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Show Twisters . . . 37 "The blanket!" I screamed at Arthur's ear. He pulled it down from the countertop and we covered ourselves our hands shaking wildly. I wasn't worrying about my mom then or my dad or Mrs. Smiley. Just us. Ryan and Arthur and me, huddled together there on the floor. The roaring had started somewhere to the east, then came bearing down on us like a hundred freight trains. Only it didn't move on. It stayed. It was the loudest noise I'd ever heard-whining worse than any jet. There was a great crack and I felt the wall shudder behind us. I knew then our house was being ripped apart. Suddenly, chunks of ceiling were falling on our heads. We'll be buried! was all I could think. At that moment, as plain as anything above that deafening roar, I heard my dad's voice: The shower's the safest place. I didn't question hearing it. Holding Ryan against me with one arm, I began crawling toward the shower. I reached back and yanked at Arthur's shirt. Somehow, we got inside with the blanket. Another explosion and the glass shower door shattered all over the bathroom floor right where we'd been. We pulled the blanket over our heads and I began to pray. Out loud, though I couldn't hear my own voice: "God help us, God help us--" I said it over and over, into Ryan's damp hair, my lips moving against his head. I knew Arthur was praying, too, jammed there into my side. I could feel Ryan's heart beating through his undershirt against mine. My_ heart was thanking God for making me go back for him, but not in words. Outside those places where our bodies touched, there was nothing but terror as the roar of that tornado went on and on. I thought the world was coming |