Bea looked around for Agnes and saw the girl gingerly stick a toe into the water, then pull it out. She repeated, wincing. It had been a long time since she’d had a warm bath. It had only been brisk mountain streams for most of her memory. Bea swam over to her and put her arms up for Agnes to take. Agnes shook her head, but Bea didn’t lower her arms, and finally Agnes melted down into them and Bea carefully pulled her into the water, turning her around. Agnes was light in her arms, buoyed by the water’s mineral heft. Agnes laid her head on her mother’s shoulder and Bea felt her relax. The way her daughter clung to her, she was transported back to their apartment, desperately clinging to her daughter, who she was certain was about to take her last breath. Slipping back into that anxiety took mere seconds, and she felt her heart begin to pound beneath the water. But no, Bea reminded herself. She is well. She’s healthy. She’s safe. Not only that, she is extraordinary. You did it. She nodded to herself, but it only made her feel wistful.

The hunting party returned with a deer and two jackrabbits, and that night they built the fire big and broad and a smaller one next to it. It took the whole Community to prepare for that much butchering. Grass gatherers set out. Whole dead sage bushes were dragged back. The smoking tent was large, but a whole deer could only be done in halves. The deer was skinned, then split, and the first half butchered, strips of meat sliced long and thin and draped over the drying racks, made years ago from strips of a downed maple, and repaired as needed with the pliable strips of smaller green bushes and trees they’d encountered along the way. It was an almost daily job, to look for materials to keep the drying rack functional. But it was possibly the most important item they had. The maple had proved incredibly resilient, and it lent good flavor too. They’d never seen another maple in all their walking. It was as though the Rangers had put it there for them to find, to study what they did with it.

The butchering was an all-night job. They switched off tending to the smoker. The whole atmosphere felt like fire. They built a larger campfire to keep everything dry and hot so the small fire inside the tent could do its small work. Create smoke and just enough heat. It was how they had evolved the process.

Near dawn they’d done all they could, and many were laid out where they’d stood, sleeping lightly.

By their count it was Saturday.

People began to worry.

“Do you think they’ll all come back in the morning?”

“Maybe they’ll come back tonight to beat the traffic?”

“What traffic?”

“What’s traffic?” the children asked.

“We tried all the doors, right?” Debra asked.

“Yes. Even the Garage. And the safety door to the Arsenal,” said Dr. Harold.

“Why is there such a door on the Arsenal? Do they expect people to storm the Post and steal their weapons?” Val said. She kicked at some dirt.

“Why is there an arsenal at all?” Glen said.

“Maybe beyond that ridge there is a militia waiting to invade,” offered Dr. Harold.

“It’s absurd they let truck drivers in,” Val pivoted. “He just had a permit. Probably got it for a bribe. Actually, it’s probably a fake.”

Carl shrugged. “Like I said, commerce is king.”

Bea laughed. “When did you say that?” She rolled her eyes at Debra. But Debra frowned back. Bea looked around and no one was looking at her. They were all looking at Carl, nodding their heads. Was everyone on Carl’s side now? She looked for Glen. He had wandered off, was crouched and dusting away some loose earth, peering closely at something. A relic or fossil, she thought. It was so Glen of him. He was only interested in the past. She felt briefly furious at him.

“And we wait here. Waiting for what? Our keepers to give us our orders?” Val spit into the dirt she had just kicked.

“Yes, we should leave immediately,” said Juan. He even got up from his squatted position, as though he would just walk away, but he only stood, stretching out his bad hip, which had never fully recovered from the tumble he took in a boulder field in their second winter.

“This is our land, is how I see it,” Juan continued. “We’ve been invited here. We are guests, and our rude hosts aren’t even here to give us a place to lay our heads or somewhere to clean up, take a shower.”

Sister asked, “What’s a shower?”

“They never do,” said Debra. “Why is this Post any different?”

“Because it is,” Carl interjected, with a fake professorial voice. He had never been a professor. “They told us to come here. For no reason. It’s wrong of them to not be here.” His calm facade melted to show his true agitation. “At least have someone here to let us into the fucking building to get our fucking mail.”

“Well,” Bea said, “they didn’t exactly know when we’d show up. And it is a holiday . . .” She let her voice trail off. She didn’t enjoy this game of Us Against the Rangers that Carl and Val and now Juan were trying to start. It made the situation they were in feel precarious. But she too wondered where the hell someone, anyone, was.

Carl shot Bea a stern look as he leapt up and strode petulantly to the Office.

Everyone followed him.

They peered in through the windowed door.

The Office was lit by the sun through the side windows. A playful ray danced over everything. The stapler, computer, In and Out mail bins that sat atop the front counter. Vinyl carpet in Ranger green. A flag with the emblem of the Wilderness State. They saw the desk that must belong to the Post’s head Ranger because on it sat a mug that read, Porque yo soy el jefe. And on another desk sat a vellum box spilling over with mail. Packages sticking out the top. Letters stuffed into all crevices. They pressed their faces to the windows, straining to read the names written with that ancient cursive.

“Okay, what are we doing?” said Val.

“Debra,” Carl said, in a sappy voice, “do you have any issues with me opening this door? There’s probably a rule about it in the Manual.”

“Oh, fuck the Manual,” Debra said. She yanked on the doorknob. “I want my fucking mail,” she screamed.

Carl covered his elbow with a pelt and bashed it into the center of the glass. Shards rained inside and out. He reached in to turn the door lock, but couldn’t.

“One of the children,” ordered Carl.

Debra put her arms out like branches and the children scooted behind them. “Absolutely not,” she said, eyeing the glass shards.

Carl tried to punch them out to create a smooth edge, but they just became more jagged and the children stepped farther behind Debra.

Then they heard a loud smack and a grunt. Glen had thrown himself against the door. He reared back and yelled as he threw himself again. Then he kicked at the knob. His noises were guttural, incidental, as though they were just what happened when a body hit a door. He kept kicking at it until the knob hung off. And then, with a roar, he threw himself full force at it one more time and sailed through, splattering to the floor and skidding a few feet. Glen beamed up at them and then at Bea, who knelt beside him and stroked his hair.

“Good work, babe,” said Bea.

They swarmed the mail table. Val and Debra wrestled for the box.

“Wait, wait,” yelled Glen, and they all stopped and turned to him, Val and Debra holding the box between them.

Glen smiled at this victory. “We need a system,” he said.

Carl groaned at the word system. But, Bea noted happily, no one gave Carl any attention. They just waited for Glen to explain.

His system, it turned out, was simple. Two people would sort. And no one would get their mail until the last piece was sorted. Debra and Val were chosen as the sorters, and Bea could see that Val relished the task. With the reading of each name she would stare thoughtfully at the person, then place it solemnly on their pile. They were deliberate and slow, and everyone was salivating watching the progress. The piles lay across the help counter. It was possibly the only action the help counter ever saw. Who came here for help ever? Other Rangers? There were no other people. The Office seemed equipped as a welcome center from some long-ago time. In the corner there was even an educational display about soil erosion.

Bea wandered the Office, opening doors, while the others hovered as close to the mail table as they were allowed.