Good Hope Road

The image of Nate hovered in the doorway as I drifted awake in the gray predawn light. Drew stood beside him, not smiling, just watching, his eyes not blue and sparkling like Nate’s, but dark like Daddy’s, brooding, sad, angry.

He came while Daddy was gone hunting and Mama was at work, trying to make it through the day even though she was sick from chemo. Drew stayed just long enough to get the boxes of his stuff that were stored in the barn. No one would have seen him at all if I hadn’t ditched school that day.

“Hey, Jenilee,” he said, standing in the doorway with his ball cap pulled low over his eyes. He looked over his shoulder at his truck, wanting to be gone from there, as if staying in that house any longer would bring it all back. There was a girl sitting in his truck, staring across the pasture at my grandparents’ old house.

“O.K. I missed a lot last semester, but I’ll still graduate next year, I guess. Mama had to have another surgery and chemo.” I watched closely for his reaction, trying to gauge whether he cared. If he did, he didn’t show it. He just crossed his arms over his chest and looked over his shoulder at the truck again. We stood there in silence.

Finally he said, “I heard Nate’s been ditchin’ school. That’s darned stupid. Twelve-year-old kid shouldn’t be ditchin’ school. I’m gonna talk to him about it.”

“I don’t blame him.” I don’t know why I said it, maybe just to tick Drew off, because it hurt me that he didn’t care at all about Mama, that he was five years older than me, a grown-up, yet I was the one stuck home taking care of Mama, when I was only seventeen. “He’s making four-fifty an hour tax-free, helping put in sod for Shad Bell’s daddy’s construction company. Shad got him on there. Shad said he could get me on there filling out construction invoices in their office.”

Drew’s eyes flashed the way they used to when he was about to beat somebody up at school. “You stick with your job at the vet clinic with Doc Howard. You stay away from Shad Bell.”

“At least Shad cares what’s going on around here. At least he’s trying to help me get a job that’ll pay some more money.” I knew that would cut deep, and I wanted it to. Drew and Shad had always hated each other. I wanted Drew to know how lousy I thought he was for running away and leaving Nate and me in the middle of Mama and Daddy’s mess.

Drew took a step forward through the doorway and pointed his clenched fingers at me with a key braced under his thumb like the blade of a knife. “Shad Bell is a drug dealer. The only reason he ain’t in jail is because his daddy’s got the money to bail him out of trouble. You stay away from him and don’t get any ideas about going to work for his daddy, either. You need to spend your time catching up in school.”

I looked at him with my mouth hanging open. There was Drew, who graduated high school only by the grace of the football coaches, who had to join the army because he was one step from being hauled off to jail for fighting and drinking, telling me to be a good student.

“Geez, chill out.” I didn’t want to admit it, but something about what he said made me feel good. No one ever asked me about school anymore. When you’re worried about doctor bills and electric bills, and how to pay for food, high school doesn’t matter much.

Jenilee, pack your stuff and jump in the truck. We’re getting out of here. Don’t worry. I’ll take care of everything. I wished he would say it. For just an instant, I thought he might. Then he turned and left, and the screen door slammed behind him.

I wondered if, as he was driving away, he thought about turning around and coming back, or if he just headed up the road, forgetting us as each mile passed, letting us grow smaller and smaller, until we disappeared altogether.

Funny how after the fact, you always wish your last words to someone were something better. Something better than Geez, chill out. Afterward, I always wondered if I could have said something that would have made him come back. . . .

A truck passed on the road, and my body snapped to life. I pushed off the sofa and looked out the window, hope fluttering in my throat. A thick morning fog hid the road from view, so I listened.

Lowering my head into my hands, I tried to think beyond the throbbing that started where I had hit my head and pounded down my spine. A tangle of images flashed through my mind, images of everything that had happened the day before. Did it really happen, or was I dreaming?

I rushed to the kitchen and grabbed a grocery bag, opened it, and held it next to the coffee table, then swept the pile of papers into it. The old letter and the picture of the baby fell in last. I closed the top so I wouldn’t have to look at them, or wonder, or think. Hugging the bag to my chest, I went out the door and walked into a thick morning fog that shielded me from everything.

I couldn’t see where I was going. It didn’t matter. I let my feet move methodically beneath me, carrying me through the heavy gray stillness toward the light that was dawning somewhere beyond the shroud that covered Good Hope Road.

Bits of paper blew loose from the weeds on the side of the road, cavorted close by, then disappeared into the gray veil like spirits vanishing. A filmy child’s nightgown, white with pink lace, caught a ride on the breeze, floating like a jellyfish in the ocean. Stopping, I watched it swim higher, twist in a swirl of wind, then drift downward and skitter along the road until the fog consumed it. Who did it belong to? A little girl probably only four or five. I wondered if it was her favorite.

I reached out to catch a picture as it tumbled by. I didn’t look at it, just slipped it in the bag and reached for something else. I moved to pick up one scrap, then another, the action pulling me along like knots in a lifeline—grab one, grab the next—a greeting card, a little gold bracelet with Amanda Lynne engraved on it, a kindergarten graduation certificate for the little Taylor boy. I knew his parents. Nearby, I found his school picture. He was smiling all toothless in front, eyes twinkling as if he hadn’t a care in the world. I added his picture to the others in the bag until I couldn’t see the little baby with the blue eyes any longer.

I passed old man Jaans’s place, about two miles up the road from ours. I could see his house at the end of the lane. For an instant it felt like a normal day. The old cracker-box house looked as it always had, paint peeling, screens flapping in the breeze, porch roof sagging where a post leaned cockeyed. I squinted through the fog, expecting to see old man Jaans doing what he normally did since his wife died—tending his small herd of scrawny cows, talking to his chickens, sipping whiskey from the flask he kept in his pocket. When he was sober enough he’d drive down to our house, set fresh milk or eggs on the post by the mailbox, then leave in a hurry in case Daddy was home. He was the only neighbor who bothered to stop anymore.

I continued toward town as the sun crested the horizon, conjuring the warmth of a Missouri July. The wispy fog withdrew into the valleys as I picked my way carefully through the debris on the road, passing farms that were not farms anymore. Where there had been homes, and barns, and families whose names I knew, there were now only piles of rubble and splintered timbers with windows and doors sticking out like broken appendages. Good Hope Road was deserted.

I descended into the valley along Judy Creek, where the fog grew thick again. I slowed my steps, moving carefully. I could hear the rushing water but I couldn’t see it. If the bridge was flooded, I’d never be able to get to town.

A high-pitched bark answered, and Bo bounded through the weeds. “Oh, Bo.” I sighed, slapping a hand over my racing heart and squatting down to pet him as he wiggled around my legs, limping on three feet. “Oh, Bo, you big, stupid dog, where have you been all night?” I stroked my hands over his wiry blue-gray fur, feeling the comfort of something familiar. “What kind of trouble have you gotten yourself into now? It looks like you got yourself wrapped in barbed wire and took the hide off your leg.” Bo whimpered, struggling to break free as I unwound the scrap of barbed wire from his leg. “Stop that!” I hollered, trying to examine the scratches. “Quit! Let me look at this!” Bo yelped and slipped out of my grasp, then started for home at a run. I cupped my hands around my mouth and hollered after him, but he didn’t come back.

“Caleb Baker.” I saw him, a gray form in the morning mist, waving one arm on the far side of the water. His voice was familiar. He’d been one class ahead of me in high school, the chubby kid who made jokes all the time so people would laugh with him, not at him. He’d been away at college for the last few years. “Are you all right?” he called.

He waded in on the other side, and for the first time I could see him clearly. His chest, arms, and face were covered with blood, and his jeans were torn. “It’s not too deep, but it’s fast. Hold on to that tree as you come across. I’ll come out to get you.”

“No, don’t!” I called. “I can make it.” He looked like he could barely support himself. “Don’t come any farther. I’m all right.” Closing the bag of pictures tightly, I slipped the paper handles over my arm and inched into the torrent of muddy water, clinging to the branches of the overhanging tree as the water whipped around my feet.

I reached the end of the tree and saw Caleb close by. Bracing my feet against the pull of the current, I moved nearer to him, one step, two, three, until my fingers touched his and his hand closed around mine. He pulled me to the bank, and we stood dripping on the other side. I closed my eyes for a moment, catching my breath.

“I don’t think so.” He groaned and straightened slowly, so that he stood a head taller than me. “Last thing I remember is unloading cattle yesterday afternoon at the Gann place. Then I heard the tornado coming, and a minute later pieces of the barn were flying everywhere, and I went flying with it like Superman. I must have hit my head somewhere, because when I woke up, it was sometime in the middle of the night and I was pinned under some pieces of the barn wall. I had to wait until the sun came up to figure which way was out. When there was some light, I crawled through a hole and started toward town.”

“Are you sure you’re all right?” I leaned closer to look at the cuts on his face, thinking that there seemed to be far too much blood on him, considering that the cuts were minor.

He nodded, moving away. “Just cuts and bruises.” He braced his hands on his knees, shaking his head. “I still can’t quite get . . . get it straight in my mind, I guess. One minute, I’m delivering cattle from the auction in Kansas City, and the next minute, I’m pinned under the side of a barn and eight . . . maybe ten hours have gone by. I kept laying there in the dark, thinking. . . .”

I didn’t hear the rest. “You were at the cattle auction in Kansas City?” Hope swelled like a tide within me. “Did you see a white diesel flatbed with a brown stock trailer? Did you see Nate and Daddy there? They were hauling a load of brindle cows. Please tell me you saw them, Caleb. They haven’t come home.” I met his eyes, realizing how strange it was for my hopes to be resting on Caleb Baker, who had never said a single word to me all the years we were in school together. I was as invisible to him as I was to the rest of them.

Caleb’s face turned grim, and I felt the hope in my chest sinking like a breath exhaled. “I only saw them first thing in the morning, Jenilee. I know they were there, but it was a big auction, and I left right after lunch with Mr. Gann’s first load of cattle. I’m sorry. I wish I had news for you.”

I nodded, hugging the bag of pictures against myself, listening to the dull crinkling of the brown paper. Despair prickled hot in my throat, and I turned away, unable to talk. I started walking, clenching my fists against the bag and taking deep breaths, determined not to cry.

I painted the image in my mind, trying to make it real, trying out a dozen stories about where Nate was, and what had happened to him, and why he wasn’t back yet. All of them were logical, they made sense, they could happen, I told myself. I couldn’t give up hope. It would be like quitting when Nate needed me most.

I heard Caleb walking beside me, saw the outline of him moving stiffly, rubbing his head. I didn’t look at him or talk to him. I knew if I did, my resolve would crack. I didn’t have the strength to do anything except keep walking as a cold numbness started where my clothes had been dampened by the water and spread over me.

Even the numbness, even the cold were not enough to block out the terrible realities of the storm as we neared Poetry. Each step closer to town brought destruction that was more complete, disintegration of the houses more absolute, until finally we crossed the path of the beast on the final hill above Poetry.

Nothing remained. What had once been a small subdivision was barren earth and streets strewn with bits of wood, brick, and stone. The houses had been lifted from their foundations, so that nothing remained but slabs with twisted conduits sticking out and cement stairs that led to nonexistent porches.

All the trees were gone, the trunks snapped like kindling. Climbing over a fallen tree in the road, I stood looking at the neighborhood, remembering a quiet circle of asphalt with perhaps eighteen or twenty homes and massive pecan and oak trees. Cars in the drive-ways, flowers in the flower beds, toys in the yards.

People. Families. The man who owned the feed store, the lady who worked at the bank, the second-grade teacher who just got married, the Andersons, the Jenkes, the Halls . . .

Staring at what was left of their homes, I tried to connect the image with the neighborhood I remembered, but it was impossible to comprehend that both were the same place.

Beside me, I heard Caleb whisper something. There’s nothing left, I thought he said, but perhaps it was the voice in my own head. The numbness inside me separated me from the warmth of the day, from the scene around me.

I turned to see a woman, motionless like a statue on the steps to a nonexistent porch, her head in her hands. I wanted to go to her, to ask her what had happened and if I could help, but I couldn’t force myself to step into that horrible place.

A half-grown cat emerged nearby. Mud-covered and missing a patch of hair along its back, it limped toward me. Squatting down, I touched it, the sensation of its fur weaving through me. Caleb picked it up and gently set it on top of the bag in my arms.

“Mrs. Atherson?” I wasn’t sure if I said her name or only thought it. She didn’t react. My high school gym teacher just looked through me, then slowly put her hands over her face again, first covering her mouth, then sliding her fingers upward, shielding her eyes from the scene around her.

In my arms, the muddy cat nestled into the folds of the bag and closed its eyes. My mind crawled into the warm space beside it and hid there. I hardly saw what was around us: the road littered with twigs, papers, bits of houses and cars, fallen trees, smashed cans of food, dented pots and pans, broken glass, the bases of shattered lightbulbs, toy animals with the stuffing hanging out, a mangled bicycle, a splintered baby crib.

Nothing remained of Main Street. Where buildings had stood for over a hundred years, there were now only crumbling brown sandstone frontispieces. The wooden walls, the heavy old doors, the blurry blue-tinted plate-glass windows were gone. Vanished, as if someone had dropped a bomb and vaporized anything that was not made of brick or stone.

It was not like anything I could have conjured in a dream. I tried again to connect the image in front of me with the picture of Poetry, where old men sat on benches along the main street, where kids Rollerbladed in the park, and cars lined the street by the café. The images would not meld, as if one could not possibly be the shadow of the other. I clutched tightly to the bundle in my arms, not wanting to see.

A helicopter flew overhead, seeming out of place, and suddenly everything came into focus in a rush of clarity. I saw movement in the streets below—emergency vehicles, trucks, cars, four-wheelers, tractors. Frenzied movement was everywhere. People were sifting through piles of rubble, working in human chains to clear away collapsed stones. Jess Carter was walking the streets of a devastated neighborhood on the west side of town with one of his hound dogs on a leash, sniffing through the piles. The dog zigzagged from one house to the next in eerie silence, Jess following heavily behind him.

“There’s nothing left but the armory,” I whispered, staring at the building that towered on the hill above the baseball fields. The armory parking lot was filled with people lying on cots, lawn chairs, and tarps. Here and there people moved through the maze, carrying blankets, water bottles, cups, various belongings.

He shook his head, mopping the blood-soaked sweat from his forehead with his sleeve. “I’m just . . . tired. My feet are numb. I just need”—he blinked hard, seeming to shake off the fog—“something to eat. I’ve got to find out about my grandpaw, whether or not he was in town yesterday when the tornado hit. He comes over here from Hindsville on Fridays for ministers’ meetings at the . . . ummm . . . the Poetry Café. I need to . . . make sure he’s all right.”

“There’s Doc Howard,” I said, spotting Doc near the edge of the parking lot, wrapping a little girl’s arm. Beside him, Mazelle Sibley, the old lady who used to run the school lunchroom, was holding a box full of bandages, patting the little girl on the head like a puppy. She frowned at me as we came closer, the same way she used to at school. I remembered how glad I was when she retired and went to work helping her son run his convenience store outside of town.

She noticed Caleb, set down the box, and hurried to his side, elbowing me out of the way. “Why, Caleb Baker, my lands, what has happened to you?” She gave me a narrow glance, like she thought I might have been the cause of it. “Lord, you look a sight! It near scared me to death when I caught sight of you just now! Land sakes! Look at that swollen eye.”

Caleb mopped his forehead again. “My grandad. Have you heard anything about my grandad? Was he here in town when the tornado hit? It didn’t hit over near Hindsville, did it?”

Mrs. Sibley patted his hand, then grimaced at the blood on her fingers and stepped away to wipe it on the edge of a towel. “No, he’s all right, I’m sure. He came by our store on his way out of town yesterday, headed back to Hindsville just after lunch. I’m sure he’s fine. You know, as he was leaving, he said, ‘May the good Lord bring you the blessings you deserve today, Mazelle.’ That’s what he said, and I’m sure that’s the reason I survived this terrible storm. Survived without a scratch out in the old icehouse, while the store was torn to bits. I’m sure it was because of Reverend Baker’s special blessing that I survived. Why, it’s—” Across the parking lot, someone cried out in pain, and Mazelle jumped, reaching up with trembling hands to cover her ears.

Part of me wanted to do the same, to block out the sounds around me—the low moans of pain, the high-pitched whimpering of children, the sobbing of men and women, the low murmur of rescue workers’ voices, and somewhere in the distance the baying of Jess Carter’s hound dog.

I looked around the makeshift hospital, my head reeling. The scene was like something on the evening news. People were everywhere, bleeding, crying, hugging one another. I knew most of them—the beauty-shop lady, the first-grade teacher, the new preacher from the Church of Christ, his wife who sold Avon, Wallie Mitchum who ran the feed store.

I stared at a woman, Bob Anderson’s wife, I thought, clutching a baby blanket to her chest, her face turned skyward, her mouth opening in silent sobs, her body rocking back and forth in agony. I thought of the picture of the baby girl.

“Jenilee . . .” Doc Howard’s voice startled me, and I realized he was standing beside us. He looked exhausted, blood-spattered, hollow-eyed. He was rubbing his hand over his heart, the way he used to before his heart attack. “Well, I have to say I’m glad to see you. Weldon Gibson said you’d gone back home after the tornado. I was worried. You took a nasty whack on the head yesterday.”

I shrugged off Doc Howard’s concern, the way I used to when I worked at the vet clinic. Doc always asked too many questions about home. “Are Mrs. Gibson and Lacy all right?”

Doc Howard nodded. “Weldon said his mother is resting. Lacy isn’t talking, and he’s concerned about that. We haven’t been able to get out there to check on them this morning. It’s taking all hands to care for the injured here. We finally located a medical doctor, a fellow who’d been out at the resort golfing before the storm. Sheriff’s deputy brought him back here sometime after midnight.” He reached up and parted my hair, looking at the goose egg where my head hit the wall of Mrs. Gibson’s cellar. “You’d better come in here and get yourself looked at. That head wound is pretty swollen today. You should be checked for a concussion.”

Dimly, I felt the cat move against my chest. “I found this cat at the top of the hill,” I muttered, watching Caleb. “I don’t know what’s wrong. He was talking just fine when we found each other by Judy Creek, but something’s wrong now. He said he was delivering cattle at the Ganns’ place when the tornado came through, and he was trapped under a barn all night.”

“What?” I felt Doc Howard’s fingers go around my elbow. He took the cat from my hands and set it down. “You’d better come on in here and see the doctor. You’re not making sense. Did you and Caleb come in here together? How did you two get here?”

Doc Howard looked surprised. “You shouldn’t have walked here. There are power lines down everywhere, and flash flooding. The tornado came right through town, then zigzagged back and forth across the road for six miles out your way. Nineteen confirmed tornadoes yesterday afternoon, all through the tristate area.” He wiped his eyes with his sleeve, shaking his head. “Never seen anything like it. It’s like hell broke loose yesterday. Twenty-seven towns and cities were hit hard, including Kansas City and the theme park at Cato Creek. We’ve got Lord knows how many people missing at the lake. Everyone was gathered there for the big bluegrass music festival.”

Caleb stood up, and Mrs. Sibley put her hand on his arm, patting him with the towel wrapped around her hand. “You come on over here and let the doctor look at you, Caleb. Come on now. Your granddaddy would never forgive me if I didn’t take care of you. Why, just yesterday, I was telling your grandfather I had kept you in my prayers after you were in that car accident last year, and—”

Doc Howard pulled me forward a few steps until we caught up with them. “Take Jenilee, too,” he interrupted. “Have the doctor look at her. She got a nasty bump in the head yesterday.”

“Oh, of course, Dr. Howard,” Mrs. Sibley said sweetly, adjusting her glasses so that she could look down her nose at me, the way she always did, the way that said white trash without saying the words out loud. Under her breath, she muttered, “Come on, Jenilee,” just the way she used to in the lunch line at school, when she could tell I didn’t have any money. Come on, Jenilee, go around the side and get a peanut-butter sandwich, she’d say loud enough so that everyone would hear. You know a peanut-butter sandwich is what we serve to those who have too many lunch charges. Haven’t your parents filled out the forms for charity lunch yet?

I stopped walking, and looked down at the concrete to keep from having to look at her. “I’m fine. Go ahead without me.” I caught up with Doc Howard before he could walk away. “Have you heard anything about my father and Nate? Are they here? They were headed to the cattle sale in Kansas City yesterday. They never came home.”

Doc Howard hooded his eyes. “There’s not much news coming in. There’s damage all over the area—hundreds of miles in both directions. The radio and TV stations are out. Every hospital for sixty miles is full, and most of the roads going anywhere north are either closed with rubble or flooded, so if your father and Nate are stopped somewhere along the way, they wouldn’t be able to get in touch with you. We’re hoping to have cell phone communication later today, and maybe some of the disaster relief agencies coming in. Right now, everyone’s busy in areas that were hit harder than Poetry. It’ll be a little easier to get information once we get some outside help. Thankfully, there haven’t been any fatalities yet in Poetry.”

I squinted against the sun, looking around the parking lot in disbelief. It was hard to imagine that ours was just a small disaster, that there was worse destruction elsewhere, and that Daddy, Nate, or Drew might be in the middle of it. Blood drained from my face and ran hot and bitter like acid through my body.

His kindness touched some soft spot inside me, and I felt myself start to crumble. Taking a deep breath, I closed my eyes and rebuilt the wall between the rest of them and me. When I looked at him again, he was watching the loading dock with a look of concern. I glanced over just in time to see Caleb stiffen and crash to the cement like a fallen tree, then thrash wildly on the concrete.

Doc Howard grabbed his bag from the little girl’s cot and ran forward. I followed, my mind flashing back to all of the times Doc Howard and I had dealt with injured animals together.

“He’s having a seizure!” I hollered, trying to reach Caleb. “Get his head! Hold his head!” I screamed, but Mrs. Sibley just stood frozen. Doc Howard pushed her out of the way and fell to the ground, trying to protect Caleb’s head. I slid into place beside him, helping to keep Caleb’s head from hitting the concrete.

“It’s all right, Caleb. Hang in there, son. It’s all right.” Doc Howard leaned close to Caleb’s face, trying to keep his attention. “We’re just going to try to keep you from hurting yourself until this thing is over. Try to be calm, son. Can you talk? Can you tell me what’s wrong?” He glanced over his shoulder at Mrs. Sibley. “Where’s Dr. Albright? Get Dr. Albright!” The words were barely out of his mouth when a man in a bloody lab coat ran out of the building to us.

“Head trauma?” he asked, his voice calm and emotionless, an odd contrast to Doc Howard and me. “Can anybody tell me what happened to him?” He tried to shine a flashlight into Caleb’s eyes as the seizure slowed and Caleb’s body relaxed.

I found my voice. “He was fine an hour ago . . . he seemed fine. He was caught in the tornado yesterday. He said he was knocked out and trapped under some boards, but he seemed fine.” Caleb’s face relaxed and he looked desperately at me. “He said he was fine, except that his feet were feeling numb, that he needed something to . . .” Something from the past clicked in my mind as Caleb’s body started to stiffen again. I remembered running into him behind the bleachers at school years before, and him turning away, trying to hide a needle, making a face at me and saying, It’s insulin, all right . . . ? “He’s diabetic!” I exclaimed, leaning close to his face. “Come on, Caleb, stay with us. Am I right? Are you having a diabetic low?”

Frantically, I dumped the contents of the doc’s medical bag, grabbed an IV needle, and tore open the package. Pinning Caleb’s arm between my legs, I pressed a vein and slipped the IV in, then held it. “It’s in. Where’s the IV?” I hollered. “Where’s the bag?”

“I’ve got it.” Hands closed over mine, slipping the tube onto the IV needle, then taking Caleb’s arm from me. “I’ve got it,” the doctor said again, his eyes catching mine for just an instant. “Get me tape.”

“Here you are, Dr. Albright.” Mazelle Sibley elbowed me out of the way and held out a piece of tape. He handed her the IV bag, and she stood above Caleb with it pinched between her fingers.

“It’s all right, Caleb. It’s all right now,” I heard Mazelle Sibley say as Caleb relaxed and started to open his eyes. She swiveled her head and glared at me. “Good Lord, Jenilee Lane, what in the world did you think you were doing? This isn’t one of your animals you’ve dragged home from the woods. You’re lucky you didn’t kill him. Good Lord. For heaven’s sake. Let’s get him inside to a bed. I’ll take charge of him.”

I stood up and stumbled a few steps away, trying to catch my breath, a sense of panic spiraling through me. You’re lucky you didn’t kill him. . . . Old Mrs. Sibley was right. I couldn’t believe what I had just done.

I followed them up the concrete steps onto the loading dock of the armory and stood there, wondering if I should go inside. The sounds from the dim interior were clear and horrible. Moans, sobs, voices I recognized, Caleb groaning as the doctor helped him onto a cot.

I stepped through the door and stared at the maze of army cots lining the walls of the huge, open room. Overhead, sunlight beamed through high glass-brick windows, lighting the scene like a setting from one of the old war movies Daddy liked to watch late at night.

“Jenilee Lane.” I looked down to see old man Jaans, the neighbor whose cows had walked the fence with me, lying on a cot near the door. It seemed like days since I had passed by his place, but it must have been just an hour or two ago.

Old man Jaans shivered beneath his blanket, even though the day was already warm. I squatted down next to him, the bag crinkling in my lap. “Hi, Mr. Jaans.” He held his hand out, and I slipped mine around it. It seemed strange to touch him, to be that close. When he had come to our place to bring milk and eggs for Mama, he always stayed outside the fence. Just like everyone else.

“I don’t know,” I admitted. “Daddy and Nate were gone to the cattle sale when the tornado hit. They haven’t made it back yet.” I bit my lip. “The roads are blocked and all the phones are out. They’re probably just stuck somewhere.” As if saying it with conviction would make it so. “Our house made it through, and I saw this morning that your place looks all right.”

His eyebrows rose, deepening the leathery furrows in his forehead. Shifting painfully, he put his other hand, cold and trembling, on my arm. “What about my cows? Did you see my cows?”

I had a sudden memory of my grandfather touching me that way, his fingers cold against my skin. My heart remembered for a moment how much I loved him, and I smiled at Mr. Jaans, patting his hand. “Your cows looked fine. They’re hungry, though. They followed me down the fence.”

“Oh, praise be!” He let his head fall against the pillow and closed his eyes. “I was on my way home when this thing hit, and I just knowed it had got my cows. Did you see my old white bull, Charlie? He’s scared of storms, you know. Busts loose every time the weather’s bad.”

“No, I didn’t see Charlie, but your cows looked fine.” Amid all the suffering, I felt joy in this one small happy ending, and an unusual tenderness toward Mr. Jaans. “Don’t worry about your bull. You know he always comes home. I’ll go by and feed the cows and look for Charlie when I get home. I’ll watch after them for a few days, all right?”

“It’s all right,” I said, trying to calm her as I would a frightened animal. I smoothed her blood-streaked hair from her bruised face, and recognized her, though I couldn’t remember her name. Her husband was a lawyer from Springfield, and they owned one of the fancy new weekend homes on the lake. Last year they’d sued Mr. Potts because they said his fence was five feet over their property line.

Now here she lay, as helpless as the rest of us. “It’s all right; you have to be calm. We’ll get you inside just as soon as we can.” I felt guilty for every mean thing that had been said around town about her and her husband and their big new house. I felt like our meanness had somehow brought this terrible tragedy on their family.

“I know.” I cradled her face as the rescue workers hurried from the building to bring her inside. “It’ll be all right,” I said, holding her hand as they lifted her and carried her up the steps. “It’s going to be all right.”

“Code blue! We’ve got a code blue on the little girl!” I heard Doc Howard scream as the rescuers laid the woman on the floor. She moaned in pain, and struggled to see her daughter as Doc Howard prepared to begin CPR.

“She’s not breathing!” Doc Howard tilted the little girl’s head back as Dr. Albright turned from the older girl to the younger one, his movements careful, measured, calm compared to Doc Howard’s.

I thought of how many times Doc Howard had dealt with animal emergencies at the vet clinic, and how he got nearly frantic every time. Doc didn’t like to see anything die. It was one of the reasons I liked him so much. He cared about every living thing. Even me.

By contrast, Dr. Albright was cool, detached. He reminded me of the doctors who treated Mama in the big hospitals—the ones who never looked her in the eye once they realized she was a Medicaid case.

The woman moaned and opened her eyes, trying to rise to get to her daughters. “Lie still, ma’am,” I said, pressing against her shoulders. I looked into her eyes, and my mind flashed back to when Mama was in the hospital.

Dr. Albright glanced at Doc Howard, muttering, “There’s no defibrillator. Continue CPR. This one is the most critical. The other girl is breathing, but nonresponsive, probable internal injury, slow internal bleed, flail chest injury.” He moved efficiently, checking the younger girl’s injuries as Doc Howard continued CPR.

I wrapped my arms around her shoulders, half hugging her, half pinning her down, stroking her hair. “You have to be still so the doctors can work.” I looked into her eyes. The soft green centers were barely visible in her swollen, bruised face. “What’s your first name?” I asked, remembering how the recovery room nurses used to ask that of Mama when they wanted her to settle down and focus.

“Linda,” she whispered, her lips drawing back from her teeth in a grimace of pain. “Linda Whittrock. The girls are Crystal and Jennifer. My husband . . .” She winced again, groaning deep in her throat. “Is my husband here?”

“We were on the lake,” she said, looking sideways at her daughters. “The girls and I pulled the boat up to shore and ran for cover when we saw it coming . . . and . . . God, I don’t know what happened. We ran into a shelter. I can’t remember. . . . How did we get here? Is my husband here? James Whittrock? He was back at our lake house, I think.”

Dr. Albright nodded, barely glancing up from his examination. “Call for LifeFlight ASAP. Tell them we’ve got two females, prox ages seven and nine, critical, multiple internal injuries on both, one with a deflated lung and respiratory arrest.” He spoke with as little emotion as he might have used to order a cheeseburger at a drive-through.

One of the rescuers ran toward the door as Dr. Albright turned to examine the older sister again. The girl opened her eyes, deep and brown against her deathly pale face. She regarded the doctor with a strange calm.

The rescuer nodded and headed to the door. Mazelle Sibley watched him hurry past, then looked back at the girls, staring at the scene like she was watching an episode of ER on television.

“Wait!” I called after the rescuer, but he was already out the door. Desperate, I turned to Mrs. Sibley. “The mother says her husband was at their lake house. Can you ask them to see if he’s been brought in? Ask them to put it on the radio.” This might be his last chance to see his daughters. . . .

Mrs. Sibley gave me a scorching look, and my heart hammered in my chest. I’d spent most of my life ducking blows from people like her. “His . . . his name is James Whittrock.”

I realized that Dr. Albright was looking at me, sitting back on his heels, his blue-gray eyes fixed on me, as if he’d suddenly realized I was there. His expression narrowed for just an instant, accenting the frown lines at the corners of his eyes. Was he going to tell me to leave?

Instead, he hung his stethoscope around his neck and used the back of his arm to mop the perspiration from his face, then smooth back the wispy strands of thinning hair that had fallen over his forehead. He glanced at the gold watch on his wrist, as if the time might matter, then moved to Linda Whittrock’s side and began checking her injuries.

I realized he was talking to me. “Umm . . . I think she has a broken leg, and something is wrong with her shoulder. Maybe her collarbone, or maybe a bruised rib. She’s hurting every time she moves it.” He caught my eyes, and I sat there, unsure of what else to say. There was a hard, emotionless look about him that reminded me of Daddy, maybe because he was about Daddy’s age. It made me draw back. “I’m not a doctor. I don’t know.”

“LifeFlight will be here in twenty minutes,” he said. “The girl’s father has been here in the parking lot all night, looking for them. He’s on his way up the hill.”

He ran to his family and fell to his knees beside his daughters, kissing them gently, then hugging his wife and whispering, “I knew you were all right. I knew you were all right. Hi, Jennifer. Daddy’s here. . . .”

Watching the father gently kiss the foreheads of his daughters, a sense of power and awe came over me. Despite all the terrible things happening around us, there in the long beams of sunlight filtering through the high windows, something strong and powerful and timeless was present. For a moment there was no destruction, no pain, no injured to be tended. The world was hushed, and there was only the love of a father for his children.