living_history (living_history) wrote in the_colony, @ 2010-06-02 22:01:00 |
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Entry tags: | ^ week 09, bridget mackenzie, leo parker, | bridget and leo |
Week Nine - Sunday
Characters: Bridget, Leo & Walker
Location: Gilcrease Orchard, Las Vegas
Summary: Drawn by the idea of fresh fruit, Bridget, Leo, & Walker take a trip to a recently discovered orchard.
Rating: G
"Thanks for coming with me Leo," Bridget glanced over at the man riding in the passenger seat, Walker riding in the back right behind him. The idea of plenty of fresh fruit had been too great an allure for the expectant mother, and once she'd felt up to going out beyond the suites again she'd asked him if he'd come along to help harvest.
They turned the corner and went from subdivision after subdivision onto a tree lined drive, a locked gate at the end. "Looks like this is the place."
"How'd you find out about this place, anyways?" Leo asked.
He was already slipping off his seat belt, his eyes absently scanning the trees as they passed. When his gaze finally settled on the gate ahead, his narrowed slightly in contemplation. Walker sat quietly in his seat with a colorful Easter basket in his lap; something he wouldn't leave the Suites without, once he was told they were going to pick fruit.
"Someone packed a phone book by mistake during the book raid, and I got curious to see what was listed. I saw an ad for the orchard, and then someone mentioned seeing this place off in the distance when they were looking for fruit trees, everything fell into place." She eyed the gate as well. "Good thing I keep a pair of bolt cutters in the back."
"I'll get 'em." When the truck rolled to a stop, Leo grabbed his shotgun and climbed out. He took a good survey of the area, standing somewhere behind the truck, before he hauled himself into the back to retrieve the bolt cutters. Not seeing them, he finally pried into a toolbox, snatching them up and hopping back down out of the truck.
Propping his gun against the fence, Leo set to work, shooting a smirk over his shoulder at both Bridget and Walker once the lock was snipped and the chains fell around his feet. He pushed the gate open with a great deal of caution, and Leo took a look around on the inside, then he walked back to peer at Bridget through the window.
"Maybe I should go have a look-see before we drive in," he said. Dust had already collected on his face and forehead, the red earth sticking to the sweat on his brow.
Bridget thought it over for a heartbeat and nodded. The incident at the meet-up had made her a little paranoid about safety, and she wasn't going to second guess his decision. "All right, I'll stay put with Walker here," she reached over behind the passenger seat and tousled the boy's hair affectionately. "Be safe Leo, ok?"
He nodded, briefly glancing at Walker in the back. Be safe. He'd heard Alice say that to him so many times in the beginning, it felt weird hearing it from someone else. "Lock the doors," he said. "And pay attention."
Making sure his shotgun was on the ready, Leo disappeared beyond the gates and was gone for a whole ten minutes, but when he came back it was hard to hide the awkward smile on his face. He shoved the gates open as wide as they would go and waved the truck in.
The ten minutes had been spent with Bridget nervously awaiting his return and trying not to let her anxiety show in front of Walker. She breathed a sigh of relief when he returned and put the truck into gear, driving through the gates and stopping once through so he could get back in. Walker was equally as relieved to see Leo, and when the man climbed back into the truck and shut the door he reached forward and patted him on the shoulder like an adult, all smiles.
"Wait'll you see this," Leo said with a bit of a grin. "Just...," his expression faltered, and his tone grew serious again. "Don't go inside the shops."
Bridget's own expression turned grim for a moment as she pictured what the shops must look like, and she nodded. "Not what we're here for anyway. Just the fruit." She looked up the drive, "How'd the orchard itself look?"
"Mostly dead." Despite the negative words, his expression was otherwise somewhat excited. "But there's fruit. Fruit I could see from far away, it's so colorful."
"Yes!" Bridget grinned and exchanged fist bumps with him before putting the truck back into gear and heading deeper into the orchard. He was right at the color, she could see the fruit hanging from the trees and littering the ground, and off in the distance she could see what looked like a vegetable patch that had at least one or two plants still alive. "I think we hit the jackpot boys."
Walker wasn't sure what was so exciting about fruits and vegetables, but he clutched that basket all the tighter, smiling at Bridget through the rear-view mirror. Leo's eyes scanned the rows of tree, wondering if the previous fruit hunt had been this exciting. It was different than hunting anything else; they knew where the fruit was, it was just a matter of it being alive and edible. Finding anything alive, these days, in the middle of Las Vegas, was a good a reason as any to feel some hope.
"How much did you plan on taking back with us?"
"I'm not sure," Bridget looked over at Leo as she put the truck into park and turned the engine off. "I've got about a half dozen plastic buckets in the truck bed, assuming we find enough good fruit to fill them up that ought to be plenty for now. There's only so much we can eat before they go bad, unless somebody knows how to stew them and we can find canning jars."
"What--" Leo said, climbing out of the truck for a second time, only now he was less on guard and stood at the side of the cab to help Walker out. Once Bridget was out of the truck as well, he continued. "Like... to make jelly and stuff?"
Walker tugged at Leo's sleeve, anxious to go pick fruit and the adults were being too slow, so Leo shook him loose and gestured toward the trees. "Well, go on. But stay close." The boy beamed and took off at a run.
Bridget watched the boy a bit anxiously as he disappeared down a row of trees. She didn't like him being out of their sight but Leo had checked the place out. "I don't really know Leo, just some way to try and stretch their life a bit so we still have some fruit later." She reached into the bed of the truck and pulled out plastic buckets and handed one to Leo.
"Maybe we can track down of those... drying things," Leo said. He took the bucket and reached in to grab another. Maybe he was being overly hopeful, but he had two hands and for once he was being optimistic enough to believe he could fill two buckets. "Um, a dehydrator or something like that." With a bucket swinging from each hand he headed in Walker's direction.
"A desiccator is what I think it's called, but I'm not sure." Bridget responded as she fell into step beside the man. Even if the area was safe she didn't want to be far from others, who knew what might happen?
"When I was little, I stayed a long time with this crazy lady who dried everything on one of those," he mused over his shoulder to Bridget with a smirk. "We had jerky, banana chips... and these apple rings that tasted like cinnamon and rubber."
A matching smirk crossed the young woman's face. "cinnamon and rubber huh? That might explain a lot..."
"Pfft," Leo snorted and shot Bridget a quizzical, if not slightly playful look, though his attention quickly shifted toward Walker who had already found a half-dead row of peach trees and was filling his bucket. With another glance in the woman's direction, Leo smirked again. "What's that supposed to mean?"
"Oh, nothing," Bridget teased with a smile, feeling a little more relaxed now that they were further into the orchard and all together. "Maybe that's how you survived the flu, she toughened you up by making you eat all that crappy food." She eyed the peach trees and plucked a fruit off the nearest one. It might not look as good as what she'd seen back on supermarket shelves, but she was certain it would taste heavenly. "I'm going to have to see if we've got the fixings to make peach cobbler when we get back, I haven't had that in so long."
"Me neither." Leo walked past the other two to pluck a peach from its stem, scowling slightly when a worm came crawling out. "At least we know this shit is organic, huh?" He half-grinned and tossed the bad fruit over his shoulder. Walker rushed over and held up a perfect peach, looking hopefully up at Leo. The man nodded and the boy grinned a took a big juicy bite. It was like the two were telepathic or something.
"We should save the pits and seeds and whatever," Leo said. "Don't you think?"
"Definitely," Bridget nodded. "We'll want to try and start seedlings if for no other reason. Hopefully wherever we end up we'll be able to plant fruit trees. Maybe we can find some berry bushes as well." She bit into her own peach and made a 'yum' noise as she chewed, a large smile on her face as she looked at the man and boy.
Walker grinned up at Bridget and held his peach with both hands, that colorful basket dangling from the crook of his elbow. He'd always had a strong sense of empathy and seemed to enjoy Bridget's bite of fruit just as much as she did. Leo rolled his eyes, but he couldn't help but to grin a little himself.
"I hope you're paying attention," he said down to Walker. "You gotta keep your seeds so we can grow baby trees."
The little boy looked down at his peach, a little mystified and went jogging back off into the rows of peach trees.
Bridget watched him go with a smile on his face. "He's such a good kid. If it weren't for the fact he doesn't speak you would think that he hadn't suffered at all during the end of the world. You're doing a good job with him." She took another bite of her peach.
"That's what Alice always says," Leo forced a smile and shrugged doubtfully. He knew better than anybody that Walker needed so much more than Leo had to offer, but up until recently there wasn't any other option.
"Parenting's not so tough." With an easy smirk, it was obvious that he was being sarcastic, not realizing the truth in what he was saying. "You just gotta let kids be themselves, teach them right from wrong, and... try not to let 'em get killed." Those were the things he'd been denied as a child; things he was sure to give to Walker. "You'll see."
"I guess I will," Bridget smiled back. It was something of a relief to have everyone aware of her condition, she didn't have to remember who she'd told and who she hadn't. A few more weeks and everyone would have figured it out anyway. "It'll be a real challenge trying to raise a baby in the here and now, but I'm looking forward to it." Assuming she survived the birth and the baby made it through the first few years, but she tried not to think about everything that could go wrong.
Leo shrugged dismissively in an attempt to reassure Bridget, as though whatever concerns she may have had weren't really worth worrying over. Of course, they were. "At least you have people like Alice... and Luc." A doctor and a mother, Bridget had a good team in her corner. His features had softened slightly, and he smiled when he waved the woman in Walker's direction.
"We better hurry before the kid gets all the good stuff," he said.