Chapter 3

Solitary. In recent years I definitely had to admit to being a solitary person. It was now making the end of civilization easier even. Sure, I had friends from my time in the Army. It was the last few years though that it had become primarily just me. The fact I was a prepper towards the end certainly didn’t help my case. I had taken some ridicule about it - lets face it, the guy preparing for the world to end had to be crazy, right? Especially building the cabin away from things and then how I made it a defensible location as well.

In the central Texas and Fort Hood area in particular most people enjoyed living an urban life. There were good numbers of people who commuted down to Austin for work, for example. While Killeen wasn’t a city to compete with Austin it wasn’t small either, topping out at over 150,000 people as of 2022.

That was one of the reasons I was sticking to the immediate area around the cabin. It was safe, but it also kept me away from the masses of bodies that were bound to be in the city proper. I also had to admit to myself I wasn’t sure whether I was ready to truly get back into society again, even if it were only a miniscule fraction of before. There were reasons I had retreated out to the cabin and away from everyone.

2010 I was a new soldier, fresh out of training and jump school, an infantry man, MOS 11B with Airborne qualification. While I obviously had to interact with groups of people in my unit and through training I largely considered myself an extroverted introvert. It probably didn’t help that I had decided to join the Army relatively late in life, an E-3 Private First Class as a 30 year old.

Training had been rough, one of only a couple soldiers in a 60 man platoon who were 30 or older. The physical side wasn’t what was rough about it. I had come in having been in decent shape and from an active youth. I knew how to work out and when my body really couldn’t go anymore. Instead of the physical, the rough part was the mass punishments.

My platoon and company were mostly young guys, as such the maturity and discipline levels varied a lot from those of us who had been around the block. To the Drill Sergeants though it didn’t matter who screwed up. Why blame and punish one when could punish all 60 in the platoon? Historically it even had an added bonus for them. The screw ups who just seemed unable to get right would typically be handled by the platoon itself. There were a couple blanket parties like what you saw in the movie Full Metal Jacket that were used for “motivation.” I hated to admit to myself that while I wasn’t one to swing a soap sock I also wasn’t one to stop it. At the time I justified it as a form of hazing, almost a military tradition. Plus, the person deserved it, right?

I survived training though and would end up stationed at Ft Hood. I was only there a short time before being sent to Iraq. While there I started taking some business classes through Central Texas College online. They had a program designed to work around a soldier’s schedule. Since I didn’t have any real expenses in that first year, in addition to classes I invested in the stock market. With a combination of studying trends a lot and some outright luck, I was making some good money in my stock portfolio on top of my regular salary.

I couldn’t have guessed it at the time, but these classes and investments would shape my life for the next 10 years and more. We had been back from deployment for a month when I started taking in person classes. It was the first day of an accounting class that would stand out for me. I had found a seat in the middle of the class with an open spot next to me. Being a relatively smaller school and catering to some night classes it wasn’t one of those big auditorium style classes seating hundreds. Instead it was a room comparable to what I had in high school: able to seat roughly 40 desks.

Looking back I found it amusing that such a small thing as seat selection would make a big difference in someone’s life. But then Tonya Edwards sat next to me. She was tall for a woman at 5’10” compared to my own 6’4”. Dressed in khaki shorts and a Fleetwood Mac t-shirt, she was definitely enough to catch my attention with her looks. I didn’t want to come off as “that guy” though, plus I wasn’t exactly the outgoing type so I gave her a simple smile in greeting and let it go at that.

I should take a moment here to describe her more thoroughly. She had long natural red hair that went to her shoulder blades and she had the pale skin to go with it. She could also probably complete the redhead stereotype: she did have her fair share of freckles. To say I thought she was beautiful and was attracted to her would be an understatement. In fact, I didn’t consider myself to be in her league. Thankfully, I was the only one who thought that.

I didn’t speak to her that first night. I do have to admit to watching her leave as I walked behind her. As the saying goes “I hate to see you go, but I love to watch you leave.” She was tall but definitely curvy. Going from top to bottom those legs of hers were a thing of beauty, but then all of her was.

It was the next night that I would get lucky. Once again I had gotten seated before her, most of the class naturally fitting into the same seats as the day prior. Tonya did the same. A nod of acknowledgment and a brief smile of greeting, then the class started. It was after class though that was the important part.

Getting out to the parking lot she and I were some of the few who were leaving after that class. I saw her getting into a late model car, it wasn’t in bad shape, just not new. Then I couldn’t help but hear the “click click click” of the starter trying in vain to start the car up. I slowed down my walk to my truck, hearing it again and the same result happening. I walked over and let her know I’d bring my truck up and give her a jump. That, you could say, was that.