I was getting used to waking up still feeling in my bones the rigors of the day  before.  Still, all  the heavy work and anxiety had me in the greatest shape I'd ever been in, even as an active guy all of my life and an athlete in high school. I was building muscles I thought I would never have. 

The others were feeling the same way when we all rose to the smell of Gramps making a huge breakfast of bacon, scrambled eggs, flapjacks and fresh squeezed orange juice from his orange trees he took out of the freezer for us. And, there were fresh strawberries we picked the day before. What a feast compared to what we had been eating at home, changing each day with declining food resources.

We finished up harvesting from the garden. Picked some fruit from the trees that were ripe and gunny bags of nuts, prunes, dried apricots and other dried fruit Gramps had stored from the year before to sell in town or at the markets. He had only one cow left, "For my milk," and one steer, "For my meat."

I suggested, "Can you raise a couple of steers and get a cow for us when we come again in about a month?"

"It might be difficult. I ain't gettin' any younger. But I'm beginning to see what you need and will see what I can do. I talked to the boy that's been helping me this morning. Now that the Ramose gang is over, I can get some other guys to come out and work here, too. With old man Meyer gone, his boys have too much to handle. I can probably pick up a steer or two and a cow from them. Since they are in a charitable mood." He laughed.

"That's the spirit, Gramps! But the way we are growing we will need a whole lot more than what your little farm can produce. Let's go over to the Meyer farm this morning and see what we can wrangle from them."

After Gramps showed the others what to do, and what they could load onto the trailer, he joined me and we drove over to the Meyer place. When we drove in, Cyrus and Rich came out of the barn and Gladys came onto the front porch.

"Howdy, guys!" Gramps called out to the boys. "We've come to do a little horse-trading. Only we don't have any horses!" He laughed. We all could help ourselves and joined him.

I took over. "Seriously, we are here to take up your offer from yesterday. We've got a growing community we want to get self-sustaining in the near future. We may be able to bring seafood and fish to exchange for beef in the future, but right now, we'd like you to give Ralph a couple of steers he can raise for us to butcher in the fall and maybe a cow or a goat so we can have milk for our kids. Gramps has an old horse trailer we can use.

Cy spoke for Rich and his mom. "I'm open to that. If you bring us seafood we can get it to market here in the Valley and to any restaurants that may reopen. For now, it's a really good deal for us, too. We just happen to have three kids we were going to have to get rid of, two nannies and a billy. With the way things are, we are getting way too much milk we can't market right now. We will be distributing it free in Eunice for now; for labor at harvest time. We have a young Holstein that is producing milk we can let you have based on our relationship developing more."

"That was easier than I thought. What do you say, Gramps, do you think we have a deal?"

"We sure do. Grandson, you sure are one hell of a negotiator." He laughed again. It was good to see him in such good humor.

The Meyer boys loaded two steers and the cow onto their trailer and two nannies about to milk on their pickup. And then, they brought out a frisky little billy who jumped right in the truck with us.

They followed us with their trailer full to Gramps's place and helped us load them onto his trailer hooked up behind our trailer. Making sure the trailer brakes worked. Our truck was fully charged sitting in the sun for two days and would use quite a bit more power going home but make it okay if we were careful with that long, long trailer behind to watch. I set up a couple cameras to make watching them easier.

But when we got back to his place, it was obvious it was rough on Gramps to see us go. At the last minute, he blurted, "I've got about six months worth of beef in the freezer and I will only eat about a month of it before those steers are ready to butcher when you come back. You can have it and you can have some chickens. I don't need all those eggs, except for Eunice. They have chickens in town, I've seen ‘em. The beef won't thaw will it?"

"Not in the coolers we brought. Any milk, preserves, eggs or anything else you can spare we would like to take, too."

With our trailer loaded with produce, nuts, fruit and grain and the horse trailer hooked up to it, we pulled out, fully loaded with food and waved goodbye to Grandpa Ralph until our promised return a month later to get more and perhaps, bring more fish and seafood for him and the Meyer family to use in trade.

In spite of my concern over the length of our two trailers, the trip back went well and we were at the gate by 3 pm with a huge crowd waiting for us to help us unload all of the food and animals. One of the homes on the street had a very large backyard that wasn't developed very much. There was no pool but there was a covered patio and abandoned garden.

Derek and I, along with Ray Dugas and a couple of other guys quickly set up some fencing to keep the goats and the cow in the backyard. Fortunately, it was overgrown from neglect. Providing green grass for the cow and brush for the goats. There was a hot tub that would serve as a place to water them. The billy tagged along with us and tried jumping up on anything he could to get a higher vantage point. He would end up in the enclosure later when he was mature enough to mate with the girls. For now, he made a great pet for the kids.

When we got back to the Rosenberg house, most of the food had already been unloaded and placed in various refrigerators and freezers. Martha started a great big outdoor barbecue meal for the block with the help of Stephanie and, surprisingly, Daphne.

When I congratulated her on helping us out, she whispered in my ear, "After we have eaten our fill here, I'd like you to join me this evening for a real treat that the others won't get after dinner." Grinning ear to ear.

I turned and whispered in her ear, "It's a date. I think I'm looking forward to it." She looked  a bit askance for my doubt. I guess she didn't know that Derek always confided everything with me like a real brother.["

It was a busy time for everyone setting up for the meal outdoors on the patio. Some wine was found to help lubricate the gathering and we all celebrated the food we had brought from the Central Valley with the hope that we would be able to grow more food and make more runs to get enough food for everyone, including other people we might invite to our growing neighborhood.

It was late afternoon after all of the good eating and toasts all around. I decided to call a meeting because we were getting too numerous to meet just at breakfast anymore. I suggested we get together once a week like this as a whole community and share ideas for what we could do going forward. I took the opportunity to share with them what was on my mind.

"As you all know, our water pressure is dangerously low. And we have been filling all of the cisterns we have so our gardens can make it through the summer. And, we can continue to grow more food in the fall before the rains come. So, I am planning to leave first thing in the morning with Viktor Sarnoff and Gary Hastings to a tank manufacturer in Anaheim to see if we can get a tank for our water tower I've already designed. It will give us water pressure. But we will have to reconfigure our whole water supply system a bit to make it happen.

"In addition, power is out all across the city, and we will lose it, too. I'm surprised that we still have it in this neighborhood, apparently from geothermal sources north of here that require very little human management, run by AI. I want Derek and Wondah to spearhead providing complete, 100% solar/wind power to every household on the street who doesn't already have it." A cheer rose from those around the tables and chairs. I didn't expected it, but humbly acknowledged by nodding and mouthing, Thank you.

"I want all of you to work on your gardens when you can and help out with all of these projects whenever you can. I believe our phones and Internet will continue for some time because it's all on satellites now, all solar powered and AI operated. They will fail in time without some sort of maintenance from humans, but then, we will go to Wi-Fi networks to maintain communication.

"One last thing. Ray Dugas has volunteered to milk the goats and the cow so the kids will have fresh milk every day and we can make butter and cheese with anything left over. For now, I'm asking all the adults not to drink milk until we have enough for everyone with more cows and more goats. I hope at least one of you volunteers to learn to milk when Ray goes fishing and help feed the animals making sure that they are watered, sheltered and protected from predators like eagles, coyotes, and even, mountain lions."

I could feel from the murmuring the statement bothered some. "There are mountain lions, and maybe, wolves and bears in the reserves north of us. We shouldn't worry too much about them coming here. They will have a lot of wild game to hunt and will shy away from us because they are conditioned to know we are dangerous. But if any do come come our animals, we probably will have to kill them to keep them from making more raids.

"I've bored you enough. You are all invited to my pool to cool off and clean up after a hot sweaty day of working to make our little community a happier place to be." Everyone cheered again and dispersed, doing what they were going to do in the evening.

This time, everyone came with a swimsuit except for some of the kids who didn't have any shame about going bare naked in the shallow end of the pool. Having fun with their newfound friends. Most of the adults, like me, were rather subdued and just relaxed, soaking up the cooling water after a long hot day.

Nearing sunset, Daphne motioned for me to follow and left the pool. I followed, catching up to her when she reached the gate to the estate. This time, there were no candles to guide us. Just the slanting light of the setting sun angling through the windows on the west side of the house that lit up various portions of the place brilliantly in a warm yellow glow.

Reaching the bedroom with both of us still in our swimsuits, she turned and pulled me into her curvaceous soft body tightly. She brushed my lips gently with hers back-and-forth a couple of times, and then opened her mouth to give me a kiss that thrilled me all the way to my toes. I couldn't help finding my swimsuit too confining as she started exploring with her tongue and hands.

Then, she stopped right in the middle of kissing, backed off, looked down at my growing bulge and said slyly, "I would fix that if I were you. In the meantime, I'm going to put on something more comfortable."

She obviously was teasing me as I struggled to remove my, still wet, swimsuit resisting by pulling it down over my erection that didn't stopped growing. I could see her in the closet with the light on in front of a full-length mirror, take off her swimsuit and start trying on various lingerie that had been Barbara's, but now, fit Daphne perfectly. I ended up sitting on the bed closest to the closet watching her try on those outfits and then, turn around, showing me various poses. And then, taking them off and trying on something else. I must say I was holding back an explosion just watching.

Eventually, she found what she wanted to wear, a vintage 1960s baby doll outfit that was completely transparent showing all of her pinkness as she glided out of the closet, pecked me on the lips and glided off to the substantial liquor cabinet where she poured us some after dinner cordials of Harold's Albany Creme.

I hadn't tasted sherry before, but found the texture and taste amazingly smooth and sweet. Found tasting it on Daphne's lips even better. It wasn't long before she led me into bed and she told me to be gentle like she had told Derek. I had every intention of being gentle as I drifted off into her until our excitement and fulfillment had us both sleeping until…

Daphne's phone rang. It was Wondah. "I saw you with Drake. Is he there? Can I talk to him?"

Daphne put her phone on speaker. I yawned and said, "I'm here."

"My sensors down the street just took off. Our cameras show five vehicles coming. What looks like a dump truck with a snow plow on the front, three pickups, all mounted with machine guns, and a car. Derek and I are launching our drones shortly and we need you to get to the tank. I have everybody on the line and they're all getting armed."

I grabbed my pants and asked, "Can I borrow your phone, Daphne?"

"Sure, honey. I think I've got another one around here. I found a couple of pistols and I'll be ready to shoot if they come here. Don't worry about me."

"We all may have to worry." I was worried to death! I gave her a quick peck on the cheek and ran downstairs barefoot to the tank as fast as I could.

       Once inside the tank, Wondah had provided a couple of view screens I could connect to the drones through our Wi-Fi. It was much easier to see what the convoy was doing. By the time I got there and turned on the displays, the convoy was already at the gate and had stopped. I could see lights flashing all over the two wrecks we left as a warning. The two drones stayed high and over 200 yards back so they would be hard to hit while they gave good views of what was happening on the street.

What the gang didn't know was there were three Claymore mines at the base of the barricade set to be triggered from either of the drones or Wondah's console. Drake held off firing them for the moment. Instead, he gave a booming warning from the hidden loudspeaker in the barricade in his best Darth Vader voice…

This is a warning. If you touch our gate you will have the fate of those two trucks you see across the road!

There was some shouting, and the convoy drove off down into Santa Monica and the beach. Later, we heard a lot of gunfire down there. It put us on edge but we were all grateful we didn't have to fight that bunch.

         Internally, I knew we would have to do something about all of the gangs if we were going to live in peace moving forward. I just wasn't sure what we would be able to do. I just hoped the lack of clean water would kill them all before the rain came in the late fall and replenished water supplies.

I rejoined Daphne for another round of lovemaking. Before we knew it the light of dawn came streaming in and I had to get up and leave.

Copyright 2023 © Ronald W. Hull

6/1/23