Winter Moon

They embraced, and Heather said, "I wish there was something I could

do, Alma."

"So do I, girl. So do I."

As they leaned back from each other, Heather said, "What's all this

cooking?"

"We're going to have the funeral tomorrow afternoon. No delay. Get

the hard part over with. A lot of family and friends will be by

tomorrow after the services. Got to feed them."

"Others will do this for you."

"I'd rather help," Alma said. "What else am I going to do? Sit and

think? I sure don't want to think. If I don't stay busy, keep my mind

occupied, then I'm just going to go stark raving crazy. You know what

I mean?"

Heather nodded. "Yes. I know."

"The word is," Alma said, "Jack's going to be in the hospital, then

rehab, for maybe months, and you and Toby are going to be alone. Are

you ready for that?"

"We'll see him every day. We're in this together."

"That's not what I mean."

"Well, I know it's going to be lonely but--"

"That's not what I mean,

either. Come on, I want to show you something."

Heather followed Alma into the master bedroom, and Alma closed the

door.

"Luther always worried about me being alone if anything happened to

him, so he made sure I knew how to take care of myself."

Sitting on the vanity bench, Heather watched with amazement as Alma

retrieved a variety of weapons from concealment.

She got a pistol-grip shotgun from under the bed.

, "This is the best home-defense weapon you can get. Twelve-gauge.

Powerful enough to knock down some creep high on PCP, thinks he's

Superman. You don't ? have to be able to aim perfectly, just point it

and pull the trigger, and the spread will get him." She placed the

shotgun on the beige chenille bedspread.

From the back of a closet Alma fetched a heavy, wicked-looking rifle

with a vented barrel, a scope, and a large magazine. "Heckler and Koch

HK91 assault rifle," she said. "You can't buy these in California so

easy any more." She put it on the bed beside the shotgun.

She opened a nightstand drawer and plucked out a formidable handgun.

"Browning nine-millimeter semi automatic. There's one like it in the

other nightstand."

Heather said, "My God, you've got an arsenal here."

. "Just different guns for different uses."

Alma Bryson was five feet eight but by no means an Amazon. She was

attractive, willowy, with delicate features, a swanlike neck, and

wrists almost as thin and fragile as those of a ten-year-old girl.

Her slender, graceful hands appeared incapable of controlling some - of

the heavy weaponry she possessed, but she was evidently proficient with

all of it.

Getting up from the vanity bench, Heather said, "I can see having a

handgun for protection, maybe even that shotgun. But an assault

rifle?"

Looking at the Heckler and Koch, Alma said, "Accurate enough at a

hundred yards to put a three-shot group in a half-inch circle. Fires a

7.62 NATO cartridge so powerful it'll penetrate a tree, a brick wall,

even a car, and still take out the guy who's hiding on the other

side.

Very reliable. You can fire hundreds of rounds, until it's almost too

hot to touch, and it still won't jam. I think you should have one,

Heather.

You should be ready."

Heather felt as if she had followed the white rabbit down a burrow into

a strange, dark world. "Ready for what?"

Alma's gentle face hardened, and her voice was tight with anger.

"Luther saw it coming years ago. Said politicians were tearing down a

thousand years of civilization brick by brick but weren't building

anything to replace it."

"True enough, but--"

"Said cops would be expected to hold it all

together when it started to collapse, but by then cops would've been

blamed for so much and been painted as the villains so often, no one

would respect them enough to let them hold it together."

Rage was Alma Bryson's refuge from grief. She was able to hold off

tears only with fury.

Although Heather worried that her friend's method of coping wasn't

healthy, he could think of nothing to offer in its place. Sympathy was

inadequate.

Alma and Luther had been married sixteen years and had been devoted to

each other. Because they'd been unable to have children, they were

especially close. Heather could only imagine the depth of Alma's

pain.

It was a hard world. Real love, true and deep, wasn't easy to find

even once.

Nearly impossible to find it twice. Alma must feel the best times of

her life were past, though she was only thirty-eight. She needed more

than kind words, more than just a shoulder to cry on. She needed

someone or something at which to be furious--politicians, the system.

Perhaps her anger wasn't unhealthy, after all. Maybe if a lot more

people had gotten angry enough decades ago, the country wouldn't have

reached such perilous straits.

"You have guns?" Alma asked.

"One."

"What is it?"

"A pistol."

"You know how to use it?"

"Yes."

"You need more than just a pistol."

"I feel uncomfortable with guns, Alma."

"It's on the TV now, going to be all over the papers tomorrow--what

happened at Arkadian's station. People are going to know you and Toby

are alone, people who don't like cops or cops' wives. Some jackass