Page 30 of Homestead

“You don’t have to do everythin’. Why would you think that? Who d’you think made me dinner before you got here? I can manage to make somethin’ basically edible.”

“But I?—”

“Damn it, Chloe,” he says with a growl in his voice. “Sit down right now and take a break.”

I suck in a sharp breath at his authoritative tone. There’s no way I can answer it. I walk over to the couch and do as he said. When he brings me a glass of water, I drink it.

He explains he’s going to clean the fish on the deck so they don’t stink up the house, so then I’m left blessedly alone.

I curl up on my side in the fetal position and cry for just a minute.

I hope he’s not too upset with me. I hope he’s not questioning his choice of partner. With more time, I think I can get better at this. I don’t want him to dump me before I get the chance.

I manage to pull myself together fairly quickly, and I’m calm when he returns to grill the fish. I even find the energy to get up to slice the bread and set the table.

He doesn’t say anything as he works, and neither do I.

I really hope he’s not mad at me.

6

We don’t talkas we sit down to eat dinner. Jimmy is still watching me as if he’s trying to prepare for my next move.

When I take my first bite of the fish, I’m surprised enough to say without thinking, “This is good.”

He glances up from his plate. “Yeah?”

“Yeah. Grandpa used to cook fish we caught, but they were never this good. What did you cook it with?”

“Just in a pan with salt and butter.”

“Ah. The butter. That’s probably what makes the difference. We never had any butter. Plus these are bigger fish than we ever caught.”

“They used to stock the creek that feeds our pond with trout a couple of times a year. That’s how they ended up here. We’d fish this pond before Impact but not a whole lot, so some of these fish’ve been here a while. Worked out well in the first couple of years when food was scarce and not much was growing.”

I was so isolated with Grandpa that I don’t actually know details on the conditions in the years after Impact. But I have picked up that there were at least a few very difficult years when a lot of the animals died and the layer of dust and debris in the atmosphere cooled temperatures so much that food crops were limited. Grandpa had stocked up so much food that we barely had to leave the house in those first few years.

“Yeah. That must have helped a lot. Do you think the fish will ever run out?”

Jimmy shrugs. “Not lookin’ like it. They established themselves real good here.”

“That’s good.”

The brief conversation is enough to break most of the tension. We have a few more casual interactions as we eat and then go about our normal routines afterward with me cleaning up and Jimmy going out to prepare the chickens and pigs for the night.

I go outside to pull the underwear, socks, and T-shirts off the clothesline since they’re dry. But the jeans, sweatshirts, and towels will have to stay overnight. Hopefully they’ll be okay tomorrow. I’m finishing folding the clean clothes and putting them in drawers as Jimmy comes back in with a waft of cold evening air. He hikes up the old sweats he changed into so I could wash his jeans and looks at me for a long minute.

I have absolutely no idea what he’s thinking. A week isn’t nearly long enough to learn all his different silent expressions.

“We should turn in early tonight,” he mutters at last.

“That sounds good to me.” It does. Despite the short break Jimmy made me take, I’m still exhausted.

Jimmy always lets me use the outhouse first, and then I quickly undress and wash up with soap and water in the bedroom basin while he’s outside.

I put on a pair of clean socks since I’m feeling chilly and then leave my nightgown and bathrobe in easy reach. I’m climbing into bed naked except the socks when Jimmy strides into the room.

He stops short when he sees me. “Thought you were still mad at me.”

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