Walk A Different Path 🤍 Jaa/First

Chapter 14 ~ stormy weather ~

He needed to check on his investments and inform all his important contacts of his plans, the only people he wouldn't inform were Maskwa and his parents, he wanted to surprise them and maybe if he was lucky he could be back there within the month?

Meanwhile, thousands of miles away in North American, Maskwa couldn't sleep, it was around 11 pm at night and all he could think about was Sam, wondering if he was ok, where he was, what he was doing and who with?

Sam had been gone just over a week and the day's were long without him, the nights were even longer. He had called him a couple of times but mostly it had been messages not that he was complaining.

It had begun to snow this morning and it looked to be set to carry on for quite a while so Maskwa was glad that his parents had come home before the bad weather began and as much as he hadn't wanted Sam to leave he had to be grateful that he had left when he had.

He was also grateful that he had hunted that last time and that he had spent the whole morning chopping wood. They had a plentiful supply of food and the horses and chickens were ok and if there was a power outage, they had a back up generator so they were all set.

Yes it was beautiful living up here in the mountains where the air was clear but sometimes the elements reminded them just who was in charge but they had been lucky, it hadn't snowed this bad in over twenty five years.

He would have to go out in the morning and help the village men to shovel snow away from doors and off porch steps. If Sam were here he would have no doubt helped his mother to make hot soup to hand out to the elders and hot coffee and sandwiches for the men.

Again, he had to be grateful because if Sam had seen this side of mountain living it might have put him off returning. He didn't know why but he decided to get up and went up to the loft to get the five gallon containers they kept stored up there.

He carried them downstairs quietly and filled them with tap water, just in case then he put them in the pantry. They also had an old galvanised bath outside in the yard that they used to use for the horses before they bought the modern troughs.

In the morning he would dig it out and fill that too then he shook his head, why wait until the morning when he was up right now. He went back upstairs and dressed before heading back downstairs and he wrapped up warm before heading out in the yard.

The first thing he did was to clear a space beneath the kitchen window, he would set the bath there, after that he went to dig out the bath and make sure it was still good to hold water. It was old but it was still good, good enough for an emergency situation in any way.

There was a full moon and the snow covering the ground reflected the light making it look almost daytime. He managed to drag the bath across the snow the the area that he'd cleared the he went to check on the horses and chicken before heading back inside to find his father up and making a pot of coffee.

"are you ok son?"

"yes father, I couldn't sleep so I decided to do something useful and store some water ... I'm just filling the old bath for the animals just in case and even if it freezes up on top we can break through the ice"

Maskwa got the water hose and fed it through the kitchen window turning on the tap to fill the old bath then when it was full he pulled the hose back in and shut the window.

"I made coffee, sit and get warmed up" his father said as he poured them both a cup

"you're missing Sam?"

"mmm but I'm glad he's not seeing the worst side of living up here" Maskwa laughed.

"you could always go and live with him son, your mother and I, we would be ok" his father said.

"I don't think I could be happy with all the hustle and bustle, in saying that, I don't expect Sam to give it all up and come here ... if it turns out that he never comes back, at least I had a few weeks with him" Maskwa replied.

"we're not meant to live alone son, if things don't work out with Sam you might ..." his father began.

"I don't want anyone else father, I would rather have my memories of a few weeks of perfect with Sam than a lifetime of average with someone else"

"well, you know what's best son, are the horses ok?"

"yes, they're used to this kind of weather so ..." Maskwa replied.

"are you going back to bed?" his father asked.

"I should try to get some sleep I guess but ..."

"you should, it's going to be a long day" his father said.

"thank you for the coffee father, I'll go on up then" Maskwa said before heading back up to his room to try and get some sleep before morning came, it was going to be a long day. 

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