If he were relying on his senses alone he would be hopelessly lost—he can barely see a few feet in front of him. But he and Lucas explored every inch of this road this summer. His memory shows him what is ahead. He knows there is a shabby blue house on his left, set back from the road, obscured by overgrown date palms; he knows an older woman with a kind face lives there; he knows that the road will curve to the right a few yards past this house, that then there will be a yellow mailbox, and then a little meadow where deer sometimes graze, where white egrets pose on their tall skinny legs, and then his own house. He knows that in good weather their home is maybe eight minutes away on foot. But now, in this chaos, he isn’t sure that they will make it that far. If he is sure of anything, it’s that they won’t.
He hears a powerful whoosh behind him, and an entire felled cypress tree, roots and all, slides across the pavement. It shoots past him and careens into the ditch. Flip knows they have to get inside as quickly as they can; he knows that is what Kirby would tell them to do. He makes a beeline for the blue house on his left—he cannot see it yet, but he knows it’s there. The woman who lives there is what Kirby calls “neighborly.” When she passes Kirby on the road they both lift a hand from the steering wheel in recognition. She will help. It doesn’t even occur to him that she might have evacuated. He turns to make sure Lucas is behind him and screams Hurry. He notes the blood gushing down Lucas’s face, the sluggishness in his gait. Yes, the house. They can make it to this house at least.
He lets himself imagine this refuge as he veers wildly about in the deluge, blindly searching for her porch. He will bang on the door with both fists and she will open it right away. Inside, everything will be fine. Lucas will be sorry that he was such a jerk this afternoon. The brothers will hug each other. The neighbor will hug them both. He will be wrapped in four arms and this shaking will stop, his eyes will stop smarting, a grown-up will be in charge once more. Inside, he will be safe.
Flip’s body gives him another burst of adrenaline and he uses it as best he can, uprooted chunks of shrubbery rushing past him, little pieces of foliage driving into him. He can see the house now, just barely. It is exactly where he thought it was.
Almost there. But this wind—
The hurricane takes what yields. Nothing more; nothing less.
Chapter 22
Inside the blue house, Phyllis goes about her day, surrounded by squat candles and a battery-powered radio. She is prepared for this sort of thing. She is always, always prepared. The terms “prepper” and “survivalist” do not resonate for her, though she is certainly willing to cede that she is both of those things. The message boards have been lively since this hurricane was named, but there’s nothing online that she doesn’t already know. These perpetual questions—of whether to bug in or bug out, of what types of SHTF situations one needs to be preparing for, of whether to join forces with a local group or go solo—do not interest her. Her home is as fortified as it can be. Her provisions are fully stocked. She has enough guns and ammo to defend her property, but nothing extravagant like some of these yahoos, just an old handgun and a hunting rifle. She keeps an eye on the latest survivalist chatter and pipes in on the occasional canned goods or gardening thread. For the most part she observes but does not engage.
In her offline life, she downplays her own preparations if she discusses them at all—not because she is concerned about people knowing of her supplies and coming to rob her when the Shit Hits the Fan, as some preppers are, but because no one wants to hear about it. In the beginning, she was more concerned with spreading the word. She tried to convince her sister and her close friends that these preparations were necessary. That the world as they knew it was ending—maybe not today or tomorrow, but sooner than the powers that be would have them believe. Her sister recommended she see a therapist and eventually stopped returning her calls altogether. And her friends—well. They drifted away. So she learned to keep quiet about her work on the house, her investment in a second generator, her solar panel research, the stockpile of heirloom seeds in her pantry. She isn’t bitter. They just couldn’t see it the way she could. They weren’t willing to look.
Now, with the hurricane beating at her shutters, she is not smug so much as confident. Comfortable. She is 90 percent certain that this house will withstand 175 mph winds—the 10 percent accounting for flukes, which are always a possibility. Every window has been replaced with hurricane glass. The roof was replaced a few years ago, with gale-force materials. Even in the event of a flood, she is fairly certain that the slight crest her home is built on, combined with its three-foot solid concrete foundation, will keep her above most moderate swells. But just in case, she has perched all of her furniture on top of cinder blocks and moved her most precious possessions to the second floor. She doesn’t take chances on these sorts of things. She prepares for the worst.
The salary she earns teaching biology at the community college isn’t enough to cover some of the more in-depth preparations she wanted to do, but when her father passed away a few years ago she was able to put her inheritance straight into the house. The investment was her version of a retirement plan—she had no use for stocks or bonds or annuities, so she spent the money on solar panels and an irrigation system. Her sister couldn’t wrap her head around it. The last time they spoke there was no screaming, no horrible insults. Just a quiet chasm between them, becoming wider and wider until finally it had grown too wide. They’d never been close. The loss was more acute in theory than it was in practice. After a while, Phyllis realized she doesn’t even miss their calls. She has no regrets. Her money is much better spent on supplies and modifications than sitting in some IRS account, only to disappear when the banks go belly-up. The generators, the garden beds, the fruit trees, the ground well, the weapons and the skills to use them—all of it. This is her future. She is done trying to convince anyone else that the sky is falling when all they need to do is look out the window.
Phyllis fixes herself a snack of sardines and crackers in the kitchen, then opens a fresh gallon of water and pours herself a glass. Outside, the hurricane wreaks havoc. In here, it is almost peaceful. Loud, but peaceful. She has a stack of tests to grade from her Intro to Biology course. Or maybe she’ll begin that romance novel she picked up from the Goodwill instead. She adds some garlicky pickles she canned herself to the plate and licks her fingers. Not her best batch, but not her worst.
A repetitive thudding sound registers as she makes her way back down the hall to her living room—she assumed it was the trees knocking against one another, or a piece of debris battering against the siding. But no, it almost sounds as if it is coming from the front door. Is it…“knocking” is not the right word. It is an erratic, desperate pounding. She steps out into the hall, listens. Yes, it’s coming from the front porch. She is hesitant to check. After all of this work to keep the outdoors out, why would she open the door and let it in? But there is something about it…something impossible to ignore. She undoes the dead bolts—there are three—and prepares to brace herself should the wind try to overpower her. She turns the knob.