“Hi, sugar.” He sat down, rotating his left shoulder to work the stiffness out of his injured arm. “What’re you guys gabbing about?”
“We’re trying to figure out what to do for this little lady’s birthday,” Tim said.
“We’ve got some cake mix in the cupboard,” Gany suggested. “It’s pretty old, so I can’t attest for the quality. Can’t mix it with eggs, either, but it should do in a pinch.”
“Gonna be nine years old,” Tim said, marveling at Ellie while rubbing the back of her head with one of his big hands. Ellie’s gaze still clung to David, and he was certain in that moment that they hadn’t been discussing Ellie’s upcoming birthday when he’d come into the kitchen. It had been something else. “I remember when you were born, squirt.” Tim turned to David. “Those stitches holding up, partner?”
“Feels like it. How long was I out?”
“Four hours or so,” Tim said.
Gany pushed her chair back and stood up. “Hungry?”
He was ravenous. He couldn’t remember the last meal he’d eaten. He found that he couldn’t recall how many days he and Ellie had been on the run, either; time was beginning to come apart at the seams, unraveling like an old afghan. Each day bled into the next.
“You bet,” he said. He stood to help her, but she told him to sit back down and not to be silly. She loaded a steak onto a clean plate, then piled some potatoes and green beans around it for good measure.
While they ate, Tim brought David up to speed with what he’d been doing over the past several years since they’d last seen each other and had a proper conversation. Back in Kansas City, he had started an IT consulting firm, which had become moderately successful. His clients were mostly private industry, and his advertisement was limited to word-of-mouth recommendations. At the height of the company, he’d had three employees working under him, which afforded him the opportunity to do a bit of traveling. Tim Brody had never been one to settle down in one place for very long, and even with the success of the company, he felt constricted by the responsibilities. So after about two and a half years, he sold the company and made himself a “tidy little profit,” which David suspected was a very modest statement. This was around the time the first cases of Wanderer’s Folly broke out. Birds had seemingly vanished overnight, and those held in captivity in zoos, in labs, and on farms, all succumbed to the illness in a matter of weeks. Given the sudden gaping hole in the agricultural ecosystem, the price of beef, pork, and fish skyrocketed. Ever the entrepreneur, Tim decided it was time to invest in a food source that had mostly been overlooked till then, as a way to compete—and undercut—current market prices.
“Rabbits,” he said, grinning.
“Oh no,” David said, pausing with his fork halfway to his mouth. He glanced down at the charred bit of meat at the end of the tines, abruptly recalling the rabbit hutches out back.
“It made perfect sense. It’s a very lean meat and, to speak frankly, will give you a terrible case of the runs if you eat too much of it,” Tim said, “but it was basically an untapped resource. I was sitting on a cache of dough after the sale of the company and this idea just jumped into my head. When I realized I could buy an old chicken farm for pennies on the dollar—because no one’s raising chickens anymore—I started looking around and doing some research. When I found this place, I saw that it fit my needs perfectly.” He spread his arms wide. “I’m miles from nowhere in every direction. I’m basically running my own sovereign nation out here.”
“Are you saying you eat those rabbits out back?” Ellie said.
“Mostly, I sell them,” Tim said. “In cattle country, I’m the guy undercutting the cattle ranchers by selling rabbit meat. Not to mention the furs, which I also sell on eBay.”
Ellie set her fork down in her dish.
“Honey, this is beef,” Gany reassured her.
“Oh.” Yet Ellie did not look convinced.
“I’ve spent the better part of the year working on these ferns, too,” Tim went on, jerking a thumb over his shoulder toward the room with all the hanging plants and UV lamps. “I’ve unlocked something in the ferns that’s helped pump up the body mass of the rabbits.”
“Steroids for Bugs Bunny,” David said.
“In a way,” said Tim, “though they’re totally harmless. No chemicals, no injections. It’s just been a process of trial-and-error, cross-pollenating various seeds and allowing them to germinate under different environmental conditions. It’s all natural.”
“You’re really doing all this stuff?” David said. “I’m impressed.”
“Oh, that’s just two-thirds of my operation.” Tim raised his glass, which contained a cocktail of fruit juice and his pungent liquor. “That moonshine you had earlier?”
“Dandelions and pinesap,” David recalled.
“I’ve got quite the distillery set up.”
“So you’re bootlegging, too?”
“This isn’t Prohibition, man.”