Total pages in book: 29
Estimated words: 27552 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 138(@200wpm)___ 110(@250wpm)___ 92(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 27552 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 138(@200wpm)___ 110(@250wpm)___ 92(@300wpm)
“Kind of hard between the roads being closed and that whole bridge collapsing thing,” I reply. “You’ve already called them a million times. Even if we could get there, they don’t have any power, and their generators aren’t working.” Not only that, but the nurse who answered the phone told King that they’re airlifting priority patients to another hospital until the wind gets too strong to keep the helicopter flying. I wouldn’t be a priority patient. Most hospitals wouldn’t even admit me at this stage. If this baby is going to come, we’re on our own. “You’re just mad they wouldn’t send the helicopter to the house for me.”
King grunts. “I know the flight medic. I’m gonna—”
“Break his neck?”
The side of his lip turns upward in a half smile. “I was going to say put a bullet in his head.”
“Look at you, full of surprises,” I tease.
He props a pillow behind my head. “Rest.”
“I can’t. I’m not even tired,” I argue, but the second my head falls back into the softness now supporting my neck, I’m out.
I wake a little while later and find King asleep on the sofa next to me. His long legs propped over the armrest. The sight of his big body making the perfectly normal-sized sofa look like it belongs in a dollhouse makes me giggle just as another contraction hits. I hiss and count and breathe and do everything I can remember from movies when people go into labor. None of it works, but it does distract me until the pain passes.
Outside, a piece of wood flies by the window. The hurricane shutters King installed are clear. The rain passing by the window is horizontal. I admire it for a few seconds, then it suddenly shifts directions until it’s spraying like a firehose against the shutter. The wind is loud. Much louder than I ever expected, almost like a car horn…if car horns could scream.
Hurricane Polly is here.
I push myself off the couch and check on the kids. They’re all sleeping, safe and sound. Preppy is asleep on the floor of Nicole Grace’s room with a bedtime story open on his lap. I shut the door softly, then waddle back into the living room and over to the window to get a better view of the storm. My worry over the hurricane is temporarily replaced by the fascinating goings-on outside. The rain shifts again, and then suddenly, it’s gone, reduced to merely a drizzle, giving me a clearer view of what a hurricane really looks like.
Somewhere between the dirt and heaven, a kaleidoscope of grey and black clouds look like fingers, swirling wider and wider, intertwining in a supernatural handshake like jealous lovers preparing to rein down either revenge or redemption upon the Earth.
Darkness captures the sky like I’ve never seen before. Ominous. Thick. It’s not even six p.m. yet the light fails to penetrate the clouds as if the sun’s warmth and light never truly existed. A mere legend or myth. A god prayed to but never seen.
And then there’s the rain.
Water gives life to all things. Plants. People. It cleanses and provides. Water is a good thing. No, a great thing.
Until it isn’t.
Water as a single droplet is harmless. However, it grows more and more dangerous as the droplets join forces. I’m witnessing just that. Rain rushes to the earth like soldiers leaping from a plane. Once they land on the ground, they gather in units, forming various puddles around the yard and driveway, widening and rising until all the puddles merge together, forming a small river from one side of the yard to the other.
I pad over to the other side of the house. The backyard is under siege as well, but these soldiers aren’t falling from the sky but crawling on their bellies from the bay, capturing more and more green space as it slowly descends upon the house.
“Shit,” King mutters from behind me, observing the rising waters. “This is only the edge of the storm and the water’s already rising.”
“Do you think it will reach the house?”
“Probably, but that’s why it’s built on stilts, so the flood waters can’t reach us.”
“Where’s Bear and Thia in all this?” I ask.
“Bear’s at the club. With the new renovations, it will hold. If the water rises to the first floor we’ll head up to the bonus room on the second.”
If there was doubt before, there isn’t now. We are in the middle of the biggest disaster of our lives.
And also, the hurricane is here.
* * *
“Mom?” Sammy asks, emerging from his bedroom, rubbing his sleepy eyes with his fists. “Where is Maxie?” Sammy asks, rubbing his sleepy eyes with his fists.
My entire body freezes, trapped in an iceberg of fear. King and I exchange a quick glance, and without hesitation, he darts down the hall. He comes back, looking tousled and frantic. His bright green eyes as wild as I’m sure mine are.