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Show Twisters . . . 70 I tried picturing them inside that sprawling K Mart store. At least there would be diapers and warm clothes for Ryan. I'd seen their boxes of Pampers stacked clear to the ceiling once . . . and there would be food . . . But what if I couldn't find them? What if there was such a crowd of people there I couldn't find my mom? I'd been lost once in K Mart and just remembering it made my heart beat faster. They'd had to announce me on the loud speaker: "Two-year-old boy wearing shorts and a striped T-shirt." Naturally, I was crying when Mom got to me, but not for the reason they thought. I was three! I had held up three fingers and that lady said I was two. Then another worry.surfaced: What would Mom think when she saw Smiley and not us? Even Smiley didn't know where we were for sure. I caught myself biting my fingernails, something I hadn't done in a long time. Attacked by a high-pitched radio whine as we went around a corner, I sat up and paid attention again, I didn't know exactly where we were, but the street we were on now hadn't been disturbed at all except for some flooding. We had to slow way down going through the water, which splashed high alongside the car, I can't tell you how good it felt for a minute there to see those rows of neat little houses in our headlights, facing each other across the street the way they were supposed to. No debris, no upended trees. Everything nice and orderly . . . everyone asleep . . . Then it struck me-there weren't any lights, anywhere, except ours. We might as well be out in the middle of the prairie. I swallowed into |