6 Fantasy Stories (7 page)

*****

Mr. Flood unfreezes the rain around us with a snap of his fingers, and the two of us walk down Market Street to Vine Street. By the time we get to the stairway at the end of Vine Street, I have to pee so bad that I’m about ready to wet my pants...but I know better than to ask if I can pee before a flood.

We walk up the concrete steps to an elevated walkway. As we cross over the expressway that loops around the edge of downtown, I’m just glad that the walkway’s covered, and I’m out of the rain for a moment.

On the other side of the walkway, we cross a bridge over the murky, brown Stonycreek River. At the end of the bridge, we enter a little station, and Mr. Flood buys us tickets for the World’s Steepest Vehicular Inclined Plane.

“The Incline,” as everyone in town calls it, looks like a boxcar that runs up and down the side of a steep hill on railroad tracks. Besides the three floods, the Incline is Johnstown’s other claim to fame, though it’s not much of one, if you ask me.

“This is some storm we’re havin’,” says the old man who sells us our tickets. “It’s rainin’ cats and dogs tonight.”

“I heard it’ll be raining elephants and dinosaurs before long,” says Mr. Flood.

“Might not be a bad idea, headin’ for higher ground tonight,” says the ticket seller, hiking a thumb toward the top of the hill. “The weatherman on the radio says not to worry, but my rheumatoid knees are tellin’ me otherwise.”

“I agree with your knees,” says Mr. Flood with a wink.

Mr. Flood and I board the Incline passenger car. As the car climbs its track up the hillside, the two of us stand at the window and look out at the rainy city unfolding below us.

Johnstown doesn’t look different from most any other night of the year. Rain is one thing that’s hardly ever in short supply around here.

Not that it seems to clean the place up very much. I guess the city was a lot dirtier back in the old days, and it must be cleaner since the steel mills shut down in the ‘80’s...but if you ask me, it still always looks like it has a grimy film over everything. It’s like the rain can never wash off this bottom layer of soot that’s been stuck to all the buildings and houses and trees and streets since the turn of the century.

Of course, if nothing in town is left standing after tonight (except Morley’s Dog), like Mr. Flood says, that grimy soot will finally get scrubbed out the hard way. Unless it all just floats up in the air and comes down and sticks to whatever new buildings are put up after the flood...which, knowing Johnstown, I think is more likely.

When we’re midway up the hillside, Mr. Flood elbows me and points to the left and down. I’m not sure what he’s pointing at until he tells me.

“The Old Stone Bridge,” Mr. Flood says solemnly, wrapping an arm around my shoulders. “Eighty people died in debris that washed up against it in 1889. They burned to death when the debris caught fire. Died by fire because of a flood.”

I’ve heard the story before, but I can’t really picture it. All I see is a railroad bridge over the river and expressway on the edge of downtown, an ordinary looking bridge I’ve been under about a zillion times.

Mr. Flood squeezes my shoulder. “That won’t happen tonight,” he says. “Drowning only. A merciful death. A peaceful death.”

As he says this, I think about my mom and dad, who drowned when a flash flood washed out a bridge under their car. I wish it made me feel better, thinking they might have died peacefully. Unfortunately, I think Mr. Flood is full of crap on this subject.

Sometimes, I can’t figure him out. Here’s a guy who’s about to kill God knows how many people in a so-called natural disaster, and he’s patting himself on the back for not burning them to death.

And the messed up part of it is, how much better am I? I can’t even stand the thought of my own parents drowning, and here I’m getting ready to help kill hundreds or thousands more in the same exact way.

It’s all for a good cause, according to Mr. Flood. Like he said at Morley’s Dog, he thinks we’re saving Johnstown by wrecking it. He claims that the deaths are the price we pay to protect this place he loves from the craziness in the rest of the world.

It would be nice if I could believe all that like he does. It would be easier if I could convince myself that he’s not as crazy as he is powerful, and that I’m not going along with this whole flood thing just because I always do what he tells me. Because I don’t want to let him down.

It would be even nicer if I could honestly say that the thought of drowning all those people bothers me more than the thought of one single person dying tonight.

The person who raised me after my parents died. The person who home-schooled me and gave me my powers and taught me to use them. The person whose place I’m supposed to take tonight, just like he took the place of the one before him.

Mr. Flood.

It’s funny, because we have kind of a love/hate relationship. He’s never let me live my own life. All he’s done is push me since Day One to learn the “family business” and take over for him.

But he’s never hurt me. I never had to do without. I’m pretty sure he’s treated me the same way he’d treat his own kids, if he had any.

There’s another reason, too...another reason I don’t want to see him die.

When you get right down to it, he’s all I’ve got.

The rain hammers the roof of the boxcar, falling harder than ever. As we climb toward the upper station and the hilltop borough of Westmont, I dread the thought of going out in that downpour.

Mr. Flood swings his cane up and raps the forked tip on the window. As soon as he does it, a lightning flash illuminates the town like an instant of daylight creasing the darkness, blowing back in time from tomorrow morning.

Not that tomorrow morning will be all that bright for Johnstown.

Thunder cracks in the distance, and Mr. Flood chuckles. He raps his cane again, and lightning flares like before.

“Water, water everywhere,” he says. “And no one’s got an ark.”

He yanks back my hood and tousles my hair and brings the lightning and thunder with more raps of his cane, and I wonder.

I wonder if I’ll end up crazy like him when I get to be his age.

And I wonder what life will be like without him after tonight.

*****

The rain is blasting down as Mr. Flood leads me out of the station at the top of the hill. Pushing through the wind-driven sheets is like being hit in the face with one bucket of water after another.

Walking sideways to cut the resistance, I see the old lady who runs the gift shop lock the shop’s door and plunge into the downpour. People stream out of the adjacent restaurant, diners and waiters and waitresses alike rushing out to their cars. The conductor who brought us up the hill dashes past us, soaked to the skin after just a few steps.

Everyone’s getting out and hurrying home as the storm gets worse. At this rate, the entire Incline station and restaurant ought to be shut down and empty within minutes. Evacuating the place doesn’t make sense, because the high ground up here is one of the safest places to be if a flood hits the valley...but I guess no one really knows for sure what’s going to happen next.

Except Mr. Flood and I, of course.

Squinting against the rain, I follow Mr. Flood out onto the cement observation deck that juts out of the hilltop beside the station. I’m all slouched over, but old Mr. Flood just about breaks into a run on his way to the railing at the edge of the deck.

When I come up beside him and look down, I see that the flood is about to begin. The Stonycreek River at the base of the hill is rising fast, filling with rain faster than the current can carry it off.

“We’re about to make history,” says Mr. Flood, drumming his fingers on the metal rail. “How does it feel to be a part of something that people will still read about and talk about hundreds of years from now?”

I turn to him then, and his eyes are wet with what I think are tears of joy as well as rain, and his pale cheeks are flushed with excitement, and the breath catches in my chest.

“I don’t want you to go,” I say to him. “Please don’t leave me.”

Mr. Flood smiles warmly and pats my back. “Thank you,” he says. “When my predecessor passed on, I was glad to see her go. It does my heart good knowing that you don’t feel that way about me.”

As usual, I’m not getting through to him. “Call off the flood,” I say. “Let’s go home.”

“The people of Johnstown are counting on us,” says Mr. Flood. “We have to save their way of life.”

“Then run for mayor or something!” I tell him.

Mr. Flood tilts his head back and laughs loudly, letting the rain fall into his open mouth. “Hey, I like that!” he says. “A flood elected mayor of Johnstown! That’s good!”

“I’m serious,” I say, getting more frustrated because I know his mind’s made up and it always has been. “Don’t do this. Don’t go.”

“You’ll see,” says Mr. Flood, brushing my cheek with his fingertips. “When it’s your time to pass the torch, you’ll understand.”

I feel tears in my own eyes, but they aren’t tears of joy. I know people would say he’s evil and crazy because of what he does--and I guess I couldn’t really argue with them--but he’s the closest thing I’ve got to a father. To anyone, actually. I’ve led a sheltered life, being home-schooled and spending all my time training to flood the city of Johnstown.

“So let’s get this show on the road,” says Mr. Flood with a giant grin, and then he unzips the fly of his trousers.

Howling like a wolf, he proceeds to pee off the observation deck at the top of the Incline.

As soon as Mr. Flood pees, the rain really cuts loose. It’s been raining hard for at least an hour, but that was a trickle compared to the ocean that dumps down now.

When he’s done peeing, Mr. Flood tucks himself back in and zips up, then whacks his cane hard against the railing. Immediately, a jagged bolt of lightning lashes down in the heart of the city.

Thunder explodes overhead. As it echoes off the walls of the valley, every electric light in Johnstown except the headlights of the cars on the streets winks out at once.

For a moment, the city is mostly silent and still and dark. Then, through the gushing of the rain, I hear a rising chorus of shouts and car horns. A lone fire siren wails, and then it’s joined by another and another. The flashing red and blue lights of fire engines and police cars strobe along the rows of darkened buildings.

This is it, I realize, and my stomach does a somersault.

History in the making.

Mr. Flood whacks his cane on the railing again, and another blast of lightning leaps into the city. As thunder crashes louder than before, he swings the cane up and jabs its two-pronged tip at the sky.

I swear, in the next triple-flash of lightning that sizzles down, the two snakes carved into the cane seem to squirm with a life of their own.

The force of the rain intensifies. The Stonycreek River surges out of its bed, spilling over the sloped, cement flood-control banks that are no better controlling a flood tonight than they were in ’77.

Whooping with joy, Mr. Flood begins to dance.

In the middle of the observation deck, he kicks and gyrates like he’s twenty years old instead of ninety. He does the Charleston, the Lindy Hop, the Jitterbug, then shuffles a soft shoe and spins like a whirling dervish. He bobs and stomps like an Indian circling a campfire, shaking his cane like a ceremonial lance.

He twirls the cane like a baton, tosses it in the air and catches it, bouncing the double-pronged tip off the cement. He does a Gene Kelly dance step and slings the cane over his shoulder like an umbrella, singing a song about singing in the rain.

With each move he makes, the rain falls harder.

“Rain, rain, don’t go away,” shouts Mr. Flood, doing what looks like a cross between the Hustle and a football player’s end zone strut. “Give us fifty feet today!”

His magic is strong. I can’t believe how fast the flood is growing.

In the valley below us, water rolls from the Stonycreek in wave after wave. Cars slam into each other and strike guardrails and buildings, drivers either blinded by the rain or panicked by the swiftly rising tide.

People and sirens scream like shrieking fireworks. Geysers erupt from the sewers, belching up manhole covers that crash back down onto pavement or parked cars.

And Mr. Flood keeps dancing like a wild man.

Beaming blissfully, he shakes and twirls and jumps and flaps his arms. The rain comes down harder when he flutters his fingers, and the thunder booms when he stomps his feet.

Looking over the railing, I see that the water is rising steadily down below. Already, the level near the river is higher than car tires, halfway up car doors. Pavement quickly disappears as the streets become canals.

I hear the sound of distant glass shattering. A child screams and dogs yowl like it’s the end of the world. Lights flashing and sirens wailing, emergency vehicles hurtle down the expressway from the townships and boroughs in the surrounding hills.

From somewhere far away, I swear I hear the crack of a gunshot.

I feel a tap on my shoulder then, and I turn to see Mr. Flood bowing deeply, reaching out a hand.

“Will you join me?” he says with a charming smile...too charming for someone about to give up his life.

If I don’t help him, I wonder, will anything change? Will he live through the night? Or will he finish the flood without me and die anyway?

It would be easy not to take that hand. It would be easy to refuse to help him kill himself.

It would be easy if I hadn’t spent my whole life preparing for this night. If I didn’t feel compelled to make him happy.

Especially if whether or not I cooperate doesn’t matter, and this is the last night I see him alive.

So I take his hand.

He tosses his cane over the railing and encircles my back with his arm. I follow his lead, looping one arm around him while he raises my other arm high, interlacing his fingers with mine.

Only headlights and the flashing beacons of cop cars and emergency vehicles remain in the valley, but our dance floor on top of the hill is still lit by streetlamps. Windblown curtains of rain pelt down in the lamplight as Mr. Flood leads me in a waltz.

Our feet splash in the water as we glide in a circle, stepping one-two-three, one-two-three, one-two-three. Mr. Flood’s sky blue eyes lock with mine, and he laughs out loud and picks up the pace.

Soon, we’re moving so fast that the waltz becomes a polka. Mr. Flood steps on my feet once or twice, but he’s light as a feather.

I get dizzy from spinning around, and I try to slow down, but he won’t let me. I close my eyes for an instant as we keep turning, but it doesn’t help. I still feel light-headed.

When I open my eyes, I realize that spinning around isn’t the only reason for my light-headedness. As I look down, I see that my feet no longer touch the wet deck.

Mr. Flood and I are dancing on air.

We’re floating three feet above the cement. There’s nothing under us but air and rain.

I shoot Mr. Flood a look of surprise, and he just winks and keeps hauling me in circles like this is something he does every day. Then, he slows down the polka and tightens his grip on my hand.

“Aphrodite,” he says, using my full name and raising his voice over the rushing of the rain. “I give you my power! Use it to continue my sacred work!”

First, I feel a tickle in my fingers, like the start of pins and needles. Then, I feel a mild shock like static electricity buzzing into my palm.

Then comes the real juice. A sudden, searing jolt burns its way up my arm and explodes in my chest like a firework and shoots out into every inch of my body.

I feel like I’m on fire. My entire body quivers and hums like a power line.

And it keeps coming.

It’s too much for me. My vision whites out, and my heart jackhammers like I’ve just downed twenty espressos. Everything seizes up at once, and I can’t take a breath.

Then, the current slows, and I start to come out of it. My muscles unclench, and the racing engine in my chest becomes a heart again. I choke down a breath, and my whited-out vision jitters back into color and form and light.

It is only now that I realize we’re still waltzing, even though I’ve stopped moving my feet. Mr. Flood has been carrying me ever since the first shock of the power transfer crashed through me.

I realize something else, too.

I never knew it before, but until this moment, my senses of sight and hearing and smell and touch and taste have been blocked to the beauty of the rain. Though I’ve had more sense of rain than other people, and even some influence over it, I’ve been wrapped in layers of plastic and bound with chains compared to how I am now.

I can see every shimmering pearl of rain as it falls. I can smell the difference between them, tell the exact altitude and part of the country where the source water evaporated to form the cloud that gave birth to each droplet.

I can feel the size and shape of each drop as it hits my skin. I can taste the acid mixed in with the water and pinpoint the air pollutant that produced it.

And I can hear the true song of the rain--not the staccato pattering of showers striking cement and wood and metal, but the vibration of droplets as they stretch and blow and collide, the secret shivering music like millions upon millions of violin strings all playing different notes at once in one heavenly, keening chord.

For the first time in my life, I can see and hear and smell and touch and taste. Everything around me is more amazing than I ever imagined.

And this, I realize, is how Mr. Flood feels every day of his life.

“This is it, Dee,” says Mr. Flood, the sound of his voice snapping my focus back to him. He smiles sadly, and I can tell that the rain running down his face is mixed with tears. I know exactly how many raindrops and exactly how many tears. “One big push. The two of us.”

This is the moment he’s been getting me ready for all my life. The moment when he pours out the last of his power into me, and together we bring down the full force of the flood on Johnstown.

The moment when I lose him.

I know I’m supposed to go along with his plan like I always do. Take all the power and let him drop dead like he did his own predecessor. Watch as our flood drowns the city and feel all proud of myself for making history and saving a way of life.

But what can I say? I guess he didn’t do such a good job raising me, because my priorities are all screwed up.

Drowning hundreds of people just doesn’t do it for me. My heart just isn’t in it.

And as for letting the person I care most about die, well...

Forget it.

Especially now that I’m surging with power and I know how to use it and I finally have a plan of my own.

“Goodbye, Dee,” says Mr. Flood, and he pulls my hand in and kisses the knuckles. “Don’t let me down.”

“I won’t,” I tell him, though I mean it in a different way than he does. “I promise.”

“Then let’s show ‘em how it’s done!” he shouts, thrusting our joined hands high in the air.

Mr. Flood shuts his eyes and knits his brows together in concentration. Electrical arcs spark from his shoulders and arms like tiny bolts of lightning.

Our clasped hands glow blue-white in the rain, then disappear in a flare of light. At the ends of our arms, where our hands should be, all I see is a pulsing ball of energy like a dwarf star dropped down from the heavens.