Hope During Havoc

Horn of My Salvation

Rebecca lifted her ball cap and adjusted her ponytail as Cliff heaved another bag of horse feed into the utility trailer. They’d parked at the edge of the Billings Farm & Ranch Supply lot, taking up three spaces.

“That’s the last of it,” Cliff said, his handlebar mustache lifting with his satisfied grin. “We’re set.”

“For now.” Rebecca checked her phone out of habit—still no service. Weird. Her phone always worked here. “You really think we need all this?” She took a step to the side so she could see into the cab of the pickup truck. There was Duke, looking at them, ears high and tongue out. “Give me a minute, baby,” she said.

“Better to have it and not need it.” Cliff secured the trailer gate, giving it a test shake. “Besides, with guests coming in a few weeks, we’ll be happy we bought it now, so we don’t have to run off to the big city while entertaining.”

Rebecca nodded, but her stomach tightened. Guests. Their first real guests at Prospect Creek Dude Ranch. The thought thrilled and terrified her in equal measure. Maybe even more than the events unfolding around the country. At least life was still normal in their area.

They’d left home before dawn, wanting to beat any crowds. The news had been getting worse all week. The airplanes crashed on Thursday night—commercial jets falling from the sky in five different cities, followed immediately by some kind of on-ground attacks once the first responders arrived. Yesterday, many bridges exploded. The Golden Gate. The Brooklyn Bridge. Dozens of others. The footage had been surreal, apocalyptic.

Those who lived in areas affected by the bridge explosions packed up and left. Unable to fly due to grounded air travel, they filled their cars with whatever they could and took off. Most didn’t plan it too well and left with nowhere specific to go. Because so many people had the same idea, the streets and interstates jammed. Gas stations couldn’t handle the demand. Hotels filled. Restaurants and grocery stores emptied. It was chaos.

Rebecca didn’t understand what they thought they were doing by leaving perfectly fine homes, but thousands upon thousands did it anyway. Driven by fear or something, people made poor choices, stranding themselves in strange towns or along the freeways, stalling traffic.

But when she and Cliff reached Billings this morning, things had seemed almost normal. Some traffic, sure, but nothing really beyond normal. They had noticed several semitrucks parked along the edge on the westbound side slowing traffic, but she expected that to be resolved before they headed back. It was certainly nothing like the jammed interstates they’d seen on television.

Cliff had insisted they come today, had insisted they stock up on supplies “just in case,” and Rebecca had learned not to argue when he got that look in his eyes. Besides, Wyoming and Montana weren’t the same as those places on television.

“One more stop,” Cliff said, rubbing his hands together. “Grocery store. Take care of that and head home.”

“We’ve already gone to the grocery store, Cliff.”

He shook his head. “We went to the membership store. There are items I want from SuperMart.”

Stopping at the big grocery store had become part of their routine whenever they came this way. Their new home and business sat in the mountains near the Montana border, tucked inside Wyoming, and the place embodied the best of both worlds. She loved being able to say they lived in Wyoming, because there was something almost magical about the state she now called her own.

Still, watching Cliff load fence posts, wire, and feed, she wondered if he was being paranoid. Seriously. The world was strange. Weird, even. But it wasn’t like it was the end of the world. Terrorist attacks had happened before, and life always returned to normal.

Rebecca opened the passenger door, and Duke bounded out, doing a happy circle around her legs before moving to a patch of weeds by the trailer hitch.

“Good boy,” she murmured, scratching behind his ears after he did his business. “You’ve been so patient all day.”

Duke looked up at her with his warm brown eyes, and her heart squeezed. They’d found him four years ago, a scraggly, barely weaned puppy abandoned at a rest stop. Cliff had scooped him up without hesitation, and Duke had been their shadow ever since.

“C’mon, buddy.” She opened the truck door and Duke leaped in, settling into the back seat as he usually did.

Cliff started the engine and pulled out of the lot. “Last stop. Then we’re done.”

“Promises, promises.” Rebecca snickered.

The grocery store parking lot made Rebecca’s breath catch.

Cars everywhere, parked at odd angles, some blocking the fire lanes. A woman was screaming at a teenager in a store vest near the entrance. Two men shoved each other near a shopping cart corral.

“Maybe we should skip it,” Rebecca said, one hand on Duke’s collar. The dog was on edge, sensing her unease.

“Maybe.” Cliff’s jaw was set in that stubborn line she knew too well. “I don’t know . . . it’s not that bad. I see a spot on the edge. We’ll be quick. In and out.”

“Big enough for the trailer?”

“Yup, it’ll work.”

He found a spot that wasn’t even part of the grocery store but belonged to the box store sharing the same lot. “Great, Cliff. It’s about half a mile to the store.”

“Oh, c’mon. You’re always telling me how you need to stay in shape.” His tone was teasing and light, yet his face held tension as he scanned the lot. “Good thing we got an early start today. We’ll be home with our feet up before it gets too crazy.”

They cracked the windows for Duke. The air was still cool, proof they’d been right to start early. If the weather warmed up, they would move him to the truck bed, where they had secured his crate. “We’ll be fast, I promise,” Rebecca told the dog, giving him one more scratch.

The trek to the store was a gauntlet of rushing cars and blaring horns. A lone cart sat with its front wheels on the sidewalk, its back wheels in the lot.

“Let’s take this,” Cliff said, grabbing the cart. It wobbled.

“Leave it, Cliff,” Rebecca insisted.

He shook his head. “Might not be any inside. Better than nothing.”

The parking lot was awful, and inside was worse. The checkout lines snaked back into the aisles. People threw items into carts without looking at prices, their faces tight with something Rebecca didn’t want to name. Panic. Or fear.

“Cliff? Are you sure this is smart?”

“Probably not. Stick close.”

She shook her head. “Best we split up. Each take a cart.”

He grabbed the last cart in the cart bay. When she saw it rolled smoothly, Rebecca reached for it.

“You get the broken one,” she said. “It’ll make me crazy.”

“Anything for you, babe,” he told her with a wink. He sobered. “I’m still not sure we should split up.”

“You get the things you said you needed and couldn’t buy at the last place. I’m going to toiletries.”

“Okay. Fifteen minutes, we meet in produce. Deal?”

“Deal.”

She grabbed a cart, and they split up. She was trying to find the toothpaste she preferred when the announcement came.

“Attention shoppers.” The voice over the intercom was strained, barely controlled. “Due to technical difficulties, we temporarily cannot process credit or debit card transactions. We apologize for the inconvenience.”

A ripple moved through the store as the voice continued, “We can accept cash only. If you don’t have cash, please bring your cart to the front and we’ll handle returning the items to the shelves for you.”

“Fat lot of good that’ll do me,” a woman down the aisle yelled.

Rebecca found Cliff in the canned goods aisle, his cart half full.

“Did you hear?” she asked.

“Cash only.” He pulled out his wallet, counted quickly. “I’ve got a hundred twenty. You?”

She dug through her purse. “Eighty-three.”

“Two hundred and three dollars.” Cliff looked at his cart before glancing at hers. “You don’t have much.”

She shook her head. “I had a few more things but put them back.” There was no reason to tell him she’d decided against the hair mask and teeth-whitening strips.

“I have about . . . what? Eighty bucks’ worth of stuff in my cart.”

She peered at the cans. “Somewhere around there? I have about thirty.” She pointed to the giant package of toilet paper. “We bought TP at the membership store, but this kind’s better for septic tanks. I thought it might be good for the cabins, but I could put it back.”

“Leave it. Toilet paper is always a good idea.”

“Said by the man who uses his sock when hiking.”

He opened his mouth to respond when the lights flickered.

“Now what?” someone yelled.

“What kind of rinky-dink store is this?” someone else called out.

The lights flickered again before going out.

Emergency lighting kicked on, casting everything in a yellow glow. Voices rose throughout the store, some angry, some scared.

“Let’s go find out what’s happening,” Cliff said, already pushing his cart toward the front.

Rebecca followed with hers, navigating around other shoppers doing the same. Near customer service, Cliff spotted an employee—a man with sweat under his arms and looking like he wanted to be any place else.

A man was yelling at the worker. A woman stood behind him, hands wrapped around the cart handle. The employee seemed to be keeping his cool, but Rebecca noticed the tension in his jaw and the way he held his hands by his side, clenched tight.

“So there’s nothing you will do?” The angry man’s voice dropped an octave as he took a step forward.

“Everyone’s in the same boat. The credit cards won’t work. Now with the regular power out and only emergency on, the registers are down.”

“Write them a check, honey,” a woman said.

The angry man shot her a venomous look. “Don’t tell me what to do.”

“Really? You’re going to take that attitude with me?” The angry man started to respond, but she raised her hand, cutting him off. She turned to the employee. “I’m going to write a check for a hundred and fifty. I shop here all the time—you know that, now don’t you?”

Color crept up the employee’s neck. “Yes, ma’am. I’m aware.”

“One-fifty.” She had her purse open and was taking out a pen.

“I’m going to lose my job.”

“Better than my punching you in the nose,” the angry man said, taking another step toward the employee.

The employee took a step back and raised his hands. “Write the check. I’m done.”

Cliff shot Rebecca a look and grabbed his wallet. “Here’s a hundred-dollar bill. These carts. We good?”

Cliff shoved the money toward him. The man looked at their cart before shifting his gaze to the growing mob of angry customers near the darkened registers. Behind them, someone was shouting about their rights.

“Yeah,” the man said finally. “Yeah, fine. Take it and go.”

Cliff didn’t give him time to reconsider. He handed over the bill, and they headed for the doors, moving fast but not quite running.

Continue reading Hope During Havoc: A Havoc in Wyoming Short Story Collection