Hurricane Kiss (9 page)

Chapter 16

THE EYE OF THE STORM

JILLIAN

The one time I smoked a joint, Kelly was over. Ethan had gone out with Jerry. We knew they smoked because Ethan's room reeked from weed even though he left the window open. They must have been wrecked because they left a half joint burning in the ashtray.

I inhaled, then passed it to Kelly.

“Feel anything?” she said.

“Nuh uh, you?”

She shook her head, took another toke, then passed it back to me. We stared dumbly at each other, and then at the same moment began grinning stupidly at nothing and everything. The grins turned to peals of laughter as everything around us suddenly had a hilarious side that only the two of us were privy to.

I can't help thinking about that now, as River opens the door and we stand there, transfixed. His eyes are shining. We stare at each other in sync, sharing something that no one else in the world is part of, high on fear now, not weed, like adrenaline junkies or storm chasers waiting for a rush.

No rain, no wind, no anything. A mesmerizing, all-encompassing stillness, the sky a ghostly, treacherous green. Even the birds are silent. Everything alive is in retreat, in a state of suspended animation. The whole world is waiting. I look back and see small frogs stuck up against the door.

“River!”

He stands wide-eyed, taking it all in. We step through the knee-high moat surrounding the school, rainfall mixed with sewage beginning to reek. The world has been shaken, debris everywhere. As we walk through it, the unimaginable happens.

The clouds begin to part, as if a screen is opening, the backdrop on a stage set. The sky morphs from an incandescent bile green to cornflower blue. The sun breaks through.

“Could it be over?” I feel strangely giddy.

“Not a chance. That's what Danielle wants you to think. She's toying with us.”

“How do you know?”

“Feel it in my bones,” he says.

I look for evidence. There's an unnerving calm to the air, as if we're in another universe. I take a few steps and nearly trip over a bulging tree root that's buried underwater.

River points to a downed tree. “If we were out here when that fell we'd be buried.” But it's not fear on his face, it's amazement. This is a rare living science lesson. “Look,” he yells. He reaches an arm out and holds up the neck of a quivering snake that dangles down the side of his arm, past his elbow. I see black, red.

“Red touch yellow, kill a fellow; red touch black, venom lack.” The crazy rhyme I learned in camp springs to mind. It isn't a poisonous coral snake, I'm sure. We studied snakes in science. Texas has more varieties than any other state in the country, and Houston is home to nearly a third of them. Only now I'm blanking. I have no idea what this one is.

It's undulating as if it would rather not be held up.

“Get rid of it before it bites you.”

River reaches back like he's about to throw a javelin and pitches it, as hard as he can while trying to keep half his body from moving. We both turn away.

“It's following us.” I laugh hysterically.

He slithers his fingers up my back, snake-like.

“Don't do that!”

“Do what?” he says.

We walk through the water, dipping down to steer clear of low-hanging power lines. I step up on a broken tree stump to survey what happened around us and I stop. There's a sound, like a yelp. “Did you hear that?”

He nods.

“What was it?”

“An animal,” River says.

The sky is slowly changing. Time is running out. The sun's still out, but the light is fading. River hoists himself up onto the arm of a bent tree. “Whatever it is, it's here somewhere.” He jumps down and heads across the watery lawn and then trips, falling on his injured side.

“Ow, Jesus,” he yells.

I run over and try to help him up, but he's like dead weight. “It's broken, it's got to be,” he says, squeezing his eyes shut.

“We'll bandage it to keep it from moving.”

“With what?” he asks, “Your trusty first-aid kit?”

“We'll find something.”

He shakes off the pain and looks around us. “Maybe if we had food we could find whatever it is and get it inside with us.”

“You think it's a dog?”

“I hope not.”

We walk cautiously, searching, trying to figure out which way to go. The sun retreats and the sky begins to deepen from turquoise to blue gray.

River looks at the sky, biting his lip. “We have to get inside soon.”

“I'll go find something in the kitchen.”

“I know where the stuff is,” he says. “I'll go. I'll be fast, you look out.”

I stare at the sky. “Hurry!”

What's taking him so long?

The sun is gone, blue sky replaced by clouds deepening by the minute. I take a last look around, walking carefully, trying to find whatever it was, but there's nothing. Was it our imagination? Maybe we're both going crazy. I need to find River. Now. I walk toward the school door as the wind begins to whip my face. I pull it open and scream.

Chapter 17

JILLIAN

River is slumped down on the floor, a few feet from the door, his eyes closed. Did he pass out? Is he dead? Near his opened hand I see packages of crackers.

“River?” I rush up to him and kneel down

No answer.

“God, please!” My heart is about to burst through my chest. I reach for his left wrist, pressing it with my index finger. I can't find a pulse, nothing. I try his right wrist. Still nothing. Maybe it's me. I'm not doing it right. My hands are shaking. I doubt if I could tell if I felt a pulse inside him, or if the throbbing came from inside me. I breathe in and out slowly to try to calm myself then try again, on the left hand.

Then I feel it. “River?”

Nothing.

“River, answer me, please!”

I stroke his forehead, his hair. I run my fingers down his face, along his cheek. Seconds go by and he lies there, still. What do I do? What does it mean? Why didn't I take a first-aid class so I'd know what to do?

I study his face watching for something, anything. Finally he moves his head. His chest rises as he takes in a breath. His eyes open and he looks at me, dazed.

“What happened?” I whisper.

He stares at me for a few seconds as though he doesn't recognize me.

“Are you OK?”

“I … don't know,” he says, finally. His voice comes out hoarse, strained. He closes his eyes and opens them again. “I was running … I hit something, I lost balance or … I must have blacked out from the pain.”

Do I get him up? See if he can walk? Keep him still? Act, don't panic. And what about whatever was outside? A person? An animal? We don't have long, whatever was out there will die without us.

“I'm OK,” he says. “Did you find anything?”

“What?”

“Outside, did you find anything?”

“No. We have to stay inside. There's no more time, River.” There's a low rumbling outside, like a warning, then a flash of lightning. “It's already too late … we shouldn't—”

“Help me up,” he says, drawing his knees toward his chest.

“Can you stand?”

He grimaces as he pushes himself up with one hand and gets to his feet. “I'm OK.”

But he's not. He's pale. He takes a step, but he's unsteady. I grab his arm. What if he passes out again? Or hits his head?

“Let's go out,” he says. “We'll look fast.”

“River, you can't. I don't want you to—”

“—I'm OK,” he insists. “One last look, then we'll come back. If it's a dog, we can't leave him out there to die.”

I push the door open and we go out, stepping carefully. He can't fall, not again. I hold him around the waist to try to support him. I expect him to protest, but he doesn't. That scares me more.

The wind is gusting hard, strong enough to knock us down, the rain pelting us from all directions, slapping at our faces. We make it down to the spot where we heard the sound, looking everywhere, calling out, but there's nothing around us that's alive, nothing.

“We've got to keep looking,” I say. And then I stop. A black dog, some kind of terrier mix, I think. He's floating in the water. We're too late.

“God,” I cry, pressing my hand over my mouth. I go over to him and touch his head, his fur wet. His eyes are open, but he's so pathetically still. He didn't stand a chance outside.

I'm flooded with memories of Bree, our black lab, a rescue who died two years ago. Her favorite word was ‘home.' She couldn't wait to get back after a walk. Where would she have ended up in the evacuation? With me? My mom?

“River, look!”

I swivel around, but it's like he doesn't hear me. There's an expression on his face I've never seen before—his eyes open wide, his lips parted.

“Holy shit!” he says, lifting his chin. I look up and freeze. Off in the distance there's an enormous funnel cloud. It's spiraling around and around madly in a dark, dusty, sepia sky.

A tornado.

And it's coming toward us.

LANDFALL

“What we heard … the vibrating … the growling sound.” I struggle for breath.

“Tornadoes come with hurricanes!” River shouts.

He's alert now like nothing happened. We start rushing toward the door, as fast as we can go without getting snared by garbage or things poking out from the ground, hidden beneath the water. But the wind is strong and it's like trying to skip through waves at the beach, the water rising up, choppy in the wind, slapping back at us. The ground is slimy and slippery. My eyes dart down and up, down and up. The sky has grown smoky and dark, as though we're looking at the world through a charcoal filter. The rumbling gets louder and deeper. We're feet from the door when the loop of my sneaker lace catches on something. I'm jerked back and lose my balance, falling and smashing my face against the sharp side of a thick tree root that's buried under the water.

“Ow, God!” It stabs my cheek like a knife. Blood spouts out over my shirt. I pull myself up, out of the water.

“Inside,” River shouts, grabbing my arm and running, ignoring everything. “Now!”

We rush through the door and make our way into the hot gym as the high-pitched keening gets louder and deeper, rattling the window frames like a phantom screaming at the glass.

“Grab the mats!” River says as we run toward the supply closet. I pull them behind me as we stop at the door in the back of the gym. He fumbles for the key and finally unlocks it. I slam the door behind us, and we crouch down, the mats over our heads in the darkness, the water covering our knees. River grunts in pain from the pressure on his shoulder.

“Start praying,” he says, as the roar grows louder and louder, as if we're crouching near the railroad tracks as a fast-moving freight train speeds toward us.

I bury my head under my arms, eyes shut tight, my breathing ragged, sweat pouring off me. Horrid thoughts bombard my brain from every direction. I can't process them: the roof being ripped off, everything inside the school getting sucked into the air, both of us getting buried alive under the rubble, dying for no reason like that pathetic dog, not seeing my family again ever, never living another minute. Life being ripped away without time to think or plan. Every cell inside me pulsates, electrified, trying to keep pace with the thoughts firing in my brain like shock waves.

Please, let it pass us. Spare us, please. I'll live differently, do better, anything. My ears pop. My mouth is so dry that I can barely swallow. We hold still sweltering under the mats, waiting.

Time stops. Five minutes. Ten. I can't tell. The world is upside down. The roar grows louder and louder. My head pounds. I press my fingers into my ears, but it's useless. It feels like my eardrums are bursting.

And then the roar slowly diminishes, as if it's receding into the background.

The tornado moved on. Or dissipated, replaced by nothingness.

I hold still, afraid to move. The loudest sound now is me gasping for air, trying to take a deep breath. I push the mat off my head and sit up. “It must be gone.”

“I'm not ready to look,” River says, exhaling, sweat dripping down his face.

My thighs feel wet. I reach down. Blood. It's everywhere.

Chapter 18

THE EYEWALL

JILLIAN

I press my hand against my face. The cut is deep, the blood keeps trickling out, but there's nothing I can do. I press my hand against it. It has to stop.

River stares at my face, concerned, but then turns away. “I'll look around.”

“Outside?” I don't want him to go.

“No, the gym, and the corridor.”

“Be careful.”

I sit there soaked in sweat. The bleeding finally slows, but my shorts and T-shirt are streaked with blood. Sportswear designed by a vampire.

Where is River? How long has he been gone? As if in answer, the door creaks and then opens.

“It passed over,” he says, closing it behind him. “At least the building's still standing.”

“We're lucky, it could have been leveled.”

“Lucky so far. The tornado passed over us, but we could get other ones. This is just the beginning.” He comes closer. “You scared?”

“I … I don't know.”

“You should be.”

I walk into the gym, the real world again. The wind is kicking up again, blowing from all directions, shaking the windows. A metal pipe of some kind must have come loose because now there's a banging sound as if something heavy is being slammed again and again on an outside wall. We're in an enclosed brick building, but the sounds are almost unbearable. I think of River's dad, Ethan and Jerry, Kelly, Sari. Are they still in their cars? And my mom? Where is she now?

Walls of rain shatter like glass against the side of the school. Unless they're bulletproof, the windows are going to blow. As if in answer, I hear glass shattering somewhere in the building and things smashing on the floor. Pottery in the art room? Books in the library? Lamps? The science lab with the aquarium? What will be left of our school after Danielle is done ravaging it?

“It's like we're inside a haunted house.”

River doesn't even nod.

The bathroom. I can't hold it in any longer, only I'm afraid to find it on my own. I have to. I can't be a baby. River's the one in pain. I force myself up and head for the dark corridor. I'm learning braille transport, using my hands instead of my eyes to guide me. I follow the familiar signposts—doors, bulletin boards, and display cases—along the way. When I finish in the stall I make my way to the sink. Without thinking, I turn on the faucet. There's still water! I wash my face with soap, crying out because it burns the gash on my face.

The nurse's office. If I can get in there, I might find bandages for River's shoulder and an antibiotic cream for my face. I walk down the corridor counting the doors. But when I get to the nurse's office, the door is locked. If only I could break the glass window in the door. But I have nothing to smash it with.

I head back to the gym, nearly tripping over a carton. It's the lost and found box, where kids drop off clothes. I grab as many T-shirts as I can find. We can rip them up instead of bandages. I walk back slowly, trying hard not to smash into anything.

BOOM
! Overhead somewhere, an explosion. The building vibrates like a wall of windows has exploded.

“River? Where are you?”

I run down the corridor and find my way to the gym. “River?” No answer. I make a megaphone with my hands.

“River?”

Still no answer. I run down the hall to the nearest stairwell. “River?”

“Up here,” he says. “Stay down there.”

I can't. I have to know what's happening. I start to run up, then stop. There's a roar so loud it sounds like a bulldozer has plowed into a glass wall. I run into the corridor and look into the science lab. The aquarium! It's smashed to bits, chunks of glass sprayed everywhere. Most of the water has rushed out, the fish shot out in every direction, squirming on the floor. I step into the room trying to push aside the glass to clear a path with my hands so I can scoop them up, to try to save them.

“Don't go in there,” River shouts from the corridor. He steps in and pulls me back. “You'll slice your hands up, and it won't help. It's too late.” He closes the door behind us.

“It's not just this,” he says, working at catching his breath. “The windows in a second-floor classroom splintered. A tree slammed into them. But it's on the north side. We should be OK down here for a little while unless the rain floods us out.”

Those tiny colored fish spread out over the floor—fifty tropical fish, maybe more. Most of them probably dead now. Electric yellow, neon blue, orange, green. So beautiful and some so rare. Lots of kids took care of them week after week, even coming into the school on the holidays to feed them. I try to convince myself that they wouldn't have lived long anyway, but that's not the point. This was such a senseless and stupid ending. They weren't supposed to die like that.

I watch the halting way that River walks and the unbearable sadness of everything that has happened hits me at once. The tears start, but I force myself to stop. “I found T-shirts,” I shout, wiping my eyes with the back of my hand. “We can tear them up. You need to keep your shoulder from moving.”

“Who said?”

“Ethan broke his arm once. I remember what the doctor told him.” We stop in the corridor, and River takes out his knife. I hold a shirt and he slices through it, cutting it into strips. I tie one strip of fabric to another until I have a piece that's long enough to bind his upper arm to his chest. He stands still as I pull it around him, tying it securely. “That should help a little.”

His face softens. “Thanks.”

We fill our water bottles in the bathroom and then try to scope out the safest spots. We walk to the theater and pull open the red velvet curtains covering the windows. Not broken, so far. We climb the stairs to the stage and cocoon ourselves behind the heavy curtains. The red walls match the curtains, and on the back wall there is a mural of figures from Greek history and theater. This room is like a safe haven, with the feel of history around us. What Danielle can't destroy is
the past.

Being here makes me think of the play the night of the picnic—and what happened afterwards in the darkness of the field.

The play was about the family of a former governor in the South who was removed from office for accepting bribes. As he was on his way to prison, his son died unexpectedly of a freak accident, convincing the governor that he was being punished for what he did.

I played the daughter, and it started with the family coming back from the funeral. The daughter finds out their house has been sold and all her things are packed away. She can't deal with losing everything at once.

“Acting isn't about dressing up. It's about stripping down and reaching inside yourself,” Miss Larson said. “The word ‘theater' comes from the ancient Greeks. It means ‘the seeing place.' The great acting teacher Stella Adler said it's ‘the place people come to see the truth about life … ' So it's the actor's job to make the audience aware of who people are, what they want, and what motivates them, because in real life that's not easy to figure out.”

For the picnic, we were performing a one-act play to pique interest in opening night. Despite my jittery feelings, the play went well.

“Awesome,” Aidan said, rushing up to me. “I nearly cried.”

My mom was teary-eyed, not that it took much to make her cry. Ethan saw me and held up this thumb, his equivalent of going overboard with praise. Kelly rushed up to me too. “You were amazing!”

“Make-believe works for me,” I said.

We descended on the picnic table like locusts and then sat outside under the stars. Kelly was with Brian, a guy from a nearby high school. Sari was with Scott, the second-best basketball player after Aidan.

“Who's up for Frisbee?” Sari asked, after we all pigged out.

“I'm playing basketball,” Aidan said.

“Me too,” said Scott.

That left Bethany, Kelly, Sari, Brian, and some other kids from my grade.

“You're the star tonight, J-girl,” Kelly said, tossing me the Frisbee. “You throw the first one.” I tossed it as far as I could, and Brian immediately caught it.

“Wimpy,” he said. “You better work out some more.” He got into a pitcher's pose and then threw it over my head. It soared into the air, landing halfway across the park.

“And your point is?” I yelled, running after it.

“Out of the park,” Brian yelled, breaking into a bump and grind dance. “Home run.”

“Not fair,” Sari said. “It's in Siberia.”

Everyone scattered in different directions to search. It would have helped to have the outside of the park lit or a Frisbee that was glow-in-the-dark.

“Check over by the tennis court,” Kelly said. “I'll look back in the field.”

“I hope you're wearing bug spray,” I said. “We'll get eaten alive.”

“Not a chance,” Kelly said, holding up a fist. “Texas girls are tough.”

There was tall grass at the bottom of the hill. The Frisbee had probably landed down there, hidden by weedy patches that were home to mosquitoes. It was definitely dumb to keep looking there. Using my phone as a flashlight, I searched all over the ground and finally gave up. I was heading back to the others when I heard a rustling behind me. A raccoon? Something bigger? Slowly, I stepped away.

“Yaah!”

I jumped. Someone laughed and I pivoted, startled.

“River! You're always scaring me.”

He waved the Frisbee over his head. “You're not looking for this, are you?”

I reached for it, but he pulled it behind him. “After.”

“After
what
?”

“The kiss,” he said. “I need to pay my dues.”

“Excuse me?”

His face turned serious. “I thought everyone had to do that, unless the guys on the team were bullshitting the new guy.”

“Oh,” I smirked. “The tradition.'”

“So?” He smiled. “Initiate me.”

He moved closer, tracing my bottom lip with his thumb. Before I could answer, his lips touched mine, moving back and forth, back and forth, in a slow, intoxicating tease. “Is this how it's done?” he whispered. “Or like this?” he said, pressing harder. “Tell me.”

“River,” I said, pleadingly, not sure why. No one had ever kissed me like that. I felt myself leaning into him as the kiss got deeper and hotter, his arms tightening around me, his tongue playing inside my mouth, meeting mine lightly at first, then more insistently. I reached up into his hair, pulling at it, inhaling the smell of his woodsy shampoo, confused by the force of my emotions.

“You smell amazing,” he whispered, running his lips lightly down the side of my neck, his body against mine, wanting more. “So lemony and sweet.” I was breathing hard, and I met his lips again with the same intensity, feeling wired and alive in a way I never had before. But as his fingertips traced the edge of my bra, I pulled back.

“River,” I said, leaning away, my voice a hoarse whisper. “I … can't. I have a boyfriend.”

“Oh yeah?” he murmured, pulling at my bottom lip, claiming it gently with his teeth.

Boyfriend. Aidan.

I couldn't.

Aidan's face flashed in my head. Cute. Reliable. Devoted to me. “Stop,” I said, pushing away. I caught my breath and looked up.

And there … was Aidan.

He had appeared out of nowhere. How long had he been standing there, watching us? His face was dark, his eyes hooded. I had never seen him so angry.

“What the hell?” he said, looking at River then back at me.

“River found the Frisbee,” I said. “And the tradition …” It came out worse than stupid—breathless, in a rush. I reached behind River's back and pulled it from the waistline of his jeans as if to give Aidan tangible proof that I wasn't lying. Like that might matter now.

Fury rose in Aidan's face as he stepped closer to River. I had never seen him look like that. “Keep. Your hands. Off. My girlfriend. You dick.”

River looked back at him, a smirk on his face.

“Maybe you're the dick for leaving her alone while you played basketball.”

That was it. Aidan flew at him, sending both of them to the ground. Aidan worked at trying to punch River in the face, again and again, struggling against River's weight, while River kept ducking, and then finally went on the attack.

It was my fault. I should never have let River kiss me. I should have stopped him sooner. If I had this never would have happened.

“Aidan, stop it. River, get off him!”

But they ignored me. River was a couple of inches taller than Aidan and had more bulk, but Aidan made up for it in wiry strength and rage. They rolled on the ground, each of them trying to stay on top and score as many punches and choke holds as they could before the other one got on top and tried to pin the other down using fists, elbows, and knees. They cursed at each other's faces in breathless rants.

“Stop it, stop it,” I kept screaming. But neither of them seemed to hear me.

A crowd started to form around them, and Ryan Whyte from the football team tried to get between them and push them apart.

“Stop it, man,” Ryan said to River. “C'mon, break it up.” But River got out of his grip and went at Aidan again. Ryan pulled at River's shoulders, but he couldn't manage to separate them.

Finally Coach Briggs ran over and pushed his bulk between them.

“It's over,” he shouted, forcing them apart with his beefy arms. They both stood away, breathing hard, glaring at each other, wiping away sweat and blood.

“What do you think you're doing?” the coach roared, glaring at River. Then he turned to Aidan with the same hard expression. “And you!”

Neither of them answered. Blood was dripping out of Aidan's nose, and he kept trying to shake it away with his hand, before coughing and spitting it out.

“You fuck,” he mumbled to River.

“Fuck you,” River said, stepping up to him.