My Heart’s Home by Kris Michaels
Chapter 6
Cam watched the people go through the lines. Another vet named Enzo joined Bull, and together, the three of them made sure the people in the trucks were respected, and he got a damn good look at everyone going through both lines. There were people still in the camp. Those were the ones who didn't trust others enough to come down, or that were too high or drunk to care, or people who wanted to stay out of sight. The next time the food truck came, he'd stay in the camp and wander even though Bull had warned him from doing it. Punt remained in the family camp area, keeping an eye on the lodges. As an unofficial caretaker, it was the perfect position to…
He caught a glimpse of someone and did a double-take. Was that…? He moved forward in a leisurely fashion and turned around. No. Damn it. The profile was close, but it wasn't Mitchell. He swung his attention to the other line. A woman with a long, thick, red braid was talking to one of the volunteers. She had her daughter with her. It had to be her daughter. The same shade of red hair hung in a single braid down her back, too. The girl's wide green eyes were the exact copy of her mom's.
He diverted his gaze to other people nearby, but his eyes quickly drifted back to the redhead. She was striking. High cheekbones, porcelain skin, and those big green eyes. Her daughter moved behind her mother when the volunteer lady spoke to her. He diverted his attention again and sighed. What would cause a mother and daughter to be homeless? What tragedy had forced them to the streets? She didn't look like a drug user, but then again, with prescription narcotics being the drug of choice, there was no way of telling who could become addicted.
He waited until the last straggler went through the line before he, Enzo, and Bull queued up. "We saved you meals. Three, right?" The lady in the food truck reached back for three containers.
"Four, ma'am. We have a person still in the camp, watching out for belongings and such," he spoke before Bull or Enzo could. They both nodded and muttered a thanks as they received a full container.
"Here, could you give these away, please? We didn't have room in the trays, and I don't want them to go bad.” She lifted two twenty-pound bags of oranges. Cam took one, and so did Bull. Enzo grabbed the extra container and headed into the camp to give Punt his food.
"Thank you, ma'am." He nodded and followed Bull.
The man dropped down at the edge of the children's dirt lot in a patch of weeds. "We eat, and then we hand these out. One per person until they're gone."
Cam nodded and dug in. He hadn't eaten all day, and the food was damn good—even the canned carrots, which he usually wouldn't eat. "Eating a hot meal. Didn't expect that," he said as Bull looked up at him.
The man shrugged. "Don't get used to it. People say they'll be back, and then they lose interest in being a do-gooder, or the effort gets to be too much or too expensive. Seen a lot of promises, not much in the way of delivery, though."
Cam nodded and glanced around. Almost everyone was eating outside. The woman with red hair was with her daughter in front of a tiny shanty. God, he’d had no idea people lived in these conditions.
"Take an orange for Punt, and I'll take one for Enzo and one each for ourselves. I'll take you to meet them now." Bull stood up and grabbed his container. "Keep that. Clean it out with some dirt. It makes good liners for your boots or to put up against the inside of your tent to block the wind."
Cam blinked but picked up his container and followed Bull after they took their oranges. They started down the inside aisle and came back down the outside. The people knew what was happening and waited at the front of their tents with anticipation. Oranges were greeted with glee from the children and with relief from the grownups.
Bull introduced him to each group of people. "This is Cam. He's with us."
The people stared at him and nodded. He did little more than hold the sack of oranges for people to dip into, but right now, he felt like Santa Clause because of the smiles on the people's faces.
They stopped in front of a little hut. A group of women was standing talking. "Ladies."
All eyes went from Bull to him. "This is Cam. He's with us." Just as with the others, the anxiousness in their eyes disappeared. He held out the bag as the children each took an orange and then extended the bag to the ladies. They thanked him quietly. Up close, the redhead he'd noticed earlier was even more beautiful. Her full lips and heart-shaped face beguiled him. He forced himself not to stare.
"Bull, we need to burn some blankets," one of the ladies spoke before they could move on.
Bull turned and looked at them. "What?" He tapped his ear.
"I have to burn some blankets. Lice, we think." The woman looked down, ashamed.
Bull nodded. "Happens. You got enough to stay warm?"
The woman looked at him and tilted her chin up. "That lady gave us some. Promised more. We can manage."
"The church on Tenth is offering washing machines and laundry on Saturday," the redhead spoke up. "Dina, you should wait to switch blankets until all your clothes are clean. They'll get bugs, too."
Cam agreed. It didn't make sense to put clean blankets into a place that had lice. "I don't want my kid getting more bites. She's scratching like crazy. Her hair, too."
"Take her to that walk-up clinic over on Bluebird. I heard sometimes they'll give out lice shampoo."
Another woman with dark hair and light brown skin added, "Better to itch for a few days than to live with it permanently."
"Maybe the church will let you use their showers if you explain?" another woman who stood behind the other women added.
"Girl, when have you ever had anyone invite someone with lice into their place? That charity work they do only goes so far," Dina retorted and the smaller woman shrunk in on herself.
"Carol!" A man's voice lifted over the structures. The small woman's eyes widened, and she hustled three children off toward the bellowing voice.
The woman with the red hair glared toward the voice and then watched the small woman scurry away. The pain and sympathy in her eyes spoke volumes to Carol's situation. Cam glanced at Bull, but the man hadn't noticed or didn't care. He continued his discussion with the other women. Cam stepped closer to the redhead. "Will she be all right, or do I need to take a walk that way?"
The woman jumped and stepped back before she glanced toward the tent where Carol was hustling her children. "I've never seen bruises."
"There are other ways to leave wounds." Verbal abuse was just as hurtful as a fist.
The woman blinked and looked up at him. "Yeah, that's true."
He extended his hand. "Cam."
She glanced at his hand and then wiped hers off on her jeans. "Mercy."
Cam barely nodded before Bull called to him. They finished the rounds of the family tents before they started down the next line in the encampment. Cam studied each face. Some people wouldn't come out of the tent when they showed up. Bull tossed in an orange to those people. Cam mentally marked the tents as he followed.
"Keep those bags. Reuse them," Bull told him when he balled up the nylon mesh.
Cam glanced down at the trash in his hand. The expression ‘one person's trash was another's treasure’ played through his mind. He watched Bull head into his tent and glanced down the hill as the sun set. He'd do his job and leave this place, but the people he'd just met…
Cam sighed and opened the drape to his tent. He dropped down and put his head on his backpack. The homeless here didn't have a light at the end of the tunnel like he did. What was strange was the desperation he expected to find hadn't materialized. Instead, he found grit and determination. He met people who were consumed with the effort to survive. Those people lived on the west side of the camp.
The men and women who were sober enough to trickle down from the east side of the camp were different. They were lost, and it appeared they didn't care about anything except their next high or drink. This was a tale of two camps, not one. It was divided between those still trying to live and those who no longer had the will to survive.
He closed his eyes and listened to the sounds of the camp. Finding Mitchell was doable if the man was here. But somehow, that mission, the one he’d eagerly signed up for, seemed to pale. Twenty-four hours in the camp had taught him more than forty years of living could. Humanity had a long way to go, and he had a first-row seat on the observation train. The homeless were no longer a faceless shroud of people who weren't connected to his reality. He could put a face and a name to so many. One in particular. Mercy, the redheaded beauty who'd probably suffered abuse. He sighed out the stress of the day and relaxed against his pack. Why was she here? What was her story?
* * *
Cam stood alongside the small shanties that bordered the playground and watched the children. Over the last week, he'd observed the community closely. Every morning, he rose before the sun and made his way to the east part of the camp, walking through the detritus of drug addicts and alcoholics. Puke and shit littered the area, but he made it his goal to memorize every face he saw. Mitchell hadn't made an appearance. But something else had. When he first arrived, he assumed the homeless population's determination to survive had outweighed the hopelessness he'd expected.
Not so. Hopelessness shrouded the camp in an ominous hover, and it showed itself in too many ways. In the faces of people who hadn't eaten in days, he could see desperation and resignation. Then there were those who'd given up. The struggle too much to bear any longer. Those were the people that matriculated over to the east side to find diversions in drugs and alcohol. Some came back, and some didn't. There wasn't a sense of community. Instead, there was a single-minded focus on surviving. Everyone looked out for themselves and their family if they had any. There was no expectation of the offer of help. Survival was paramount.
The only laughter he heard was from the children, and even they rarely laughed. It was almost as if the ability to enjoy play had been stripped away from them. He shook his head. The hope of getting into a shelter drove some, but from what Bull told him, they were overcrowded, and there were people in this community, due to one reason or another, who couldn't register for spaces in the shelters. It was an impossible situation for them, and that cloud of hopelessness dipped closer.
He shoved his hands in his pockets. Just over three months ago he'd been in the Air Force. His mind flitted to the men Blessing had introduced him to at the USO and wondered what they were doing now. He'd never expected to be in this position. How were they fairing? He was particularly curious about John, the young man that had saved all those letters. That man felt things deeper than he let on. Cam kicked a rock and glanced at the kids playing in the dirt. Would they ever have a chance to play three sports like the child that had written to John? He doubted it. He sent some positive vibes up toward… Where had John gone? Rhode Island? Maine? He couldn't remember. When he finished the op, though, he'd hit the guy up. John had texted a couple times when he was getting set up. He hoped that teacher kept sending letters. It was a good thing.
He swept the area again. His job had put him in this camp, and he'd eventually leave and go back to his family home, to warm winter nights by the fireplace and food that spoiled in his refrigerator. With that thought in mind, he went about his job, checking his phone each morning for any texts, hiding it again after he received whatever information Terrell passed along. He still had over half his battery left, but soon he'd need to recharge it.
As he watched, he saw three cars bouncing up the pothole-infested road to the shelters. He whistled, and the children's heads came up. Without saying a word, they drifted to the tiny hovels as adults came outside or stood up from where they were sitting. The cars pulled up, and six men exited. Cam crossed his arms over his chest as he watched them head into the camp. They were wearing gloves and immediately started tearing apart the structures as they came to them. Mercy gasped and pulled her daughter toward her. He moved closer and assured them, "They won't do that here."
"Are they the police, Cam?" The girl's big green eyes begged him to say no.
"I don't know who they are," he gave her a quick smile. "What's your name again?" he spoke as he watched the assholes tossing the east side of the camp. Three of them turned and started to work through the middle of the camp.
"Destiny," the girl answered.
"Okay, Destiny, you and your mom go up and get Punt out of his tent. Tell him I need backup. Then you stay up there." He glanced at Mercy, and she nodded. They turned and made their way to the vet's encampment while Cam moved through the huts and tents, heading toward the assholes coming his way.
Punt joined him a minute later. The man had somehow maintained a buzz cut and displayed a scar that marred his top lip into a permanent snarl. The assholes stopped when they saw the two of them blocking their way. Cam spread his feet and let his hands dangle at his sides. "Leave these people alone. They've suffered enough."
"Fuck you. Who do you think you are?" The man directly in front of Cam took a swing. He ducked it and came up with an uppercut, then followed it up with a left hook. The man went down like a rock. The other man produced a knife, and Punt went into action. That vet was lightning fast. He hit the man's hand with a roundhouse kick before he moved forward, his foot in the air, kicking rapidly and repeatedly at the man's chest and chin. It was over in seconds. Punt picked up the knife and placed it behind his old belt against his jeans.
The other four stopped what they were doing and gathered as a group. Cam glanced at Punt. "They're planning our demise."
Punt grunted and stood his ground. The four spread out and came at them in a semi-circle. "You shouldn't have done that, fellas. We were just having some fun." The one who spoke yanked a hunk of corrugated tin from one of the shanties and chucked it into a tent. A startled yelp proceeded, a man scurrying out of the deflated canvas.
Cam did a double-take. Mitchell. Damn it. Mitchell rubbed his arm and stood up, but once he understood what was happening, he bolted toward the back of the camp, away from the cars and men.
The guys heading their way turned suddenly and started running after Mitchell. Son of a bitch. He turned to sprint after the men.
Punt's hand grabbed his arm, stopping him. "Not your concern, man. You follow them, you'll get killed."
Cam snapped his arm out of Punt's grip. Did he blow his cover? Would Mitchell get away? He couldn't see Mitchell or the men now. They'd sprinted over the top of the cement embankment.
"Dude's been here for the last month or so. He knows where to hide. Fuckers won't catch him, and if they do, it ain't our concern." Punt stared at him. "Why are you playing the white knight?"
Cam dropped his head back and stared at the cold, grey, cloud-covered sky. "Because once upon a time, I was someone who cared."
Punt snorted. "Well, be that kind of guy when you finish your sentence in hell. Now, you mind your own business unless they come after the kids. The kids don't deserve the shit the adults get them into."
One of the men they'd taken down moaned but didn't get up. Punt nodded toward the vehicles. Several women were at the cars, removing floormats and anything else they could use. "We watch until they get what they can, then we walk away."
Cam glanced away. He had to report the sighting to his boss and Captain Terrell. Thankfully, it took no time for the vehicles to be stripped of anything useful. When everyone was back in their shanties, he and Punt walked back to their tents.
"I'm going to get water." Punt reached into his tiny shelter and pulled out a bottle then walked away without a backward glance.
Cam went into his tent and retrieved his phone. Powering it up, he sent two texts confirming he had located Mitchell and then indicated the man was on the run. He opened the tent flap and brought the cars into focus, zeroing in on tags. Hopefully, someone in forensics or tech could blow the pictures up and read the license plates. He waited for several minutes before he powered down the phone. He'd recheck it tomorrow to see what instructions he had from either Laghari or Terrell.
The men he and Punt had handled moved slowly down the hill. They didn't seem too concerned about the condition of their sacked vehicle. The men split up, and the two cars lumbered down the pitted road. He narrowed his eyes and glanced back over the hill where Mitchell had bolted. Why hadn't they waited for the goons that had chased Mitchell? Another question to top off a heaping plate of missed opportunity. Damn it. He'd been within ten feet of the man. He mentally kicked himself and flexed his swollen fist. He'd been so damn close.
