"Starting From Scratch" (closed)

[TiredFingers]

"Starting From Scratch"

(closed)​

For more than an hour, Brett Dawson had remained silent and still behind a large Douglas fir tree at the edge of a clearing, looking out upon the meadow before him and, in particular, upon the little cabin setting near its center. It wasn't large, perhaps a single room; it was neither new or old, a log cabin built in late 20th century of the frontier style popular to western frontiersmen of the 18th and 19th centuries.

When he'd first come to the forest edge and spotted the clearing and then the home, there had been a woman breaking the ground of what appeared to be a future garden with a heavy garden pick. A bit later, a boy of perhaps 12 carrying a squirrel rifle -- likely a .22 -- had emerged from the woods in a hurry at an angle from the cabin perpendicular to Brett's position and hurried up to the woman. They chatted a moment, then entered the home together. Brett had seen neither of them since.

He wasn't here to do either of them any harm. He was hungry after three days of virtually nothing to eat; he was sick, his body being ravaged by a fever that had exploded within him the day before; and he was exhausted, having been on the run from a militia that had falsely accused and convicted him of thievery before sentencing him to five years of hard labor in their work camp, what essentially amounted to enslavement. All he wanted was a meal and a warm dry place to lay down and die in peace.

"Move and I'll blow your head off."

Brett flinched at the voice and turned his head to find its source, but other than that he did as he was told. A young woman, perhaps 18 or maybe a bit older, was standing in one side of the old abandoned dirt road Brett had followed to this point; she was leveling a shotgun at him from about 30 feet away.

"I'm going to move," he said with a weak voice. "I'm going to turn … and I'm going to sit down … at the base of this tree … because if I don't, I'm going to pass out and fall over … and you might shoot me thinking that I'm some kind of danger to you."

Then, slowly, he did exactly as he'd announced he would. His entire body ached from the fever, and his head was pounding, but he managed to slide down the tree's trunk until his buttocks found the fir needed covered ground. He gave the young woman another look, then closed his eyes.

"Do me a favor, will you?" he asked of her as he closed his eyes and leaned his head back against the fir. "If you do shoot me … please shoot me point blank in the chest … so that you kill me … outright. I don't think I deserve to suffer … after the good life I've lived."

A moment later, he slumped over to the ground, unconscious.

#################​

When he came to, Brett found himself flat on his back in a too-soft bed, staring straight up at what he would realize was the rafters of the log cabin. He felt significantly better, even though he was as thirsty as a man crossing the Sahara. He rolled his head left, then right; he was, in fact, in the cabin, and all three of the people he'd seen earlier were in there with him.

"Water," he murmured to the boy, who was sitting on a chair a couple of yards away with his small caliber rifle across his thighs, staring intently upon at Brett. Licking his lips with a dry tongue, he repeated with desperate hope, "Water. Please."

The boy looked off toward the woman, who checked Brett first, then nodded permission to the boy. He set the rifle aside and retrieved a plastic cup that had a bendy straw in it, like he'd used the last time he'd been in the hospital for surgery. As he sucked eagerly on the straw, Brett imagined that the woman -- the mother-type -- had been through this kind of caring for an injured or ill person before.

Brett lay his head back again, considered his current situation a moment, then asked, "How long have I been here? And … where is here?"

 

[Alice2015]

Earlier

Vicki's hands were getting all torn up and dry from working in the garden without gloves. When she and the children came across this cabin two weeks earlier, it had obviously been abandoned for years. It offered very few of the necessities of working the land, such as gloves for one. But Vicki had decided it was the safest place for them to stay with the world falling apart as it was. And if they were going to stay on what had once been a farm, they were going to have to work it like farmers.

And of course, Vicki wasn't a farmer. She'd been on one several times when she was a girl. Every October, her school would ferry bus loads of students out to the Ol' Pumpkin Patch to navigate the hay bale maze and pick out the orange melon that they would carve into a jack-o-lantern the following day. That had been Vicki's experience with farms until now. She had really no idea what she was doing out here but she was trying her hardest. She'd found a tool that looked like the love child of a miner's ax and a heavy garden hoe. She had no idea it was called a garden pick, of course. She'd been lifting it over her head and sinking its broad steel blade in the ground again and again for the last two days to break up the ground of what looked to have once been a garden. She was exhausted and sore and all she wanted to do was walk up and down the aisles of a Walmart and fill a shopping cart with cans of anything she could eat.

"There's a man in the forest," Cooper told Vicki when he ran up to meet her. He warned her when she began to look around, "Don't look!"

"Where's your sister?" Vicki snapped anxiously. "Why isn't she with you?"

Alice wasn't Cooper's sister anymore than either of them were her children. But they were family now, and it was a mother's duty to worry about her children when one of them was missing.

"She's in the forest," Cooper answered, adding, "She's sneaking up on the man."

Alice's eyes spread wide in shock and as she stood taller she naturally looked to the forest's edge for the young woman.

"Don't look!" Cooper warned again. "He'll know we're talking about him!"

Vicki chastised the 14 year old for the danger he and the 18 year old girl were getting themselves into. All the while, Cooper kept reassuring Vicki that Alice knew what she was doing and that they, Vicki and Cooper, should just go inside and wait. Vicki didn't like it, not at all. But what was she going to do? Finally, she and the boy turned and went inside.

<<<<<< >>>>>>​

After quite some time of staring out the windows to search for Alice in all directions, Vicki caught sight of the teen running casually up toward the cabin. Alice and Cooper both went out to meet her near the future garden. Alice asked with concern, "What's going on? Cooper says--"

"There's a man in the forest," Alice cut in. She was smiling with delight, which bothered Vicki to no end. "He passed out. I think he's sick. I tied him up."

Vicki's eyes widened and her mouth fell open. "You tied him up!"

Alice only smiled wider with pride. "Yep! I saw how to do it on TV."

Vicki was flabbergasted and chastised both of the younger ones for a moment. But in the end, the three of them headed out to the woods to look at this passed out stranger. Arriving, Vicki could see that he was sick. She told the two to stay back and looked him over herself. There was blood on his left side and when she lifted his shirt Vicki found an infected wound. He was going to die out here if he didn't get help. It might have been better to just leave him here. But Vicki couldn't do it.

"Go get that cart the two of you were playing with, Cooper," she told the boy. To Alice she said, "Go with him. Feed the fire and put some water in a pot. We need to clean his wound and bandage him.

<<<<<< >>>>>>​

"He's handsome, isn't he?"

Vicki looked back over her shoulder at Alice, who was standing over the man laying on the bed Cooper usually slept in. She warned quietly, "Get away from him. We don't know him. We don't know whether he's a good guy or a bad guy."

"But he is handsome, don't you think?"

Chastised again, Alice moved away and returned to helping the older woman with the many tasks involved in tending to the man's wounds and fever. Vicki went to the bed and put a compress to the cleaned injury. It looked to her like a knife wound. She'd been a nurse at an ER in the Capital's most violent neighborhood for six years, so Vicki knew a little bit about wounds caused by knifes, guns, and heavy blunt objects. She called the other two over to lift the man's upper torso so that she could wrap him. They laid him back and covered him with a blanket. All they could do now was wait.

<<<<<< >>>>>>​

And wait they did for longer than Vicki had imagined. He'd been in and out of consciousness repeatedly. He'd done a great deal of moaning and mumbling. He'd had some moments of clarity that suddenly went away as he again passed out. And now he was finally awake and seemingly clear headed.

"How long have I been here? And … where is here?"

"Three days," Vicki told him after she'd moved closer to stand over him. "How do you feel?"

He answered. Vicki told him, "You're lucky to be alive. You had an infected wound on your left side. Another day or so out there and you might have become sepsis. You would have died."

She leaned over to offer him more water. As he drank she emphasized, "I want you to remember that, that we saved your life, when you are well and strong enough to stand and decide how to interact with us."

"Whether you're going to play nice," Alice cut in from near the cabin's front entrance, adding, "Or make us kill you because you're an asshole."

"Alice!" Vicki snapped, looking the younger woman's direction. She looked back to the man. "I'm Vicki. That's Alice, the one at the door with the shotgun. And behind me is Cooper. He's the one with the twenty-two."

Vicki glanced at the others, then looked back to Brett with a smile on her lips. In almost a whisper she told him, "I think they want to kill you and eat you. We ran out of meat a while back. But Cooper here thinks you have mad cow disease, that you'll give it to him and he'll become a mad cow, too."

Her smiled widened and she chuckled. She clarified the mad cow situation, "He found some very old newspapers in a crate and was reading. I don't think he quite understood the reporting."

She stood and retrieved a bowl of something slushy, like oatmeal, then asked the others to help sit Brett up. "Eat this. No, don't bother asking what it is."

She sat on the edge of the bed close to him and raised a filled spoon up to his mouth. It was just quinoa though she liked the idea of Brett not knowing what it was. She'd found it growing wild over a portion of the property. It wasn't native to this area, so she surmised that an heirloom variety of it had been planted here once and had since begun growing wild.

After she'd fed the man his fill, Vicki remained sitting beside him as she asked, "So, Brett, what are you doing all the way out here in the middle of the woods?"

She reached a hand down and touched his injury just barely enough to make him grimace and give her a hard glare. "And who did this to you and why?"

 

[TiredFingers]

"Three days,"

Brett was mildly shocked but too weak to really respond to the news other than to simply shake his head a bit.

"How do you feel?"

"Half dead," he responded. He had no idea how true that response was. She told him about how close he'd been to being fully dead, to which he murmured a soft, "Thank you for helping me."

"I want you to remember that... she began telling him.

It was an unnecessary reminder, though; he had had no intention of doing them harm and he certainly had none now that they had saved his life. But then, she couldn't know that, could she?

Another female voice chimed in from just out of Brett's sight. He vaguely remembered the face, but after the older woman began the introductions, he remembered the girl from the woods.

He smiled at the Mad Cow reference and made a weak mooo sound. He was fed something that looked like Malt O'meal and could have eaten four more bowls of it if offered.

"So, Brett," Vicki began. "What are you doing all the way out here in the middle of the woods...? … And who did this to you and why?"

He grimaced a bit as she touched his wound, more so out of expecting pain than was justified by the little bit of it she caused. Brett smiled a bit wider, thinking I bet she can be a cruel woman if the need arises.

"I was being forced to work a rock pit," he began, asking for more water. After he sipped long and deep, he continued, "I escaped but got injured in the process."

She brought up the fact that the wound looked like it had been caused by a knife. Brett smiled again, thinking this is no stupid woman.

"I escaped and got injured in the process," he repeated, correcting, "When one of the guards stuck me in the side with a knife."

The boy stepped more into Brett's line of sight and asked with excitement, "Did you kill him?"

The older woman's reaction told Brett that this wasn't the right time to speak the whole, graphic, horrific truth, so he lied, "No. I hit him with a stick enough to knocked him out … and then I ran away."

He must have looked exhausted because a moment later he was being laid back down, and in an instant he was drifting off to sleep again.

################​

When he came to again, Brett found the room illuminated only by the slowly dying flames in the stone fireplace. He tilted his head and found all three of the others asleep. With a bit of pain, he rolled to his side, then slung his legs out and sat up.

Simultaneously, he felt something tugging at the back of his neck and heard a little bell chiming unseen in the room. In an instant, the woman and the boy were awake and reacting; she rolled out of her bed and reached for the shotgun leaning against the wall, and the boy -- sleeping on a mat of folded blankets on the floor -- pulled the squirrel gun out from under his blankets and pointed it at Brett's stomach.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa," he told them, holding his hands out wide. "I just need to pee."

He looked between the two armed residents, then glanced to the younger woman, Alice. She'd raised her head to see what the matter was, then laid it back down to return to her sleep.

They allowed him to slip into his boots only after Cooper had tied the laces together like some middle school practical joke, then out into the dark night they went. Brett wasn't otherwise restrained in any way, and after he'd finished his business, he just stretched his arms out wide and twisted his torso in an attempt to work the kinks out of his body.

Without looking back to the pair watching over him, Brett asked, "Are you ever going to come to trust me?"

He waited for a response, then told them, "I could be a great help for you here. I saw you that first day … hacking up the turf. Putting in a garden? It's going to be a lot of work. And honestly, I was watching you … and I see you now. You don't look like you're up to that much work. No offense intended."

 

[Alice2015]

Vicki felt a bit awkward standing here in the dark while Brett (a few yards out in front of her, his back to her) whipped out his cock and began peeing into the darkness. But what other choice did she have? He asked, "Are you ever going to come to trust me?"

"Probably not," she said without hesitation even though she didn't really mean it. Vicki was already beginning to trust him for she found no reason not to other than the fact that she didn't know him. She added with a bit of humor in her tone, "Maybe we could talk about this when we aren't out here in the dark and you've got your dick in your hands."

She'd expected some comical or shocked reaction to her crudeness, but instead Brett continued, "I could be a great help for you here. I saw you that first day … hacking up the turf. Putting in a garden? It's going to be a lot of work. And honestly, I was watching you … and I see you now. You don't look like you're up to that much work. No offense intended."

Vicki didn't know how she was supposed to not be offended. Brett had in essence called her a weakling. Had it been a sexist comment? Was it because she was a mere woman? Maybe a bit. But to be honest, she wasn't up to it. She'd never before done the kind of labor intensive work that a farm would require. She was 5'6" and barely 110 pounds. She'd been a jogger before the end of the world so she had great endurance. But when it came to muscle power, she just wasn't that person.

"Are you done there, big boy?" she asked, again with humor in her voice, "Or do you and your friend there need some more time together?"

They made their way back up to the little cabin's front porch. Vicki stopped Brett at the door. "You need a couple more days rest. Let's say we put a pin in your idea for now and talk about it later."

She loved the idea of having a big, strong man around to do the heavy lifting, figuratively and literally both. But Vicki didn't know Brett. For all she knew the moment he thought he had the strength he'd wrestle her down and rape her to death, then do the same with Alice and, hell, maybe even Cooper if he was that much a freak.

"By the way, how'd you like the motion detector?" she quipped about the bell that had been at the end of the string safety pinned to the back of Brett's collar. "That was Coop's idea."

They headed back inside, and (setting the gun aside with no anticipation of trouble from Brett) Vicki helped him back into his bed. She didn't reattach the bell string, instead just telling him, "I'll hear you if you get up again, so, don't."

 

[TiredFingers]

Brett laughed at the woman's joke about dick in hand but otherwise only finished his business and zipped up.

When Vicki suggested they give it some time, Brett nodded and -- knowing he was still weak -- told her, "I could use the rest, and I could enjoy breakfast in bed for a couple of days."

He laughed about the motion detector, too, saying, "Yeah, I wasn't expecting that. The kid's ingenious. That'll help you out here."

Inside, Vicki didn't wire him back up again, instead just warning him to stay in bed. "I'm not going anywhere."

##############​

The next morning Brett awoke to the smell of searing meat. He sat himself up to find the younger woman, Alice, stirring food cooking in a cast iron skillet resting on a grill over the flames in the fireplace. She didn't hear him over the sizzling sound, giving Brett a moment to study her.

She was a beautiful young thing, something he hadn't truly appreciated when she was aiming a shotgun at him that first day. She was petite, in contrast to the older woman who was full figured, yet even from here as she was turned more away from him than toward him, Brett could see that she had a moderately impressive rack before her.

C-cup? he mused as he ogled her upper features, then let his gaze return to that shapely ass that was very well displayed for him. When she turned to look back his way, showing surprise that he was sitting up, Brett smiled quickly and said, "Good morning … Alice, right?"

Again Brett reached out to stretch his body, and a moment later the boy, Cooper, came through the front door with an already skinned rabbit. He announce to Alice, "Got another one. You want to cook it now or--"

He went silent and smiled with delight at the sight of Brett up from his mattress. He held the rabbit higher, saying, "New snare."

Vicki wasn't far behind the boy, reacting in her own way to seeing Brett up. She spoke to him, then to the others, after which Brett said cryptically, "I need to take a walk … outside."

It was, of course, his way of saying he needed to urinate. A minute later he was outside, this time around the side, a bit more out of sight what with the sun being up. He studied the land he hadn't seen out here until now. There was an overgrown orchard out here, a mix of fruit and nut trees.

Back out in front, Brett found a concrete pad that had once supported a small building, possibly a work shed or small barn. "We should build something there. Might have to fill the cracks."

He took his first real daylight survey of the land surrounding the cabin. He estimated the open area at about 16 acres, roughly oval in shape, surrounded by thick fir, pine, hemlock, and scattered, assorted hardwoods.

"The only problem you're going to have with a garden is predators," he began explaining, "Rabbits and deer eating your plants as fast as they grow. And the coyotes will kill your rabbits and chickens. I'm assuming you're going to try to raise some of them?"

They chatted about options, then he continued, "There are ways to prevent your hard work from going to waste. Cooper's good with traps I see. We could use live traps to catch rabbits to breed, and I saw chickens running around an abandoned farm after I escaped the work pit. And we could snare the predators."

He hated the idea of wiping out the coyotes, skunks, weasels, and other animals that could prey on their smaller stock animals; they were only trying to feed themselves, just as the residents of the farm would be. But you had to do what you had to do.

"We can try to make pens that they can't get into," he added, "but … odds are, we're going to have to thin the predators out."

They talked some more, then headed back inside. Brett was getting stronger but still needed to limit his time up on his feet for now. He sat at the kitchen table this time -- no breakfast in bed -- and tried engaging the others in conversation about how they all had gotten here.

It was pretty obvious that the three of them weren't family by blood, so Brett wasn't surprised by that revelation. He was intrigued by how they'd come together, though. It was a tale of miracles in a sense.

 

[Alice2015]

Alice

She looked back over her shoulder to find their house guest ogling her. Alice didn't consider him one of them, of course. She didn't trust him. And he ogled her. He was doing it now, and she'd caught him doing it before. Alice might have found it flattering if the looks at her curves (minor as they were relative to Vicki's) had come from a boy or man she knew and liked. But she didn't know Brett. And she hadn't yet decided whether or not she liked him.

"Good morning … Alice, right?"

She didn't respond but instead went back to moving the rabbit meat about the hot pan in an effort to keep it from sticking and burning. Cooper came in to reveal yet another animal who had fell prey to his snares before holding the rabbit up toward Brett and announcing, "New snare."

"Hang it up," Alice commanded him. "We'll smoke it later."

Vicki took Brett out for his walk which Alice knew meant taking a piss. She waited until they were gone and Cooper was occupied with his rabbit. Then she moved to a tiny cracked window and pulled the curtain back. Checking that the boy wasn't going to catch her, Alice peeked outside in an effort to check out Brett's junk. Oh, she may not have trusted him and she may not have liked him but that didn't mean she was above wanting to know what he was packing below his belt. During his three days of bed rest, Brett had often unconsciously become hard down there. And the still pure and virginal Alice couldn't help but want to lift the covers and open his jeans while Vicki was busy with other things. She'd never seen a penis in the flesh before. Oh, there had been the internet before the destruction of Earth at the hands of the Toads. But that had never been close to the real thing.


Vicki

After he'd relieved himself and curled back around from of the cabin, Brett told Vicki, "We should build something there. Might have to fill the cracks."

"There are water pipes coming up out of the ground and electrical conduits," she informed him. "I think maybe it might have been a pump house."

They talked about what crops could be planted assuming they had seeds and what animals could be raised assumed they could catch or otherwise locate them as well. Vicki admired Brett's ambition. The farthest she'd gotten with her big plans so far was to plant some old seed potatoes she'd located that had already been sprouting new growth for days.

"Cooper says there are some pigs living out in the forest," she informed Brett. "And we saw chickens when we first got here. But Coop' found a mess of feathers the other day, so, we're thinking some animal got them. Don't know really."

Back inside, Brett sat at the table and began asking personal questions. Alice showed no interest in answering his inquiries but Cooper was more than eager to tell his story. "When the Toads attacked, I was at camp. It was one of those back to nature things that my sister would have hated. We didn't have a lot of tech'. They say the Toads attack anything with a motor or computer or what makes a signal, like a radio or cell phone. We didn't get killed, probably 'cause we had to give up our cell phones and didn't have TV or computers or anything like that."

He stuffed a piece of rabbit into him mouth and continued talking between chews. "The counselors kept us up there until a Toad ship landed and started collecting people. Me and a bunch of guys ran into the forest. After a while, it was just me. I ended up in a little town. It was destroyed. Big crater right in the middle. Looked like pictures from the moon or an atomic bomb crater. I found food in some of the buildings."

Cooper looked toward the younger of the two women and smiled. "And I found Alice."

"I found you!" Alice corrected. But it was all she said on the matter.

Cooper continued, "We filled some packs and a shopping cart and went down a skinny little road that had lots of trees on both sides to hide us."

This time Cooper looked to the older of the two women. "And I found Vicki."

"Yes, you did find me," Alice confirmed. She looked to Brett and continued the story, "We've been together ever since. It's been almost a year. A year this June. We wandered around a while, then found this place last November, right before a massive early snow storm. After the snow was gone, the cold hit, then the ice, then more snow, and finally more rain."

"It was nasty," Cooper added.

"There wasn't much food here, but we'd brought quite a bit with us," Vicki went on. "Coop' here's quite a hunter and trapper. And Alice found some interesting ways to use some old spices we found in the cupboard to keep us from getting tired of rabbit, squirrel, and song birds. We got a couple of Canadian geese a few days ago, too."

They chatted a bit more the three of them. Alice chimed in once in a while but mostly just to correct things Cooper had said that she felt were wrong. Alice finally rose and began clearing the table. The others offered help but she insisted that this was her job.

"Everyone has to contribute," she informed him, raising an eye brow as if she was implying that he wasn't. "Cooking and dishes are my job."

Vicki invited Brett back outside again for more talk about the farm. She couldn't help but notice his surprise when she came out unarmed. "If you'd wanted to kill us I'm sure you would have done it while you had a fork and knife in front of you during breakfast."

They talked more about what could be done here to support themselves. They also ventured into the concept of leaving, returning to what remained of civilization to scrounge for food and other supplies. But it seemed pretty obvious that this might be their best change at making it. At starting over.

"Starting from scratch," Vicki mused.

After some more conversation, Vicki suddenly took the conversation in a radically different direction. "Alice might come across as hard as a rock to you, but, she's attracted to you believe it or not. She's just a kid, Brett. Yeah, I know, she's 18 and a woman in her own right. But she's still just a kid. Leave her alone, please. She's going to get curious at some point, curious about adult things. But, I beg you, for now, just let it go."

 

[TiredFingers]

Brett looked back over his shoulder after he'd stepped out of the cabin to see that Vicki was unarmed; she'd had the shotgun a moment ago, but she must have set it against the wall before following him outside. He gave her a bit of a smirk, then said with humor, "You probably know a hundred and one ways to kill a man with your bare hands, right?"

They talked more about what could be done on the property, and Vicki mused, "Starting from scratch."

Brett looked to her and nodded his head in agreement. "Starting over. Not just here, either."

He looked out over the cleared land to the forest and to the mountains beyond. "I'm sure that there are a lot of survivors out there starting from scratch."

The conversation had been going along well when suddenly Vicki switched to warning Brett off of making a play for Alice. He quickly responded, "Of course, Alice. Of course! I wouldn't think of it."

Actually, Brett already had … several times, including once just an hour ago when he'd imagined coming to her as she cooked breakfast and leaning her forward onto her hands and knees to pummel her tight, young pussy from behind. He added, "She's just a kid, Vicki. I wouldn't do that."

Another lie. He would, and in a heart beat had Vicki not warned him off. Now, to put his cock inside that sweet young thing -- what could be not so sweet at times -- would be little more than a big betrayal of the older woman's trust in Brett. He waved off the conversation as if it hadn't even needed to be mentioned and turned away to look out over the farm again … and conceal his disappointment.

"What about you, though?" he asked. He took a moment before turning to look at the older of the two women. He smirked. "I noticed that you didn't tell me to keep my hands off you, Vicki."

 

[Alice2015]

"I noticed that you didn't tell me to keep my hands off you, Vicki," Brett clarified.

Without hesitation, she replied with a smirk that matched his own, "Keep your hands off me, too, Brett."

Her smiled widened because she thought the retort was funny and because she wasn't entirely sure she wanted Brett not to put his hands on her. Not entirely sure because although her last three lovers prior to the alien invasion had been women, Vicki liked cock just as much as pussy. Her most recent sex life had simply been a product of circumstance. It had been more than four years since she'd been with a man. It had also been more than a year since she'd been with a woman. So, when Brett had been found and brought to the cabin, she'd had her own share of fantasies about him, despite not even being certain he would live to once again experience an erection with which to please her.

She laughed at Brett's reaction and diverted her eyes as a blush filled her fair skinned face. When she finally looked back to him, she told him, "I'm not looking for a lover, Brett. No offense. It's just not something I can deal with right now. I have young people depending on me, and I need to keep my focus there."

Then, conspicuously, she let Brett see her scope out his body before saying with a laugh, "But who knows. Once the kids go off to college and we have the house to ourselves..."

They went back to the house and talked over the farming and ranching ideas. Cooper said he knew exactly where the feral hogs were living and if Brett could help him make some non-lethal snares he though they could snag at least some of the piglets. Brett reminded them of the chickens he'd seen a few miles away, but Vicki wasn't too excited about the injured man heading out into the world again in his condition.

"Chickens and eggs can wait," she said. "Cooper found some trees in which the song birds are nesting. He's been snagging some of the eggs. They're small but they're worth it, so long as he doesn't fall and break his neck."

They broke up the lunch conversation and went about their day. Cooper took Brett to inspect his nearest snares, Vicki laid out plans for the garden and did some more soil turning, and Alice did some house work, including washing the bedding and hanging it out on a line to sun dry. More was done, dinner was devoured, and more conversation was made.

Vicki was beginning to get a good feeling about Brett, and she seemed to think he was getting a good one for her. At times she caught herself looking over his body and wishing she hadn't so firmly put her foot down about not fucking him. But as she'd told him, she had more important things to deal with right now.

Darkness arrived and it was time to end the day. They heated some water from the stream that ran along the edge of the property, and everyone got a chance to take a wet rag bath in a corner they walled off with a blanket hung from the cabin's cross beams. Cooper had given up his bed to Brett, more than willing to sleep by the fire on the thick pad of folded blankets Vicki had put together for him.

As she laid down, Vicki caught Brett glancing her way as he, too, got into his bed. She held his gaze a moment, then smiled and rolled away from him. She laid there several minutes remembering their earlier conversation about hands on or off. And she wished so badly that she could slip a hand down between her thighs and fantasize about the possibilities with the man.

 

[TiredFingers]

Brett was fully awake before sunrise. It was partially because he had to pee again and partially because he had never been the type to go to sleep as early as this group did.

He rose from his bed, slipped on his untied boots, and headed for the door. To his left in his peripheral vision, he saw Vicki roll his way but he didn't bother to look to see whether or not her eyes were open, watching him. He headed outside, knowing that if she felt it necessary, she would come out to ensure he stayed near.

He did his business then stood there and watched the sun come up. It was spectacular, and it almost made Brett forget that an alien race had attacked and invaded Earth, leaving most of the Human population dead and a considerable portion of the survivors enslaved.

He stretched his body, finding it free from pain of the injury Vicki had had to repair. He scanned the work the older woman had done the day before, then took her place in doing it. The dirt was still wet enough to allow it to be turned easily but not so wet as to be nothing more than mud.

Despite it being March -- or was it April? -- and 6am or so, Brett was soon heating up. He shed his shirt, drank some water from the bottle he'd brought out with him, and went back to work. By the time someone brought breakfast out to him, Brett had dug up and turned over half as much sod as Vicki had the day before.

It felt good to be working so hard without a task master standing over him hitting him with an extendable baton for essentially nothing at all.

 

[Alice2015]

Vicki

She did indeed hear Brett rise and head for the door. She did indeed roll over and look his way. But Vicki made no effort to join him, let alone escort him outside. The night before, as she'd looked across the room from her bed toward Brett's, Vicki had decided right then that she was going to have to trust him. She rolled back to her side again, staring at the ceiling a bit as she remembered the flirtatious smiles they shared. Then she closed her eyes and drifted back to sleep without a care in the world about whether or not she'd made the right decision.


Alice

Looking over her shoulder from the fireplace, the younger woman watched the still groggy older woman rise from her bed and stretch. "G'morning, sleepy head."

"What time is it?"

Alice looked to the wall clock that was now on the last 9 volt battery they had and answered, "Bit past ten."

"Ten?" Vicki reacted with surprise. She hadn't slept past six in months. "Why didn't you wake me?"

"Why would I wake you?" Alice asked as she poured hot liquid into a slightly cracked mug.

Vicki laughed, saying, "There's work to be done."

"It's being done," Alice said as she crossed the small room. "Who's missing?"

She handed the mug to Vicki, who gave her an appreciative moan of delight. They'd run out of coffee last year but Vicki had come home from the market in Bay City one day with a two pound bag of black tea leaves. Neither of them had been a fan of tea then but they had both been big fans of caffeine.
Alice had asked how Vicki paid for it but the latter had only told her not to worry about it. The younger of the women had assumed that the older one had opened her thighs or mouth or both to one or more men. But she hadn't asked. It didn't seem necessary or appropriate particularly since Vicki had also brought home hard candies for Cooper. If she was willing to service men to help the family, Alice wasn't about to question her for it.

"Tell me Brett isn't working the garden," Vicki said with a tone of disappointment. She didn't think he was up to it yet and needed more recuperation. "Where's Coop'?"

"Brett is working in the garden," Alice responded as she filled a plate with food, "and Cooper was checking his snares this morning but is now working with Brett."

Alice turned with the plate heaping with roasted meat, boiled vegetables, and bread smothered in jam they'd made from huckleberries they'd picked last fall. She seemed to be heading toward Vicki, whose eyes opened wide as she said, "Whoa, that's way too much. I can't eat all that, and why are you being to nice to me this morning?"

Alice laughed as she curled around the dining room table and toward the door. "First, I'm not being nice to you. I'm just giving you a break. And second, this isn't for you. You can make your own plate."

She smiled and giggled a bit as she carefully opened the door and headed outside. She was almost all the way to the two men working hard in the garden before Cooper looked up, saw Alice, and drew Brett's attention to her. Coming up near them she said with a commanding tone, "Bring the plate and silverware in when you're done with it and wash it."

She handed the single, platter-sized plate to Brett, then took a step back. She was wearing a pair of poorly sized and scratched sunglasses she'd found in an abandoned truck the year before. Through them she casually ogled Brett's fit, muscular torso as she chatted with them about this and that. He was a beautiful man, and just as Vicki had warned Alice was quickly coming to the conclusion that she was going to lose her virginity to Brett. She was 18 now, had been for a couple of months. It was time. And it was the perfect time. There was this beautiful man living under her roof.

And Alice was the kind of woman men liked Brett liked to fuck. Oh sure, Vicki was beautiful with her bountifully shaped body and her exotic face and all that long red hair and, well, her bountifully shaped body. But Alice was cute with her China Doll face (literally) and her sun-softened long curls and a petite body with young, firm breasts a size or two larger than normal for the height and weight of a girl like herself, something that had always attracted the attention of the boys in school.

Alice watched Brett and Cooper share from the plate held between them as they sat atop overturned 5 gallon buckets. She glanced away each time Brett looked up to her and commented on this and that in an attempt to prevent awkwardness. She felt awkward anyway. She was ogling Brett like boys and men had ogled her since she was 13 years old and had already begun growing her tits. She knew she should walk away. But with him sitting there shirtless with the sweat still glistening over his muscular chest and arms Alice just couldn't pull herself away.

A barely noticeable jingled sounded from the edge of the woods. Cooper hopped up excitedly and ran off, hollering back that he'd put a bell on one of his new snares. Once he was gone, Alice turned her attention back to Brett just as he looked up to her. She smiled to him, then asked with a hopeful tone, "Are you glad you found us, Brett? Are you glad you're here. With Vicki and Coop'. And me?"

 

[TiredFingers]

Upon seeing Alice, Brett very nearly -- though casually -- reached for his nearby shirt to cover himself up. He recalled his conversation the night before with Vicki about remaining hands off with the teen, and he didn't think it was appropriate that he be here like this before her.

Of course, that was assuming that Vicki's theory that the younger woman would want to be his lover was true. Vicki couldn't know that for certain, could she? Maybe the two of them had actually had a conversation about it already. He'd been unconscious for three days with fever; he couldn't know what had happened during that time. Hell, for all he knew, Alice had pulled the blankets down during some time when Vicki was out of the house to check out Brett's junk.

He glanced up at the young woman often as he and Cooper ate, and each time he caught her looking at him. Oh, she thought she was being sly with the dark sunglasses and the suddenly diversion of her gaze. But Brett was no naïve teen boy like the men he assumed Alice had pulled such tricks on in school before the invasion.

Then she asked him, "Are you glad you found us, Brett? Are you glad you're here. With Vicki and Coop'. And me?"

It was the and me at the end that caused a chill to run up Brett's back and, a moment later, goosebumps to explode up and down his arms. And me; Alice had separated herself away from the other two, and Brett didn't think for a moment that it had been an innocent mistake.

He glance back toward the cabin for some sign of Vicki but saw nothing but a closed door and pulled shades. He looked back up into Alice's face … smiled … and dismissing any concerns about whether it might lead to a break in or even just bend of his agreement with Vicki, Brett answered, "Yes, I'm very glad I'm here … that I found you … Vicki and Cooper … and you."

He maintained his look toward the dark glasses, studying Alice's reaction, still smiling. Then he asked, "Are you, Alice? Glad I found you I mean?"

 

[Alice2015]

Alice was pleased with Brett's answer and her widening smile showed it. Then he asked if she was glad he'd found them. Her smiled only widened farther, and a blush spread through her face. Without realizing the message it might send, she looked back over her shoulder toward the cabin for Vicki. She looked back to Brett again.

"Very much so, Brett," she said softly. She looked to the plate which the two males had nearly finished off and asked if wanted anything more. After he answered, Alice just stood over Brett for a long moment studying him with a pleased smile. Looking back for Vicki again, she asked Brett, "So, before this, before the war, the invasion--"

She hesitated, forcing herself to continue. "Did you have a wife? I mean, do you think you still have a wife? Somewhere? Are-- Are you still married, or--"

Alice diverted her eyes a moment, knowing how stupid it was to be asking this of Brett. She looked to the cabin again, then back to the handsome man. She finished, "Or, do you think you're single again. I mean, not that it matters. It doesn't. Not to me. I mean, why should I care if you're single, right?"

She was rambling nervously now as she realized that she was being ridiculous. She wanted to come right out and ask If I wanted you to make love to me, are you willing and available to do so? But she couldn't do that of course.