“Hey, if we can find your mom, we will,” Jake told Alice.
“Do you think she’s close?” Timothy asked with a worried tone. “Mom wouldn’t have left us, would she?”
“No way, buddy,” Jake replied, patting the boy’s arm as he held out the cards to Alice. “But, you know, the whole city went bonkers the other day. She probably just got caught up in it.”
“Mom’s fine,” Alice said as she took the cards from Jake. “I can feel it. I’d know if she was hurt or…” Her words trailed off as she gave Timothy a worried glance. She was about to say “dead” then seemed to recognize that her little brother was there and that she needed to protect him from such dark thoughts. The little girl was perceptive and had a lot of spirit, and she reminded Jake of his own daughter, Zoe.
“Hey, Jake. You didn’t invite me to the party.”
Jake looked up to see Marcy watching them from the hallway with a half-smile on her face. Her shorts were wrinkled, and her dark hair was a tousled mess. Timothy turned at the sound of Marcy’s voice, immediately crawling closer to Jake with a frightened expression, yet remaining just out of arm’s reach as if he didn’t quite trust Jake yet. Alice gave Marcy a half wave, but her eyes were full of doubt.
“Hey, Marcy,” Jake said, trying to sound enthusiastic and positive. “I met a couple of friends while you were taking a nap.”
“I can see that,” Marcy said with a knowing nod as she peered at them through her scratched glasses. “I heard some happy voices and thought I was dreaming about faeries, but now I see they’re actually real.”
Alice stared at Marcy for a moment before she stood, walked stiffly over, and stuck out her hand. “I’m Alice. Nice to meet you.”
“I’m Marcy,” Marcy said, looking impressed as she shook the girl’s hand.
“And that’s my brother, Timothy.” Alice glanced over at the boy, who seemed frozen to the spot.
“Hello, Timothy,” Marcy said, nodding at the boy. To her credit, she didn’t approach him or press him to speak, allowing him to speak to her when he felt comfortable doing so.
“Do you need to borrow my brush?” Alice asked, looking up at Marcy’s head. “I brought mine from downstairs.”
Marcy absently reached up, felt around her head, and pushed some loose strands behind her ear. “Sure, um, Alice. Seems like my hair is a bit ratty.”
“Over here,” Alice said, taking Marcy’s hand and pulling her across the front room to where she’d dropped her purple and pink backpack on the floor. Marcy gave Jake a strange look as she limped behind the girl and then waited while Alice rummaged around for her brush.
“How’s your leg?” Jake asked.
“Sore,” Marcy said. “Then again, my entire body is sore.”
“Me, too,” Jake said with genuine sympathy. The only problem was that Marcy could have an infection on top of her beat-up body. “We should probably have a look at it soon.”
“As soon as I’m done with my hair,” Marcy scoffed at Jake in mild offense before Alice handed her the brush. “I need a mirror.”
“I’ve got one right here,” Alice said, lifting a small mirror up so that Marcy could see herself.
Jake could only watch in bemusement as Marcy took Alice’s mirror and worked out the tangles atop her head. Then the little girl came back over and picked up the cards.
“You boys ready to take on the champ again?” Alice asked.
“I wouldn’t talk smack if I were you.”
“Jake, can I talk to you for a minute?” Marcy asked, stepping over to the kitchen.
“Sure,” Jake said, then he looked back and forth between the two kids with a serious expression. “Get ready, because I’m going to ask Marcy if she wants to play. And she’s a beast at Uno.”
Timothy’s eyebrows went up in fear, while Alice only leveled a look of disbelief at him. Laughing, Jake stood and joined Marcy in the kitchen.
“Cute kids,” Marcy whispered as she watched them set up a new game.
“Real cute. Timothy is a little shy, but Alice is a firecracker.”
“I can tell,” Marcy said, crossing her arms on her chest. “Where’d you find them?”
“I got antsy and decided to check out the second floor. Busted in, just like up here, and found them hiding in the first room I checked. She wanted to trade me guns for food.”
“Guns?” Marcy lifted her eyebrow in question.
“Yeah, right here.” Jake turned to the counter and opened the backpack with the guns and ammo, showing Marcy they were unloaded before he placed them back. “One for each of us.”
“Should come in handy,” Marcy said, thoughtfully. “When do you think we should leave?”
“I was thinking we should put together some bug-out packs, wait until the water recedes a little more, and make a break for it. Well, maybe wait for the storm to die down first.”
“It still sounds crazy out there,” Marcy said, listening to the wind and rain pelt the windows.
“I just hope that monster we saw last night was the last tornado we see,” Jake said with a pang of dread. “The weather should give us a little time to rest up without worrying about Hawk and X-Gang. They won’t be out and about tonight. It’s too dangerous.”
Marcy nodded her agreement.
“Let’s go, you two,” Alice called with a note of childish agitation in her tone. “We’ve got business to take care of in here.”
“You heard the lady,” Jake said with a laugh.
“And just like that, we’re a family,” Marcy whispered and then shot Jake a questioning look before she limped into the living room to join the game.
Chapter 9
Sara, Gatlinburg, Tennessee | 8:05 a.m., Wednesday
Sara walked out onto the front porch and stared at the new round of damage caused by the previous night’s storm. Several large branches had gotten ripped off of trees and twisted in with the lower ones, causing a mess of green. Leaves and debris were strewn everywhere, but it didn’t appear that anything big had hit the house since there were no leaks.
The fresh scent of rain wafted around her head, leaving a hint of serenity in her mind. No matter how much destruction it caused, Sara could never begrudge the rain. She folded her arms across her chest and breathed deeply.
Zoe and Natasha followed Sara outside before the dogs bolted past them and launched themselves off the right side of the porch and into the wet grass. Rex landed with a fair amount of grace, but Astro hit the slippery turf and wiped out immediately, his rear end causing water to spray into the air and Zoe to break into a fit of giggles.
“They’re going to be a mess,” Natasha said, shaking her head.
“They’ve been cooped up inside with us all night,” Sara said, watching the dogs get muddy and wet. “They probably couldn’t wait to get outside. I’m half-tempted to take a dive into the wet grass myself.”
“True,” Natasha said, laughing as she took in the beautiful, storm-beaten scenery.
Dion came outside and put his arm around Natasha, and Todd came to stand next to his mother. They said nothing for several minutes before Todd pointed out toward the creek. “Hey, Mom. Look.”
Sara looked to where he was pointing as it hit her like a brick in the face.
“The bridge is gone,” she said in a crestfallen tone, stepping down off the porch and jogging up the gravel driveway with her hand placed over her chest. “It’s just gone.”
Her heart sank in disbelief as she reached the end of the driveway and looked down into the creek’s rushing waters. The cement moorings held splinters of wood where nine big bolts had once held the bridge in place. That was the bridge she and Jake had built by hand, and a lot of love had gone into it. It was hard to believe it was gone.
“Did it smash to bits and float away, or is it underwater?” Sara asked in a confused, saddened tone, as her eyes followed the creek to where it bent downward several hundred feet before plunging off the side of the mountain. The bridge was there, laying half in
the creek and caught on a huge tree where the creek bent.
“The flood must have ripped it from its moorings and carried it down a ways,” Todd said, coming up and shaking his head in wonder.
“I thought it was a goner,” Sara said, breathing easier.
“That must have been a powerful flood,” Dion said. “I guess I shouldn’t be surprised after what we saw at the bottom of the mountain.”
“Never underestimate Mother Nature,” Sara said, looking between the relocated bridge and the gap where it used to be. “But the question is, how do we get across the creek now?”
“We’ve got this, Mom,” Todd said, his voice growing with excitement. “We’ve got plenty of rope. We can hitch up Dion and Natasha’s Subaru to the bridge and pull it out.”
“That might be doable.” Sara put her hand to her chin and rubbed it. “Provided Dion and Natasha agree to that.”
“Whatever you need,” Dion said with a shrug.
Natasha agreed with a vigorous nod. “Yeah, whatever we can do to help.”
“That’s settled,” Sara said. “So how do we get the bridge back into position?”
“I think I know how,” Todd said, then he looked around at the bigger, longer branches laying in the yard. “We strip down some of these longer branches and use them as levers. We can guide the bridge as the Subaru pulls it closer to the moorings. Once we get it into position, we can work it back onto the moorings. It won’t be locked down, but you should be able to drive across it.”
Sara walked along the bank of the creek, thinking. The banks were steep enough to give them the right angles to lever the bridge, but it might not be enough. “We need to put some big rocks beneath the levers to make sure they don’t sink into the mud. Then, it might just work.”
While there was no sunshine coming through the rain clouds, Sara felt her heart lift and her hopes rise. She set her jaw, nodded, and turned to the others. “Let’s start gathering up branches and pulling them over here. We’ll need various sizes, nothing that you can’t lift on your own. Zoe can help as long as the branches aren’t too big.”
They went to work hunting for branches in the yard and then dragging them to the creek. Zoe got in on the fun, dragging semi-usable pieces of wood up and laughing as the dogs wrestled and ran around the yard. Rex and Astro had become fast friends, and Rex seemed to understand that Astro was just a puppy and that he needed to be gentle with him.
Once they’d gathered twenty branches, they went in search of some big rocks. These they found up around the woods on the edge of the yard, and Todd brought the wheelbarrow up so they could pile them in. Sara directed them to find the widest rocks they could, since those would be better to disperse the weight the levers might put on them. The bridge was small, but it was fourteen feet long by ten feet wide and weighed over a thousand pounds.
Dion and Todd each took a wheelbarrow handle and guided the rocks over to the branches, dumping them there. Then Todd ran and got a couple of saws out of the shed so they could start trimming the branches. While they did that, Natasha brought the Subaru around, and Sara and Natasha started laying out the rope.
It took them an hour and a half to get the branches trimmed and the rocks placed along the near bank. Then Sara and Todd tied anchor ropes around their waists before they carried more rocks across the creek to the other side. The water hit Sara in the shoulder and sprayed into her face like a cold slap, but the rock she was carrying helped weigh her down, and she made it across easily. The only annoyance was being soaked to the bone for the tenth time this week.
The last thing to do was to wade in where the bridge had fallen into the creek and tie the rope to the near corner. Todd and Dion handled that chore, ensuring it was wrapped and knotted around what remained of the anchor piece. They grew into a team as they worked, and soon Sara saw that she didn’t just hope it worked, she knew it would.
“Okay, everyone,” Sara called out. “Let’s get the first levers in place and get ready to move this thing.”
“Can I help, Mom?” Zoe had dutifully stayed back, but she was getting anxious to join in.
“I have a very special job for you,” Sara said, kneeling in front of her daughter. “We’re going to pull that rope really tight, see? And when that happens, it could snap. I don’t want Astro or Rex to get hit by it, or get hit by the car, either.” Sara instantly regretted her words. She never wanted to insinuate Rex could be hurt or even killed, and she was sure Zoe would begin to worry, but the little girl’s eyes were fixed on her mother with intent focus, and she nodded her head in a shake of curls.
“Good,” Sara said, smiling proudly at her little girl. “So, I need you to go put them in the house and shut the door so they don’t get out. You can watch from the porch, and I need you to make sure the dogs don’t get out, okay? Rex trusts you more than anyone.”
“Okay.” Zoe’s smile was huge, and she immediately ran for the house, calling the dogs to her.
The dogs chased after her, and Sara watched as they ran up the front porch and into the house. A few seconds later, Zoe craftily backed out of the house, pulling the door shut behind her. She turned and came to the edge of the porch, waving at Sara.
Sara waved back, whispering, “Good girl, Zo,” before she turned back to the others.
The plan was that Todd and Dion would put two levers beneath the bridge on the near bank in order to lift it out of the water, while Sara lifted the shorter side from the opposite bank. Natasha would give the Subaru a little gas and attempt to pull the bridge up and out of the water. Once they got the edge up onto the near bank, it wouldn’t take much to leverage the bridge back in place.
Sara waded across the creek with a branch about six feet long and two inches thick, then she went over to where she’d positioned a flat rock beneath the short side of the bridge. She got on her stomach and wedged the rock close to the bottom of the bridge, climbed out from beneath it, and got her pole. She jammed the end beneath the bridge into the mud and pressed down, testing how high she could get it. Only when she hung from the pole and put her entire weight into it did the bridge lift about an inch.
Todd and Dion tested their side as well, requiring both of them to lean all their weight on their poles to get the bridge to come up even an inch. That would have to be good enough.
Natasha started the Subaru and inched it forward so that the rope went taut. Her job would be the most difficult of all because she had to edge the car forward without giving it too much gas. If she gunned it, she could snap the rope or even damage the bridge.
“On three,” Sara called, exchanging firm nods with Dion and Todd to acknowledge they were ready. Then she counted.
When she hit “three,” Sara grunted and hung from her lever, shifting her weight back and forth to coax the bridge up. With Dion and Todd’s help, the bridge lifted. Dion called out to Natasha through clenched teeth, and the woman let the car roll forward, pulling the bridge up the opposite bank inch by inch.
Elation surged through Sara’s heart as she grunted and pulled, trying to keep her lever on the rock. But as the bridge moved toward the driveway, it slid her lever to the edge of the rock until it fell off, dropping the bridge back down.
“Whoa!” Dion shouted, and Natasha stopped pulling.
“Okay,” Sara said, standing up and inspecting their progress. “Six inches. Not too bad for a first try. Let’s do it again.”
They repeated the process, moving the bridge eight or ten inches up the bank. Again and again they lifted, pulled, and halted, and the communication between them grew tighter as they moved the bridge inches at a time.
Finally, on the sixth try, they got the other side of the bridge pulled up onto the bank.
“Yes!” Sara called out, dropping her lever and pumping her fist into the air. She was sweating and out of breath, and there was mud splattered up her shins from digging in with her feet to maneuver her side of the bridge, but they’d done it. “Now we just have to get it back onto its moorings.”
Natasha backed up and swung the Subaru parallel to the creek in order to get a straighter pull on the bridge, and then they went at it once more, this time with the confidence of a high-functioning team.
Dion waded over to Sara’s side to help her whenever the ground became too high or muddy, and they managed to get the bridge all the way back to the moorings in ninety minutes. Natasha left the car, grabbed herself a lever, and came over to Sara’s side.
“You boys ready?” Sara asked as Natasha rolled up her sleeves.
“We’re ready,” Todd said, flashing the women a grin. “Go easy on the new lever girl.”
Natasha shot Todd a hard look before she turned to Sara. “Did he just say that?”
“I think he did,” Sara chuckled tiredly, legs shaking and arms aching. Something had strained in her back ten minutes ago, but she didn’t want to stop when they were so close. “Okay, on three.”
Sara counted again, and they leveraged part of the bridge past the first set of moorings. A lot of grunting and three more heaves later, they set the bridge perfectly in place. Sara dropped her pole, walked to the middle of the bridge, and jumped up and down, smiling with numb exhaustion.
The bridge she and her husband had built was back in place, still firm even after a flood had tried to wash it away. It seemed somehow symbolic, representing everything her family had been through the past week. But it also reminded Sara that she needed to be strong and never give up on them, no matter what.
Sara grinned at Todd as he walked across the bridge with sweat and rain on his brow. Sara hugged her son and then high-fived Dion as he passed her on his way to hug Natasha.
“That was amazing, you guys,” Natasha said. “I’m so proud of us.” Dion swung her in a circle so that she whooped and laughed.
“I’m proud of us, too,” Sara said with a sigh.
“I’m so hungry,” Todd said, breaking the embrace and fixing her with a hungry expression only a sixteen-year-old could have. “Can we fix some breakfast now?”
Weathering The Storm (Book 2): Surge Page 6
