Everything Has Changed Read online

  “Are you listening to yourself, Hannah? Don’t you think what you’re saying about men is sexist?”

  “No. Actually it’s the way men have been talking about women for a very long time.

  “So you go ahead with your wonderful plan, honey. Build up as many hours as you can. The more hours you earn the more men I can get to come and help me out with… whatever I need for them to do. And when you go fishing or hunting, you can take your time. Things will be just fine without you.”

  Tony turned to Melvyn and said, “How about a little help from my best friend?”

  “Nope. You started it. I’m just a neutral spectator.”

  Now Tony was in a spot.

  They were now just three or four weeks away from getting their own bundle of materials. And it wasn’t that Tony was afraid of hard work. Not at all.

  Tony, you see, didn’t consider himself the smartest tool in the shed. He was not mechanically inclined at all. Given the task of fixing a broken lamp or repairing a hole in a wall or replacing a leaking pipe he was far more likely to screw things up than to fix them.

  Same for fixing anything on a car.

  He didn’t like his limitations, but he’d long ago learned to accept them.

  At the same time, when he went after Hannah in high school he thought she was way out of his league. He considered himself an ordinary guy. Nothing special.

  And Hannah, in his opinion, was a goddess.

  She was beautiful, smart and funny, and could have any guy at their school.

  He asked her out one day, figuring he didn’t have a snowball’s chance.

  When she said yes, his jaw literally dropped. He was that surprised.

  Then he figured she only went out with him because she had a kind heart. She’d never go on a second date, but at least her conscience would be clear because she’d accepted his first offer.

  She asked him out for a second date. And a third and a fourth too.

  By the end of their sophomore year they were hopelessly in love.

  But Tony never got over his feelings of inferiority. And he hated being asked to fix something, because every time he tried and failed he felt he let her down.

  The truth was, Tony felt their log cabin would be better built, and have fewer problems, if he just stayed out of the process.

  Even if all he or Hannah did was supervise, he knew instinctively that she’d do a better job.

  Now he was having second thoughts, though.

  Now he was wondering if one of the muscular workers Hannah and Gwen were teasing about might try to take his beauty away from him.

  Chapter 16

  “Tony!”

  His head snapped as he was quickly brought back to the present.

  “Huh?”

  Hannah was kind to him, as she always was. She didn’t point out that he was caught daydreaming again.

  “Sorry,” he stammered. “What did I miss?”

  “I was just asking you about your socks.”

  “My socks?”

  “Yes, I heard a rumor you had a sock problem today.”

  Tony looked at Melvyn and whispered, “Tattle tale.”

  Melvyn just smiled.

  To answer Hannah’s query Tony sat in a dining chair and kicked off both of his shoes.

  “Remind me never to tie my shoes in front of Melvyn again.”

  Melvyn smiled a second time but didn’t say anything.

  Hannah looked at Tony’s socks and stifled a laugh.

  “I know, I know,” Tony admitted. “One white sock and one black sock don’t exactly match.”

  Hannah wrapped her arms around his neck and hugged him.

  “Honey, I think you’ve outdone yourself this time. Bless your little heart.

  “I mean, I’ve seen you wear mismatched white socks before. And I’ve seen you wear mismatched black socks before.

  “But this… this takes the whole enchilada. You win the grand prize in the sock mismatch contest.”

  “Yeah, yeah. That’s what I get for being courteous.”

  “How so?’

  “Well, we left very early this morning and I was getting dressed in the dark so I wouldn’t wake you.

  “In the dark, the socks both looked alike. I put them on, slipped my shoes on, and forgot to tie them. On the way to the work site, I sat on a rock and tied them, and that’s when Melvyn noticed they were different.”

  Hannah hugged him again.

  “Oh, honey, that was so sweet of you.”

  She turned to Melvyn and Gwen and said, “See? I told you Tony was the sweetest man in the whole wide world. I’m so lucky to have you, honey.”

  The five year old in Tony reared his head and he stuck his tongue out at Melvyn.

  In all the years he’d been in love with Hannah he truly believed he was lucky to have her.

  Every once in a while she pointed out to him she felt lucky to have him as well. And it made him feel all warm and fuzzy inside.

  Gwen changed the subject.

  “Hey, speaking of gathering fish and meat to last through the winter, have either of you checked into that food program FEMA is offering for the residents’ first winters?”

  “I picked up a brochure the last time I was at the processing center,” Hannah replied. “Hold on and I’ll get it.”

  She brought it back and passed it around the table.

  While the others took their turns to read it she summarized it for them.

  “It basically says that FEMA knows there’s going to be a learning curve when it comes to new residents learning how to survive in Alaska.

  “That’s why they’re not expecting anyone to grow crops or to hunt and fish this year. They’re providing rations until breakup, for this winter only.”

  “Breakup? What in heck is breakup?” Tony asked. He was last in line for the brochure and hadn’t seen it yet.

  “Breakup,” Hannah explained, “Is what Alaskans call the coming of spring. “It’s the day every year when the ice on the rivers breaks up and the rivers start to flow again. It’s a big thing for Alaskans. Even bigger than Christmas.

  “It’s not a set date on the calendar, like the official first day of spring. It changes from year to year based on the weather and how thick the ice is.

  “But Alaskans look forward to it because once the rivers are flowing again they can travel again. They can fish again. They can start hunting again without having to fight their way through heavy snow and freeze their tushies off.”

  Gwen summarized the brochure.

  “It says here that FEMA expects new refugees to be too busy their first year to have to worry about their winter food supply. That we’ll have our hands too full with building our cabins to hunt and fish and grow crops on a large scale.

  “It says they’ll feed us over the first winter, but that once breakup comes it’ll be up to us to start learning the Alaskan ways.

  “It says that in rural Alaska, people typically grow and gather enough to last them the winter, and they put it away to get them through the cold weather months. They grow vegetables and some fruits, and they gather wild berries. They can them or dry them and put them away. And they do the same things with meat. Those who don’t know how to hunt and fish learn how. Those who don’t know how to smoke or dry meat learn how.”

  “But are we really considered rural?” Tony asked.

  “It says here we’re not considered rural,” Gwen continued. Since we’re not in the city we’re not considered urban dwellers either. We’re kind of in the middle.

  “It says FEMA is going to run power to the cabins, but it’ll be a small power station. We’ll have enough power to run our lights and chest freezers, but not enough to heat our homes. We’ll still use wood stoves for heat and will be responsible for gathering our own wood.

  “And it says that as long as we have a source of income we’re close enough to Anchorage to go shopping. So we don’t necessarily have to gather enough food every year to survive each winter.


  “But they recommend we gather as much as we can.

  “At the same time they recommend we purchase boats if we can, even if several families have to share them.”

  “But why? We can fish from the shore, can’t we?”

  “Yes. But it says the fishing is much better from a boat. Especially when the salmon run up the rivers in the area. And it says that when you have several hundred people around here all hunting the same areas, the wildlife will be depleted pretty quickly. They recommend traveling up river for several miles for hunting, where the game will be more available.”

  Gwen finished the brochure and handed it to Tony.

  Tony winked at her and passed.

  “I don’t need it now. I got you to read it to me. And thank you very much, by the way.”

  Chapter 17

  “Hey, guess what I heard yesterday?” Gwen said to nobody in particular.

  Melvyn answered for the group.

  “What?”

  “Well, I went by Wanda Benedict’s cabin. She wanted my opinion on the new curtains she got in the mail.”

  “Where was I?” Hannah demanded. The two of them – Hannah and Gwen, were thick as thieves and the best of friends. They did everything together.

  Usually.

  “You were napping with the baby,” Gwen said.

  “Anyway, Wanda said she was up at the FEMA station and saw the number 4863 on the delivery schedule for this week.”

  “Really? So I was right! It is assigned to somebody after all. I wonder who it is.

  “Hey, do you think it might be some big fancy movie star? Or maybe the leader of a rock band or something?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe. Must be somebody important, if they don’t have to drive up here in a rickety RV and live like sardines in a tin can for months while they’re waiting for their turn to come up.”

  “Wait a minute,” Hannah said while holding both thumbs and forefingers up to her temples, like she was in deep thought. “I’m seeing a vision. I see Jason Swenson, sitting in his hotel suite in the Cayman Islands, getting a phone call. It’s from FEMA. It’s to say his bundle has arrived, and he can now send his hired construction crew to build his cabin and his Olympic-sized swimming pool, so he can tell his adoring fans he’s roughing it when he’s not on tour.”

  Melvyn chimed in.

  “Wait a minute. Who or what is a Jason Swenson?”

  “He’s the lead singer in the latest boy band that Hannah has a crush on. Beyond Reason, I think they call themselves.”

  “Wait a minute. Hannah, aren’t you too old to have crushes on lead singers in boy bands?”

  “Yes. But I made an exception in this case. Jason Swenson is just too dreamy and… huggable not to have a crush on.”

  “Yet I, your husband,” Tony said, “Don’t have any trouble at all not having a crush on him.”

  “You’re not a girl, Tony. You wouldn’t understand.”

  “No, honey. I’m not a girl. I’ll tell you what I am, though. I’m the guy who’s gonna murderize your friend Jason Swenson if he moves next door to us.”

  “Murderize isn’t a word, honey.”

  “The Three Stooges say it all the time.”

  “You really think The Three Stooges are the best people to use to teach you vocabulary lessons?”

  “Um… I guess not.”

  “I think it’s cute that you’re jealous.”

  “I’m not jealous of a runny-nosed pipsqueak like Jason Swenson.”

  “Really, now?”

  “Well… maybe just a little.”

  She walked over and kissed him.

  “Thank you, honey. That was all I was looking for. And I love you too.”

  Tony started to object, but realized halfway through he probably shouldn’t.

  “But wait a minute. I didn’t tell you I lov... oh, never mind.”

  When the fearsome foursome: Gwen and Melvyn, Hannah and Tony, processed in to the FEMA processing center they were assigned numbers 4864 and 4865.

  Then they parked their RV in a line on the shores of Etlunka Lake to await the day their numbers came up.

  While waiting they got to know their neighbors.

  Now they were good friends, or at least acquaintances, of every single person in Block 4800.

  Except the owner of 4863, who would be Tony and Hannah’s next door neighbors.

  They knew the lot had been given to somebody, because the number had been marked off FEMA’s board.

  FEMA wouldn’t tell them who the owner was or why they weren’t waiting patiently at the lake like everyone else was. “Privacy concerns,” FEMA said.

  FEMA’s refusal to share the information deepened the mystery, and exactly who the owner of lot 4863 was turned into a topic of great discussion around the evening campfires at the lake.

  Everyone had an opinion.

  And all of them, it would turn out, were wrong.

  “Well if you’re right,” Melvyn said, “and the bundle will be dropped there this week, we’ll finally find out who it belongs to. I mean, they have to be there for the joint inventory with Sid. Right?”

  “Yes. We’ll finally find out who the man of mystery is. I still say it’s a billionaire who thinks he’s too good to hang around here with us riff-raff. He doesn’t want to leave his mansion in the Hamptons to come and watch while his peons build the little hunting cabin he’ll only visit for a week every summer.”

  “Well, he’ll have to visit it to do the joint inventory of his building materials.”

  “Maybe, maybe not. The mega-rich hire people to do that sort of stuff for them all the time. He’ll just give them power of attorney to act on his behalf.”

  “Isn’t there something in the FEMA regulations that prohibit somebody who’s very rich from getting a cabin at government expense?”

  “You’d think there would be. But there isn’t. I already checked. The only requirement is that it must be someone who was directly displaced by the eruption, or who gave up his or her home for someone else who was directly displaced.

  “The only other stipulation is someone who meets neither provision but who was given special authority by the Federal Emergency Management Agency. Or words to that effect.”

  “Ah,” said Melvyn. “And therein lies the catch-all. That’s how the billionaire gets his foot in the door. He pays off someone in FEMA and is given that special authority.

  “It’s a very old story. The government is corrupt on every level. Those with enough money get whatever they want.”

  Hannah said, “Well, all I know is I’m gonna find out who shows up to do that joint inventory with Sid. There were no other deliveries scheduled for this week for Block 4800. That means whenever the helicopter shows up over Block 4800 it’s our mysterious Mister or Miss 4863.

  “And as soon as I hear that chopper, I’m gonna run over and see who it is.”

  Chapter 18

  As it turned out, Hannah didn’t have to wait long at all.

  The following day she fed little Samson his lunch and put him down for his nap.

  She popped open the ceiling vent above his bed so she could hear him.

  Then she and Gwen prepared tuna sandwiches for their own lunches and climbed atop the RV to enjoy them.

  Not all recreational vehicles have roof retreats, but those which do provide a nice place to relax and enjoy the sun.

  Hannah’s had a reinforced roof strong enough to support the weight of four adults with lawn chairs, and a ladder on the back of the unit for easy access.

  The top of the RV not only had a much better view than the shoreline, where the view was blocked by the long line of RVs.

  There was also a much better breeze atop Hannah’s RV, which did a better job of chasing away the mosquitoes.

  Mosquitoes in Alaska, you see, are as big as tugboats.

  That’s because there’s so much wildlife they can feast on. Many people assume that only man suffers this pointy-nosed little pest. But that’s not true
at all. Mosquitoes attack any animal which carries yummy blood through its veins.

  And in Alaska, very little of the blood these blood-suckers suck comes from humans, for humans have ways to defend themselves from the little buggers.

  Humans have mosquito netting, insect repellent and mosquito coils.

  Not to mention humans use their hands to squash the mosquitoes flat as a pancake, which mosquitoes really hate.

  On the other hand, your average caribou, moose or bear has none of these. They’re absolutely defenseless against the attack of the tiny mosquito. So mosquitoes attack them in droves, hang on until they’re full, then fly away until they’re hungry again.

  Because feeding is so easy for them, it’s said that Alaska is second only to Siberian Russia in the number of mosquitoes per cubic meter.

  And it’s not only the numbers.

  Even those who doubt Darwinism admit the merits of Darwin’s theory of survival of the fittest.

  What it says, in effect, is that when a faster and stronger lion defeats and kills a slower and weaker lion, it’s the stronger lion’s genes which live on to further the species. And as a result the species is improved.

  Mosquitoes which are bigger and stronger get more than their share of the blood supply, which enables their offspring to prosper, when frailer and smaller mosquitoes are more likely to die off before they breed.

  The species, in a place like Alaska where the blood supply is abundant, will therefore grow larger in comparison to other parts of the world.

  That’s why some such mosquitoes look like 747 jumbo jets.

  Several years ago an Alaska state legislator introduced a bill to replace the ptarmigan as Alaska’s state bird with the mosquito, on the grounds the two were comparable in size but the mosquitoes were much more plentiful.

  It was all done tongue-in-cheek. The bill never went anywhere and wasn’t expected to.

  One thing FEMA did for the Yellowstone refugees was to provide them a handout suggesting various ways to keep the flying vampires in check.

  “Wear repellent, as well as netting around the face and neck. Wear long sleeves when possible and trousers instead of shorts.

  “And camp in the open, where breezes and winds can deter mosquito bites by preventing the insects from landing.”