She waited a
moment for it to hit her, the stark reality of the situation, now she was home,
but all she felt was a sense of calm and quiet.
Well, no doubt she would feel other things later, so she might as well
get on now.
Julia came
out of the kitchen to get more things.
Laura had filled every inch of the Landie with supplies, which must now
be put away, so Julia had helped make a start lugging it all through to the
kitchen straight away. It wouldn't all
fit in there. Some stuff would need to
go in the garage, but it would all stay in the house. There was no point risking putting things in
the barn any more.
Julia looked
at the bolted door and then at Laura.
“Where's your dad?” She
hissed. Laura closed her eyes and took a
breath. When she opened them she saw one
of the kids, peeking out of the door to the living room – on high alert for any
drama. “He went back for some beer.” It
was true, at least. She picked up a
multi-pack of bottled water and took it through to the garage. There was loads of it there already, but you
never knew when the water from the tap would stop coming, and it seemed safest
to boil it, so you needed the electric or the Aga for that, and they might not
always be able to use those.
She'd
managed to find some UHT milk. She felt
proud of that. It'd been hidden behind
some tins so hadn't cost them any more time, unlike her Dad's silly beer. It wasn't a patch on real milk, but it was ok
in coffee, and the kids didn't seem to mind it on cereal for a treat from time
to time. She missed butter. The kids liked chocolate spread and peanut
butter, but hot buttered toast was something they missed out on. At least they could rely on the Aga. It had seemed such a faff before, but now
they depended on it. She'd not found any
coal though, and it didn't do so well on the wood they managed to get. She seemed to remember that pine sap could
cause chimney fires, and you should leave the wood to dry out first, but needs
must, and they had to risk it. They had
to eat.
“Laura,”
called Julia, “I've filled all the cupboards.”
She went through. True enough,
the cupboards were full to busting, and much better organised than Laura would
have done them. The freezer was full
too. The generator worked well at the
moment, but it wasn't worth counting on it, so they'd turned the freezer off,
and were using it as a cupboard, but they still kept the fridge going, not that
there was much to put in it now. They
needed to get better at this, the tins wouldn't last forever. Laura noticed some space in Dad's beer
cupboard. “Did you get enough stuff?”
smirked Julia. Laura didn't answer
her. Julia knew it wasn't worth risking
not getting enough. “He's not coming
back, is he?” Laura ignored that. She looked up at Dad's cupboard: “Let's use the beer cupboard. We can always put beer in the garage.” “Oh God.”
Julia sat down, suddenly, “how are we going to tell John?” Laura lost patience, “John's a grown up, he
can manage! You got over it didn't
you? It's one less pain in the arse
cluttering up my house!” Laura stormed
out. Of course Julia worried about John,
but with Bill missing and Dad gone, who was going to worry about Laura
now? She'd stormed into the utility room
and there was nowhere else to go. She
started pulling wet clothes out of the washer, but she was furious. Someone else could put the laundry on the
racks for a change. She felt it
coming. The sadness. How was she going to tell John? She would have to do it. How were they going to manage? Who would be next? How would she look after the children?
