Little House on the Wasteland

Seventeen: Hawkeye Crossing

The next morning began with a bath, for Ma wanted them to look presentable when they reached Hawkeye Crossing.

Hawkeye Crossing was the name of the settlement where Laura's family would obtain papers permitting them to travel the Great Eighty Road. Tobias Goatherd had marked its location down on Pa's parchment map, right where the thick dashed line of the Eighty Road met one of the rivers that forked diagonally up through the Yowa. That river was the same one that they had seen yesterday, said Pa, so Laura knew that Hawkeye Crossing must be very close, somewhere just west of where they had camped that night beside the Eighty Road.

Hawkeye Crossing was just a small village and trading post, according to Pa, but it was also the location of an Ortega fort. Inside the fort was the Clan's regional supervisory office. Tobias Goatherd had given Pa a letter of introduction to the supervisor in charge of the Hawkeye Crossing garrison, a man named Malcolm Syed. If all went well, they would be allowed to continue on, following the Great Eighty Road all the way to Lildaka and to their new home in the Wastes beyond.

Ma did not want them to look like desperate displacees when they petitioned the Hawkeye Crossing supervisor. And so, when Laura woke that morning, Ma was already busy with her thread and needle, stitching tears in Mary's coat.

Pa was nowhere to be seen, for he was hiking back towards the river to fetch water. When he returned, he carried a jug in one hand and a sloshing bucket in the other. Slung across his broad shoulders were two bulging waterskins.

The night before, Ma had worried about smoke so close to the big road. They had kept their cookfire small and doused it quickly. Now, though, the firepit crackled and glowed. Ma instructed Mary to boil a big pot of water so that they could all have a good thorough wash.

When the pot began to bubble, Mary removed it from the fire and carefully poured the steaming water into the basin that Pa had forged from scrap aluminum. Mary then mixed in cold water from the waterskins until the temperature was just right.

Laura bathed first, lathering up a washcloth with one of Ma's lavender pine soaps and scrubbing her skin all over until it glowed a happy pink. She even washed her hair. Undoing her braids, she worked soapy water through the matted clumps and tangles until her fingers massaged her scalp. It was bracing, standing there with damp hair and skin in the cold morning air. Laura hopped from one foot to the other to fight off the shivers. Still, goosebumps and all, it was marvelous to feel so clean.

Meanwhile, Mary set out the jar of tooth powder. As Laura bathed, Mary mixed a spoonful of the fragrant powder with water and some ashes from the campfire to make a sticky paste. She spread the paste across her teeth with her finger. Then she took the bone-handled toothbrush that Ma had made for them and dutifully scrubbed the inside of her mouth with its soft hemp bristles. When it was Laura's turn, Mary handed her the toothbrush and the bowl of paste. Laura hated the burnt taste of the gray ointment, but Ma always said that they must clean their teeth with paste at least once a week if they wanted to keep them. She forced herself to brush up and down, front and back, until the foul mixture frothed over her lips. Then she spit into the bushes with a theatrical "blech!" before rinsing the taste from her mouth.

When they were both brushed and bathed and dressed, Mary and Laura sat together to comb out one another's hair. They used Ma's comb. It was an antique from Lectric Times, with dozens upon dozens of stiff iron prongs that never seemed to rust or stain. Laura bit her lip, wincing as Mary coaxed wet brown knots of hair through the comb's narrow teeth.

Not for the first time, Laura wished her hair would flow like Mary's and not coil into such tight kinks. Mary had teased her about it when they were younger. Of course, Ma's hair was the same way, and no one could deny that Ma was beautiful. Still, Laura couldn't help feeling a pang of jealousy when she looked at her older sister's sandy curls. Neither of them would ever have golden hair cascading down their shoulders like the Queen on Mary's carrysack, but Mary's hair was a good deal closer than Laura's.