Chapter 7

Bryan pulled into the driveway at five minutes past six. Silver was standing there waiting for him. He pulled Amy out of her seat as she was exhausted from all the riding around and slung her sleeping form gently over his shoulder.

She looked at the truck and trailer, packed down like a gypsy caravan and gave Bryan a questioning look.

"Do you have the news on?" he asked.

"No, should I?" she asked.

"Yes," he said.

They sat down in front of the television and watched as the announcer introduced the President of the United States. The speech was lengthy, nearly thirty minutes long, yet could be summarized with just three points.

1. The Federal Reserve was being officially dissolved. 2. The monetary system of US dollars was no longer valid and would be dispensed with. 3. There was an emergency bank holiday until the system could be changed over to the new North American Amerodollar.

Bryan sat there watching Silver. The stunned look on her face seemed to grow angrier by the minute. Maggie sat on the edge of the couch, watching the scenario unfold. She was old enough to know that this was important, yet not really experienced enough to know what the implications truly were.

Once the speech was over and a series of talking heads began coming on to pick the speech apart, Bryan lowered the volume and got down on his knees in front of Silver, placing the still sleeping Amy in Maggie's arms.

"Are you ok?" He asked.

"Yeah," she said, smiling a smile that he knew was there for the benefit of Maggie. "You've got us prepared. We just need to trust you now more than ever." She placed a hand on his cheek, caressed it a bit and abruptly changed the subject.

Bryan was familiar with that particular tactic. He knew that she was simply trying to hide her fears from the children and put up a front of competence and solidarity. Having two boys who were very easily affected by the emotional outbursts of others, she had long since learned to bury the bad thoughts and emotions until she could privately purge them. Maggie however, was having none of it.

"What does this mean?" Maggie cried. "What's going on?"

Bryan turned to the panicking girl and placed a hand on her shoulder to steady her. He looked her straight in the eyes and raised an eyebrow to show that he was serious.

"What this means is that the American dollars that we use are being replaced. Their value has dropped to nothing." He paused for effect. "As such we will have to turn in all of our old dollars and exchange them for the new Amerodollars, but not until the banks open, whenever that's going to happen." Silver stood up and walked silently into the other room. He watched her go, noting by the walk and the fingers rubbing her forehead that she was upset, even if her facial expression did not betray it.

"So we wait." He continued, turning back to Maggie. "It's hard to tell what the exchange rate for the dollars to Ameros will be." The word seven rang in his head like the inside of a bell.

"What do you mean exchange rate?" she asked, still confused.

"Well what they are talking about is that we will take one dollar," he held up a dollar bill, "and exchange it for one Amerodollar. That is an exchange rate of one to one. What makes everyone nervous is that the exchange rate might be two to one, or five to one, or ten to one. This kind of thing as big as it is is very disruptive. Until the banks open most people won't be able to officially purchase anything."

He continued. "Credit cards won't work, ATMs won't work, and everyone will be afraid to take cash and checks because they won't know what it is really worth until the banks open again."

"So what do we do?" she asked, a low quiver in her voice.

"We wait." He said. "We pray. We hope it all settles out. We help those in need, keep our heads down and don't draw attention to ourselves."

He looked around, making sure no one else was within earshot. "The most important thing we can do is not to draw attention to ourselves."

"If anyone asks how much food we have, you tell them we have enough for a day, maybe more. We obviously have a week or so worth, but we have a lot of mouths to feed here. Telling someone, and I mean ANYONE, that we have extra food may mean the difference between eating and starving for you and your brothers and sisters ... or worse." His voice had become very stern and he softened it as she reacted to his hard tone of voice.

"I am not upset with you," He continued. "I just need to make clear what we have here. People may not be able to buy food. People may not be able to buy food for days. And once the banks reopen the supply lines that deliver the food may not get back into working order for a week or more."

"Can you imagine not eating for an entire week?" he asked. "People who haven't eaten in an entire week have been known to kill for a moldy loaf of bread. There are examples of it throughout history."

"Hopefully, it won't be that bad," he added. "That's where the praying comes in. Things rarely get as bad as that. People help each other, things don't last as long as they could, or cooler heads prevail. Generally total anarchy occurs only after months of famine. We just have to wait and work through this quietly. We will survive."

She nodded her head, lips tight, looking for all the world like she was about to cry. He hugged her, pulled her tight, letting her know that everything would be fine. She sobbed quietly.

"Oh to be a teenager..." he thought.

"When we come out of this you will be an adult," he said. "This situation is one of those that will force a child to grow up. Unfortunately, this is also one of those things that's hard to live through, or at least no fun. I promise we will make it though. I promise you can do it."

She nodded, sobbing, rubbing the tears from her eyes beneath her glasses with her fingertips. "I'm gonna go lay down," she said, still sobbing. He nodded and she got up, slowly ambling toward her room carrying Amy, wiping her eyes again.

Bryan turned the television back up and listened to the commentary for a few minutes, then determining that nothing was to be learned from it, shut it off.

He walked into the kitchen where Silver had her laptop computer out. She appeared to be talking to friends. As he approached she turned, the normal smile was missing from her face. She rubbed her forehead and turned back toward the screen.