North Vancouver
Where was Michael? I peered around. Dust kicked up from under the top damp layer of earth. I blinked through the cloud and saw him stagger toward Jake and me. He walked drunkenly as he tried to stay upright on the buckling ground.
Without warning the ravine ruptured past him. It opened and dragged him in. I caught a glimpse of his panic-stricken face and clawing hands. Then he slid out of sight. My throat tightened and the blood rushed out of my head. I gasped for air and called Michael but didn’t move. Pinecones and small branches littered around me. I covered my head again. Stay. I could do that. Stay calm. Much harder. What else had Tony drilled into me? Stay safe yourself. Try to calm others. In that moment I decided that the quake was not going to beat me. I’d stay strong. I’d stay smart. I’d survive.
Jake was in the tightest fetal position ever. Even though he was older than me, he was totally clueless. I needed to think for both of us. That’s okay I can do that. I rubbed his arm and he lifted his wild eyes to mine. “Cover your head with your hands!” I shouted and showed him how.
He copied me and a rock rebounded off his laced fingers. His body went rigid. With his face still buried, he gave the okay sign. I covered my head again.
The ground pulled one way, then the other. Rocks tumbled down, pelting our backs, legs, and arms as they rampaged past. The earth was warring with itself and we were its innocent victims. Just as I wondered if it would ever stop and how long I could stay calm, it ended.
A few last boulders paraded wildly down the hill. Flocks of birds burst through the air, chattering indignantly. A great horned owl swooped past. An owl in daytime! One of its feathers floated down to me. Without thinking I caught it and jammed it into my pocket.
I tapped Jake’s shoulder and said, “Michael’s back this way! We’ve got to help him.”
He looked at me blankly and gulped like a goldfish. At that exact moment he was probably about as smart as one too. Poor guy. It was his first day in the forest. I hoped it wouldn’t be his last.
“Michael—we’ve got to help Michael.” I squeezed Jake’s hand once and let go before leaping toward the last place I saw my brother. Jake shadowed me. When we got close to the edge of the hole, I dropped to my belly and snaked forward.
Michael dangled, just out of reach, his hands wrapped around a single thin tree root. Terror twisted his face. “Do something—fast! I’m slipping!”
I’d never seen Michael show fear before. Tony didn’t allow it.
Behind me the ground bounced with the impact of a falling tree. I locked my teeth together and ordered the shrill voices in my head to shut up.
“Rowan!” Michael’s roar slapped away my anxiety.
The ravine yawned broader as I watched. The root ripped out of Michael’s hand and he slid farther into the opening wound. He snatched at twigs and tree limbs but the gaping sinkhole sucked him deeper. His eyes stretched wide. His mouth opened in a cry that was lost in the uproar of the scolding birds. I read his lips. “Help!”
Tony said sinkholes could happen anywhere, any time. Especially in earthquakes. Think. Observe.
At one end of the hole was a storm water pipe, big enough to stand in. Parts of it had shattered into large pieces. They lay strewn around the sinkhole. Michael fell back and his head thumped against a chunk of broken concrete. A deranged smile flitted across his lips and he closed his eyes. Time slammed to a halt as I gazed at his unmoving body.
“Michael! Michael!”
No response. I was trapped in a nightmare. No one could hear me except Jake, and he was paralyzed with fear. A clinging smell of wet clay and mud rose around me. The ravine hole had gone from ten feet wide to fifteen. How long before Michael was sucked in and swept away? Dirty water dripped from the open pipe and two rats paced anxiously at the opening. I prayed Michael wouldn’t see them. Rats drove him crazy.
Behind me, Jake lost his lunch. The smell of partly-digested cheese and root beer gum made me gag.
Stay calm.
“Michael, can you hear me? Say something!”
On the suburban edge of the forest, loud bangs rang out like artillery fire.
Gas explosions and fires come with major earthquakes.
Tony’s lessons filled my head. I thought of towering waves dragging helpless victims away from safety. In front of me, murky waters rose around Michael. He stirred and blinked a couple of times.
“I better go home.” Jake’s words rushed out. Shaking harder than a bobble-head doll, he looked at me with dazed eyes.
I kept my tone soft and coaxing, the way I talked to toddlers. “Jake, we can’t just go and leave Michael here. He needs help.”
Jake moaned. “I can’t do anything.”
Before I could reply, a loud blast from somewhere close deafened us. Jake’s eyes widened. I rubbed his shoulders. “You gotta help us. Please.” I gave him my best yearbook smile and nodded encouragement.
A whirlwind of emotions raced through his eyes. At last he nodded.
“Hey!” barked Michael. He pushed himself upright, fully awake now. Bogged by mud, he lifted his feet like an old warhorse. “I gotta get outta here!”
He stomped a single foothold in the clay and rock walls of the gully hole and heaved himself up. The bank crumbled under his feet. As he attempted a second time, the water running into the crevice doubled in volume. Then it tripled. In no time at all Michael was ankle-deep and the water level was rising.
Six inches of moving water can knock a grown man off his feet.
Anyone who’d ever river-fished knew that.
A swell washed the rats into the hole with Michael. They tried to scramble up the steep walls.
Plan.
“Jake! Take off your pants!” I toed off my boots and wriggled out of my jeans. Years of sports had taught me not to be too self-conscious about where I undressed. Still I hated being half-naked in front of Jake. Even when I was fully clothed, he couldn’t take his eyes off me. Luckily I was wearing plain black boy-shorts underwear, nothing sexy. I avoided his eyes but I could still feel his creepy teenaged-male hormones radiating toward my body.
“We’ll make a rope,” I explained to make him think about something else.
Michael braced himself against a boulder. A fresh rush of water surged around him and he saw the rats. His voice jumped an octave. “Hurry!”
Jake stripped to his navy jocks. Then he helped me tie the leg of his chinos to my jeans in a tight reef knot. Michael continued trying to kick steps into the mud wall. Churning brown water swirled up his calves. He leaned into the bank to stay upright.
My pulse pounded in my ears as I watched Jake throw one end of the improvised rope to Michael. “Good,” I said to encourage both of us. “Now we’re going to anchor this end.”
Jake placed his cold hands above and below mine. His touch soothed me in a way I didn’t expect. I smiled at him and he smiled back. We could do this. We could save Michael.
“Ready!” Michael sounded half frightened, half angry.
“Go!” I bit my lip. Jake and I lay, shoulders touching, and held tight. The fabric strained and then went taut. Michael grappled his way up the muddy wall. The rope slipped out of his hands. Horror-struck I saw him glide down the slick ridge, into the filthy water. I screamed his name. He fought his way back to the lifeline and grabbed it again. Then he tightened his arms and charged at us. I could hear Tony as if he were beside me. Show those bastards what you’ve got. Do it, Morgan!
“Do it, Morgan!” I roared and tried to sound as ferocious as Tony.
Grunting loudly, Michael hoisted himself up. When he was just an arm’s length away, Jake and I extended one hand each and hauled him over the edge. The earth shuddered in an aftershock and Michael lunged past us, took two wobbly strides down the path, and let out a loud whoop. Mud covered every inch of skin and clothing, turning him into a slime monster. He scraped his face and a pale mask opened around his eyes. All about us the forest was rearranging itself. Branches clattered to the ground. An occasional bird squawked. More rocks rolled past us down the hill. A siren lit the air somewhere far away.
We looked at each other in stunned silence. Then we shivered off our fear, fist-bumped, and pretended we hadn’t been terrified. I turned away from Jake and dragged on my mucky pants. In the short time since Michael climbed out, the water in the gully had grown to a raging brown torrent. A drenched cat, spinning in the current of the percolating water, was gone before I saw much more than its pointy ears, plastered whiskers and frenzied eyes. Where was Oliver? Guilt pulled at me. In all the confusion and helping Michael, I’d forgotten my best bud. I turned in a circle, hoping to see him. Gone.
“I think we should stay here for a bit. Wait to see if there are any aftershocks or if it’s all over for now,” I said. “And get Oliver. I don’t want to go back without him.”
“I think we have to get out of here, Row. That hole’s getting bigger by the second and we don’t know where it’s going to end. Let’s get somewhere safe—home.”
Michael was losing it. We never called Tony’s place home. Since Tony built the place and Mom refused to move in with him six years ago, we’d only lived with him for the summer, like visitors. Working visitors at that.
He bit his lip, wiped more mud from his face, and continued in a whisper. “Look at this.” He waved his hand at the damage up and down the thickly forested hill. “This was a major quake. That means there could be some killer aftershocks to come. We have to get out of here. Now.”
He was right but I didn’t want to abandon Oliver. He had saved my life once and I couldn’t just leave him there. Pick your battles. Mom’s voice this time. Where was she anyway? I needed to know, urgently. I checked my phone. No service. “Sure,” I said, still casting my eyes around for the scouring pad on legs. I called Oliver’s name a couple of times but the only answering sounds were birds complaining and water rushing in the gaping gully. He could find his way to Tony’s, I told myself. We’d walked here together hundreds of times. He knew the way even though the trail was buried.
The only sure direction was up the hill to the service road that led out of the park. Somehow getting to higher ground seemed like a good idea, especially if any more landslips happened. Michael followed my eyes and nodded but Jake stood fixed to the spot. His hands hung limp at his side. His lips worked silently, as if his vocal chords had been cut.
Another of Tony’s Helpful Hints for Natural Disasters popped into my head. Help calm others. “Drink?” I offered him my water bottle.
He emptied it in a single slug. “Th…thanks,” he stuttered. A moist sheen covered his face.
“Ready?” Michael said as he tightened his bootlaces. Muddy water pressed out of them. “We’re going to have to do some bushwhacking.” He motioned to the mess above us.
Jake nodded mechanically so I turned and led the charge. Debris and fallen branches tripped us with every step. I thought I was in good shape but nothing could prepare me for this. I grunted as I wrangled my way from spot to spot. No one said anything and it took about ten minutes to go maybe fifty feet. The sun fought its way out of the clouds and held a spotlight on patches around us. Steam rose from the shaken earth. When I stopped to catch my breath I noticed even super-jock Michael was red-faced and panting.
He looked around, his eyes measuring the destroyed paths and fallen timber. He said, “What we’re going to do is…Jake, are you with me here?”
Jake stood motionless. His eyes drifted over the forest and he breathed low and shallow. Perspiration poured down his pasty white face. His pupils were dilated. He looked numb. I hoped he wouldn’t faint. If I had to plant my lips on his vomit-coated mouth to revive him, I’d probably puke myself.
“Holy crap, he’s in shock,” Michael whispered.
I moved to Jake’s side. “Hey, Jake, you’re going to be fine. C’mon, let’s lie down for a few minutes. We could use a rest before we hike any farther.” Jake did exactly what I said and I lay down beside him on a mossy patch. “Wow, the clouds are breaking up. I guess that’s the end of the rain for today.”
As I talked, Michael raised Jake’s feet off the ground and propped a large branch under them. I doubted that Jake was really in physical shock but we had to be sure. Tony had forced both Michael and me to take a kajillion first aid courses: babysitting first aid, family first aid, summer camp first aid, pet first aid, manic father first aid. I did the courses, aced the exams, and then forgot most of what I learned. But I did remember what to do for shock and so did Michael. We checked Jake from head to foot for any physical injuries. He had a few scrapes on his hands but he wasn’t bleeding. He could talk okay. He had psychological shock. Who didn’t? His heart was racing and he was close to panic. We had to help him before he got too dazed or depressed.
“Alright, let’s practise deep breathing,” I said. I touched Jake’s stomach. He tightened his abs then relaxed. Helping him helped me; it stopped my urge to get up and run away as fast as I could. “Breathe in and out. Concentrate on making my hand rise and fall with your breaths. Can you do that for me, Jake?”
He nodded and looked at the sky. A creepy stillness settled over the park again. Even the birds stopped their chorus. The quiet calmed Jake and for a while only the sound of our breathing broke the silence.
Then a noise, muffled at first, got louder. The snap and crackle of breaking branches warned that someone or something was moving in our direction. I sat up on one elbow and listened. What now? Michael mouthed the word bear and reached for the canister of bear spray on his belt. His hands shook as he yanked it out of the holster.
He motioned to Jake and me to stay put and ducked behind a fallen tree that blocked the north side of the trail. He tiptoed to one end of it and peered through the branches. Then he straightened. Before he said anything I heard faint whistling. The Gypsy Rover. My granddad used to whistle that all the time. Sometimes he sang it, raspy and off-key. But here, in the woods, with all this destruction and chaos around us, the casual, cheerful sound froze me to the spot.