5
Jessa had been gone for several hours and she had found herself going back into the city that she had left. It felt a little safer in the day time, but she felt more exposed as well. Women were not supposed to travel alone and it was for very good reasons. Since her husband died, Jessa had been in a community for most of the time. The larger numbers of people gave her some security, but alone with Shane a couple of miles away, she had never felt so vulnerable. Once again, she was wishing that Michael would hurry up and come back. She missed him something terrible and felt better with the strong man next to her. Jessa was even missing Milo, with his quiet ways and shy smile.
There hadn’t been much in the way of wild edibles. It looked like that part of the city had been went over pretty good and it was another moment that Jessa wished she was still back in the community. If she wasn’t so adamant on protecting her dignity, she would have still been there. But one of the leader’s friends had tried to force himself on her. Jessa couldn’t let it happen and now she could see the extent of what that decision would cost her.
It had made Michael run off for revenge that she had demanded. He and Milo were both in danger and she now that she wasn’t so upset, she saw what it was that she had asked him to do. She shouldn’t have, but she couldn’t help it. She had only thought of Shane being hurt and blaming herself. If she hadn’t have done what she did, then she wouldn’t have had to run, Billy and his friends wouldn’t have chased her and everything would be different. But she didn’t know then what she did now.
Jessa couldn’t help but wonder what more it was going to cost her; the ripple effects seemed to be never ending. Shane was hurt and alone, while she was out scavenging in a burned down city. It was not how she had planned it going, but nothing seemed to go as planned anymore.
Her eyes saw something out of her peripheral vision, but every time she turned to look, there was nothing there. Jessa was afraid she was losing her mind and hunkered down behind a building and waited. She started to hear voices a block over and watched several men in a group going down one of the streets parallel to the one she was on. It made her nervous, but it was clear that she hadn't been seen. Jessa sighed inwardly and realized that she had to be even more careful.
Finally, she found an old survival store in town and was surprised that it hadn’t been ransacked completely. Part of that was because it looked so torn up that it was most likely passed over time and time again. Able to find a few packs of ration bars and some freeze dried meals, Jessa couldn’t have been happier with her score. It had been a while since she had tasted the gritty coconut flavor of the ration bars, but she knew that they would go a long way. It also meant that she could go back to Shane without having to dodge people that she didn’t know on the road.
Jessa made her way to the outskirts and didn’t hear or see anyone else or anything else the whole way. She was just about to get back to the small cottage when she noticed several sets of footprints. Her heart started to beat harder, convinced that it was Milo and Michael back from their mission. As she got closer to the cabin though, she realized that it wasn’t their tracks. She had been following and walking with them for some time and Milo in particular had a very distinct gait. As she realized that it wasn’t them, she moved faster to the place she had left her son. Jessa was in a full on sprint and stopped when she saw the door moving back and forth in the wind. She had certainly not left it open and Shane knew not to go outside when she was not there. The process of elimination left her with only one thing that it could be; someone had been there.
She was even more afraid then than she had been when she was trying to wake him up. As she pushed in the door and called out his name, Jessa instinctively already knew that she was not going to get an answer. She ran through the small apartment, saying his name and just wanting more than anything to lay eyes on him. When she didn’t and it was clear that her gut had been right, she moved back outside and looked closer at the prints. There were no small prints of Shane’s leaving the place like there was of the two that had gone into the dwelling. Without thinking, Jessa tightened her bag on her back and started towards the tracks she was following. They were moving fast and by the deep grooves the shoes left, at some point they were practically running. It could mean anything, but it meant that Shane was being carried. The idea didn’t sit well with her.
Jessa followed the tracks quickly and it was soon nightfall and she was stuck in the woods alone. There was no shelter around and it was getting too dark to see the imprints in the ground. The weather was taking a turn for the worst and she could hear the skies rumbling above her. Jessa had to go on, sure that the rain was going to wash away all of the prints and she was going to never be able to find Shane again. It had been one scare after another and she didn’t even know if he was still alive. There was no one to help her. She let out a shuddering sigh. She really needed Mike.
She was frantically running through the woods on a path that had been used more than once. There was light up ahead of her from a fire in a barrel and then she saw several people standing around it, cooking something. It wasn’t the smell of food that pulled her from her cover, but the need to find Shane. She was sure that this was where her son was and it didn’t matter that she was supposed to be seeing what was going on first. There was no stopping her from moving towards the group. All she had was a knife tucked in her hand, ready to use it if she had to.
Several surprised faces looked at her until finally an older woman stood up and stared at her.
“Where is my son? I know you took him!” Jessa cried.
Malinda shook her head. “We have not taken him, but brought him with us to feed him. You had been gone some time and we were afraid that you weren’t coming back. The city has been full of danger lately.”
Jessa wasn’t really listening, her eyes searching the small village for her son. “Where is he?”
“In there, by the fire getting warm. That little place he was in was getting quite cold.”
Jessa went from nervous to feeling judged, and she marched over to the small makeshift structure. Her heart sank back into her chest when she spotted him. “Mommy, there you are. I thought you were going to be home before dark?”
She put her arms around him and started to feel the drizzle going down her eyes that she could not stop. “I was home baby, but you were not there.”
“I went with them because they had something to eat. They said I could stay here until you got back.”
Jessa nodded, still not sure if she liked the whole idea of it. She didn’t like the idea of her son leaving without her, but she knew that he had to eat. He hadn’t been in a situation without her there before, and she felt guilty that she hadn’t been there. Shane seemed better. His blue eyes were not so hollow looking. It had been more than food that they had given him. When she asked about it, the old woman named Melinda told her that she had given him a tonic to revitalize him. The ingredients were much of what she would have used, if she had taken all of her herbs and supplies with her.
“Well I don’t know how to thank you Melinda. I was so worried when I saw him gone. It is more likely to run into bad, instead of good.”
Melinda nodded and her brown eyes closed for a few minutes, remembering something in her own past that made Jessa’s words true. There were far more bad people in the world. They were the ones that survived and as the bombs had hit and the years of struggle went on, it was always the ruthless that made it through another long winter. It was not because they were stronger or better, just merely more willing to take and kill to get what they wanted.
“If you really want to help us, there is something that we could really use some help with…”
Jessa nervously listened to what they needed. She wanted to help them, but what they asked was too much, too strange. They had fed and cared for her child and there was nothing more worthy of her help than that. Shane chimed in that they were real nice and needed her. “You should help them mom.”
Jessa knew that he had no idea what he was talking about and she just nodded and smiled at him.