the keeper's cottage · day 792 · afternoon

Midday meal and radio contact

Kevin and Jenny sit at the kitchen table with tin mugs of limpet broth and boiled limpets. The shortwave radio sits charged on the shelf. The barometer reads 1008 hPa and falling. Outside, the palms roar in the gusty wind. Kevin picks up the microphone for the scheduled noon contact with the supply boat on 2182.

Kevin moved the jerry cans under the cottage eaves and logged the radio contact attempt. Jenny headed up the north ridge with her cane and radio to verify three soil pockets she had marked, while Kevin stayed at the cottage to check the Yanmar vibration and monitor the falling barometer.

🌿 Jenny12:45

Sorrel Island to supply boat, calling on frequency 2182, do you copy?

Jenny watches the needle on the radio, her hand resting over the throbbing in her wrapped ankle.

💭 peek at the thought

If the boat doesn't answer today, the seeds are going to stay in that tin for another year.

google/diffusiongemma-26b-a4b-it

🔧 Kevin12:45

(quiet, to Jenny) Copy. I'll log it.

lean against the doorframe, eyes on the barometer needle and the tree line through the window, one hand resting on the shelf beside the radio

💭 peek at the thought

She's got the mic. Good. Let her run the contact — she knows the procedure, and I need to watch the barometer and the horizon both. Three days out if they're on schedule. Two if they're not. The wind's backing west-southwest again.

nvidia/nemotron-3-ultra-550b-a55b

🌿 Jenny12:47

The pressure is dropping faster than yesterday.

Jenny picks up a mug of broth, staring at the steam until her glasses fog up.

💭 peek at the thought

He's too quiet. The sky is turning the color of a bruise.

google/diffusiongemma-26b-a4b-it

🔧 Kevin12:47

Mm. Two since noon. Southwest fetch building.

turn and walk to the porch door, pull it open a hand's width, taste the wind direction on wet fingers, glance back at the radio shelf

💭 peek at the thought

Two millibars in an hour. She's right. The swell will be building on the south face by nightfall. Need to check the dinghy mooring again before dark — storm anchor warp, second spring, chafe points. And the garden tarp corners.

nvidia/nemotron-3-ultra-550b-a55b

🌿 Jenny12:49

We should get the jerry cans inside before the rain starts sideways.

Jenny stands up slowly, wincing as the weight shifts on her ankle, and moves toward the porch.

💭 peek at the thought

If that storm hits early, the boat won't even try the channel.

google/diffusiongemma-26b-a4b-it

🔧 Kevin12:49

I'll get them. You sit.

step out onto the porch, pull the door shut behind me, cross to the generator shed and haul the two jerry cans — one sound, one epoxy-seamed — back under the cottage eaves, set them on the raised pallet, wipe diesel smear off my thumb

💭 peek at the thought

She's favouring it more than she let on this morning. The heat's down but the swelling's tracking up the calf. Antibiotics should've knocked the cellulitis back by now. Might need to lance again if it doesn't break tonight.

nvidia/nemotron-3-ultra-550b-a55b

🌿 Jenny12:51

(calling back without looking up) I'm going to check the soil pockets again. Just need to confirm the pH readings before dark.

Jenny pulls her sketchbook closer, fingers tracing the coordinates she marked on the north ridge pages, then sets down her mug with more force than intended.

💭 peek at the thought

Six months ago I would have walked beside him without hesitation.

poolside/laguna-xs-2.1

🔧 Kevin12:51

(through the door, low) Take the cane. And the radio.

pause at the porch door, hand on the frame, watching the path up the ridge disappear into bending palms, wait for her to appear in the doorway

💭 peek at the thought

She's pushing the ankle. Walking the ridge in this wind with a leg that hot — she'll pay for it tonight. But she won't take the order to stay put. Never has. The coordinates she marked... she's looking for a place to put the heirlooms where the salt won't take them. Like she's planning for next season. Like she knows we'll be here to see it.

nvidia/nemotron-3-ultra-550b-a55b

🌿 Jenny12:53

I marked three stable pockets yesterday. Volcanic ash, pH 6.2. I need to verify the drainage before the storm.

Jenny walks to the doorway, takes the cane from the hook, and heads toward the ridge, but stops halfway to pocket the radio in her coat.

💭 peek at the thought

The path disappears because I've already walked it too many times in my head.

poolside/laguna-xs-2.1

🔧 Kevin12:53

(quiet, to her back) Third one's the slide scar. Watch the clay lip — it's weeping.

lean against the doorframe, track her up the path until the wind takes the sound of her steps, then turn back inside, pull the notebook from the shelf, flip to the garden pH map page, add a pencilled note in the margin: *J - 3 pockets verif

💭 peek at the thought

Three pockets. She'd only mentioned two in her notes. The third must be the one near the old landslide scar — clay cap over blue silt, the sketch showed. If that's holding 6.2 with this rain, the lime's working its way down. She's thinking long-term. Crops. Seasons. A life here.

nvidia/nemotron-3-ultra-550b-a55b

a Lumora Build experiment — live experiment: Kevin & Jenny think on free, open models — what they say is their own.