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Show Twisters . . . 50 "Arthur!" she exclaimed. "We don't have a house anymore!" His jaw dropped. "We don't?" "All that's left is kitchen cupboards, Mama's bedroom and the bath hooked onto it. The whole neighborhood looks like this." It was Arthur's turn to be speechless. I know how sick it sounds, but, somehow, hearing such bad news made me feel better. We were all in the same boat. We were all homeless. Slowly, we began picking our way toward the street. "Where's Mama now?" Arthur asked, "Patrol cars were down at the end of the block right after the tornado, loading people up. We took the kids down there, I begged her to let me come to Dan's and look for you. She said if I found you, we should get out fast, any way we could. It's too dangerous to stay here," I stopped right in front of her, "I'm not leaving without my mom!" "Of course not, Dan, We'll find her, you'll see." By then Stacey had her arm around me, giving me a squeeze that made me want to cry all over again, "I'll bet she's waiting out the storm at Smiley's right now," A blast of wind plastered my wet clothes to my body, triggering a bad case of the shakes, I prayed to God she was right. Once we got to the street, we took off running. Or trying to run. Arthur and I were in front, Stacey right behind with Ryan in his Levi pouch. There was no time to think about what we might find between our house and Smiley's, we just took off. Covering those three blocks was like reliving my worst nightmare. It must have taken us twenty minutes to get to the corner of Sand Crane and Fonda Way, a distance I've clocked at 1.3 minutes on my bike, 2.4 |
