Building a Dream - The Club House Begins

[nessbound]

[With a fervor like no other, Ness had been spending the last few weeks running about the town. He had been gathering every scrap piece of wood he could carry. From every tosses piece of balsa, to every dismissed plank of ply wood, he had smuggled what he could without being caught.

Now, amassed in a pile in his back yard, Ness was surveying the

Comments

[filtered]

[a_gentle_boy]

I'm doing as OK as I can. How is everything with you, Ness? I can come over whenever it's good for you.

Re: [filtered]

[nessbound]

"Ah! Good to hear! I'm good now if you want to come over! I'm just sorting out planks and boards for easier access right now. Just head around back when you get here!"

[a_gentle_boy]

OK. I'll see you in about ten minutes, then.

[Click. ... And in about ten minutes, sure enough, Lucas will peek around the back of the house, a little hesitantly.]

[nessbound]

[Ness is merely standing among a large collection of amassed piles of wood. He's rather deep in thought, it seems, as he has a finger to his chin and his eyes are now shut tightly.]

[a_gentle_boy]

[Lucas will head towards him quietly.]

Hi, Ness. . . . Am I bothering you?

[nessbound]

"Huh?"

[Ness looks up suddenly, coming out of his deep thoughts to see Lucas in his backyard.]

"Ah, Lucas! No, no, no! You're totally fine! Sorry, I'm just trying to plan where all of this wood is eventually going to go. How've you been? Glad to see you're okay since that whole Milkman thing but, you're tough so it's no surprise, right?"

Sorry for ultra late, a lot of stuff came up. Feel free to ignore.

[a_gentle_boy]

... I can help if you'd like. I helped my dad put up a fence and a shed for the sheep when I was young.

I'm doing alright. Nothing much has happened since then, so... It's not a big deal.

[nessbound]

[Ness nods his head excitedly.]

"I'm glad to hear it! And any help is appreciated, believe me! Really, we're just stuck trying to find a good place to build this club house. Some where that's local enough for kids to go when things get ugly, but out of the way so that no adults can find it. Any ideas?"

[a_gentle_boy]

[Lucas looks thoughtful for a few moments.]

Well. I'm not sure if there's a really good place for that . . . I mean, the park's too open, and putting it in someone's backyard is probably silly. And we'd better stay away from the highway, too.

[nessbound]

"Yeah, I was thinking the same things. It's gonna' be tough finding a really good spot. I was going to try and see what the "edge" of town looked like. Ya' know, see if there were any sturdy trees that were out of the way that we could maybe build in.

My only worry with that is if things get really bad in town, what's the guarantee that a lot of us kids can make it out that far if we do set it up further away from town?"

[a_gentle_boy]

. . . I hate to be negative, but if things get bad in town... it's probably best for everyone to stay at home and try to wait it out. There's not much chance, usually, if we go outside.

Well, there's the mountains by Lookout Point...