Looking Back Through Ash Page 9

  “Can you tell Chase to bring me up one of those folding chairs? You know? The ones that were in the room where we slept?” Jimmy asked this very sheepishly, immediately regretting it.

  Surprising him a bit George just yawned while saying, “Yeah, whatever,” before he walked out.

  ….....

  Tuesday

  Daniel awoke later than he had planned, the glowing green hands of his watch told him this plainly. There were so many things that he wanted to get done today, but the fog in his brain conspired against putting a cohesive order to them. Thoughts clearing slightly as he sat up, Daniel arrived at checking the garage for project materials first.

  He belted on his favorite pair of khaki cargo pants for the third straight day and a faded black t-shirt that his father had given him, which had ‘Interpol’ printed across the front in red, blocky font. Sitting on the edge of the bed, he tugged some socks worn fresh several days before, right side out and put them back on. Then his comfortable, but delaminating pair of old hiking boots went on over the stiff socks. Finally, a tattered-brimmed blue baseball cap with a fancy looking ‘D’ went on. The hat was from a sports team that Daniel could never forget the name of, given his father’s passion for the sport that they used to play together in a past life.

  The hat and watch were worn almost every day, but it was the remaining stored items in the basement and the blue-lensed sunglasses that reminded Daniel most of his father, Allen Moore. This mixed bag of items was all that was left of his father, and of a troubled childhood.

  As Daniel walked down the groaning hardwood of the hallway, heading toward the sounds of his wife and daughter having an animated conversation. He tried to shake the memory that always accompanied thinking of his father. At one point in time Daniel could summon up several different events, each making a permanent impression upon him in his youth, but these memories now seemed determined to compile themselves into one particularly scarring occurrence.

  The hazy remembrance was now only of his father, who was shooting a gun and yelling obscenities. The memory then skipped ahead like a vinyl record to where Allen was roughly picking him up, carrying him away from something horrible, something he could never quite remember clearly, before throwing him into the truck. Flashes of smoke and fire, blood, and strange men and women shrieking were dispersed throughout. The memory eventually faded away into the shadows of night where he and his father made it back to this house and stayed. At least the thirteen year-old Daniel stayed, as he was by himself most of the time from then on.

  Rebecca’s shrill laughter broke him out of the dark reprieve, along with the smell of cooked food. Much to his disbelief and even more to his delight, Corinne had made oatmeal with dehydrated blueberries in it for breakfast. The two girls had a boisterous board game going and hardly noticed his passing. He looked inside the pot next to the burner as a plan for the day solidified in his thoughts.

  “I’m heading out to the garage for a bit,” Daniel interrupted.

  “No way, missy! I saw that. You spun a three. Start over from here,” Corinne playfully scorned, pointing her direction at the board. She turned her head around to face him, smiled with light apologetic blue eyes and addressed his statement, “Oh, alright Babe. I made oatmeal…We saved you some.”

  “Thanks, Core. I’ll grab a bowl right now. Then I am going out to work on a surprise for you,” Daniel said, meeting her smile, and letting their gaze linger.

  “Oh, I can’t wait,” Corinne replied, coyly rolling her eyes before turning back around to see if Rebecca was cheating again.

  Daniel smiled slyly about getting out of his pinky promise. Rebecca was lost in an exquisite laughter, thinking only of getting her mother to smile along with her. He grabbed the bowl and spoon left out for him and tried to pry a scoop from the pan. Corinne had overcooked the oatmeal using the two-burner, portable camping stove, while probably using up far more propane than she needed to. Daniel did not mention either of these things and he still wore a smile as he entered into the garage.

  Daniel really hoped that Corrine had broken out of her depression. He had a lot to get accomplished and could really use some help around the house. Selfishness was not the only reason why Daniel was glad to see his wife’s improved countenance, it was the rejuvenated look in Rebecca’s eyes this morning. Rebecca seemed to feed off of her mother’s moods. If Corinne was happy the whole house was happy.

  He set the untouched bowl of sticky oatmeal aside, which could probably be used as weather proofing at this point. The stress that he was feeling filled his stomach anyway, keeping any of the hunger pangs that he might otherwise feel at bay. For Daniel it seemed the wiser choice to pretend that he had enjoyed receiving the food, as opposed to upsetting Corinne on one of her first ever attempts at cooking by saying he was not hungry.

  Inside the stuffed garage Daniel moved around and restacked several bins and boxes filled with various types of plunder, clearing a path to the extension ladder and reflective insulation left over from when he built the dehydrator box and solar oven. The plan for making the new shower would be very similar to both of these items. After clipping on a carpenter’s belt with pouches full of useful tools and different kinds of fasteners and after pulling his father’s sunglasses down to shield his eyes, he went out to measure the height and width of the seldom-used black rain barrel in the front corner of the house. Using these measurements, he planned to build an insulated box up on the roof, which would have its south side made of glass.

  Building off of a wedge-shaped platform to keep the barrel level, the insulated box went together fairly quickly on the roof. The glass panel he needed was pulled from a window on the house next door. After sealing the box, Daniel refilled the black water barrel with the same buckets that he had used to empty it. Effectively, what he had built was a giant passive solar oven, baking the barrel whenever the sun was out. By insulating and sealing the box, he hoped to help increase the contraptions heat retention during the night or long periods of cloud cover. If the dusts kicked up again, sealing the box would have an added benefit.

  He drilled the only penetration that was going to be needed into the roof above the garage, fishing the garden hose down into it. With more epoxy than was necessary, Daniel sealed all the way around the new hole. He had to clear another pathway inside the garage to gain access to the pull cord of the folding, drop-down stairs that led up to the attic. Not only was it stiflingly hot inside the confined space, but it was dangerously dusty too. Learning to not breathe in the ashen dust was an easily absorbed lesson, which took a lifetime of careful preparations to accomplish. After he had donned a respirator, Daniel finished drilling the holes through the plywood and drywall, which spanned across the rafters above the garage. After sticking the hose through these holes, he sealed them up also.

  Curious about how much water pressure there would be, Daniel grabbed two large wheeled bins, placing one under the impromptu new shower head. Knowing that the water would need at least a day or two to warm up did not stop Daniel from eagerly striping down to wash away the layer of gritty sweat that he had built up. In one way, the sun shining was a good sign, but he could already feel the heat of a mild case of sunburn radiating from his skin.

  Daniel wheeled the dirty shower water over to the driveway’s edge and, naked as a Jay bird, dumped it out. No one lived in any of the houses across the street, and he lived furthest away from the Warehouse in this direction, so no foot traffic ever came down the street either. Modesty was not a huge factor in your life when you truly believe that no one can see you.

  Standing inside the bin, watching it catch the already warming water, Daniel had an idea of how to go about washing small batches of clothing. If a few articles of clothing were put inside the bin during a shower, they could be agitated by that person’s feet, underneath the warm, soapy water, to try and clean them. They could then be rinsed out in a separate bin to help remove leftover soap and grime. He was not sure how well it would work, but anythin
g had to be better than the knuckle-busting wash board, so he decided to go draw some more buckets of water from the barrels in the backyard, which he poured out into the unused second bin.

  The sunshine and bracing breeze dried his exposed skin. The effect was invigorating, and he could now say that it had been sorely missed. Ripples of snowy white clouds stretched low across the azure sky. The effect looked strikingly similar to the sandy bottom of a body of water, like the same unknown force applied in both cases.

  Securing the garage door and returning to fully dressed made Daniel ready to go back inside. He had more than earned some time to cool off after working up in the sweat box. He would forgo working on the sliding glass door and moving the bed downstairs, replacing that allotment with some quality time spent with the family. It was the perfect occasion to secretly celebrate the completed project with a shared lunch and board game. His appetite had returned, and it wanted to make up for lost time. Daniel decided that he was not going to tell Corinne or Rebecca about the new shower until after it had gotten a chance to warm up for a while, then he would reveal it to them.

  Following lunch and a heated argument about Rebecca’s future sleeping arrangements, Daniel gathered together the bathroom waste bin and the garbage can that was used to collect table scraps. Putting the can atop of the far heavier waste bin, Daniel announced, “I’m going out back.” He needed some time away from his wife and a quiet space to think clearly about what should be done next around the house.

  In the corner of the back yard, hidden from view behind the lone live oak, Daniel set down his odiferous load. He stood a piece of particle board that was laying on the ground up on its edge, propping it against the privacy fence. This revealed the 6’x3’ composting pit, which was dug down into the soil around 20 inches. Daniel tossed the fresh table scraps into the trench, which consisted mostly of eggshells and shredded paper. The Moore’s’ utilized reams of printer paper as use for their dinner plates. Once used, the sheets of paper were shredded by hand while they were being put into the scraps can. He added to the pit a handful of sifted wood ash from the fireplace, stored close by inside a plastic coffee container. Daniel briefly turned the contents of the pit over with a fiberglass-handled metal rake, also kept nearby. The swelled, heavy particle board was plopped back down in place to shelter the compost from the rain and the ash, and to help keep in the heat that was generated.

  Daniel grabbed a fiberglass round shovel, after replacing the rake back in the corner of the fence, under a car hood awning. Through a section of fencing that he had removed to create a portal, Daniel carried the waste bin and shovel into the strip-mined yard of the burnt house. He dug a shallow hole, and rolled the bin’s contents down in. Two large chunks of thick, weedy sod covered the round baggies of body waste, which had spread themselves around the hole with an innate geometric order. He took another clump from the pile that was created when the topsoil for the garden beds was gathered, stomping this one down into place. Daniel took time and care while rinsing out the garbage containers; the rinse water going straight into the garden beds.

  Ever since coming outside, Daniel had kept looking up at the solar water heater, quite satisfied with the job and with the amount of the sun shining down upon it. He tried to envision it through the eyes of Corinne and his father. Even though it looked impressive to him, all that his father could see was how obvious it was. Suddenly, it didn’t look like all that good of an idea, and he found himself wondering whether draping a blue tarp over the backside of the box would help or hurt its visibility. Corinne would appreciate it, though, and that was enough to bring him back to the present.

  Who cares if people can see it?

  Being done with his chores, and having no more reasons to stall, Daniel went back inside. The temperature was woefully similar to what it had been outside. When Daniel pointed this out to Corinne, she suddenly agreed to help move the bed downstairs. Even though his wife was still angry at him, she did not want to spend another night upstairs. Daniel and Corinne worked quietly together, struggling to get the bed around all of the corners and down the stairs. Rebecca being constantly in the way “trying to help” only served to shorten their tempers with each other even further. He left Corrine to be harassed while trying to make the bed; Rebecca was now insisting that by being on the bed was somehow helpful to the situation.

  Daniel stepped back into the garage to put the boxes back out of the way under the refolded attic stairs. A clothes line was hung up, using two nails, driven in at a steep angles, and the bartered for hemp string. A figure-eight knot on one end was stretched tight over to a clove hitch and two half hitches. The series of hooks around the spare bedroom could still be used to hang wet clothes on to dry. The new clothes line out in the garage was strung up purely as a convenience, and because the level of ash had dropped so dramatically. Daniel planned on taking another shower to try out washing his grubby clothes, but not until after he had made dinner.

  He snuck back into the house with the uneaten oatmeal hidden from view. The girls were deep in the throes of a squabble, covering the sounds that he made while scrapping the bowl out into a plastic grocery bag. There was nothing to hide the bag of oatmeal with inside the freshly cleaned garbage can, so he slid open the back door and flung the mushy bag as far as he could toward the burnt house. When Daniel returned to the basement, he found that Corinne and Rebecca were now actively ignoring one another.

  “So? What’s this big surprise?” Corinne asked. Her tone making it well known that she was in a huff.

  “Oh…right. You want to know now, or after I make dinner?” Daniel replied, trying for very mysterious.

  “I mean…What is it? Just tell me now,” Corinne sighed, certain that she would not be impressed.

  “All righty…I made you a shower. I put a barrel up on the roof and closed it up like I did with the sun oven. Rebecca, you little girl get to take a bath at the same time,” Daniel announced matter-of-factly.

  “I can?” Rebecca asked.

  Followed quickly by Corinne’s, “You did?”

  “Yep. It will probably be a little cramped, sorry ‘bout that. But if you guys want to take a shower while I make dinner, you’ll find it out in the garage,” Daniel said, starting to laugh.

  The look on Corinne’s face did an immediate reversal. “Did you take the soap out there?” she asked, following right behind Rebecca, who was already making for the stairs.

  “No. No towels either…” Daniel called after them.

  “Okay. I’ll get them,” Corinne said in the most accommodating of ways.

  “Well hold on, I still have to get you some candles stands out there, so you guys can keep the big door closed.” Watching them scurry away had made him remember just how much he loved his wife and child. It was a moment of pride and joy for him.

  Daniel briefly talked the girls through what they should do out in the garage, and then left them alone to have some privacy. While he made spaghetti topped with a chopped dog and crushed tomato Bolognese sauce, doughy biscuits, and a very old jar of green beans for dinner, the girls spent a surprising amount of time cleaning their bodies and clothes. He ate dinner alone, listening to the squeals and giggles coming from the garage. When the sounds finally came back inside, he grabbed a clean pair of underwear, called out the location of the food, and went to take a real shower.

  He wheeled the 50-gallon tote out into the faltering light of evening to dump out the fifteen gallons of shower and bath water that the girls had used. He poured it out into the same circular splay mark made earlier in the thick grass. Daniel had explained to Corinne about adding a few pieces of clothing to the bin while taking a shower. The other bin was going to be just for rinsing and wringing out the clothes in, so Rebecca was told to stay out of it. The one taut string across the garage completed this most basic of washing and drying systems.

  It was nothing like what he had put in at the Warehouse. Daniel had built them four large cisterns, heated by a complex flue sys
tem; one reservoir for each stage of cleaning. An entire bank of communal baths stood against the opposite wall, the plans were straight from a book about ancient Rome. The whole system was run off of diverted water from the short, square water tower in the center of the old complex. This way, only one generator was needed to pump the water up into the tower. From there, gravity could be used to get the water to the numerous locations that it was needed.

  Daniel stole two puffs of marijuana, did an abbreviated version of what the girls had done in the shower, then, again naked, he dumped the water into the same damp spot. His plan for the morning was to create a wide funnel that could be attached to the barrel during rainfall to help fill it back up. How well this worked would determine how much water would have to be hoisted up in the future to keep Corinne in warm showers.

  All that was needed to keep the possibly perpetual shower working was for it to start raining on a regular basis. How well the system worked during the colder months of the year would, of course, determine whether or not he had to think of something else. But taking this first small step felt like a good start to maintaining some of the creature comforts that Daniel and Corinne had gotten used to again.

  After hanging his reasonably clean clothes up on the line, right beside the girl’s still dripping garments, Daniel returned to the basement to join his family in the newly positioned bed. Rebecca had obviously won the last debate about where she would sleep, her bed remained upstairs inside the pink bedroom. Corinne and Rebecca were both definitely in higher spirits now, and they were laughing heartily as they got into bed, feeling both full and clean. Daniel crawled into the bed, in only his underwear, giddy that he was feeling cold.