Firestorm (19 page)

We ran back
into the house and checked all the logical places where she might
leave a note like on the fridge door or on the kitchen table, but
there was no sign of a note anywhere. As I turned to run out the
back door, however, I noticed her indoor sandals lying by the back
door.

“Meg, look! Her
sandals are there and her shoes are gone, her garden shoes. Now I
know she’s gone into the forest looking for us.”

“Oh, Sarah, I
think you’re right. There’s her shoes she wears to go shopping so
she hasn’t gone into town. She must have gone in the forest. Look,
there’s one of the guy’s cell phones on the little table there –
and there’s the other one. She probably couldn’t work either of
them and so just decided to go looking for us on her own.”

We ran out the
back door where the guys were just about to lift the stretcher.
Brad chuckled when he saw the phone.

“Hey, that’s
mine. So, did you call for an ambulance?”

Meagan was
about to hand Ali his but instead kept it and stepped away from
where we were talking so she could call. Ali shook his head and
huffed as he motioned for us to look at Grandpa.

“If he doesn’t
get medical attention like right now he might not make it. We’re
gonna have to split up but one of us has to get him to a doctor. We
can’t wait any longer.”

Brad wiped the
sweat from his eyes.

“Okay, you
drive him into town, take Don with you, and I’ll go back with the
girls to try and find the grandmother. Once you get him to the
ambulance you can head back for us.”

Ali squinted
and shook his head forcefully.

“Crap, this is
not good. You guys shouldn’t go back in there and we don’t even
know that she’s gone in for sure. I think we should all just get in
the truck and get out of here.”

And that’s all
I wanted to do, but I knew Nana well enough to know that she went
looking for us. The guys carried Grandpa to the truck and laid him
in the back and Don climbed in beside him, saying that he’d watch
over him. Meagan and Ali hugged for second as she handed him his
cell phone. He took it and shoved it in the pocket in his
shorts.

“I don’t like
this but if we don’t get him to a doctor he’s not going to make it.
I’ll be back for you just as soon as I can and when you find her,
start walking on the road and I’ll pick you up there.”

My insides were
shaking and the last thing I wanted was to head back into the
burning forest, but Nana was in there and we had to get her out. As
we were running back in, the fear ringing in my ears was even
louder than the crackling fire ahead of us.

The forest was
very dark and quiet this time, not like before when it was vibrant
with life and streams of sunshine radiating through the overhanging
branches. The stench of dead wet smoke lingered along the trail
even though there were no actual clouds of smoke in sight.

Brad stopped us
almost immediately and opened his cell phone.

“We should just
call the police and see if they sent someone here to get her in the
first place or if they can send a rescue team out now. I’m just
going to run back to the open area there so we can get reception.
Did you two want to just go in a bit and start looking for
her?”

We waited with
him for a few seconds and as usual, he was put on hold so Meagan
and I wandered inside the forest and called out for Nana. There was
no response and with each breath I took, the knots inside my chest
tightened. I felt as if we were on an endless mission with no idea
when Nana came into the forest and no clue as to how far she may be
– if she even went inside.

“The smell of
smoke is getting heavier, Meg. If it’s that bad here, it’ll be
worse in there so wouldn’t she have just turned around to get out
of it?”

Meagan kept
walking ahead of me along the path and yelled back.

“Who knows?
She’s upset, desperate, probably panicking, so she could do
anything. We just have to keep looking and calling for her – unless
Brad says that they have her.”

We didn’t want
to travel too far into the forest and get separated from Brad, and
yet on the other hand we did want to keep searching for her. I
looked back to see Brad and he was holding the cell phone to his
one ear while his other hand covered his other ear, so I guessed
that he was talking to someone. We continued to walk straight along
the path but the heaviness of the dead air was getting to us, and I
knew that we weren’t going to get far in here.

“Meg, I can
hardly breathe and we don’t even have the clouds of smoke on us,
yet. I’m not sure that Nana would keep going or even stay in here
with it like this – even if she was panicking.”

“Yeah, but if
she’s really worried about Grandpa and about us I don’t think she’d
even notice it, would she? I just hope that Brad says they have
her.”

I was about to
suggest that we just run for it but Brad was jogging towards us and
I was anxious to hear what he had to say.

“Okay, I talked
to a guy at the police station in town and he said that some
neighbors down the road had come here to get both of them but she
refused to go because she was waiting for her husband to get
back.”

My heart just
thumped against my chest and Meagan put her arm through mine as we
waited for Brad to take a breath.

“She told them
she was going in here to look for us but the neighbour told her not
to and that they’d send a rescue team out for us. He told her to
stay in her house and wait for the rescue team, and apparently she
agreed to stay.”

Meagan’s face
was red and her arms were shaking as much as mine.

“So? Did the
rescue team come?”

“He just said
that they sent it out a while ago, however long ago that is, I
don’t know. It was hard to hear him plus he put me on hold a few
times.”

As we stood
there staring at each other, the daunting odor of the encroaching
smoke began slipping in through the trees and around us. The dream
was pounding inside my head and I wanted to get out of the forest,
but I had to keep looking for Nana.

“That doesn’t
help us. Gees, where would she be?”

Brad took off
his cap and rubbed his sweaty head.

“You know her
better than I do. Would she wait for help? Does she trust anyone to
come out here? Is she stubborn? Does she listen? What?”

Meagan and I
looked at each other to find the answers in each other’s eyes. We
thought we knew her but in times of panic, even the most obvious
patterns of people change.

“Meg, she’s
like my dad – like your dad. And on top of that, she’s afraid of
the woods, doesn’t know them at all and usually trusts in other
people to carry these types of burdens. So, maybe she tried to come
in here but got scared and left and she’s, she’s…..”

Meagan slapped
her leg.

“Exactly. She’s
probably - Brad, where did you say they told her to wait?”

“In the
house.”

“But Meg, you
and I searched inside the house and she’s not there. Maybe the
rescue team came already and they just haven’t reported that they
have her, yet.”

Brad squinted
and looked back at the entrance to the trail.

“Maybe - or
maybe your grandmother is hiding in the house in a place to stay
safe.”

Meagan beat me
to the punch in asking why she’d hide.

“Because she’s
afraid the smoke will get inside but she knows she has to wait for
the rescue team and that she’ll hear them when they come in to the
house.”

Meagan’s voice
was getting anxious.

“Then why
didn’t she answer when Sarah and I called for her? That doesn’t
make any sense, Brad.”

“Okay, okay.
So, what do you want to do? We’re running out of time.”

My thoughts
were to return to the house and search it again, and I began to
grab at straws for ideas of what might have happened to Nana.

“Maybe she was
up all night worrying and crying and fell asleep and didn’t hear
us.”

Meagan shook
her head as she looked back at the smoke in the forest.

“Yeah, but
Sarah, even if she was tired she would have heard us in the house
when we were calling for her. She was waiting for us so she’d hear
us when we called.”

Brad was
getting antsy and began looking in every direction.

“Let’s continue
here until we can’t go any further and then we’ll head back to the
house to search it again. We’re here now so we should do what we
can do now.”

We agreed with
him because it seemed to make sense to at least look a little bit
in here, since that’s why we were here in the first place. We ran
along the shaded path towards the center of the forest and called
for Nana along the way. But by the time we reached the fork in the
path, my chest pounded and Brad suggested we turn back.

“It’s getting
so hot in here and the air is getting cloudy. We’re not going to
survive if we go much further and I really don’t think she would
stay in here at this point, either.”

Meagan covered
her mouth with her hand and nodded, and as much as I wanted to keep
looking, I knew that Brad was right. So, we turned around to head
back and that’s when I noticed a big shiny red hair clip on the
ground just inside the other path.

“That’s Nana’s
hair pin. She did come in here. She must have run up that path and
dropped her pin.”

We turned and
ran along the other path as fast as we could and yelled for Nana
all along it, but there was no sign of her anywhere. Brad was in
the lead and turned around as he was trekking.

“This takes us
back to the house, doesn’t it?”

We told him
that it did and my insides quivered with the excitement.

“So, she came
in to find us, couldn’t and then left because she was afraid or the
smoke was too much or whatever, and then took this path back to the
house.”

Meagan squealed
with excitement.

“So she’s
probably at the house and we couldn’t find her before because she
was in here at that time. Oh, thank God.”

We ran even
faster and minutes later we were at the top of a hill and we could
see the house, so we got off the path and cut through the trees. As
we stepped out of the forest and onto the field that ran along the
side of their house, we all stopped and gazed at the forest. The
smoke clouds were rolling in and we could hear the burning fire in
the distance.

Brad took off
again and was in the lead as he raced across the field to Nana’s
back yard, but as he did he was startled by the smoke clouds that
raced in towards us.

“Come on! We
have to hurry. I hope that rescue team gets here soon.”

We followed
Brad but the path was anything but even and I tripped and twisted
my angle. It hurt a lot for the first few seconds but the sight of
the smoke behind me made me soon forget the pain. I picked myself
up and Meagan and I continued running to the house only my foot
hurt too much for me to run really fast.

Brad came back
to help me and that’s when familiar sounds pierced my ears and made
my legs feel like rubber. Meagan screamed when she saw the shooting
ambers behind us and that sent more chills shivering up and down my
spine. Brad put his arm through mine and motioned for us to hurry
and that’s when I thought we were going to die.

I held my
breath as a hot coal the size of a basket ball flew through the air
above us and landed a few hundred feet on the far side of us. It
instantly ignited the ground around and I stared in horror as I
thought that we really weren’t going to make it. Brad pulled my
arm.

“We have to get
to the house and get her out and then run like the blazes down that
road. I know your foot hurts, Sarah, but we really have to move
it!”

I could only
hope that Nana was in the house because we really didn’t know that
for sure. The three of us jogged through a shrubbery garden that
ran alongside the field, and then we hustled across the back yard
towards the house. The smoke was now very predominant and the smell
filled the air all around us.

We took turns
yelling for Nana as we ran but we couldn’t hear her answer. In
fact, I couldn’t hear anything except my heartbeat pounding in my
ears so I’m not sure I’d hear her even if she did answer.

Instinctively,
I looked behind me and that just added more terror to my already
shaken body.

“Meg, look.
It’s just one big inferno back there. And the smoke….the
smoke…”

“I know and
it’s not that much better on this side over here, either. Let’s
go.”

We crossed the
back yard and finally made it to the back door step. Brad whipped
the door open for us and I hobbled through with my ankle that now
pounded with pain.

“We’ll search
upstairs and maybe you can do this floor, Brad, okay? Yell if you
find her.”

I have no idea
why I volunteered to go upstairs when it hurt to just walk on the
level floor, but there was no time to change the plan so Meagan
stomped up the narrow staircase and I limped quickly behind her. We
called out for Nana, but she didn’t respond.

“Sarah, check
the closet and under the beds in our room. I’ll do Nana’s
room.”

I flopped down
onto my knees and whipped back the comforters to the beds but she
wasn’t under either of them. My ankle stung as I stood back up and
opened the closet door. I called for her but she wasn’t there. Then
I remembered that Nana has this privacy thing and probably wouldn’t
have gone into this bedroom anyway just because our things were in
it.

Our things! We
had no time to gather our clothes or belongings and I knew that
everything we brought would be burned. For one very brief second I
stared at our clothes in the closet and then shook my head. There
was no time to think about it. We only had time to find Nana. As I
shot passed the dresser I saw my cell phone on it so I grabbed it
and stuffed it in my shorts pocket.