Down The Path Page 3
“Yeah, I gathered that last part. She is certain I am going to my death.” Walter had steadied him, and he was regaining his composure, the anxiety slowly rolling off his back like water down the thick scales of the carp.
“Not certain, just worried. She cares as much about this city as the rest of us, we just can’t all agree all the time. Come, I will walk you back to your box, I think you should rest. It has been a trying day for everyone.” Walter was excited, but also still tense. He had no idea that Nancy was going to grill Cooper that hard. She had held that whole plan very close to her chest.
5
Two days passed, and Cooper had spent almost all of that time pouring over maps he had never seen before. These maps had been housed inside the schoolhouse, but kept in a thick metal box and were in excellent condition. He could clearly see the river on the maps, and thought it would be easy to get there using the nice compass the council had given him that hung around his neck on a string. The compass was a small metal circle that flipped open and had a mirror on the inside top, with the floating magnetic needle on the inside bottom. Cooper had to be told to quit opening and closing it all the time or he would wear out the tiny hinges. He didn’t have much gear yet except for the compass. He decided it would be best to settle on a route and get everything clear in his head before moving on to other preparations.
Word had spread quickly that he was planning an expedition and the support from the residents was unbelievable. Many people stopped by to offer services as best they could; others were now cleaning his dwelling and bringing food so he could focus on the expedition. The best thing for him had been the other people in the city doing so much for him and lifting his confidence.
Cooper’s favorite part of his neighbors involvement had to be the food. It appeared the residents, many of which he had never met or spoken to before this, had all decided he needed to be fattened up before he left. They were clearing out all of their hidden stashes and giving him the best food he had ever eaten. Most didn’t have many things squirreled away, instead relying on the community food reserve that they all contributed to in some way. Technically, it was against the rules to store any of your food instead of turning it over to the reserve to be shared amongst all the residents.
A young, darker skinned girl, named Claudia, brought him a small plate of beans. He thanked her profusely, imagining what it must have meant for her family to give up such a treasure. He had never eaten beans because they hadn’t been able to successfully grow them in decades. He knew they would keep, dried, for years and years, and it didn’t matter how old they were before preparing them to eat. After cooking them, the texture was firm, yet yielding. They had a sweetness and a meatiness to them that was unprecedented on Cooper’s tongue. Most surprisingly, a small plate had filled his belly for a very long time. It was amazing!
It didn’t stop at that. He received smoked carp, peanuts, oatmeal, and many other things. They didn’t hide them while walking down the path to his box, either. It was as if the council was turning a blind eye to everyone’s food hoarding since they were donating it to Cooper. They could have kept these treasures hidden away, but it was as if giving it to Cooper nourished them more than eating it themselves. Some expressed regret for not helping others before they had left, but they felt it a waste. They did not expect them to survive. One thing was certain, though, they expected Cooper to live through this ordeal, and they were betting their most prized possessions on him. It was inspiring and terrifying at the same time, to be held up to this impossible task. He could not let them down.
He was curious why he hadn’t seen John in the recent days. He usually just interjected himself into whatever Cooper was doing, and with all the activity around his box, he found it hard to believe that John could stay away. He thought it odd, but he had much larger things to think about than the activities of his co-worker and neighbor.
That evening, after the activity died down, Walter brought him the first of the gear. Cooper was very intrigued by the tent. He had seen them set up before, they weren’t all that rare. This one was different though. When it was folded and packed away, it was very small and barely weighed anything. He doubted how anything so compact and light could provide decent shelter. Once he learned how to set it up, his opinion of this tent changed. It blocked out all the wind and appeared to be quite waterproof. The floor came up the walls almost a foot so water couldn’t leak in from the bottom – a common problem with most of the other tents he had seen. It even had a small mesh shelf inside near the top on which to store some of his things.
Walter also proudly handed him a small flint for making fire. It had a dull and weathered red handle, but plenty of striking metal. He had never seen one of these with so much metal remaining.
Then Walter’s mood seemed to change. He looked from side to side, and his brow furrowed as he made sure no one else was nearby and no others were walking up. There was very little activity at this time of night; it was why he had chosen this time to come by, but he still wanted to be certain.
He handed Cooper a sack, nearly the size of his own head, and it was full of salt. It was the most amazing thing he had ever seen. He had never seen so much in his entire life. This would be enough to make smoked carp for everyone in the city for over a week. He just stared at the salt, afraid to open it for fear of spilling even one briny crystal.
“Where did you find these things, and how have you been able to keep them hidden?” questions he knew he was not supposed to ask, especially when addressing an elder of the council.
“I found most of the gear when I was a young boy. I stashed it in case of emergency.” He was staring straight over Cooper’s red hair, off into the distance at the gray, crumbling mega city on the horizon. “I think this constitutes as an emergency worthy of it.” He sighed.
“…but the salt, sir, it’s so much…”
“All I will tell you about the salt is that it is not only from me. It was collected from the many who wanted to give it to you. I must say, I was surprised to see how much it amounted to as well. It proves that many are hoarding things more than they use to, probably because of despair. Our city, as well as our community, is on its last leg, and that’s what makes your journey so important.”
Cooper understood this more than ever. Everyone seemed so happy that he was embarking on this journey, possibly sacrificing himself to help them all. As people walked around the city, they seemed to have a little extra hop in their step, and he noticed they actually stopped to talk to others instead of just walking by with their heads down. It was a dramatic change.
He was still thinking about the new attitudes of the residents when Walter began snapping his fingers right in front of his face. “Hey Carrot top, pay attention, this is important.” Cooper felt embarrassed he had drifted off into thought after being given such an amazing gift, and his cheeks flushed red. “Listen, this salt has many more uses than just making carp taste better. If you get injured while on the outside, sprinkle this on the wound immediately.”
This perked up Cooper’s ears. Why would he waste such a precious commodity on his own skin? Could he scrape it off later and use it again? Many thoughts flew through his mind all at once but were pushed away as Walter began speaking again.
“It will cause you incredible pain when you do this; pain that you may have never imagined before. This pain will be a good thing though. It means it’s cleaning out the wound and preventing it from turning sour.”
“Can I not take any red liquid with me?” In the city, they had several jars of red liquid for use on wounds. It stung slightly when administered, and it left your skin brown in that area for several days, but it seemed to work well.
“Of course we can send you out with some of that, but being a liquid, I fear that if it spills, you are left with nothing. The salt will be protected in several layers and even if it spills, it can be scooped right back up and used.”
That hadn’t occurred to Cooper. He needed to remember that e
verything he left with was all he had, and once something was gone, there was no replacing it. He would still bring some red liquid though. He wanted to save all that salt for food.
Walter began glancing from side to side, checking once again that no one was within earshot. Then in a very low voice he said, “One last thing about the salt…no one else knows how much everyone’s salt donations added up to except for you and me. Now these are good people, and I am certain that it wouldn’t be taken, but it may be a slap in the face for some to realize just how many people were breaking the law involving something as important as salt. Just keep it hidden in your bag until you have gone through the city gates.”
Cooper was still in shock, but he nodded in agreement and tucked it safely under his bed for the time being. Then Walter set down a handful of much less exciting things. Clothes with less holes than his, a few more maps, smaller than the ones he had been studying, these were for taking on the journey with him, and a few more odds and ends. His thoughts continued to go back to the salt and the sheer amount of it all. The elder said he would come back tomorrow with a few more things that others said they would donate to the cause and then stood to leave. Cooper didn’t know what else to say but thank you, and he said it several times as Walter slowly walked down the path.
With his back to the box, Walter could be quietly heard saying “no, son, thank you,” and several tears rolled down his cheeks as he followed the path in the darkness, the familiar crunch of gravel beneath his feet.
6
As light began to stream through his small window, Cooper rolled out of bed. Immediately checking to make sure that the salt was still tucked away and had not somehow disappeared while he slept. He had now spent several days preparing and was in the final stages before leaving this city, possibly forever. He poured himself a cup of honeysuckle tea and opened the door to his box on the new day only to find John pacing just outside his door, obviously waiting for him to wake up.
“John, you startled me. Is something wrong?”
“Yes, you’re leaving the city. No one should leave the city. They never come back!”
“Come in, John. Want some tea?” he didn’t wait for a response, but merely handed him the other cup to hold as he filled it with water. “Have a seat, I have a little bit more time before I have to go before the council and receive final instructions.”
The large man sat on the one chair inside John’s box and it groaned with displeasure. Cooper was fairly certain it would hold and it didn’t matter much anyway, it was not like he was bringing the chair with him.
John stared him in the eyes as best he could, although he was fairly certain that one of his eyes was focusing on his ear. His eyes always seemed to be more out of alignment when he wasn’t in the sun and Cooper never understood why.
“I just don’t see why you should die. All those times you talked about going south, I never thought you actually would.” John struggled to maintain eye contact a little longer, before shifting his gaze to the floor and settling deeper into the small wooden chair, which groaned again.
“I have no intention of dying out there, John. Besides, have you noticed the change in the community? People seem happy again and…”
“As soon as you leave, it will wear off. A few days will go by and people will remember that no one comes back and everything will be the same except I will have a new garden worker. It will probably be one that makes fun of my eyes and has no interest in living near the garden. I will be out here alone.” There was much anger in John’s voice as all these words spilled out of him.
With that, Cooper began to understand. Even though he had never thought he was very friendly to John, others treated him far worse. He hadn’t thought about leaving him down here alone because it simply hadn’t occurred to him that it would bother John. He assumed that John would entirely forget him after a day or two and that didn’t seem to be the case. Odd that it took Cooper leaving the city to realize this, but such was life.
“Listen John, I am leaving to try to help the city. You will not be alone. I am not going outside to die. Many good people have given me terrific gear and supplies to stack the odds in my favor. No one has ever left outfitted with what I have.”
None of his words seemed to change the big man’s attitude at all. Cooper decided to change track slightly, “I will come back, and I have a job for you while I am away.” He had hoped putting the simple man on a task might distract him.
“A job, while you are gone. I’ll do it, whatever it is.”
“I need you to watch over my things. We have plenty of boxes for others to live in, so no one will be taking mine. Just make sure no one goes in it, and keep it clean from time to time. In exchange for this, I will give you the rest of my honeysuckle tea. Assuming you don’t eat it, it should last you awhile”
John seemed genuinely pleased to be put in a task like this. Plus, it would give him something to do instead of staring out at the lake.
“Now, I have to be heading down the path, I don’t want to keep the council waiting on me.” Truly, he had plenty of time, but he could see this conversation may be hard to end; John had a way of rattling on.
The big man shook his head vigorously and clapped him on his back, swearing to watch over his stuff, saying it would be just as he left it when it returned. Cooper expressed his relief in having someone he could trust look after his box and thanked him for the service, then began strolling down the path in the sunlight of this early spring morning.
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Since he had extra time, he decided to stroll through the city. There were many places he hadn’t been in a long time because they were simply too depressing to bother with. The only place he went with serious regularity was the food reserve building both to get meals as well as drop off produce from the garden. It was just a series of boxes put together with interior walls removed to make a large storage area. The doors were all left on so that it would be secure.
There was a separate box off to the side that was for processing the carp. All the waste went into a large vat and then it got spread out throughout the various garden plots. Cooper always made sure John picked up the vats of fish guts and pieces when the garden that they tended was due for some. They had large fires outside these boxes with big pieces of metal over them that they cooked the fish on. The smell grew stronger as you got closer, but the size of the city had shrunk over the years and the smell permeated the whole site strongly enough that everyone had stopped noticing it.
Next to the food service building were the boxes where they did the washing. Everyone dropped off their soiled clothing into another large vat full of water to soak and the men and women who did the wash took them out and scrubbed them ‘clean’. One of the older washing men spoke of his youth when they had something called soap that made the water very slippery and filled it with bubbles. He always said things needed much less scrubbing when they had soap. The mud slipped right off, apparently. Cooper couldn’t imagine how water could become more slippery and chocked it up as another tale from the elders that made little sense.
Today though, he was not walking to either of those places. He was heading over to the main dwelling center, where most of the people now lived. He wondered if his choice to live near the garden was actually a choice to live anywhere but the mass of misery that was the main dwelling area..
As he strolled into the first few clusters of boxes, some folks came out to chat with him. Mostly they were complimenting him as he walked along. He heard several people say they were proud of him, many wished him well, and some young woman near his age ran out and kissed him full on the mouth; then batted her eyes and said “for luck” and ran off giggling.
This area looked very different than he remembered it. Only around 150 people lived here now, mostly paired up into around 100 boxes. It wasn’t just the size though; people were active here as well. Many were outside talking to others, nearly everyone’s door was open and people were walking back and forth. They were h
elping each other clean things up. Several men were walking around with buckets, washing off everyone’s dwelling. It was nowhere near as depressing as he remembered it.
He wondered how long it had been this pleasant. He still liked his view of the garden and the lake better, but it would have been nice to have people other than John to share tea with. Plus, the young woman who gave him some luck would have been a welcome neighbor.
After meandering through, shaking many hands and getting a few more lucky smooches from other women, he had come to the other side of the main dwelling area and proceeded farther down the path to the chambers of the council. He was very happy with his decision to take on this task and was even more certain that this city would persist. They would not forget about him in several days, as John had said.
7
“It’s already working, the city hasn’t been this vibrant in decades!” he heard one woman say from inside the council chambers. “This was a genius idea, Walt, just genius!”
Cooper was unsure what the woman was talking about, but he suspected it was him. He had seen the change in the city himself, and he was glad everyone was happy. He didn’t know how the idea was genius, but he had other things to think on besides what some random person on the council ranted about when she didn’t know others could hear.
“Excuse me,” Cooper said as he peered around the corner into the room. “I received word the council wanted to meet with me again before I leave?” He wasn’t sure why he was being so submissive to them, but a large group of older people tend to bring that out in a young man.