Unspeakable (41 page)

As he went down the upstairs hallway, he noticed how dark it was. His mom sure was sleeping a long time. It must he suppertime already. Maybe even past supper.

On the way downstairs, he halfway expected to hear her coming after him. If he asked her permission to do this, she would probably say no, so now was a good time. He could get there and back before she missed him.

When he came back, he would go upstairs and hide the stuff under his bed, then he would wake up his mom and tease her about being a sleepyhead and tell her he was hungry for supper. She would never know that he had left the house, something he was forbidden to do unless he had checked with her first. Never, ever, was he to go beyond the yard without her or Grandpa. The

"yard" was the grassy part with the white fence around it.

It was a dumb rule. He was old enough to go to school, wasn't he?

He unlocked the front door and stepped out onto the porch, being careful to pull the door closed behind him. On the porch, he paused. Everything sure looked funny. Sort of green and weird. The sky looked scary, too. He saw jagged forks of lightning and heard the thunder that followed. Maybe he should wait and go another time.

But he might not have a chance as good as this.

Before he could talk himself out of it, he ran down the front steps and across the yard. He crawled beneath the fence and angled off toward the barn. As he ran past the corral, he noticed that the horses were acting strange. They were running along the fence, first one way, then the other, like they were trying to get out. They snorted and stamped, tossed their heads, and rolled their eyes. He wouldn't like riding them today, not even with Jack holding the reins and leading. He paused again, wondering if maybe he had fallen asleep after all. Was he having a dream? But when the lightning flashed again, he knew he was awake.

He ran faster. If he didn't hurry, he might get rained on and then Mom would know that he'd gone outside without asking permission.

***

Despite his seat belt, Jack went airborne when his truck ran over a pothole. He banged his head on the ceiling of the cab. "Son of a bitch!" He swore not because of the pothole or the pain to his head, but because even though he was pushing the truck toward eighty miles an hour, it seemed to be mired in quicksand.

He had hit the pothole because his eyes were on the sky, not the road. He knew the warning signs because he had experienced them before. Once in Altus, Oklahoma; once in a small town in Missouri, the name of which escaped him now. When the sky looked like this, and the atmosphere took on this greenish cast, the conditions were right for a tornado. He glanced at a familiar landmark as he sped past and knew that he had only a couple more miles to go. "Come on, come on," he said, urging the truck to perform at maximum capacity. Thank God he'd had that oil level checked.

Raindrops as heavy as sinkers began spattering the windshield. A gust of wind disturbed the preternatural stillness. Then another gust, stronger than the first. In under a minute the branches of the trees lining the highway were in a frenzy. Falling twigs and leaves got caught in his windshield vipers. It began to rain harder. He glanced at the turbulent sky and cursed again. The sudden rainfall after months of drought made the surface of the road dangerously slick. When he finally reached the gate and applied the brakes, the truck went into a skid. Managing to stop it about thirty yards beyond the gate, he pushed it into reverse and fishtailed backward, then dropped it into drive and shot through the iron arch.

His first thought upon seeing the house was that all the rooms were dark. Why weren't the lights on? Were they here? Or had Anna, frightened by the threat of dangerous thunderstorms, gone into town to wait them out? Possibly with Marjorie Baker?

Jack didn't even take time to shut the door of his truck. As soon as he cut the engine, he clambered out and ran up the front steps to the porch. Not bothering to ring the bell, he pushed open the door. The wind caught it, ripped it from his hand, and slammed it against the interior wall.

Although that made a racket loud enough to raise the dead, he shouted, "Anna! David!" He raced into the living room. It was empty and the television was dark. Running from room to room, he shouted for David. He opened the cellar door in the kitchen and hollered down, but he couldn't even see the bottom of the narrow stairs for the darkness below. Besides, David would have replied if they had taken shelter there.

"Where the hell are you?"

Jack went back to the entry and ran up the staircase, taking the treads two or three at a time. David's room was empty He ran toward Anna's and burst through the door. She was lying on the bed. "Anna!" In three strides he was across the room, shaking her awake. She sat bolt upright, obviously terrified from having been awakened so abruptly from a deep slumber, shocked to see him in her bedroom standing over her and breathing heavily. Knowing he must look like a wild man, he held up both hands palms out. "Where's David?" She glanced at the rumpled empty space beside her and registered alarm. Jack said, "There's a storm coming. We've got to find David. Hurry!"

Sensing his urgency if not catching every rushed word, she scrambled off the bed and followed him from the room. They checked Delray's bedroom, the attic, the closet in David's room, underneath his bed. There was no trace of the boy.

Jack gripped her shoulders. "Where could he be?"

Frantically, Anna shook her head.

Nearly stumbling over each other, they ran downstairs. "I've already checked down here, but let's do it again." He took the time to look directly at her so she wouldn't miss any words. "I'll search this side of the house. Meet me back here."

In less than sixty seconds they were back in the foyer. Anna's hands were in her hair. She was seconds away from hysteria. Jack bolted through the open front door, ran to the end of the porch, and looked toward the northwest.

And saw it.

An angry finger of destruction dipping down from a curtain of cloud. "Shit!" He grabbed Anna's hand and leaped off the porch, dragging her with him. She managed to land on her feet. He raced for the storm cellar, which he knew to be on the far side of the corral. Defray had pointed it out to him shortly after he began working for him. Jack saw that the horses were terrified, and he regretted being unable to do anything for them, but they were safer in the corral than inside the barn, which could collapse on them. Even if they weren't safer outside, his priority was seeing to Anna and David's safety. But Anna wasn't cooperating. She dug her heels in as they approached the storm cellar. He stopped and turned to her. "Get in the cellar." Even though it didn't matter how loudly he spoke, he was yelling above the roar of the wind. "I'll find David." She wrested her hand free and began running in the opposite direction of the cellar.

"Goddamn it!" Jack started after her.

She reached the barn seconds ahead of him and struggled to pull open the heavy metal door. The wind tore at her hair and clothes. Raindrops struck like needles, but she seemed unaware of anything except finding her son.

Jack pushed her aside and grabbed the handle of the barn door. "David!" He cupped his hands around his mouth. "David!" He jogged down the center aisle, checking each stall and the tack room, shouting as he went, but when he reached the opposite end, the boy was still not to be found. He slid open the rear door.

"Oh. Jesus."

That he didn't shout. He spoke it as a prayer.

CHAPTER FORTY–ONE

T
he funnel cloud had spun itself into a full-fledged tornado, but it was still trying to decide whether to remain airborne or skim the ground. With every second it gained velocity and strength. The ranch lay directly in its present path. They had maybe two minutes. Probably less. While Jack was still trying to assimilate their peril, Anna shoved him out of her way and dodged his attempt to grab her and hold her back. She ran across the open field toward the trailer. Jack ran after her, overtook her, and kept running. As soon as he reached the trailer, he banged on the aluminum side of it, then nearly yanked the door off its hinges in his haste to open it.

"David! David!"

The boy was cowering in a corner of the built-in sofa.

Terror-struck, teeth chattering, he said, "Am I in trouble?"

Jack scooped him into his arms. "Just glad to see you, buddy." Anna had just reached the door of the trailer when Jack leaped through the opening with the boy in his arms. "The cellar!"

This time she didn't hesitate or argue, but instantly reversed her direction. They sprinted back across the field and past the barn. The distance had never seemed so far. Hard as they were running, it seemed to Jack they were making no progress, until suddenly they were there. David was clinging to his neck so tightly that it was left to Anna to open the cellar door. She had difficulty lifting it, then the wind caught it and slammed it against the ground. Jack glanced over his shoulder. The twister had dipped lower and was cutting a furrow through the field they had just crossed. Faster than his eyes could register the bizarre sight, fence posts were being plucked from the ground and sucked up into the whirling funnel. The sound was horrific. Anna scrambled down the steps ahead of him and David, Jack passed the boy to her, then fought with all his strength to lift the door up so he could close it. For what seemed like an eternity, he played tug-of-war with Mother Nature at her most ferocious. The tin roof of the barn was being ripped off sheet by sheet. One sailed past him. Ten yards closer and it could have sliced him in half.

Putting all his strength into it, gritting his teeth, he managed to get the door up, then ducked beneath it as it slammed shut almost on top of him. He bolted it from the inside. Plunged into total stillness and stygian darkness, and reeling from the battering he'd taken from the gale-force winds, he lost his balance on the concrete steps and stumbled down them.

"Jack?"

He followed the direction of David's quavering voice. But it was Anna's hand he found reaching out for him through the impenetrable blackness. When their hands touched, they clasped tightly. He moved forward carefully, feeling his way, until he was crouched in front of them, touching them. David's leg, Anna's shoulder, her hair, the boy's cheek.

His arms closed around them. While the storm raged outside, he held them protectively. Anna buried her face in one side of his neck, David in the other. His hands cupped the backs of their heads, pressing them closer. Things were hurled against the cellar door with such impetus that David whimpered in fear. Anna felt the vibrations; she shuddered.

Jack whispered reassurances, knowing the boy could hear them, hoping that even though Anna couldn't, she would be comforted by the movement of his breath in her hair. Her hand lay trustingly on his thigh. David's small fist gripped a handful of his shirt. And he knew that this was what mattered. They mattered. He mattered to them. All the rest of it— all the rest of it—evaporated into insignificance.

His throat became painfully tight with emotion. He squeezed his eyes shut to block out the loneliness of his past. He hugged Anna and David closer, cherishing their nearness. Their warmth seeped into him far deeper than his skin. This moment would be locked in his memory forever. Nobody could take it from him. This one time, this moment, he experienced love. Jack could have held the embrace forever, but eventually David became restless. He wiggled free. "Was it a twister, Jack?"

Reluctantly Jack released them and sat back on his heels. "That's what it was, all right."

"Wow, just like the movie." Now that the danger had passed, David was excited. "Do you think it blew our house down? Or picked up our cows and carried 'em off?" Jack chuckled. "I hope not."

Anna's hand found his in the darkness. She bent his fingers back so his palm was flat, then she traced letters against it. " L...i...g... ? Light? Light." He patted her knee, indicating that he understood. "David, is there a light in here?"

"It hangs down from the ceiling."

Jack stood up and waved his arms around until he connected with a single lightbulb. When he pulled the short chain, he blinked against the sudden glare.

"Wow! Look at that spider!" David exclaimed.

But Jack was looking at Anna, and Anna was looking at him. and although she was as wet and bedraggled as a lost kitten, he thought she had never been more beautiful. He noticed how snugly her wet shirt was clinging to her. It fit like a second skin, hid nothing. With admirable chivalry, his eyes moved back to her face, but staring at it posed no hardship. It was so goddamn beautiful, why would he need to look farther? Ragged as he must look, something in her eyes told him he looked pretty good to her, too.

"Hey, Jack? Jack?"

"Leave the spider alone, David," he replied absently. "This is her house, not ours."

"I know, but she's crawling toward Mom."

His daze interrupted, Jack brushed the harmless spider off the wall behind Anna, then took a look around. The ceiling of the cellar was only about four inches above his head. He estimated the enclosure to be twelve feet long and eight feet wide, with two cots along each wall. It was on one of the cots that Anna was still sitting. David had gotten up to explore. On the back wall were several shelves stocked with candles and matches, lightbulbs, canned food and a can opener, a jar of peanut butter, a sealed glass canister containing a box of saltine crackers, bottled water, and a heavy-duty flashlight with extra batteries. At the front end were the steps leading up to the door, which set at a forty-five-degree angle. Jack went up the steps and put his ear to the door. Turning to Anna, he said, "The worst is past, I think. But it's raining hard and I hear thunder. I think we should stay a while longer." David interpreted her signs. "Mom says whatever you think, Jack."