Beyond the Storm: Quilts of Love Series (13 page)

Abigail nodded and allowed herself a second to forget the horror and simply bask in his smile. “It’s okay,” she whispered. Something fluttered in her stomach. He really was nice. Really and truly . . . nice. She couldn’t imagine any of the men she’d dated in the past ever being as heroic as Justin had been through this ordeal. She held his gaze with her own and wondered exactly what it was that made him tick. And if he was this good looking, why wasn’t he already attached? First chance she got, she’d ask Danny.

Bob Ray had hitched a ride to the edge of town with one of the guys from Low Places who’d not only survived but still had a functioning vehicle. The going had been slow and frustrating, and they’d had to stop more than once to drag stuff out of the way. Finally, when the road could take them no closer to Rawston because of wrecked cars and fallen trees, he got out, thanked his benefactor, and struck out on foot. With every step, he begged God to let Heather and his son be okay.

“Please, please, please,” he chanted as he rounded the corner of Fisher’s Mill Highway and turned onto Sycamore Drive, the street that led to his alma mater. Good old Rawston High School was all lit up. But not the way it used to be, back when he was playing football. This looked more like emergency lights being run by a generator. And the flashing red and blues of cop cars. And ambulances. And fire trucks.

A siren squawked as an ambulance backed up and then turned and nosed out onto the road that lead to Southshire. Gravel shot from beneath the tires as it picked up speed and turned the siren on full blast.

Bob Ray quickened his pace. What had been going on at the school? Should have been empty, this time of night. It wasn’t a game night . . . He’d broken a sweat by the time he reached the football field. Everywhere he looked there were traumatized kids, standing around dressed in formal wear, clutching their parents and each other and crying. Bob Ray blinked.
Prom? Was that tonight? Ah, man.
He slowed as he came into the light and sucked in a huge breath.

The gym had collapsed. There were kids on gurneys and lying out on the brick rubble as EMTs set up I.V.s and bandaged wounds. A lot of kids were covered in blood and two kids were covered all the way, with sheets. Fingers of fear closed around Bob Ray’s windpipe, and his breathing came in shallow puffs.
Death.
It was here, too.

But these kids . . . they weren’t like Renee. They were just . . . kids. Innocent. Young. They had their whole lives ahead of them. Just like Heather. And Robbie. Looking into their tear-streaked faces, Bob Ray felt about a hundred years old. Their parents were frantic and sobbing. Just like he’d be, if Robbie had been in there.

For the first time in his life, Bob Ray could understand parental fear.

9:00 p.m.

Justin jumped down off the top of an upended car and headed back to “camp.” They’d been sitting in a circle around the flashlight, Chaz and Isuzu on one 3x3 dog bed, Abigail and Justin on the other and Jen in her lawn chair. They’d created a makeshift three-sided shelter out of some broken crates and sheet metal for Jen, just in case the now clear sky clouded up and it started to rain again. The temperature had lowered considerably, and they were huddling together to conserve a little warmth.

“Looks like they’re inching their way toward us,” Justin said. “I can see the lights flashing on the police cars about three-quarters of a mile from here. It won’t be long.”

He was wearing a men’s suit jacket, as was Chaz. For the women, Chaz had selected an assortment of wool and mohair sweaters. He even managed to dig up a Pendleton blanket for Jen’s lap. The world as they knew it might have ended, but at least they were stylin’. Well, except for the mud and the holes.

Hands on his hips, Justin turned his attention to Jen. “How are you feeling?” he asked. “Any contractions yet?”

“Don’t you sound like you know what you’re talkin’ bout?” Chaz laughed up at him. “He even kind of looks like a doctor now, wouldn’t you say?”

“I say he is Handsome-guy,” Isuzu deadpanned with a glance at Abigail.

Abigail nudged her. “Shut up,” she mouthed.

“Actually, my sister-in-law is a midwife,” Justin explained, pushing his jacket aside and planting his hands on his hips, “so, that makes me an expert-in-law. Plus, my brothers have six kids between them, and their wives aren’t exactly shy about discussing childbirth over dinner. I tell ya, I know a lot more about breastfeeding than I ever wanted to, that’s for sure,” he muttered.

Abigail smiled at his pained expression.

“Contractions?” Jen asked, and shook her head. “No. But my back is killing me.”

“Is it a steady ache, or does it come and go?”

Jen’s brows gathered in a pensive frown. “It was hurting pretty bad about five minutes ago, but then it was better. But it’s really bugging me again.”

“Back labor.”

At Chaz’s amused snort, Justin said, “Hey, I can’t help it if my brothers’ wives are the queens of TMI.”

“You should have been a doctor, man,” Chaz said, still ribbing Justin. “Then she could be paying you for this house call.”

“Don’t give him any ideas,” Jen said and grunted at the pain gripping her back.

Justin knelt down next to Abigail and shined the flashlight at his watch. “I have 9:02. Five minutes ago would have been 8:57. Next time it starts to ache, let me know, and we’ll try to figure out how far apart the contractions are.”

“This can’t be happening,” Jen said.

Justin gave her shoulder a reassuring pat. “Relax as much as you can, okay? I hear first babies are notorious for taking forever to arrive. My nephew took forty-eight hours.”

“
Ohhh
.”

“I’m not helping, am I?” Justin lifted his baseball cap and scratched his head.

“No, no. You are. It’s just that I want Danny.”

“Of course you do.” Abigail shot Justin a helpless look. “I don’t suppose, now that the police are probably less than a mile away that, you know, maybe we should all try to walk Jen down there?”

They all pondered the idea and discussed the ins and outs. “It’s dangerous. There is glass and sharp stuff everywhere,” Justin said.

“But is having a baby out in the middle of it all such a good idea?” Abigail asked.

Justin lifted a shoulder. “No, but then falling down when you are in labor isn’t such a hot idea, either.”

“
Auugh
. I can’t believe we live in this day and age and we are sitting out here without water or electricity or any way to communicate and get help. I didn’t think this kind of thing was even possible,” Abigail said.

“I say we pray,” Isuzu said, and grabbing Chaz and Jen’s hands, began to pray. In Japanese. For a long, long time. When she was finally finished, everyone sighed and echoed her amen, certain that she’d covered all the bases.

“I have sushi.” A disembodied voice came from beyond their small circle of light.

“Bernard?”

“Yes, my lady. At your service. I also found several bottles of fresh water.”

Prayerfully, Isuzu looked up to the heavens. “Thank you! That was quick.”

Abigail’s jaw dropped as Bernard set a Tupperware container of Sakura Garden sushi before them and added two bottles of water. “Eat!” he encouraged and then turned a five gallon plastic bucket upside down and took a seat. “I have dessert, too. But that’s for later.” He patted the cloth grocery sack at his side.

No one wasted a minute arguing. Justin pried the vacuum-sealed lid off and passed the sushi around.

“Oh, this is so good,” Abigail said around a huge mouthful.

Isuzu nodded. “I make this one. I know because I make the California Rolls.”

“Some day, you are going to have to teach me how to make this stuff.”

“Sure. Just as soon as restaurant is built.”

“Oh. Yeah. Well, I can wait.”

Jen’s nostrils pinched as she inhaled sharply. Her words hissed out like a leaky balloon. “What time is it?”

“Why?” Abigail asked, afraid of the answer.

“
Baaack
pain.”

“Uh-oh.” Abigail clutched Justin’s arm in alarm.

“I’ve got 9:07.” Justin rubbed the back of his neck. “Five minutes apart.”

Abigail gnawed her lip and glanced uneasily at Jen. “What does that mean?”

Justin exhaled. “Shoot, I don’t know. I tried to tune out everything the midwife-in-law said after the part about the water breaking.”

“Some doctor you turned out to be,” Chaz griped. “Anybody here know anything about childbirth, you know, just in case?”

“I see good episode of
House
last month. Very informative,” Isuzu said.

“I saw that!” Chaz said. “But I don’t think the mother lived on that one, did she?”

“When my nephew was born, I was at a Knicks game,” Justin said.

“When I was a kid, our dog had puppies . . .” Abigail offered. “Not the same, though, huh?”

“No.” They all agreed, it wasn’t the same.

“Five minutes between contractions is generally the time a woman should head to the hospital,” Bernard offered. “It’s usually best to deliver within 24 hours of the water breaking. To avoid infection.”

Mouths agog, everyone turned to stare at Bernard.

B
ernie,” Abigail said and peered through the diffused light into the strange old man’s face, “why do I get the feeling there is more to you than meets the eye?” They’d aimed the flashlight straight up and topped it with the sushi container to create a makeshift lamp.

He chuckled. “I reckon you could say that about most folks, huh?”

“But how do you know so much about labor?” Justin asked aloud what the rest were thinking.

“Long story.” He shrugged. “I don’t like to talk about it all that much. It’s your garden-variety sob story.”

“Ah.” Abigail picked a stick up and began poking around in the rubble. She pulled out a child’s T-shirt, shook it off, and smoothed it over her knee. It had a fuzzy giraffe on the front. It was so small. And soft. She wondered who it had belonged to. And if they were all right. Justin reached up to trace the giraffe’s soft neck.

“Anyway,” Bernie continued, seeming unable to resist his captive audience, “I used to be a doctor. OBG in fact.”

Justin gave Abigail’s hand an imperceptible nudge with his finger. It was a message. He wasn’t sure if he should believe Bernie. Abigail nudged him back. She wasn’t either.

Bernie propped his forearms on his thighs and squinted at the flashlight. “Used to be a respectable kind of guy. The kind of guy you’d call a workaholic. Got married. Had a couple of kids. Nice house, nice cars. The whole ball of wax. But I was so busy working to get all that stuff, I didn’t have any time to maintain it. So, the wife ran off with the guy who taught her self-defense class; the kids hated me because they didn’t know me; the house and most everything else went to them in the divorce settlement; and because I couldn’t stop working long enough to deal with the pain, I hit the bottle.”

Chaz made an empathetic sound in his throat, and Isuzu reached over and patted his shoe. The fact that he was wearing two different shoes had Abigail wincing.

Bernie’s wheezy laughter was mirthless. “Got so dependent on booze I couldn’t function at work.” There was a definite catch in his gravelly voice when he could finally continue. “Lost a young mother during what should have been a routine C-section. It . . . it was . . .” He dragged a sleeve over his face and struggled to compose himself. “Vowed to never deliver another baby as long as I lived.”

Abigail glanced at Jen for her reaction, but as usual, Jen didn’t appear disgusted or appalled. Just sympathetic. And sad for Bernie.

“Malpractice accusations, lawsuits, criminal trial, a little prison time, and here I am. Ruined, shameful, lost, unable to cope, you name it. Just . . . taking each day as it comes until I can check out. Thought maybe today was my ticket to hell, but I didn’t have the guts to stay outside.” Again, he fell silent, and no one had anything to add.

Selma had amazing night vision. Ever since her second cataract surgery, it was like a miracle. She could read without glasses and see fine print better than she could when she was half her age. So, when it came to navigating a debris strewn wheat field at warp speeds, she was a regular Dale Earnhardt, Jr.

Luckily, the tornado’s swath did not include long stretches of Route 66, and Selma made good time over to Exit 5 and onto Fisher’s Mill Highway. Eventually, they had to stop shy of Sycamore Drive and the high school, but they were light years closer than they had been before Selma decided to 4-wheel-it in a rear-wheel drive. Jerking the Olds to a stop behind a smashed up school bus, she and Guadalupe threw open their doors and hit the ground running. Ahead, the gymnasium area was brightly lit, and it was obvious that the paramedics had been hard at work for a while.

“No,” Guadalupe whimpered, bracing herself for the worst. “No,
no, no.”
She pressed her knuckles to her lips.

“It’s okay, honey. Try not to panic,” Selma said, panting, trotting, and trying to keep up. It was easy enough to say, but she’d been in Guadalupe’s shoes before—in fact the circumstances were eerily similar—and knew that staying calm was next to impossible.

“Elsa!”
Guadalupe began shouting from a block away as she rushed toward the school.
“Elsa! Elsa, donde esta?”
She was crying now and making no effort to hide her growing hysteria.

“Mama!”
Elsa screamed from the parking lot, and charged toward her mother and flung herself into Guadalupe’s waiting arms. Her eyes were puffy and her nose was red and she was jerking from the kind of body-wracking hiccups that come with hard crying. “It was s . . . so
horrible! So terrifying!
I c . . . can’t believe . . . I’m
alive
.”

“Elsa, Elsa, oh, thank God you are all right!”

Elsa’s beautiful prom dress was dirty and torn, but she was—except for an odd bruise here and there, and some serious emotional trauma—injury-free.

“What is it,
hija
?” Guadalupe peered into Elsa’s eyes as the child was crying so hard her guttural babblings were now impossible to understand.

Elsa tried to speak, but had to stop twice to pull herself together. “Two . . . of the kids are
dead
, mama,” she cried, her voice guttural with horror. “And, others are missing and so many are hurt.”

“Muerto?”
Guadalupe gasped. “No!”

“Yes, mama. But they are not telling us who, until their parents arrive. But I think I know, Mama . . . I think . . . I
know
.”

Selma hung her head and began to pray. Because if anyone would know exactly how they felt, it was Selma Louise Tully.

Everyone was on edge. And not just because they’d just barely escaped with their lives from a history-making tornado. And, not just because of the terrible stench of manure that had blown in from a local dairy or the occasional startling collapses of now rickety buildings. No, at the moment, everyone was feeling the stress because Jen had begun labor in earnest. She was a true champion, clearly in terrible pain, but handling it with a strength and grace that was amazing, given the situation. Luckily, the battery in the flashlight was still going strong, and the emergency crews were gaining ground in their direction. Everyone had hope that it wouldn’t be long now. But that didn’t relieve the torment that plagued Jen every sixty seconds.

“Bernard,” Abigail asked, agitated, “Isn’t there something we can do to help her with the pain?”

“No,” he said with a grunt. “Not without an anesthesiologist on hand. Just keep breathing like you’re doing,” he said to Jen. “Pick something to focus on.”

“Here,” Abigail said and spread the tiny shirt with the little giraffe on Jen’s knees. “Look at this and—”

“Hee, hee, hoo,”
Jen breathed.

“Atta girl,” Bernard praised. “You’re doing fine.”

“It hurts so bad, Bernie,” Jen gasped between contractions.

“You do seem to be progressing pretty fast. How many weeks along are you?”

“Almost thirty-eight.”

“Hmm. Could be worse.” Bernie bent down and dug through his grocery bag.

“Found this in the same place I found the sushi. Can’t believe it didn’t break.” He held up a bottle of sake.

Bernard handed the bottle to Chaz. “I was gonna tip it later, but I think we oughta bust it open now.”

“I’m not sure now is the time to party, my man,” Chaz said, staring at the bottle he suddenly found in his hands.

“Not to drink. To scrub.”

“No, thank you.” Chaz tossed the bottle to Justin.

Justin lifted his hand and caught the bottle with a thwack against his palm. “What are you trying to say, Bernie?”

“Just that you might want to have sterile hands. In case you have to deliver the baby.”

Selma was driving Elsa and Guadalupe back to her place when she spotted a young man walking down one of the back roads that was reasonably debris free. Slowing the Olds to a crawl, she peered at his face as he squinted over his shoulder and into her headlights. She rolled her window down and poked her head out. “Bob Ray? Bob Ray Lathrop? It that you, honey?”

“Ms. Tully?” He held a hand up over his eyes to shield them from the glare until he came around to her side of the car.

“Sure is, sweetheart. Do you need a ride home?”

Bob Ray sighed up at the sky. “Ms. Tully, I’m not sure I even have a home anymore.”

“Get in and we’ll go see. If you don’t have a place to stay, I’ll take you and your family home with me.”

Weary to the bone, Bob Ray didn’t argue. He came around the other side of the car and got into the front seat. “Hi.” He turned around and gave a little wave to Guadalupe and Elsa who were snuggled together in the back seat.

“Hi, Bob Ray,” Guadalupe said.

“How are you doing, sweetheart?” Selma asked. “And where is that wife and baby of yours?”

He choked back a spate of tears. “I—I don’t have any idea. I was at work. I think they were at home when the tornado hit.”

“Oh, honey.” Selma reached out and gave his thigh a thumping with her free hand. “That’s gotta be scary.”

For the first time in his life, Bob Ray Lathrop felt the need to get real. His father and Ms. Tully’s son, Paul, had been close friends, and Bob Ray had grown up knowing he was special to Selma. “I’m terrified. I have just been to hell and back and am not sure what is—or is not—waiting at home. And, because of that, I have probably never been better.”

Selma’s brows disappeared under her short bangs. “Now that is not what I expected to hear tonight, of all nights.”

“Not how I expected to answer, ma’am. But tonight I think I finally learned a terrible but invaluable lesson at the School of Hard Knocks. I finally figured out exactly what is important to me. And I’m just praying that my wake-up call didn’t come too late.”

“Sometimes, it takes everything turning upside down to show you what is right-side up. I have had similar epiphanies in my day.”

“I know, ma’am. I remember.”