The man finally reached the back of the room where the serving area and kitchen were, and turned to face the crowd. He was dressed in the ubiquitous Southern male uniform of khaki pants and a blue button-down shirt, and he drank from a water bottle in his left hand before he began speaking. “Let me have your attention,” he said in a loud voice, repeating the phrase over and over and being roundly ignored. The noise continued unabated.
Sela didn’t think she had many talents, but by God she definitely had one: she could whistle. She placed two fingers between her lips and blew, producing a shrill, loud whistle that silenced the entire room.
The sudden silence was a relief, but now everyone was looking at her. She felt her face get hot. Quickly she pointed at the man who had been trying to talk over the noise.
He gave her a grateful nod and said, “I’m Jesse Poe, with the county commission.”
That prompted a rush of questions, but he shook his head and held up his hand. “I don’t have answers to most of your questions. We’re still working out a plan. What I’m here about today is the food here in the lunchroom. There are perishables in the coolers, and a lot of staples, and we don’t want this food to go to waste.”
A woman said, “How do you plan on handling it?”
Jesse Poe cleared his throat. “We propose going by the latest population numbers, figuring out the weight of the food here, and dividing the weight by the population to see how much food each person gets.”
The woman stood up, a disbelieving look on her face. “The county commission doesn’t have any idea how a lunchroom works, does it? The staples are in big bags. How are you going to divide that, have everyone bring a measuring cup? And what about the people who stayed here instead of going home? There’s a rental cabin next door to me and those people are still here, said they didn’t know anything about a solar storm. Are we supposed to include them in the food giveaway, when their tax dollars didn’t buy any of it?”
“Now, wait just a minute,” a man who looked alarmingly like Teddy Roosevelt said loudly, his scowling face turning red. “I don’t live here, but I own a vacation house and I pay property taxes just like everyone else. Are you saying my wife and I aren’t entitled to any extra food?”
The woman shrugged. “You aren’t here all year paying local taxes the way we are. I’d say yeah you could have some, but not a full share.”
“That’s bullshit!” His head jutted forward and he advanced on her.
“Settle down, now!” Mike Kilgore appeared, pushing his way between people and getting in front of the Roosevelt look-alike. “There’s no need to start acting up, this can be worked out.”
“They both have legitimate points,” Carol put in; Sela saw the alarmed look she cast at Olivia, and knew her aunt was trying to play peacemaker to head off any possible violence because she didn’t want the girl scared. The situation was frightening enough to kids, without adding adult anger to the mix. Mike Kilgore gave her a grateful nod.
“It doesn’t matter.” Another woman stood up. “I work in the lunchroom, and I can tell you, Mr. Poe, dividing the food likely won’t work. This other lady is right about the staples being in big bags. The meat won’t keep long, and neither will the eggs. The produce, lettuce and tomatoes and such, will last longer but they need to be eaten within a week. I don’t know what you think you’re going to do with all that meat, either, just cut off hunks and hand them out to people who may not have a means of cooking it?”
Sela immediately imagined big hanging sides of beef, though she knew that wasn’t what the lunchroom had. The lunchroom worker had a point; how did one cook that much meat, when, other than their backyard grills, most people had lost their means of cooking? Eventually people would work out systems for cooking, but the meat would spoil before then. She and Carol and Barb had canned what meat they had so it would last just fine, but what about the others?
Thinking about the large amount of meat, she saw the solution and leaned forward, murmuring to Carol, “Those big meat smokers. Right off the bat I can think