The Stormchasers: A Novel (15 page)

T
hey stay in the bottom of the Badlands until they are summoned back up, which isn’t very long. Their conversation has taken a while, and shortly thereafter Kevin’s cell phone rings. “We were wondering,” says Dan, “whether you’re planning to rejoin us or start your own nature hike company.” Karena and Kevin hurry up the road holding hands, which they drop when they get within sight of the Whale. Scout winks at them, and Fern mouths,
Good on ya
, and Karena’s cheeks feel scrubbed with embarrassment and sunburn, wind and Kevin’s stubble.

But they don’t have a chance to do anything else until an hour later, once everyone has finished checking in to the J&J El Rancho Fergusson Inn & Suites in Kadoka. Karena slings her bags into the room she’s sharing with Fern and Alicia and goes back out to secure the Jeep, which is parked in the very last space in the full lot, beneath some old pines. Kevin is in the driver’s seat, unhooking his laptop and the ham from their power cords to be carried safely in for the night.

“Hello,” says Karena.

“Laredo,” Kevin says.

Then, although she doesn’t know who starts it, they are suddenly going at each other in a session the likes of which Karena hasn’t experienced since high school, when she and Tiff called it mashing. That first kiss down on the wildlife platform in the Badlands was amazing, delicious and slippery and investigative in the way only first kisses can be—and this one was a doozy. Now shirts are pushed up, Karena’s hair comes down, her bra snaps undone with a deft flick of Kevin’s wrist. “Left-handed,” she murmurs. “Nice.”

“I’m ambidextrous in that category, Laredo,” Kevin says against her neck. “I am a man of many skills.” They kiss and grapple with each other until their mouths are swollen and their skin flushed and the windows are completely steamed, and Karena is sliding her hand up the nearest leg of Kevin’s shorts and he is looking a question at her—
shall we move to the backseat?
—when suddenly Kevin pulls away. He holds up a finger.

“Excuse me a moment,” he says.

Then he opens his door and steps out of the Jeep.

“AUGH!” he yells at the sky. “AUUUUGGGHHHHHHH!”

Karena laughs, though she is bewildered. She pats her hair and combs her fingers through it—it’s in what her mom would have called a rat’s nest. The air from Kevin’s open door is pine-scented, damp and chilly, raising goose bumps on Karena’s bare skin and painting her flushed cheeks. She refastens her bra and pulls her shirt back down.

Kevin has been stomping around the parking lot, circling his arms and talking to himself. Now he returns and opens Karena’s door. “Ma’am,” he says, ushering her out. “Welcome to the Coitus Interruptus Tour, 2008.”

“Thank you,” says Karena. “What’s going on?”

Kevin pulls her in tight and they stand stomach to stomach, swaying a little. Karena can feel the evidence that Kevin’s circuit around the lot hasn’t done him much good. She sympathizes. She feels somewhat deranged.

“Laredo,” Kevin says, his breath stirring her hair, “I’d rather poke myself in the eye than say what I’m about to say, and I’m sure every red-blooded male in America is screaming in protest—but frankly, this kind of . . . activity . . . makes me a little nervous. For one thing, I’m on the clock here. I have this awful work ethic that makes me respect professional boundaries, and you’re a guest on my tour.”

“Actually, I’m media,” Karena reminds him.

Kevin draws back to give her a look. “All the more reason,” he says. “I don’t want you to give me bad press.” He pushes her hair aside. “Besides,” he says in her ear, “I’ve had it with this gearshift in the gut thing, haven’t you? I’d rather do this right, Laredo. I’d like to be horizontal with you.”

Karena’s stomach jumps in happy agreement, and her thinking self is relieved. She is on assignment too, and she needs to keep her head clear for Charles. “I concur on all points,” she says.

“You do?” Kevin says, and sighs. “I was afraid you’d say that. I was kinda hoping you’d talk me out of it. Oh well. We’ll figure something out.”

He takes her face in his hands and they kiss awhile longer until Kevin steps back with a grimace, adjusting his shorts.

“Okay, now I’m really done,” he says, “unless you want me to do something illegal. Say good night, Laredo.”

“Good night, Laredo,” Karena says.

“Smartass,” says Kevin, giving her a whack on the corresponding body part. Karena lets out a startled squeak. “See,” Kevin says, turning and walking away backward, “that’s what I’m talking about, that little noise right there. I want some more of that.” He tips a finger at her. “Good night, Laredo,” he says, “sweet dreams.”

Then he drags himself across the parking lot in an exaggerated Quasimodo lurch. Karena laughs. She knows how he feels, though she hasn’t felt it since—high school? College? Sometime back in the beginning, when everything was brand-new. She watches Kevin until he’s gone into the room he’s sharing with Dennis, then turns away, shaking her head and smiling. “Whoo,” she says, and locks the Jeep for the night.

T
he next morning Karena wakes up grinning. She lies gazing at the ceiling, listening to the air conditioner and Fern’s snoring, replaying the events of the previous day. Then she rolls her head to the side and looks at the clock. Eight fifteen. They are right on the cusp of Central and Mountain Time, so Karena’s not sure whether they’re supposed to be at briefing in forty-five minutes or if they have an extra hour. But she decides not to take any chances. She gets out of bed and cracks the curtains, peering out. The light from the lot dazzles her.

“Good morning,” Alicia says, pushing herself up on one elbow, her hair a dark skein across her face.

“Good morning,” Karena says. She loves how everyone on tour starts the day with this simple civility. It should be commonplace back in the Cities too, but with traffic and weather and the rush through daily obstacles, it’s often not.

“Bloody hell,” says Fern from beneath her pillows. “What bloody time is it?”

“After eight,” says Karena. “Rise and shine.”

She twitches the curtains back farther to see the J&J El Rancho Fergusson Inn & Suites billboard. Such a long name for such a modest motel. Karena loves it. She loves that there’s a café attached to it. She loves the fact that heat is already simmering off the vehicles in the lot, meaning there’s plenty of energy for storms later and she might find her brother. She loves everything about this morning.

Alicia pads over in her Cowboys T-shirt and boxers, her pretty face screwed up against the glare. “What’s it like out?” she asks.

“Sunny,” says Karena. “Steamy. Perfect.”

Alicia smiles and bumps her hip against Karena’s.

“Somebody sure is in a good mood this morning,” she says. “Could it be because of a sunset walk she took with somebody else?”

“Sunset walk, my arse,” says the lump that is Fern. “She got a jolly good rogering is more like it.”

“Fern!” says Karena. “Good Lord.”

“Oh my,” says Alicia, then, “What’s a rogering? Do I want to know?”

“No,” says Karena, “you don’t,” and she throws a pillow at Fern.

Fern rises majestically up out of her nest of blankets, her eyes slitted and her purple hair every which way.

“ ’Course you do,” she says grumpily. “Everyone should have a good rogering once in her life, even you. It’s the kind of quick and dirty shag that bangs your head against the wall and blows your bloody socks off,” and she tosses the pillows aside and stomps toward the bathroom. Halfway there she pauses and looks back at Karena, putting up a hand to shield her eyes.

“Just as I thought,” she says. “Afterglow. Bloody blinding.”

“It is not,” says Karena. “Because nothing like that happened, Fern!”

The bathroom door slams.

Alicia peers at Karena with interest. “You
do
seem to have a glow about you.”

“I do
not
,” says Karena. “If anything, it’s sunburn.”

She goes into the alcove to wash her face. She is sunburned, Karena sees, as she applies makeup in the cramped space crowded with bulging toiletry bags and hair dryers and cell and camera chargers. She should look like hell. She hasn’t exercised in days, she’s running on sleep fumes, she’s been subsisting on a convenience store diet of pretzels and V8. Her brows are like something from a nature special and her fingers bristle with hangnails from washings with gas station soap. But the red cheeks and feverish eyes and even the few extra pounds suit Karena, making her look less like an anemic, exhausted thirtysomething reporter and more like the girls in her grandmother Hallingdahl’s samplers. Actually, she has never looked better.

Fern comes out of the bathroom in a turban and towel.

“Glowing,” she says as she passes.

“Zip it,” says Karena.

She packs up, deciding to forgo a shower in exchange for a decent breakfast, and carries her bags out to the Jeep. It is already hot and humid. The sun glitters off mica in the lot. Karena pauses to snap photos of the J&J El Rancho Fergusson Inn & Suites billboard.

“Good morning,” she says to Dan Mitchell, who is wresting his breakfast, a Mountain Dew, from the vending machine near the motel office.

“Good morning,” says Dan, unsmiling as a pirate.

Dennis is smoking outside the café, and when he sees Karena he hastens to open the door for her. “Hilloo!” he says, in an Inspector Clouseau accent that reminds Karena of Charles. “Good morning! Fancy meeting you here!”

“Good morning,” Karena says, grinning.

Inside, the café has an attached gift shop, gray-and-red linoleum, red vinyl booths, and Formica tables. Locals in plaid and overalls turn to eye Karena with faded interest as she enters the dining room. The wall chalkboard offers bottomless coffee for ninety-nine cents, daily specials for under five dollars. Karena decides Kadoka is one of her favorite places. She spots Kevin in a corner booth with Pete and Marla, his hair seal slick from his shower, and her stomach leaps. She nods professionally. Kevin nods professionally back. Karena takes a seat at a center table with Dennis, Melody, Scout, and Alistair.

“Good morning,” she says.

“Morning,” says Scout, smiling at Karena. “Did you have a good night?”

“I did,” says Karena, and Scout quickly touches her hand, then gives Karena a menu.

Karena orders the coffee and the Eighteen-Wheeler Omelet, which contains bacon, ham, sausage, tomatoes, peppers, onions, mushrooms, and hash browns and comes drenched in cheese sauce. She eats the whole thing and two slices of rye toast besides, for a while happily conscious only of filling her empty stomach, the sun slanting through the blinds, and Kevin’s presence warm at her back. When she is done she gets out her recorder as Dennis explains the day’s setup. He draws diagrams on a place mat with such enthusiasm that his pen rips the thin paper.

“So this,” he says, circling a dot several times, “this is the target. If it were me, I might go a little more north, toward the Cheyenne Grasslands Area. But Dan’s set on playing this region right here, between Pierre and Oweeo. And Dan’s the man.”

“Dan’s the man,” repeats Alistair. He is focused on a handheld video game, rocking slightly, thumbs working.

“You’re the man,” says Dennis to Alistair, who smiles but keeps playing. “How’d you like to see a tornado today?”

“Brilliant,” says Alistair. “Eight thousand four hundred fifty-five.”

“That’s the number of tornadoes he’s seen,” explains Melody. “From
Twister
.”

“Seen the film one thousand four hundred nine times,” says Alistair to his game, “six tornadoes in the film, eight thousand four hundred fifty-four.”

“Right!” says Dennis. “Gotcha.”

“That’s amazing,” says Scout, smiling. A stripe of sun tangles in her blond hair for a second, turning it into a nimbus. “You’re an amazing guy, Alistair, you know that?”

“Brilliant,” says Alistair.

“Today could very well be eight thousand four hundred fifty-five, my friend,” says Dennis. “Yup. Mother Nature could very well let her dragons out to play today.”

“Dragons,” says Alistair and hoots softly.

Kevin’s party heads through the restaurant, and Karena’s table too gets up to leave. Karena lingers to eat the remaining toast crusts, then uses the ladies’ room—always a priority before hitting the road. By the time she gets back out to the gift shop to pay, she is last in a line of locals, so while she waits she browses the books on South Dakota history, the polished rocks and pine soaps and sketches of Mount Rushmore. Trinkets, Karena thinks. Beneath the counter is a display of silver-and-turquoise rings.

“Are those Sioux?” Karena asks the woman at the register.

“You bet,” the woman says, “Lakota. Fella brings ’em in from Pine Ridge Reservation, guy by the name of Black Cloud.”

“They’re beautiful,” Karena says. She wishes she could buy one, but she doesn’t have time to try them on.

“Are you all tornada chasers?” the woman asks. She has a severe overbite and cropped brown hair like Carol Burnett, a similar toothy warm smile.

“Some of these guys are,” says Karena. “The rest of us are just along for the ride.”

“Well, I hope you brought a basement with you,” says the woman. “Remember the ’97 tornada, Bob?” she says to an old rancher standing behind Karena with his check in hand.

“Sure do,” he says. “Spencer. Destroyed the town. Peeled the paving right off the road.”

The woman hands Karena her change, and Karena sets the mullet photo on the counter.

“You haven’t seen this guy, have you?” she asks.

The lady slides on glasses hanging on a string of flowered beadwork from her neck.

“You know,” she says, “I believe I have. Only without the fancy hairdo. Is this the fella who had the ring that looked like Howie?”

She passes the photo to the rancher, who holds it at arms’ length.