Constant Fear

CHAPTER 17

Trust in God, but have a deep larder.

Prepping wasn’t about having a supply of food to last a few days. It was about how to survive for the rest of your life. Jake believed that when The Day came, society would cease to function, and he’d have to hunker down for the long haul. It was as simple as that. The larder in his bug-out location, and the other provisions he stockpiled, were the means by which he would endure the coming collapse.

Now Andy wanted it gone, and Jake had to give this serious consideration. He made a promise. Jake was prepared for everything, except to say good-bye to this part of his life. It was like ripping a security blanket from the hands of a young child or taking a teenager’s cell phone. He’d feel naked without it, lost, alone-and, worst of all, vulnerable.

Jake slumped down on a stack of bags filled with brown rice. He had come down here not just to check on his supplies, but also to connect with the space, to think. He’d built this from nothing, and the sweat equity made this more than just a storage area.

When Jake first discovered this underground room, it was filthy, in complete disrepair, covered in cobwebs and infested with rodents, as were most of the abandoned tunnels. It took hours of work to clean it up, and countless lost weekends to get the rooms suitable for storing his supplies.

The rooms and tunnels were still connected to the school’s power supply, so getting light down here was as simple as replacing and reconnecting lots of forgotten wiring. Jake thoughtfully selected natural daylight fluorescent bulbs to bring a bit of artificial sunshine down below. Now the space was lit, clean, and organized as any general store. It was massive like a store, too: almost seven hundred square feet with eight-foot-high ceilings. Thick, concrete brick walls and a lack of windows made the room a bit dungeon-like, but posters of the outdoors-mountains, lakes, and forests-lightened the dreariness.

Jake looked at the freestanding shelves and could recall loading and stocking each item there. The twenty pounds of salt, bags of brown sugar, and raw honey would give the food some needed flavoring. He’d thought about keeping flour down here, anticipating that Andy would want his famed pancakes, but the grain stored poorly and rotating it was more than a bit cumbersome. Andy would get used to wheat berries, and it was a more nutritious breakfast anyway.

In addition to other grains, like buckwheat, dry corn, and quinoa, he had plenty of canned fruit and vegetables, beans (stored, like the grains, in pails certified for food), peanut butter, coffee, tea, powdered milk (nitrogen-packed from Walton Feed), as well as tins of olive oil. He had cans of meat and tuna and other supplies such as toilet paper, soaps, lighter fluid, and bottled water.

The temperature never got much above sixty-five degrees in the summer, and Jake siphoned off heat from the preexisting ductwork so nothing ever froze in the winter. In the event of a power failure, kerosene heaters would keep the larder and sleeping quarters toasty warm. Jake kept careful records of his inventory, and any food item close to expiring would be moved from the larder and brought to his home so nothing went to waste.

How to dismantle it all?

If it came to it, most of the equipment could be sold, Jake supposed. Items like his hand-cranked grain mill, home dehydrator, and the vacuum-packing machine (great for sealing plastic bags and evacuating the air from mason jars) would probably sell for close to what he paid on sites like craigslist.

The real money would be in the guns and ammo. Jake had chosen his weapons carefully for their versatility. No single firearm could be counted on to do every job, plus he had to limit the cartridges to what was readily stocked in most places that sold ammo. If he needed to go scrounging for bullets, it would be better to look for.22 LR ammunition, by far the most common in the world.

For hunting small game, Jake had a Ruger 10/22 with a ten-round rotary magazine. The recoil and noise were minimal, making it a good gun for Andy to shoot as well. Newer shooters, afraid of noise and kickback, often developed bad habits such as poor shooting posture and flinching when firing a higher-caliber weapon. Jake had recently added an AK-47 to his arsenal. The AK-47 shot a 7.62x39mm round, and Jake would use that gun for hunting larger game as well as defense. When the collapse came, he’d need to be able to fight force with force.

The long guns had better velocity and a longer sighting radius, but they were not always practical to carry, which was why Jake had pistols down here as well. The SIG SAUER he kept at home, but here Jake’s Glock 19 served him well. It was a reliable gun, and the 9mm round was a popular choice, useful to have on hand when bartering with others who survived the coming collapse. Jake also had a Smith & Wesson.22 LR rimfire pistol, with a ten-round capacity, and a Ruger LC9 in his arsenal. The Ruger was an easily carried backup pistol, and at one pound fully loaded could be worn day and night without second thought.

For mobility, Jake used a Condor H-Harness chest rig with a battle belt. He could carry plenty of mags on the move. If he had to, Jake could slip a mag into his back pocket, just in case. Even though he had refinished the rifles using Cerakote H-Series materials finish, Jake still stocked plenty of RIG (rust-inhibitive grease), and he maintained his guns with the same thoroughness as he rotated his inventory.

If the larder went, though, the guns would go, too. Jake knew he couldn’t keep a window to this part of his life open even a sliver. Just like with baseball, it would be too tempting to open it all the way and climb right back in.

The brown rice shifted and made a rhythmic sound as Jake stood. He walked to the back of the larder, where a thick metal door opened into a smaller adjacent room. Jake flicked the light switch and made a quick inspection of his fuel and power supplies. The storage room, half the size of the larder, locked from the inside and doubled as a safe room, but Jake wouldn’t want to stay in there for long. He had a stockpile of rechargeable batteries for various electronic devices, including his communication equipment, and rechargers for each type. Two solar-powered rechargers would serve as backup, should the electricity go out. The underground tunnels and many of the rooms were wired to run off the school’s generator; and if the grid went down, Jake had a fuel-transfer pump to keep that generator humming. The pump ran off a 12v motor that could siphon ten gallons of gas per minute. He could get gas from abandoned cars, or even dig up a tank at a gas station if necessary.

In here, Jake kept his water-treatment filtration system, medical supplies, and bags of seed. How could he let it all go? Laura showing up the way she did was another reminder that uncertainty was life’s only certainty. Since seeing her, Jake had thought of little else. Every detail of the encounter had been etched upon his mind. How could he still have feelings for her? It was illogical, nonsensical, and yet undeniable.

A thought struck him. Was it really Laura he wanted, or just the idea of Laura? Was his bug-out location a way for Jake to cling to a time in his life when he felt most secure? Was all this planning and prepping just a means to find a safe haven after all his losses? Displacement, Andy had called it. All these years, Jake simply accepted what he did without truly understanding where the behavior came from.

He wondered if now was the right time to step off the path. Maybe Laura was like a cool breeze, telling Jake it was time to close that window to his past once and for all. He knew Ellie well enough to know she’d never embrace his ways. It was foolish for him to think otherwise. Perhaps letting go of Laura, Jake could find it in himself to dismantle his bug-out location. The possibility intrigued him.

Andy had gotten Jake thinking. He’d achieved that much with the promise he’d extracted.

Laura had been in town only a couple of days, and the urge to see her felt sometimes overpowering. They had met for coffee the day after her arrival and enjoyed a pleasant conversation, albeit one tinged with sadness. Jake didn’t offer any details about Andy because his son should have the prerogative to choose what information to share. What he did talk about was his life after she had left, and she of hers, but for the most part the conversation didn’t dip below surface level.

Either way, Jake would see Laura again, but first Andy had to meet his mother. Jake had offered to be there, but Andy wanted to confront her on his own. Confused as Jake was, he could only imagine how his son was processing everything. Jake had tried to get Andy to open up, but that conversation had gone nowhere. Jake only knew that Andy and Laura were going out to a late lunch.

Poor kid. His head must be spinning, unsure what to feel.

Jake snagged the clipboard he kept tacked to the wall, thinking he’d do some work on the inventory, when he heard the fire alarm. Usually, the alarms were nothing and Jake was inclined to ignore them, but he had a Uniden scanner and figured he might as well check. Sometimes he turned on the scanner while he worked, and would smile when he heard Ellie’s voice.

The Winston PD was already preset. With a push of a button, Jake dialed the scanner to that channel. Between bursts of static, Jake listened to the chatter.

“How many ambulances can you get there?” The male voice was professionally calm.

“We got three en route, but I’m looking for more.”

“There is a big team from Clean Air here. They’re going to help with the evac.”

Jake’s head began buzzing. What were they talking about?

“Buses are already at Pepperell Academy. We can load them and move out quickly. We’ll take them to the regional high school.”

“I’m not smelling the ammonia.” This was a new voice. The people communicating knew each other, but Jake didn’t know any of them. What ammonia? Ambulances? Buses? What the hell is going on?

Jake shut off the radio and raced for the tunnel. Something big was happening at the school. Like any father would feel, his concern was for his son.