside and dogs are barking. I think they may have picked up on the smell of my blood from the cut on my leg. I bandage it quickly and take the gun bag and bullets across the hall to Robert's room. I clamber onto the roof toward the back of the house, away from the voices. I steal a peek over the top of the roof and see two men, each holding a club and two leashed dogs. They are all standing in the street and the dogs are pulling against their leads, barking and snapping their jaws. They look hungry. I check the gun and it is loaded. With the barrel resting on the crest of the roof I take aim and fire. I miss wide, but the bullet ricochets and hits one of them in the leg. All four of the dogs turn on the wounded man as he hits the ground. The other man goes to swing at the dogs with his stick. He hits one and they turn on him as well. I drop down off the back of the house and make my way out of the neighborhood and back to our camp.

Robert had been gone for half a day before I set out looking for him. I checked all of the places he usually hunted or fished but I couldn't find him. There was no trace, no sign of struggle. I was confident he had not been attacked or had an accident. Not at any of these places, anyway. Rebecca would say not to get upset because that won't help anything. I figured I may have missed him on my circuit and doubled back to our camp. I could hear them long before I could see them or smell them. They had my son tied up and were tearing our camp apart. I stayed out of sight and tried to get Robert's attention while he was being questioned. They were all looking at him or going through our belongings. I pulled the locket out of my shirt and shook it hoping he would catch a glimmer of it's bright gold. They roughed him up a bit. They said they wanted to ask him some questions. They said they would know if he was lying and if he lied they would hurt him. They asked him who else he camped with, he said his mommy. They asked him where his mommy was now. He told them his mom was dead, and nodded toward the mound at the edge of camp. He asked them if they were going to kill him and they said no. They stood him up and he asked where they were taking him. They said into the city to sell. He was always such a clever kid. I made my way back to our old house quickly and quietly. Once had I retrieved Becca's rifle I was coming back to track my son. They would have about three hours head start of me, but I know where they're going.