Just after 4:00 p.m., Kenneth entered room #201 at the Prairie Embassy Hotel without knocking. His son was surprised. Rain hit the east-facing window at a right angle, each drop striking as if three more were waiting impatiently behind it. The overhead light was on, but the room remained dark, which made the frequent lightning strikes seem all the more brilliant.
Kenneth stood in the doorway. He had never seen a storm this powerful in his life. “Are you sure you don’t know any way to stop it?” he asked his son, shouting to be heard over the sound of the rain.
“I have no idea.”
“Then we’d better pack.”
“Agreed.”
In ten minutes they stood, suitcases in hand, in the front lobby, where the water came up to just below their knees.
“Should we pay?” Anderson asked.
Kenneth stomped his foot in the water, splashing it. He looked out the window and saw how trees that had been far from the river were now part of it.
“There’s no need,” he said. “It won’t be a hotel for much longer.”
They opened the front door of the Prairie Embassy Hotel and stood outside. The rain hurt their faces. Leaving the door open, they waded towards their vehicles. Stopping briefly, they looked up. The storm cloud hovered directly over the hotel, rain pouring out of it. They could see that every cloud, all the way to the horizon, was being pulled towards them. Even as they stood still, staring, already drenched to the bone, the cloud grew larger.
“We’ll take my truck, but you drive,” Kenneth said to his son. On his way to the passenger door, he stopped. The water had already reached the top of the wheel wells. There was little chance they could drive away. Turning, he looked back at the Prairie Embassy Hotel and saw the sailboat behind it. To his surprise, it no longer looked unfinished. It now had sails. “But that,” he said, pointing, “would work much better.”
“We did warn them,” Anderson replied.
“Agreed.”