Hurricane Kiss (7 page)

PART 2

Chapter 12

12 HOURS TO LANDFALL

RIVER

No time to talk. We run, hydrate, and keep running, running, and running, stopping to dig pebbles and dirt out of our shoes, then running more, back toward Houston, the way we came. We're next to each other, but on our own, like strangers in a race. I've done miles, marathons before, so I'm used to this. But she isn't. She's winded, struggling. I watch her from the corner of my eye. Sympathy isn't going to help. I look away thinking about everything else.

“I don't know how much longer I can keep …”

Shut up and keep going.
I stay silent.

“You're used to running in the heat, you're in good condition …”

After I came back, I started running again. Every day, any weather, in spite of it. Heat, rain, steam-room humidity, my fuck-you fitness regimen, jumping hurdles, the ones in front of me for the rest of my life. I couldn't change my head, but I could change my body, build hardness, and toughen my heart. I'd become somebody else. Peak fitness or die.

“I have to stop,” she says, nearly gasping for breath.

I don't hear her, I'm deaf. I won't play to that. Suck it up.

“River …
River!
” She grabs my arm and shakes me.

I glance up at the darkening sky. “Two minutes.”

We're on a side street parallel to the highway going against the traffic in an industrial part of town where no one would choose to be. A body shop off to the left, a taqueria, a McDonald's. Warehouses with their protective steel doors down, the outsides zigzagged with bloodred and green graffiti. This is a giant ghost town now. No one's around except for the victims in their cars on the highway. The sky fades from light to dark and then brightens again, as if the sun can't make up its mind. She drops her backpack and is about to sink down when I see them.

“Not there!” I grab her arm and jerk her away, just in time.

“What? What is it?”

“Fire ants.”

There are mounds of them. I kick one of the small hills of sand and it rears up, tiny red ants poking out, springing to life, like an army erupting from a hidden bunker, scattering in all directions, running for cover. I learned about them the hard way. My first week in Texas I was outside in sandals and stepped on an anthill. The next morning I was covered with hellish red bites.

We stop at a clearing farther away and finally drop down. I take out half a pill and tilt my head back.

“Stop taking those,” she says. “You're going to pass out!”

I look at her and don't answer.

JILLIAN

I finally sink down. I didn't think it would be this hard.

River looks at his phone. “Traffic's moving, my dad says.” He shakes his head. “So what, now we run back and it stands still? No way I'm going back.”

I couldn't if I wanted to. “Any idea where we're going to hide out once we're back in Houston?”

He pats his pocket. “I have the key to the school.”

I tilt my head to the side. “Why didn't you tell your dad that?”

“Are you kidding?”

I wait for him to explain, but he doesn't.

“How did you get it?”

“Briggs gave us keys so we could get into the locker room when the school was closed.”

“That was allowed?”

He raises an eyebrow.

“He never asked for it back?”

“Never had a chance …”

“I don't understand …”

He waves his hand dismissively.

It never occurred to me to take shelter in the school. It was a brick building. It looked like a fortress. It was way better than sitting inside a car on the freeway. “There are juice machines and probably food in the kitchen. Of course, we could be accused of breaking in.”

“You think they'll be looking for prints after a hurricane?” River gets to his feet. “Let's get going. A few more miles. You ready?”

Is there's a choice?

I once read about an ultra marathon in California, a 135-mile race in July across Death Valley where temperatures are over 120 degrees. They say it's the world's toughest foot race. It goes from below sea level in Death Valley up to Mount Whitney, over 14,000 feet high.

I never understood who ran those races or why. Maybe guys like River, who needed to jump hurdles and test themselves. They needed victories in their lives to prove that they were strong and could overcome hardship. Or maybe it was about distraction, when everyday life didn't offer you challenges and you needed to up the stakes to feel alive again.

This isn't Death Valley, but it feels like it. I think about that race as I stay in motion, slowing only to sip water before catching up to River. Suddenly I get a cramp, like a knife in the side of my hip. I stop and lean over. I can't move. He glances behind him then runs back. “Blow out and rub it.” I try it, and it eases up. We keep going.

He never asks how I'm doing. He keeps going, oblivious to me. Finally I slow down again.

“I'm so thirsty and tired.” I can't help myself. I'm not a stoic. I can't pretend to be.

“I didn't force you to come.”

No …

He looks off annoyed, then turns back to me. “You can do it.”

“How do
you
know?”

He looks back at me coldly. “Because you have no goddamned choice.”

My head throbs and every joint is burning, but rage or resolve propels me to keep moving. I think of River's tattoo.

Never. Give. In.

I force myself to keep going, trying to understand why this is all happening. If logic's gone, what's left? I consider karmic payback because this is the first time I ignored my mom and ran off. Sari used to call me Miss Goody-Goody because I never got into trouble like other kids in school. I always studied when I had to. My grades were good, I never did drugs or drank much. But now everything was out of my control.

My cell rings: my mom again. I drop the phone into the bottom of my backpack and run faster. I'm furious at her now—for abandoning me, for telling me what to do when she was on another planet. If it wasn't for her, I wouldn't be running a half marathon in weather so hot it can stop your heart.

Chapter 13

10 HOURS TO LANDFALL

RIVER

It's raining now, a soft, steady downpour before the real show when the streets turn into streams. A granola bar and a liter of water, my Danielle diet. So what? I'm used to semi-starvation. That's something you get good at when you're locked away. It beats rancid food and nights with your head in the toilet, upchucking your guts, convinced you're dying.

“What's the matter, hotshot, you don't like hamburger meat mixed with worms?”
The night guard stood at the bathroom door watching me heave again and again. He laughed.
“I wouldn't feed the shit they give you to my dog.”

Then he'd go back to his desk and unpack the food he brought from home. He'd enjoy eating it in front of us, making a show of wiping the steak sauce from his mouth with his clean, white napkin.

With my shaking hands, I slice the top off my water bottle with my knife and hold it out to catch rainwater.

JILLIAN

Kelly calls. “How boring is this?”

Boring?

“Jillian, you there?”

“Yeah.” I try to pretend I'm not out of breath.

“What's wrong?”

“Why?”

She doesn't answer. “How far ahead of us are you?”

No way to fudge this. “I'm not.”

“What do you mean?”

“I left. I ran from the car.”

“Jill, what are you talking about?”

“I left … with River. We didn't think we'd make it on the highway.”

“Are you crazy?”

“I'm getting there.”

“Where are you going?”

“Back. To Houston.”

“What the hell?”

“You're wasting your power,” River says, trying to grab my phone.

I pull it away. “Don't! Kel, I'll call you back.”

“Where in Houston? Tell me Jill! Stay on the phone!” She sounds scared. I've never heard that in Kelly's voice before, and now it scares me. But I can't tell her where we're going. I disconnect.

I reach into my backpack for a juice. Only six of twelve boxes left and two packs of peanut-butter crackers. Stupid to eat those, they're dry, but you don't exactly make smart food choices when you're starving.

My body feels horse-whipped from the run, everything red, blistered, achy, and swollen, my feet bologna-sized, the body's way of saying, “Take a look at how you're destroying yourself.” Oily sweat covers my skin. I must glow like I'm radioactive. I tear at flying strands of hair blindfolding my face.

Whoosh! I lose my balance and pitch forward, landing in mud. “Shit!” I manage to pull myself up then slip again, my eyes tearing up. My legs, shorts, and hands are coated with mud. River glances over, but does nothing. I give up trying to wipe the filth away and rake my hands along the sides of my T-shirt.

I. Am. A filthy pig.
Then I work to wipe my mind of that. It won't help.

K-e-e-p g-o-i-n-g.

I say it over and over to drive the mantra into my brain.

Block everything and keep going. I do until I'm shaken out of self-hypnosis by a deep ache in my ankle. To make it worse, the wind is now sending me sideways, moving like a crab. I lean against a tree by the side of the road, my legs sinking, unable to support me anymore.

I slip down to the ground, landing in a mud puddle. It feels so good to stop, to rest. I lean my head back. How insane to run when I never trained.

“What?” River says, stopping next to me, his face in a hard line.

“I'm … dead.”

His face darkens. “It's not much farther, you can make it.”

I shake my head back and forth. “I can't.” I turn away so he won't see the tears. Is this heatstroke?

My dad tried to run the marathon one year. He never made it because at mile twenty he hit the wall, his legs turned to jelly. They wouldn't support him anymore. That's what this is. The breaking point. My absolute limit. All I care about is sleeping, every part of me aching for rest, crying for help.

“You can,” River insists, his face hardening.

“Just go, OK? Don't worry about me.”

“I'm not going.”

“Why do you even care?”

He stares back at me and doesn't answer, a muscle in his jaw pulsing.

“Go, River. Just go! Leave me alone.” He turns his back on me, but stands there, a hand on his hip.

I close my eyes and feel myself drifting.

“C'mon,” he says, waking me, his voice softer.

I shake my head.

“Jillian!”

“I can't.”

He kneels down in front of me. “C'mon, we're losing time.”

It takes too much energy to answer.

“Jillian,” he says, again.

I close my eyes.

“You
can
,” he hisses. He slaps me hard across the face. “Move. Now!” Smack! He slaps me again.

“Stop it,” I scream, reaching out to grab his hand, but he pulls it back then slaps me again, harder this time, my skin stinging from the blows.

“Get up, get up now!”

“No!” I try to cover my face and head with my hands, fury rising up in me. He is crazy. Aidan tried to warn me, why didn't I listen? Maybe that's why he got locked up, for beating people up and bullying them.

“You're coming,” he says, his teeth clenched. “Just decide you want to.” He pulls my arm roughly and tries to pull me up. “Let's go.”

I refuse to budge. I can't.

“Jillian,” he says, like a warning.

“Why don't you take out your knife and cut my throat? You probably killed someone before, right? Maybe you're used to that now.”

“Christ!” he says, looking away, shaking his head. He shifts, as if he's about to go, then turns back to me.

“I never killed anyone,” he says, looking at me coldly. “But I probably should have.” He grabs my arm. “Up, now.”

I wipe my burning eyes with the back of my filthy hands and start walking again, working at catching my breath, feeling it travel down my scorched throat and lungs. I try to focus on each individual step, every one a triumph. One. Another. Then another. Not how far to go, but the distance growing shorter with every step.

Shorter, shorter, shorter, shorter.
I keep saying the words over and over in my head.
Shorter, shorter, shorter
, obsessed by the repetitive sounds, blocking distraction—heat, sweat, the drawing pain in my feet and legs, every diverting thought …
shorter, shorter, shorter. Shorter, shorter, shorter.

Before I can say anything, River turns down a side street and starts to try the doors of one car after another. I run after him. “What are you doing?” He looks at me and looks away. “Stealing a car?” No answer.

I don't want to get in trouble. But to get us moving faster … and not to have to run anymore. On his fifth try, he finds an old dented Chevy just outside a body shop.

“Bingo.” He laughs. “And the key is in the ignition. Perfect. Get in,” he says, climbing into the driver's seat.

I'm on autopilot, locking my seat belt and staring ahead. He drives down the empty street as the rain suddenly starts to hit harder, pounding on the roof. I've seen these flash floods before in Texas. In minutes the streets turn into wading pools.

River finally gets onto the entrance ramp down to the freeway. So few cars. Everyone is already gone now, and if they're not, they're at home, staying put.

Except us.

Then I look up and see waterfalls. I scream.

They're cascading down the high barriers on both sides of the freeway, pouring down like Niagara. But by then we're already on an exit ramp going into a shallow lake. We plunge in and begin to float. The water level around us rises and within seconds it reaches the tops of our tires and laps at the hood of the car as we move.

“We have to get out of here.” My voice comes out strained, pleading.

River looks around him, running a hand through his hair. “We'll power through,” he says. “It's still moving, we're not flooded out yet.”

Somehow the car keeps churning ahead, only I'm not sure if the water is carrying us or it's the engine that's taking us forward. The water sloshes over the windshield, again and again.

“Jesus,” he mutters as we continue to go forward. Then suddenly I lose my bearings, I don't even remember where we are and I freak, hypnotized by the red rosary beads hanging off the windshield mirror, swinging back and forth violently as the wind shoves the car around roughly. I reach out to grab the beads and they break, spilling down over the floor of the car.

“Oh my God, River, what did you do? What's happening?”

“I didn't do anything!” he says. “It's a goddamned hurricane! Stay calm, OK? Just stay calm. We're almost there.”

“Almost there? We're going to drown in this, Jesus, why did we do this?”

“Calm down, OK?”

My heart feels like it's going to break through my chest. River concentrates on driving, his face as taut and expressionless as his dad's was.

The wind-driven water wallops the car from side to side as the rain hits the roof as hard as golf ball–sized hail. If the car tips, we could get stuck inside. River grips the wheel with both hands, trying to steady it.

Somehow we emerge from the lake. “Pray the motor isn't totally flooded out,” he says. “C'mon babe,” he whispers to the car. The water around us starts to recede. Miraculously, the car keeps going.

He laughs, almost to himself. “Can't believe this old heap is still working. See?”

I bite my lip to keep from telling him to go to hell.

Then a rush of water surrounds us as if a dam broke. It starts to fill the car. Within seconds, it's over our knees.

“Omigod, we're going to drown!”

“Unbuckle your seat belt, quick!” River yells.

“What?”

“C'mon,” he yells, pushing out his door, despite the wall of water pressing back against it, like it's trying to drown us. He manages to get it open and I slide over. Waist-high water surrounds us.

“What are you doing?”

“We'll swim up to the exit ramp,” he says, out of breath. “And walk from there.”

With my heavy wet bag on my back nearly weighing me down, I swim after him, stroke by heavy stroke, the water smacking my face like I'm swimming against the tide. I'm sucking air, water splashing up into my face, every stroke an effort against the force of the water against us. You're saving someone's life, I keep repeating, pretending I have to reach a drowning kid.

River swims ahead of me, every so often glancing back to look at me.

You bitch, Danielle, you bitch
, I keep repeating to myself, anger fueling me, keeping me going, stroke after stroke until I'm closer. We make our way toward the side of the road, and finally we're at the ramp going up. The water is only as high as our ankles as we finally get out.

“Holy shit,” he says, breathless.

I'm breathing so hard I can't answer.

“We're not far now,” River says. “Just a block or two.”

My sneakers are waterlogged, like weights on my exhausted legs. Just a block or two. If I can make it.

RIVER

I have to pull her along, but we get to the school. The wind's blowing crazy hard, the whipping rain flooding the streets, nearly knee-high now, gusts slapping our faces, but finally we're at the back door of the school.

I never thought I'd be here again.

I flash back to the late day practices. It was dark out, we weren't supposed to be there, but we had keys and let ourselves in. We went out to the field and practiced, then we came in and talked strategy. If it went well Briggs ordered pizzas. If not, we stayed hungry.

The strangest thing was that every day at exactly 6:15, Briggs would stop practice. Without a word, he'd walk back into the building for five minutes. We wondered what the hell he was doing.

Then one day one of the guys went to the bathroom, passing Briggs's office during that five-minute break and the mystery came clear. Briggs went inside to feed the canary. Something about the rigidity of that schedule freaked me out.

After practice I'd drive home at eight or nine, stopping for fast food. Then there was homework. I crashed for five or six hours and the next day it started all over again.

“Hope they didn't change the lock.” Jillian stares at me in disbelief.

I fish for the loose keys in my soaking hip pocket. Finally I slide one out. I reach for the handle. “Start praying.”

“That should help.”

“I got you here, didn't I?” She's finally quiet. “You're free to run back to my dad's car at any time, OK? Don't worry, I won't stop you now. You won't be stuck here with me.” I take a deep breath, and insert the key.

It doesn't fit.

She's breathing hard. I look over at her.
Don't say it.

I jiggle it and then struggle to pull it out, finally. I turn it over and try again. I know what she's thinking. I'm not crazy. And no, it's not the goddamn pills.

It still doesn't fit.

“Crap.” I pull the key away and search my pocket for the right one. I used to know it by the grooves, but my mind is dead now. I flatline. I forget things. Everyday things. I take out another one and as I'm about to insert it, it slips from my wet, shaking hand, sinking into the pool of swirling mud covering my sneakers.

“Omigod,” she says.

We drop to our knees searching.

Things don't just disappear, where the hell could the damn key have gone? The rain is pelting our backs, dripping over our heads like we're under faucets. In seconds, it could have floated ten feet away. Tree branches snapping from the live oaks are airborne, smacking our backs. And this isn't even Danielle yet, it's just a hint of what's to come.

JILLIAN

I sift the mud through my fingers. A key doesn't disappear. It's here somewhere. I rake through the dirt again and again.