The Stormchasers: A Novel (20 page)

“Why do you do it?” Karena asks.

“Hmmm?” Kevin says. He is easing his hand up beneath the back of Karena’s T-shirt. “What’s that?”

“Chase,” she says. “Why do you chase?”

Kevin’s hand pauses, a starfish of heat on Karena’s skin.

“I chase because I love storms, Laredo,” he says. “Simple as that.”

Karena sighs, and Kevin seems to take this as a challenge, because he adds, “I was born this way. I’ve always loved storms. My first memory is of dragging my mom outside to show her a T-Cu—that’s a thunderhead to you, Laredo. I didn’t know what I was looking at, I just knew I loved it. I must have been three, four years old.”

Karena shakes her head.

“You and Charles,” she says. “He was the same way. He used to crawl toward lightning. Sleep on the doormat during thunderstorms. Our mom would find him in the morning when she went for the paper. I guess—I just don’t get why, exactly.”

“Why what?”

“Why you can’t admire them from a distance. Why you have to put yourselves in harm’s way. I do understand to some degree. The storms are beautiful. And weird and awe-inspiring. But they’re so destructive too.”

Kevin slides his hand out from under Karena’s shirt and rests it on her waist.

“First off,” he says, “you know better than that by now. We don’t put ourselves in harm’s way. We stay out of its path—exceptions like today notwithstanding. Who was better off, us or those poor people stuck in Oweeo?”

“Yes, but—”

“Hold up, Laredo, I’m not finished. Plus, if it weren’t for us, a lot more people could have died. You said it yourself, in your article: The NWS issued a tornado warning
seventeen minutes
before that thing hit the town. Who do you think called that in? Spotters. Chasers. Dennis and Dan. We do a public service, you know.”

“I can see that, but—”

“Wait, Laredo. Sorry, but you’ve hit a nerve here, because these are misapprehensions so many people have, and it just really turns my crank. So finally, the destructive potential of storms—yes, it can be horrific. As we saw today. But today was an
anomaly
. Do you know how many mile-wide tornadoes there’ve been in the last century? Like, fifty. Over a hundred years. I’ve been chasing twenty years, and I’ve seen only three: Greensburg,” Kevin says, tapping fingers on Karena’s hip as he counts, “and Moore. And today’s. And do you know how many tornadoes are categorized as violent?”

“No,” says Karena, “but I suspect you’re going to tell me.”

“Damn straight,” says Kevin. “Less than two percent.”

He gives her hair a gentle tug.

“Severe weather,” he says, “it’s really just Nature’s way of correcting an imbalance. It’s wind and moisture rushing from one place to another, and when the imbalances between them get serious enough, there’s a storm. The more extreme the imbalance, the more severe the weather. But the storm corrects the imbalance, Laredo, and afterward the atmosphere is stable again.”

“Okay, Mr. Wizard,” says Karena. “Thank you.”

Kevin is quiet for a minute. Then he tents his fingers on her tailbone.

“You sound unconvinced,” he says.

“Not necessarily,” says Karena, “I’m just thinking,” and she is. She’s thinking about imbalances. She’s thinking Nature is majestic, yes, but vicious too. She’s thinking that whatever Kevin says, Nature is something to be wary of, because of its two-faced system. Because storms are necessary to scour the atmosphere. Because chaos is required before order. Because a human brain can be so scrambled—naturally, scientifically, just chemicals and synapses—that a few hours’ peace, let alone euphoria, must inevitably be followed by a descent into hell. Nature may be beautiful, but it is cruel in its extremes.

“Charles used to think there was a connection between his instability and atmospheric instability,” Karena says. “That that’s why he was so good at finding storms. Because in essence he was one.”

“Did he?” says Kevin. “He never told me that. Interesting theory.”

The siren starts up again, swinging round and round on its pole.
RrrrowwwWWWW! WwrrOOOOOwwww!
Karena bolts up.

“God, that sound freaks me out,” she says. “It used to terrify me. Not Charles, though. It was his favorite.
Siren
was his first word.”

“Not yours, I take it.”

Karena shivers. “Hardly,” she says. Her first word, come to think of it, was
Charles
.

Kevin sits up too and puts an arm around her.

“Are you scared now?” he says, his breath warm in her ear.

“A little,” Karena admits.

“Don’t be,” says Kevin. He pushes her hair to one side and kisses her neck. “Trust me, I’m a professional. I’m here to protect you with my superior skill and knowledge.”

“Oh boy,” Karena says, rolling her eyes. “We’re toast.”

“Now, that is just not very nice, Laredo,” says Kevin, hooking his fingers into the waistband of Karena’s shorts and sliding them around to the button. “After everything we’ve been through,” he adds, undoing it, “you haven’t placed complete and utter faith in me yet?”

“No way,” says Karena, as her zipper clicks down inch by inch.

“Wise girl,” says Kevin, and pulls Karena back onto the bed.

W
hen Kevin makes love to Karena, she goes places. This astonishes her. She has had younger lovers and taller ones and fitter ones, and she would never have believed that this short, stocky stormchaser with his sun-reddened arms could drive her mad. But he does. Kevin is clever and inventive and extremely energetic, and there’s something about his body that feels like home to Karena. She loves everything about it: his calves blocky from soccer, the sweet spot on his neck, the heat of his mouth. Maybe it’s pheromones, the way he smells, good ol’ chemistry at work, but everything about him fits Karena just right.

And then there are the places. During their first lovemaking session, while the siren is still going off, Karena finds herself transported to her backyard in New Heidelburg, the air smelling of pine, the grass spiky beneath her feet. The second time, before dawn, it’s the house on the Hallingdahl farm, with its glorious white snowball bushes. The third time, when they wake at first light to find each other naked and together, it’s the New Heidelburg town pool, where Karena sunbathes slick and sizzling, her skin fragrant with baby oil.

“Wow,” says Kevin, when Karena tells him about this. He is lying on his back with one arm around Karena, blinking thoughtfully at the ceiling. “I make you go places, Laredo? Nobody’s ever said that to me before.”

“Nobody’s ever taken me anywhere before,” says Karena, sliding her hand down Kevin’s stomach to pluck at what she and Tiff used to call the goody trail. Karena loves Kevin’s stomach most of all, although it is admittedly more beer belly than six-pack. The solid curve of it reminds her of the drawings of bread in the Richard Scarry picture books she and Charles loved as children. In those illustrations the loaves always had wavy lines of heat coming from them.

“Watch it there, Laredo,” says Kevin, “unless you want to be starting something.”

“Again?” says Karena. “Aren’t you done yet?”

“Woman,” he says, “I am just getting warmed up.” He kisses Karena’s temple, then asks, “So, these places I take you, are they good places?”

“They are,” says Karena. “They’re my favorite places.”

“Then I’ll take that as a compliment,” says Kevin.

Suddenly he rolls over and parts Karena’s knees with one of his own in a single, fluid movement.

“Patented Kevin Wiebke Knee Sweep,” he says. “You like? Now, tell me where you want to go, and as your trusty guide, I will be happy to take you there.”

An hour later, when the sun is spoking through the parking lot’s chain-link fence, they stagger into the shower. “Good grief,” says Kevin. “Okay, my legs are weak. I have to say, Laredo, you may look sweet, but you’re an animal.”

“Me!” says Karena. “Who literally pushed me off the bed? You’re the animal.”

“I’m an animal, I’m an astrotravel machine, make up your mind,” Kevin says, uncapping the tiny bottle of shampoo. “So what’s our plan for today?”

Karena stands with her head down as Kevin massages the gel into her scalp. She feels like a bird with salt on its tail, hypnotized. She loves anything to do with her hair.

“Well,” she says, “I’d like to stay another day at least. To keep checking the hospitals and emergency centers until the search-and-rescue’s done. How long do you think that’ll take?”

“I don’t know,” says Kevin. “Probably a day or two. It depends on the extent of the damage.”

He turns Karena to face him. She is shivering despite the hot needling spray.

“Look,” Kevin says, “if Chuck’s here, we’ll find him, but frankly I don’t think he is. We saw him as we were going
toward
the wedge, right? And then we turned around and came back, and he wasn’t there. For him to get anywhere near that tornado, we would have passed him. He probably dropped back when he saw how dangerous the situation was, and now he’s miles from here, safe and sound.”

“Well, safe, anyway,” says Karena. “I hope.”

She thinks he probably is—not so much because of Kevin’s theory, although its logic is comforting, but because Karena believes if Charles were dead, she would know. And not because of the twindar, which has proven fairly ineffective. Karena would just know in the same way she knew Siri died an hour before Karena actually confirmed it. At the time Karena was driving home from Norwegian Ridge, the town one over from New Heidelburg, with some of the rommegrod the old ladies made there—thinking if Siri could be persuaded to eat anything, it might be this pudding. But as Karena passed Siri’s favorite field, the one with contour-farmed pillowy rectangles of corn between rows of grass, Karena had started to cry steadily. There had been no call from the neighbor sitting with Siri. There had been no pinch. Karena had just known.

So Charles is probably alive now. Karena just needs to stay and make sure. And, of course, to find him.

She tells Kevin this, adding, “Can you do this? What’s your schedule?”

“I’m officially a free man until August fifteenth, when soccer starts,” Kevin says. “Turn around, I’ll do your back,” and he soaps it briskly.

“I was thinking,” Karena says, “in addition to the hospitals, we could drive around to the fast-food places and gas stations to look for Charles’s car.”

“That’s a good idea,” says Kevin. “What was it again, a yellow wagon?”

“Volvo,” says Karena.

“Okay, let’s download an image of one to photocopy and hand out,” says Kevin. “With a photo of Chuck too, if you have one.”

“Oh, do I,” says Karena. If Charles really is unharmed, please God, it’ll serve him right to have his mullet photo plastered all over Pierre.

“You’re brilliant, Mr. Wizard,” she tells Kevin.

“Pshaw, it’s nothing, Laredo,” says Kevin. “Oh dear, look at that, I dropped the soap. It’s right by your foot—could you pick it up, please?”

“Nice try,” Karena says. “I’m not falling for that one. . . . Oh my, in the shower, Mr. Wiebke? I thought stormchasers didn’t like to get wet.”

“Extenuating circumstances, Laredo.”

“I can feel that,” says Karena. “Very extenuating.”

“My, you’re mouthy,” says Kevin. “Let’s put that mouth to better use, shall we?” He kisses her, hands busy. “We’ve got a long day, Laredo, so let’s hurry and see if we can make you go somewhere you can behave.”

T
hey leave on Wednesday afternoon after another day and night of fruitless searching, leaving Charles’s mulleted and tuxedoed image and Karena’s cell number all over Pierre. Again they head east on I-90, Karena driving, then Kevin. As they near the Minnesota state line, Karena watches the topography change. The high plains give way to farms, first one, then a handful, then more and more until finally that’s all there is. Dark green fields of soy and corn—
knee-high by the Fourth of July means a good harvest.
Red barns with white piping. Clusters of silos. Cows. These are prosperous family spreads with big houses and numerous vehicles, proud and clean beneath a blue sky dreamy with Cu, the late-summer sun flowing golden over the land like syrup. It’s as perfect as the picture on the back of a cereal box, and it fills Karena with dread.

She tries to parse the source of it: Is it because she’s exhausted, traumatized, because this strange adventure is over, because she doesn’t have that much to go back to? Because of her uncertainty about what will happen with Kevin? Because of her uncertainty about what has happened to Charles? All of the above. Nothing seems stable. Karena thinks of the grasslands outside Kadoka, and then of Fern and Alicia and Marla and Scout, and then her grandmother Hallingdahl, her uncle Carroll, her mom, Siri. For all intents and purposes, Frank. And Charles. Karena turns to the side window to hide the tears. Why even bother, when all you love will be taken away?

“What’s up, Laredo?” Kevin says. He gives her knee a gentle shake.

“Nothing,” Karena says, but it comes out in a tiny squeak.

“Nothing,” repeats Kevin in a Minnie Mouse voice, “nothing? Doesn’t sound like nothing to me.”

“Well, it is and it isn’t,” says Karena. “I’m just having a mean attack of the Dreads.”

“The Dreads, what’s that?”

Karena explains the wall of fear and bad feeling that sweeps toward her every evening.

“I know the Dreads,” Kevin says.

Karena gapes at him. “You do?”

“I do. I don’t get them every day, but I do get them situationally. Ex Dreads, for instance. That whole best-man-eloping-with-my-fiancée thing—that kinda messed me up for a while. I was afraid to leave the house. I kept feeling like something was going to fall on me.”

“Yes,”
says Karena. “Like you’ll be walking down the street and an air conditioner or piano or anvil will smash you from a clear blue sky. What
is
that?”