Pharmacopoeia

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A family struggling to survive after the end welcomes a stranger to their home...


Pharmacopoeia



by Geode

There was a car coming up the road.

There hadn’t been a car coming down 47 in eight months. There hadn’t been a car coming up 47 in three years.

My son Jim, my youngest, came running at the sound. “Jim,” I told him, “get me the shotgun.” He scurried off into the house. He was just returning as the battered old Nissan pulled over at the side of the road, right in front of the house.

A man climbed out, perhaps forty but no older, dark-haired and lean. He shut his door cautiously and called over to me:

“Ex- excuse me, do you have any gas you could spare?”

I looked him over. “Might be. Where you headed? I haven’t seen traffic up this way in a good long time.”

“I, I was thinking Brattleboro. Do you think that’s far north enough?”

“Brattleboro? Sure. Hell, we’re doing alright even here, so far.”

“I… I wasn’t sure. How far north it got. I was in Windsor Locks… Connecticut… on the Day.”

“Well, last I heard, folks up in Brattleboro were doing just fine. Town’s bigger than it was before the Day, even. Tell you what- I’ll have my son fill up your car, and you can stay for supper.” Poor man looked like he could use a meal.

“Oh, no, I-” he started to object, but stopped when he saw the look I gave him. “Geez, ok, thanks. I’ve been living off microwave dinners for the last few days, no microwave. The roads were a real mess coming up from Connecticut.”

“It’ll be my pleasure. My kids haven’t seen any new faces in- well, quite a while. This’s my son Jim. Girls!” I called. “Come on out!” After a minute with no sign of them, I called again. This time, my younger daughter stepped out onto the deck.

“Laura,” I asked, “where’s your sister?”

Laura walked over to me, eyeing the stranger carefully. “Dad,” she whispered, “she doesn’t want to.”

“She can’t stay cooped up in the house every time anybody passes by," I said. "Bring her out here.”

Laura sighed, but did as she was told. “Sorry about that,” I told our guest. “My oldest girl is a little shy.”

After another minute they both came out, Laura practically dragging her sister. I could hear them arguing.

“These are my daughters- Kelly, my oldest, and Laura.”

The man’s eyes widened. “Huh,” he muttered.

“And what’s your name, friend?” I asked.

“Oh..." He thought for a moment, distracted. "Oh. Blake Ross. Formerly of Northampton. Not that there’s much left of it.”

“Well, Mr. Ross, I’m Kyle Hullum. Welcome to my home.”

The man looked like he was chewing on a puzzle, but all he said was “Thanks.”

* * *

“Dad, can I talk to you?” Laura asked as soon as we entered the hall.

“Sure, pumpkin. Jim,” I called, “Can you show our friend to the dining room and set the table? I have to put the gun away.” The little boy took the man by the hand and led him away. I headed up the stairs to the gun safe in my bedroom, Laura in tow. “So,” I said. “What’s up?”

“It’s Kelly, dad. You know she doesn’t like strangers. You know why.”

“I do,” I said, and hesitated. “But I won’t always be around. She can’t live her whole life behind closed doors.”

“She doesn’t stay inside all the time. She works the fields, takes care of the animals just like the rest of us.”

“You know what I mean.” I grimaced. “If our guest says one word of unkindness to her I will send him on his way. I promise you that.”

“I’m not the one who needs to hear that, Dad.”

I nodded. “Make sure she’s at the table. We eat as a family.”

* * *

“So, Mr. Ross,” I was asking. “What did you do, before the Day?”

“Oh, I was a pharmacist.”

“That’s good. Helping people.”

“I guess. It’s not like I was a doctor, or anything. I just filled prescriptions.”

“Still. Knowledge could come in useful, up in Brattleboro.” Or anywhere these days, I left unsaid.

He looked down at his food, moved it around his plate, and looked out the window, then finally back at me. “So, your kids-” He pursed his lips and nodded towards Kelly.

“Yes?” I stared straight into his eyes. He flinched.

“Um. How old are they?”

“Jim’s eight, Laura’s fourteen and Kelly’s seventeen.”

“Hmm.” He looked at his food again. Kelly, seated directly across from him, hadn’t looked up from hers the entire meal. “This is really good.", Ross said. "You don’t, um, you didn’t get contamination up here?”

“No; the wind was west on the Day, didn’t get anything from Northampton, and Boston’s just too far away. We get our water from the aquifer, and anyway the river runs south so that’s fine too. Your food’s safe, don’t worry.”

“So why’d you stay out here?”

“That’s a good question. Lots of family up in Brattleboro now. But Sunderland’s always been home. I got my farm here, it’s where my kids grew up. It’s where I buried my wife.”

“Oh- I’m so sorry.”

“It’s alright. It’s been four years now...” I wiped my mouth. “She called me, on the Day. From Northampton, as soon as she got in range of a cell tower that hadn’t been knocked down. Told me about the bomb, told me she’d made it out, she was fine, she was coming home. The sickness took her not long after; by the time she made it home she could barely keep control of the car. She didn’t last much past nightfall.”

“Did she know? About-” he looked at Kelly again.

Kelly burst up from her chair, almost knocking her dishes off the table, and ran from the room. Laura followed; I heard her running up the stairs after her sister. Ross swiveled round in his chair to face me, shock on his face, the word What...? forming on his lips.

“What’s wrong with Kelly, Dad?” Jim asked.

“Jim, can you clean up? I need to talk to Mr. Ross.”

“Aw, Dad, I already did my dinner chores for today.”

“Then you’ll get out of one tomorrow, now scoot.” He scooted. “I could use some air,” I told my guest. “Care to join me?”

* * *

“She knew she was supposed to be a girl when she was three. Told us as much, but I didn’t much care to listen. She was real insistent though. I don’t think we went a week without her saying ‘but I’m a girl, Dad’. ‘Till she was six. Bridget knew it before I did, that she was telling the truth.” I took a breath. It was August, but somehow I was shaking. There must have been a million stars out; the sky was clear and crisp, and for all the warmth it looked bitterly cold.

“God, that was hard,” I said. “Our first boy, the son we gave my name… you have all these dreams for your kids. I didn’t really care if Kyle was a football star, but… that was hard. But Bridget pushed, and even Laura, she couldn'ta been three years old and she knew... and they got me to go along with trying it out. Letting her be herself. And before too long, I couldn’t see her any other way.”

I could see Ross thinking about this. “Wasn’t… she… laughed at? Looking like that?”

I tried to see my daughter the way he did. Tall boy, lanky, man’s muscle starting to come in, looking ridiculous in a homespun cotton shift. I gave up; too hard to reconcile that image with my mental picture of her. “She started so young, there’s not much difference between boys and girls at that age. Then they gave her this medicine, to stop her body changing. She was supposed to get more pills soon to make her… develop as a girl, but then, the bomb…” I shook my head. “I know she’s growing up, turning into a man, but I still just see the pretty little girl I remember.”

“She must hate that.”

I nodded. “You got no idea.”

Ross said: “It’s not like this is the first time I’ve seen… one of those. I lived in Northampton, you know the rep that town had. When you see a man in a dress coming into a pharmacy to fill a prescription for estrogen, you figure out what’s going on. That was just the job, though. I’m pretty liberal, but if my son had come to me saying he wanted to be a girl… I don’t know.” He laughed a desperate, pathetic little laugh. “Now, I’d probably be so happy to have him back I wouldn’t care. I lost him on the Day, probably my ex too. She worked at Kollmorgen, making optics for submarines. Everybody says that plant is why they hit Northampton.” He reached up to wipe tears from his eyes. I clapped a hand on his shoulder, and we stood there for a time.

Finally, he broke the silence. “Could I talk to her? I’d like to apologize.”

“Well,” I said, “I can’t guarantee she’ll accept, but yeah. You can try.”

* * *

“Hi, Kelly,” Blake Ross said. We were upstairs in the girls’ room, Kelly and Laura seated on Kelly’s bed with Laura’s arm around her sister’s shoulders. Kelly’s eyes were red from crying.

“I wanted to say I’m sorry,” Ross went on. “Your dad explained things to me. You have a really special dad, by the way.”

“I know,” Kelly sniffed. “And thanks. It’s ok.”

“It’s not ok,” Ross said. “It’s obvious I really hurt you. And… and I want to make it right. There’s something I wanted to tell you.”

Kelly raised an eyebrow. “Yeah?”

“The drugs you were taking, before the Day. Do you remember what they were?”

“I was taking spiro-”

“Spironolactone?”

“Yeah, and they were talking about putting me on estradiol and maybe progesterone in a year or so.”

“Well,” Ross said, “It won’t be as good, but I know of some plants that might help you out. There’s red clover, which should be easy enough to find, and also a certain cultivar, not legal but I guess that doesn't matter now...”

* * *

The old Nissan pulled onto the road, raising a cloud of dust, and once again there was a car heading up 47. We waved at it, my arm around my eldest daughter. In exchange for an extra jug of gas and some home-cooked eats stuffed into the last of our ziploc bags, Blake Ross had driven with us down into Hadley to sample the wares some local farmers had kept away from prying eyes. “You won’t smoke that stuff in the house, or anywhere near me,” I told my daughter, not looking away from the road.

“Yes, dad.”

“Or your brother and sister. I don’t want them touching it.”

“I got it, dad,” she said, and wriggled out of my embrace. She grabbed up the basket Ross had left us and walked behind the house. I watched her go, torn. Letting her become a girl was one thing...

But I never thought I would have to sit and watch one of my kids become a pothead.

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Comments

Pharmacopoeia

I don't think I've ever seen quite this same plot before.

Very creative, and I like the way you put it all together.

Thank you, Geode.

Sarah Lynn

Hi. Great first story here, Geode.

laika's picture

One of the better post-apocalypse stories I've read in a while. You don't see too many stories with both POST-APOCALYPSE and SWEET/SENTIMENTAL tags, but they both totally applied. People + families (nuclear families, haha!) muddling thru as best they can, things not getting any more exotic + crazy than they have to, characters more with the prosaic real life flavor of ones in a Phil Dick story than reflecting the fashionable dog-eat-dog pessimism of those 80's junkyard-dystopia flicks; A family that holds together through the hardship, the dad and kids all clearly defined and believable, so that you care about these people ........ then ending with a gag about the alleged feminizing effects of a certain plant, a rumor I recall circulating a couple decades ago. (Which I'm STILL waiting for it to kick in, damn it!)
~~hugs, Veronica
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EDIT an hour later: Oh, and this story stands as a textbook example of how to start a tale like this, WITHOUT a big information dump. Just a couple of simple sentances about the untrafficked highway piquing our curiosity and giving us a feel for how things have changed, standing in for that three page history of the nuclear war, explaining who hit who and why, that many writers would feel compelled to lead with...

Thanks!

I'm really happy to get feedback like this, thanks!

I did actually do a little bit of research about relevant effects of various plants, and cannabis seems to be one of the better choices: stronger than some, and doesn't become toxic in the doses needed to have significant effect. Still not remotely as effective as the drugs typically used in HRT, but the pharmacies would have been looted in the aftermath.

Anyway, thanks for reading.

Nice Story

terrynaut's picture

Thanks for this. I really liked it. It's a little bittersweet but with a very sweet aftertaste.

Thanks and kudos (I'll come back to click the "Good Story" button since it doesn't seem to be working now).

- Terry

Probably because I'm a new author

I looked in the FAQ to make sure I posted this right, and it seems that a lot of that stuff won't function until the admins turn on author status. Thanks anyway, I'll take good comments over the kudo button any day :)

Kudos!

terrynaut's picture

How about a comment, thanks and kudos? :)

- Terry

What can I say Geode!

- But, it's very good.

Reminds me of 'Deliverance' for some strange reason. Must be the Hillbilly touch?

LoL
Rita

Age is an issue of mind over matter.
If you don't mind, it doesn't matter!
(Mark Twain)

LoL
Rita

Deliverance

Well, this actually takes place in Massachusetts, so pretty far from the Deep South... but then, there is a certain hospitality that's common to rural folks everywhere (except I guess the hillbillies in Deliverance). Also, I spent about half my childhood in Georgia, so some of that is probably creeping in. People in this part of the state speak with pretty much a standard Midwestern accent with just a slight regional variation.

Seriously worth the reading.

I was rally impressed with the subject matter and the way you went about writing the story with the normal family, not so normal in a world after the bombs. Just survival, no nasties just a good story, a really good story.
*Hugs*
Bailey.

Bailey Summers

After Things Calm Down

I don't know where people like the authors that wrote "Road Warrior", or some of those other movies got their negative expectations from, but I think that most country folk, would just go back to their weeding and fence mending after a while. Mostly, country folk just like to keep doing what they do. It would be my hope that after a while and the bad ones from the city died off, the rest would do likewise.

I just spent a week camping in the Outback of Oregon, and I noticed that the campgrounds were more peaceful than the last time I was camping 28 years ago. Before the roudies were busy making trouble, and the government was busy writing tickets. Now it seems that the trouble makers don't leave town any more and the state isn't writing tickets because there are too few state employees to do it.

Yep, I think the story rings pretty true.

Nice job.

Gwendolyn

Pharmacopoeia

I like this story.

    Stanman
May Your Light Forever Shine
    Stanman
May Your Light Forever Shine

This was very nice. As

LibraryGeek's picture

This was very nice. As others have already commented, it's not often you get post-apocalyptic with sweet, but this does the trick. Very realistic.

Yours,

JohnBobMead

Yours,

John Robert Mead

Very interesting story,

Very interesting story, thank you for writing.

I heard that a guy might get boobs from smoking pot, but using that as a hrt...
Kind of strange ;)

Beyogi

excellent first story

very, very well done. Welcome to BC.

Dorothycolleen

DogSig.png

Good story

I have driven Rt 47 many a time to go visit my sister when she lived in the Northampton area. Sunderland is a nice area. I live in Fitchburg which used to be a priority target when Westinghouse had their turbine manufacturing plant here.

Sunderland

Yes, it's a nice area. I currently live in Sunderland, but lived in Northampton about half my childhood. I actually have no idea how high the Kollmorgen plant would be on anybody's actual target list, but it was always sort of common knowledge in my high-school days that it would be one of the places hit in a large-scale attack.

That aside, I definitely recommend Northampton as a great place to raise kids, it's one of the most liberal and LGBT*-friendly small cities in the country, with the cosmopolitan feel and thriving commercial district of a bigger city without all the traffic and crime. People are pretty neighborly too.

In your very first posting,

In your very first posting, you're managed to do something quite difficult. You've come up with something unique... at least unique in my experience. Kudos, bravo and any other appropriate accolades.

Welcome to BCTS, Geode. (Love the pseudonym. Tough outer shell with a pleasant surprise inside. I'm sure there's a story in there somewhere.) ...Lora
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