Storm of the Century

So imagine you’re in your own bed at home. It’s raining outside—hard. You can hear it falling on the roof and blowing against your windows. But you don’t care. You’re all wrapped up tight like a burrito, warm and dry in your blankets.

Okay, now take away the cozy part. And the warm, dry part too. While you’re at it, put some holes in the roof and rip out the windows. In fact, take away everything except the rain, wind, thunder, and lightning.

Now throw in a flimsy tarp that makes Swiss cheese look like reinforced steel, and you’ll have a pretty good idea of what it was like inside our shelter that night.

We were all shoved into the corners, trying to stay out of the drip-drip-drip-drips that kept coming in. Except then the drips turned into drops, and the drops turned into a waterfall. Most of our packs and bags ended up soaked.

I tried to pull my sleeping bag over my head, but that didn’t get me too far. It wasn’t like I was going to sleep, anyway. Not with all that lightning and thunder going off.

Every time we got a flash, I could hear Arnie counting on the other side of the shelter. It was like—

FLASH!

“One Mississippi, two Mississippi, three Mississippi, four Mississippi, five Mississippi, six Mississippi—”

And then—

KA-BLAM!

“What are you doing?” I said.

“Counting the miles,” he said. “Every second is one mile. That’s how far away the lightning is.”

“So it’s still, like, six miles away?” Diego said.

“Something like that,” Arnie said.

“My dad got struck by lightning once,” Burp said. “It was on a night just like this—”

“Shut it, Burp!” D.J. said. I guess Burp’s reputation had gotten around camp by then. But Burp wasn’t one of my problems that night. Everything else was.

And then—

FLASH!

We all counted this time. “One Mississippi, two Mississippi, three Mississippi, four Miss—”

KA-BLAM!

“Four miles,” Diego said.

“Oh, man,” D.J. said. “That’s not good.”

I could hear someone crying over in the girls’ shelter, but I couldn’t tell who it was. I think Sergeant Pittman was in there too, trying to calm them down. But I didn’t get to figure it out because the next time around, it went like this—

FLASH! KA-BLAM!

And then two and a half Mississippis later, we had enough. We all bailed on our wet, miserable little shelter and made a beeline for the warm, dry tent that Fish had set up for himself.

“What are you people doing in here?” Sergeant Fish yelled at us. “It’s just a little rain!”

“Yeah, and the Grand Canyon’s just a little hole in the ground,” D.J. said. “I think I saw that Noah guy going by in his ark.”

“It’s crazy out there!” I said.

“And we’re scared!” Diego said.

“Oh, you’re scared?” Fish said. “Well, why didn’t you say so? Maybe we should all head over to the nearest IHOP for some pancakes until this blows over.”

“Can we really do that?” Burp said, a little too excitedly.

“NO, WE CAN’T REALLY DO THAT! NOW GET OUT THERE, SECURE YOUR SHELTER, AND HUNKER DOWN!!!”

“But our shelter’s toast!” Arnie said.

“Duly noted,” Fish said. “I guess that means you’ll have to tie it down properly this time.”

“But—” I said.

“Now, go! MOVE, COCKROACHES!”

“But—” D.J. said.

“MOVE, MOVE, MOOOOOVE!!!!”

I didn’t think anything could be scarier and louder than that storm, but I was wrong. So we all piled out of Fish’s tent like five blind mice, and started looking for our flashlights, some rope, and whatever was left of our shelter.

Three words: Worst. Night. Ever. At least, until the next night.