Suddenly Alone: Day 4

Word Count: 30,003

Summary of Events:
Chapter 9:
Sofia started homeshcooling Charlotte, which took a little bit of motivation to accomplish. Axel helped out some neighbours in harvesting their canola when Sofia called and said the power company was threatening to cut the power if they weren't paid within the week. Sofia, worried now that they'd discovered two unpaid bills, decided to work on piecing together the papers Josef had written notes on and she, Hendrick, and Charlotte succeeded in finishing the piecing.
Chapter 10:
Axel and his accountant surveyed the results of going through Josef's finances and notes, and found that Sofia was in a horrible position. Axel took the information to Sofia and told her they were going to need to sell as much as they possibly could. Axel then brought out all the tractors and other equipment to be assessed by a friend of his and photographed so it could be sold.

Excerpt of the Day:
"Nervously Sofia watched as Axel pulled the doors to the machine shed open. The great, green combine loomed before her. The very vehicle off of which her husband had fallen to his death. Sofia honestly felt quite terrified at the sight of it.
Once the doors were open Axel beckoned for Sofia to follow him. Sofia hurried over to his side and stayed half-hidden behind him as he stepped into the machine shed.
"We're going to need to drive everything out of here and get some good pictures of them to advertise them," Axel said. "I've called in an assessor to get values on these things and we'll use those to figure out prices."
"Could we not just have an auction?" Sofia asked.
"Well," Axel said. "We could. But, the thing is, at an auction you can't exactly guarantee that you'll get the price you'd like to get."
"Can't you set prices?" Sofia asked. "Like, say, you tell the auctioneer you don't want him to dip lower than a hundred dollars or whatever."
"The auctioneer usually does something like that of his own accord," Axel replied. "But I think that if we were to do a private sale would be easier, because then we wouldn't have to pay for the auctioneers' service, and we can make sure we get the money we want to get from different things."
Sofia nodded.
"Why are you hiding behind me?" Axel asked, turning to look at her.
She looked warily between Axel and the machine. Axel glanced toward the combine somewhat ashamedly.
"Sorry," Axel said.
"It's not really that so much," Sofia said. "It's just that, well, it's so huge."
"Yeah, it's definitely big," Axel agreed.
"Do I have to take pictures of them?" Sofia asked.
"No," Axel replied. "The assessor's going to do that."
"Oh," Sofia said.
Axel moved on through the machine shed with a confidence that Sofia almost wished she had, the thing was that all of these machines were so huge, and she was sure that if she moved wrong all of the sudden one of them was going to roar to life or something and she didn't exactly want to be around when that happened.
Stopping beside the large truck, much like Axel's own, except that it wasn't black, Axel climbed up beside the door and looked in the window. Axel then climbed down.
"What?" Sofia asked.
"Josef left the keys in the ignition in every vehicle," Axel replied.
"Is that a bad thing?" Sofia asked.
"Only if someone were to break in," Axel replied.
"Oh," Sofia said.
"It's good for us because we don't have to hunt the keys down and play eenie meenie miney mo to figure out which key goes where," Axel replied.
"Oh," Sofia said.
Axel turned around and walked back to the combine, being as it was in front. He climbed up and opened the door. He looked down at Sofia.
"You want to be inside or outside when I start this?" Axel asked.
Sofia scrambled up the stairs and took a seat on the small passenger seat in the cab, even from the inside this machine was big and intimidating."