Love in the Dark

Chapter Two

Laura and Zahara started walking. The shortest route to her father's house would have been to go straight through the city on the state highway. But Laura didn't want to go that route. Surely by now there were plenty of people waking up to the reality that something very bad was happening. So, she took the back way, the longer route, but the safer way.

Keeping Zahara safe was all that mattered.

Before they reached the bridge, Zahara had climbed into the stroller. She sat on one bag and held the other on her lap. Laura pretended to keep her head down, but all the while she was watching. There were a couple of stranded vehicles on the road. People that were driving when it happened and their vehicles inexplicably died. A few people were wandering outside, looking at the powerlines, trying to see if there was some obvious damage. Some people were shouting at each other. "Will your car start?" "No, man, I think I got a dead battery or something?" "s**t, me too!" "Is your power out?" "Yeah! Nothing's working at my house at all." "Heat's out, its cold!"

Laura kept on walking, and no one paid her any attention. She passed under the underpass, leaving the suburbs behind. From there on, the landscape changed abruptly to rural. There were snow-covered stubbled corn fields, old barns with slate roofs and gray, warped walls. Several miles on there was a working dairy farm. She could hear the farmers swearing about the generator failing and having to milk fifty head of cattle by hand, and how the milk would be ruined because the coolers were down.

She shook her head and kept walking. She had known this time would come. She had tried to warn her family, the few people she called friends. But they had all dismissed it, chalked it up to her "wild imagination", that they secretly suspected was really some kind of mental condition. What kind of child talked about the end of the world? What kind of teenager was more interested in stock piling food than her senior prom? Her dad was the only person who had believed her.

She idly wondered if any of them would think back on her warnings today. Somehow, she doubted it. When she reached the railroad tracks, she diverted off the road and onto the tracks, which would take her right to the back of her parent's ten-acre property, more directly than the weaving road, and best of all, far from any people who might be out and about.

It took her a little more than three hours before she finally reached the overgrown back pasture of what had once been a beautiful horse farm. Laura lifted Zahara over the rotting fence, and tossed the backpacks over after.

"What about the stroller?" Zahara asked.

Laura retrieved her machete and kicked the stroller aside. "We won't be needing it any more." Laura shouldered both bags and plowed a path through the brush and brambles. Zarah marched behind her, her little boots squelching in the melting snow and mud.

The old riding arena was falling apart. When Laura's mother died, her father had shut down the farm, keeping only Roy, their breeding stallion. He stayed in a paddock behind the barn, so that Laura's father didn't have to maintain the pastures.

They traipsed through the old pastures all the way up to the white ranch house, with neat black shutters, and a big porch. The dog heard them approaching and started barking from inside.

She reached the front door and gave one warning knock before she pushed it open. The door was always unlocked. A wave of welcoming heat hit her in the face. The woodstove in the living room was already lit and burning merrily. Molly the extremely overweight hound-dog jumped around in excitement at her visitors, giving Zahara's cold face a thorough tongue-washing.

Laura's father, Everett, was on the couch, a cup of coffee steaming in his hand. He squinted up at Laura. "I figured I'd see you today."

Laura undressed her daughter and hung the snow clothes on the hook behind the door, before she started peeling off her own layers. "Yeah," Laura said grimly.

"So, this is it?"

Laura nodded and sank down into the ugly, camel-colored chair opposite the couch. "We're headed up to the cabin," she said softly. "Come with us."

Everett shook his head. "Nah. I'm too old for this, Laura. I'm gonna wait it out right here. I got plenty of food, my old rifle, and plenty of shells." He held out his hand and the fat dog came and nuzzled it before she plopped down on the couch just like a human. "Molly and I will be just fine."

Laura didn't argue or try to convince him. She'd always known he wasn't going to leave the farm. And he knew that she couldn't stay.

"You had breakfast?"

"Yeah, we're good." She blew out a breath. "We just came to get Roy."

Everett nodded to himself. "I won't miss having to go out and water that old nag when its ten below zero. I won't miss the vet bills and the farrier bills either." He held up his cup, "you want some coffee? Its instant, but its hot."

Zahara climbed into her grandfather's lap and wrapped her arms around his neck. "We came for hugs and kisses, not coffee, Grandpa." She squeezed him hard.

Laura looked away to hide the tears in her eyes. She cleared her throat. "Zahara, why don't you hang out with Grandpa while I go get Roy ready."

"Okay Mama," Zarah agreed, she was already poking around in Everett's breast pocket, knowing he kept a stash of peppermint candies there.

Laura wiped her eyes. "I'll just be a few minutes."

She shrugged back into her coat and went back out into the cold. She trudged down the driveway to the red and white barn, with the copper weathervane of a running horse on top. The barn, the farm, it had been her mother's pride and joy. They had bred and trained Morgan horses since before Laura was born. They had always joked that Laura learned to ride before she could walk. The same was true for Zahara.

Roy heard the barn door slide and whickered a greeting from the paddock. Laura grabbed a scoop of grain and a flake of hay for his stall before she went to the back door and swung it open. The bay stallion strolled into the barn and went straight to his stall, pushing the door open wider with his nose before he went in and buried his head in his feed trough.

Laura grabbed some brushes and went to work giving him a quick groom. He wasn't a show horse anymore, so he sported a long, shaggy winter coat that was just starting to shed out. For a stallion, Roy had always been calm, gentle and levelheaded, even more so since there were no mares on the farm to tease him. After picking the ice-clods out of his hooves, Laura went to the tack room to grab her saddle and the rest of the tack she needed. Her hands moved with practiced ease, adjusting the saddle pads, buckling the breast plate, tightening the girth. She threw a set of canvas saddle bags behind the saddle, and used some old bits of rawhide to tie them in place. She warmed the bit in her hands as much as she could before she slid it into his mouth. Roy took the bit eagerly, and even lowered his head for her to slip the bridle over his ears.

Laura gave his itchy spot a good scratch. "Always eager for an adventure, aren't you old boy?" His lip bopped in agreement. She slipped the halter over his bridle and led him back up to the house. She tied him to the porch and went back inside.

Her father was showing Zahara his new jigsaw puzzle. That's how Everett spent his winter days, doing puzzles with the dog, watching the gameshow network and the Hallmark Channel. The TV was out of order now, so he would need to find more ways to occupy his time. Laura pretended not to notice that her father's eyes were red-rimmed from crying.

"Zahara, baby, its time."