position. George had been acting extremely paranoid since leaving his old home and the safety of a known area. Making them all sleep down in the mold-riddled, stinky basement stood testament to this fact. They had also started sleeping later and later into the day. The group’s sluggishness could be attributed to slight malnutrition, three days without finding any substantial food sources was depleting their stores far too quickly.
Not wanting to chance going back down the squeaky stairs, Jimmy went to continue the search alone. After a tertiary search of the main floor, he hurried up the flight of stairs to the second floor, even though they made more noise than the basement ones did. He found that the first two bedrooms had nothing in them but worthless junk, left behind from whenever the previous occupants had moved out. Judging by the amount of dust on the banisters and window sills, this had taken place some years ago.
Backtracking down the hall, Jimmy went past the top floor bathroom on his way into the last bedroom. He opened the door and saw that it was in the same state as the rest of the house; empty. He was about to turn around and head back downstairs when movement caught his eye. He sidled up to the window in the master bedroom, which like all of the other windows was devoid of any kind of shades or blinds. Jimmy cautiously peered out into the backyard of the house that was behind and to the left of the house where they had slept. What Jimmy saw looked like a beacon shining through the midday calm, a possible answer to some of their worries. He saw a lanky-looking, yet obviously well-fed man, alone using a hose to water down a pathetic looking set of gardens.
“I better go get George,” Jimmy muttered to himself. While heading back down the two flights of stairs to awaken his brother and George, Jimmy did his best to ignore the fear that was trying to creep up from behind.
A few minutes later and after what was sure to be a fresh bruise on his arm, Jimmy led George into the upstairs bedroom. Pointing out a general direction for him, Jimmy stepped well out of his way. George just managed to catch seeing the man heading back inside his house, carrying what looked like a long stack of lumber.
George turned, pointed at the barren carpeted floor and said gruffly, “You stay here. I want to watch this dude for a couple days. Check all around us too. I want to know if there are more people living around here. You better make sure that no one sees your ass up here,” emphasizing his point by raising and exposing the back of his hand. “I’ll send your brother up in a little bit. After he wakes up and makes me some food.” With that George moved to leave the room, heading back towards the basement and the broken-down couch.
“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