Ronnie left a short while later, after finishing off the warm water she was drinking. She went to relieve Epstein and reassume her post, taking him a metal thermal flask Rebecca had filled and a few different teabags that Sam pulled out of their collection.

The other women resettled on the couch, pulling blankets over their laps, and Rebecca pivoted to lean against Sam's side as a backrest, nestling under Sam's arm and resting against her shoulder much like a reverse of their positions early in the morning. They had their knitting and notebook idle in their laps, but weren't doing anything with them for the moment, still thinking over the big changes on the horizon.

"I mean... letting the Barsons in a month ago, we couldn't turn them away in the middle of winter, could we? But it definitely put a dent in our food stores, since they barely brought anything with them." Rebecca was looking up past her forehead at the edge of Sam's face that she could see.

"Hm-mmm." Sam shook her head. "I really hate that we have to weigh our safety against trusting strangers in need and our own comfort and stability... and not getting taken advantage of. Sure, they validly were on hard times, but if people get to know they can come to us for handouts..."

"Yeah. At least if there's a stockpile, we could take care of people who need it without dipping into our own winter reserves that we worked so hard on, right? And... I guess if they're settin' up some kind of rationing system, we might not even have to be the ones making the decision. If we're not running the show, that and a bunch of other things aren't our problem." Rebecca looked back down and fiddled with a length of yarn between her fingers. "Well, not our responsibility, anyway. Still plenty of ways it might become our problem."

"Yeah, but... this isn't Lassart or slacker group project freeloaders or lazy do-nothing coworkers, right? Epstein and Fairbanks and their folks have all been pretty solid, I don't think they'd let much land on us if they can help it."

"I suppose. I dunno, I'm also starting to wonder if it might be good to have them around anyway, as, like... not quite a police force, but... some kind of security. Like, so far we've lucked out and have been able to kinda self govern, by consensus as a small community. But if we keep growing, eventually we're going to reach the point that there has to be someone seen as being in authority, and enforcing norms or rules. If we get too many people here, even without a bunch of bad apples slipping in, there's bound to be conflict and dissent and people who simply don't get along... or maybe even belong."

Sam drummed her fingers on her notebook, then ran them through Rebecca's hair and tucked it behind her ear. It gave Rebecca a little tingling shiver, and she squirmed a little and hugged Sam's other arm around her tighter while Sam spoke. "That might be a good point. Oh god, are we going to have to rebuild governing systems from the ground up too? Talk about next-level adulting."

"Seriously. I'm suddenly finding myself glad Amira is around. Some stuff I'm happy to leave to someone else. I just help fix and build and grow stuff when I can... shoot badguys if I have to... and cuddle with my girlfriend when it's cold."

Sam chuckled, holding onto Rebecca with one arm and gazing into the glowing coals and small flames in the barrel stove. "As much as there is that we don't have anymore, I admit, sometimes the simplicity is nice. When it's not boring, anyway."

"Hey, at least you can, like, build or design something to stay busy. After taking apart and putting back together all my gear so many times, all I have is reading, or knitting, and not very well at that."

"You read perfectly well, aren't you a soft science major?" Rebecca whacked Sam's arm lightly. "Okay, sorry. I mean, I could try to teach you some of this stuff, beyond the basics, but there's a lot of pretty tedious grind to learn before you can actually start using it creatively."

"Let's be honest, I'd probably just cross a wire and blow something up again."

Rebecca felt Sam shrug. "Well, we could channel that towards the right outlets." Then, after a moment, Sam let out a long, drawn out sigh.

Rebecca looked up again with a slight frown. "Hey... what's wrong?"

"Blah. I was thinking about the idea of checking on our families once we have extra gas again."

Rebecca remembered what Sam had told her about the weekend everything went to shit, how her father came home sick while she was back from school, how her mother had refused to let Sam come close to them and made her flee to a friend's house. Rebecca reached up to hold the hand Sam had around her and squeezed it gently, a physical reminder she was there.

"I don't... I can't imagine what it might be like walking up the front steps and opening the door again. Like... I want them to be there, but then if they are, but aren't, if you know what I mean... god. But... part of me just won't stop hoping, you know?" Sam sniffed forcefully. "Fucking Schrödinger's apocalypse. But I have to know. I don't do quantum shit."

Rebecca sighed sympathetically and squeezed Sam's hand tighter. "You won't be alone. Ronnie would probably do it, or I would." She meant going into the house first, seeing what was there. "It's the least I could do."

Sam let out a short, choked laugh and leaned over Rebecca, wrapping her other arm around her too. "No it's not, you dummy." She sniffed again, before burying her face in Rebecca's hair, which muffled the rest of her words a little. "It's far from the least."

Rebecca felt several of Sam's warm breaths on her scalp and was glad she'd managed to wash her hair two days ago, when the afternoon had been a little warmer. Brushing it out by the fire afterwards, wrapped in two blankets, was worth it now. Hopefully it still smelled vaguely like one of the several bottles of scavenged "old-world" shampoo Cat had brought them for Christmas, not just wood smoke. She reached up with one arm to return Sam's embrace, at least managing to get it around the back of her shoulder, and attempted to caress Sam reassuringly. "I'd do anything I could for you, Rosie."

Sam tightened her grip briefly. "Stop it, you're going to make me get snot in your hair."

"Okay, okay. I'm sorry." She patted Sam's shoulder. "See? I'm apologizing excessively again. Everything's back to how it should be." Sam's laugh was a little closer to normal, and her grip was relaxing gradually. When Sam let her go entirely, Rebecca sat up and pivoted to face her.

Sam wiped an eye and patted Rebecca's knee gratefully. "I know you would. I know." She took a deep breath and let it out slowly. "I'm okay."

"Okay." Rebecca patted Sam's hand where it rested on her knee. "I know it's probably still chilly out, but it might be a little better... you wanna take Rufus for another stroll? Get some air?"

**

The change of scenery seemed to do Sam some good. After a wide loop that included contemplatively peeking into the other large building mirroring theirs, the women moseyed past the rooftop solar panels. They debated while they walked about if a hypothetical generator should go near the panels for easy wiring and security, or somewhere on the ground floor, which meant easier refueling and possibly better fire safety. Around when they reached the interior room the community had come to use as a dark, cool food storage area, they agreed it probably would just come down to size.

Sam picked up and held flashlight for Rebecca, who poked through their dwindling stock of produce, unwrapping a couple of apples from the paper that helped preserve them. She made a face at the first, which was starting to go bad — straight to the compost that would go. Fortunately, the next was a little soft but still edible, so she slipped it in her coat pocket to split with Sam during the rest of the day. Turning to face the shelf behind her, she inspected one of the larger winter gourds they had left — having agreed to help Allie prep a large dinner for many of the residents and their guests.

Since they'd basically eaten their way through their stores in the order things would go bad, the potatoes, acorn squashes and pumpkins were long gone. They had a smattering of butternuts left, along with some ugly blue-grey lumpy onion-shaped squashes Allie had introduced to her as "Hubbards". Rebecca carefully rolled several of them around on the chicken wire mesh shelves to check for softening or spotting, but they didn't see any worse off than last week. They had back stocks of canned and packaged foods, but had always tried to dip into those only if they had to, getting by on replenishables whenever they could.

"What's on the menu tonight?" Sam stooped to see more of the shelf Rebecca was pawing about in.

"I'm not sure what else she had in mind, but Allie wanted me to open a couple of these up so she can make them into a soup. Think we can spare the power to use a blender later? Otherwise we're all in for quite the workout..." Rebecca didn't look forward to smashing and stirring enough squash into soup to feed for over a dozen people. She rolled two of the larger fugly blob squashes to the edge of the shelf and scooped them up in each arm like a pair of footballs.

Sam held the door for her and she shut off the flashlight and hung it on the doorknob, patting her leg to signal Rufus to stand and follow them. "Well, I caught a whiff of SOMEthing deliciously carb-y earlier, so I think we might be in for some bread or naan-equivalent to go with it."

"Oh god, please, you're going to have me thinking about that all day, even if the smell doesn't."

They bantered lightly on the way back to the apartment, and Rebecca set the squashes down in the kitchen with a relieved sigh. As Rebecca turned to open the curtain for more light, Sam perched on a stool across the counter from her. "Do you want help?"

Rebecca turned back to face her and the counter again, pulling the apple from her pocket and passing it to Sam with a small cutting board and paring knife. "Cut that up for us, and feed me once my hands get gross? This is going to be a gore-fest."

Sam smirked and briefly stepped around to Rebecca's side of the counter to wash the apple and her hands in the sink, pausing to kiss Rebecca on the cheek where she waited to do the same. "Mm, my messy, messy chef."

"Eh. I don't know if I'd go that far. I'd rather stick to baking. That I have a decent handle on."

While Rebecca dried her hands, Sam sat across the counter again and tapped her chin thoughtfully before picking up the paring knife with a little twirl that made Rebecca just ever so slightly nervous about a fumble and a nick. "That's true. You do look pretty adorable when you get flour on your nose and in your hair."

Rebecca rolled her eyes before pulling out one of the chef knives in a block nearby. It was way more expensive than anything she'd had in her college years, but she'd figured that if she was going to feel guilty about just taking things from a store, she might as well do it right. She dug out a sizable pot from the cupboard, along with one of their Pyrex bowls, setting them on either side of the cutting board. She took the one piece of apple she'd probably pick up herself, and dragged the plastic tub they used for compostables over to sit on the floor next to her feet.

Sam made quick work breaking down the rest of the apple and looked at her expectantly, waiting for further instructions, but... Rebecca shook her head at her. "Don't worry, this is going to be messy, but not too hard... and I don't know that another pair of hands will really do much."

"Okay, if you're sure." Sam left the chair to grab her notebook and calculator again, also collecting her phone from a solar charger in the window. Rebecca saw her hesitate when her hand rested on the headphones next to it.

"It's okay if you want to zone in." Rebecca grinned when Sam looked at her sheepishly. "I'll still be here, and it's not like narrating vivisecting these would be thrilling conversation. If you've gotta crunch some numbers or sketch out some plans for technowizardry, don't let me stop you."

Sam gave her a little adoringly grateful half smile. "Thank you babe." Often they'd leave music playing on a phone's speakers, but she'd always been able to focus much better with it being piped directly into her head. Something about hearing the different layers of music interplaying in both her ears, sometimes back and forth, helped her concentrate and come up with new ideas.

Rebecca set into trying to remove the dusty coating of olive oil they'd brushed the squashes with to extend their shelf life. Cold water and just a drop of dish soap was making slow progress, so she eventually used a glass measuring cup to scoop hot water from the fire pot, and dribble it over the surface of the squashes before scrubbing and rinsing them again.

By the time she'd finished that and first started levering the knife into the gourds, Sam was humming along and occasionally singing a few lines under her breath without really thinking about it, the scratching of her pen on the notebook pausing now and then as she twirled it in thought. ("...starts in my nose and goes to my toes, da-da-da da mm-mm-mm...")

Rebecca smiled and found Sam's intermittent a cappella karaoke a perfectly pleasant soundtrack — sometimes she liked Sam's covers of tunes better than the originals. (Sam made the same claim, and they both thought the other was nuts for it. Sometimes, Rufus had to put up with their attempts at drunken duets.)

Once she'd gotten the squashes open, she dug as much of the gooey threads and seeds out as she could with a metal spoon, scooping them into the bowl. She wasn't looking forward to picking all of the seeds out by hand for future use, whether roasting or re-planting, but they couldn't afford casual waste. Maybe she'd be doing this again in several months from something grown from those very seeds?

Before she got her hands all slimed up with that, she focused on skinning and dicing the two squashes ("...sew on patches to all your tears... da-da da, da-da da...") while she could still handle a knife safely, dropping the rinds into the compost at her side, and piling the edible hunks loosely in the pot. Along the way, she periodically caught Sam's eye and carefully plucked a slice of the apple from Sam's fingers with her teeth when it was held up for her. She blew Sam a kiss after the second one, which got her a wink and tongue-click in reply.

Rebecca sighed when she'd finished the tidy part, setting the knife aside and reluctantly picking up the first handful of squash guts, giving it a disdainful little shake to separate it from the rest of the mass. Sam looked up and shook her head slightly with an affectionate smirk before poking at her calculator again. If it hadn't been for the notebook, calculator, and phone all in the line of fire, Rebecca probably would have flicked some of the mess across at her.

It took about twenty minutes to get all of the seeds separated and piled on one side of the cutting board, and the gooey remnants shaken and rubbed off of her hands into the compost. The experience had been mildly reminiscent of when her uncle taught her how to "clean" a fish. Less squicky, but Rebecca still held up her hands and looked at them with mild revulsion, greenish-orange strands and film still clinging to them. Sam held her pen up defensively, point towards Rebecca, eyebrow arched, when she'd wiggled her fingers menacingly in her direction. Rebecca laughed, and took the empty glass bowl to the sink.

Without power for a drain grinder, and the limited amount of water their partial occupancy put through the building drainpipes, Leonard had precautioned them to be extremely careful about the amount of solid (or semi-solid) matter they put down the sinks. Rebecca washed her hands over a wire mesh strainer, digging her nails under each other and allowing herself another drop or two of the citrusy soap to get the last of the gunk off. When she whacked the inverted strainer on the rim of the compost bin and was finally finished with her messy task, she let out a relieved sigh and walked around the counter to sit on a stool next to Sam, where she rested her head on the other woman's shoulder with a weary thump.

"Hopefully Allie can make all that into something better tasting than I could." Rebecca and Sam were still struggling with hitting the right combinations of cooking time and temperature with a hand-stoked fire, and their latest attempt to roast one of these squashes had managed to turn out both under and overcooked.

Sam pulled one earbud out and Rebecca could hear the faint music beyond the gentle chastising that followed. "Cut yourself a little slack, Remy. Your pumpkin bread, and the pie you made for Christmas turned out pretty good." Leonard and Allison's drum stove was an "upgraded model" incorporating a hollow pocket with a removable door for baking, and another couple had made themselves a decent approximation of a wood-fired pizza oven, both which she'd had occasional successes with.

Rebecca lifted her head and sighed. "Yeah, okay, but that was a month ago. And... deer fat instead of Crisco or butter? Eeew. I may never be able to make a proper crust again."

"Hon... after the year and change we'd all had? You could have just handed me a bowl full of that filling and I would have eaten it with a spoon. It was like spiced holiday normalcy. Make it in little cups like a creme brûlée or something next time if you're so worried about the crust."

"I appreciate the implied compliments and all, but you're REALLY overestimating my baking skills... or the apocalypse has just really lowered your bar."

Sam squinted at Rebecca for a moment, giving her the same look she would use for noteworthy spectrum analyzer results she hadn't quite figured out the trend behind yet... and then set her pen down and took out her other earbud. "Okay. What's this nervous energy about? Are you stressing about making a good impression on Amira or something?"

"Heh." Rebecca took a slow breath and her gaze focused somewhere out the window across the kitchen from them. "No, I don't think I'm wound up about her. Today just has me on a bit of an emotional roller coaster, I guess. Being able to just 'walk across the street' to get a roll of toilet paper or a bag of flour or another blanket... having enough gas to actually drive somewhere again... freaking out about someone trying to take all of that for themselves instead of just sharing it." She didn't bring up the possibility of searching for her mother... she really didn't want to rub that in Sam's face, especially not with that recent display of rare vulnerability.

Thankfully Sam didn't seem to pick up on her silent thoughts for once, and smiled sympathetically. "I hear ya. God knows there's enough leftovers to last what's left of us for a while. I gotta say though, I could get behind not having to feel like a vulture picking through a probably-dead-person's pantry every few days. Or carrying it back ourselves, never knowing if we'll only find a little, or be carrying back our own weight in canned goods and housewares."

Rebecca chuckled. "I admit, some trips, I haven't been sure which one of those I'm hoping for."

"See, that's even more consistency we might get back. Plus, isn't being on an emotional roller coaster kinda the new normal? This is just the next loop around the track. I'm just glad you're here in the seat next to me."

The edges of Rebecca's mouth turned down in the same face someone might make at a fuzzy kitten or a sleeping puppy with its tongue hanging out. "Meep. Okay. You win."

Sam turned to lean over and hooked her arms around Rebecca's neck, fluttering her eyelashes coyly. "Yes, yes I do, and I like my prize. But, let's get that pot over to Allie, if she truly is baking, and I can swipe something mere minutes out of the oven... I just can't pass that up."