Daddy's Little Girl

by William Malmborg

  An odd laugh escaped her lips at the thought.

  Nothing like that would happen today or at any point in the near future. Of this she was certain.

  She looked down at her phone.

  Still nothing from Oscar, not even a “Read at” note beneath the most recent text she had sent him.

  He’s dead.

  She wasn’t sure how she knew this, but the certainty of it was impossible to dismiss.

  Her phone buzzed.

  She looked down.

  It was her dad.

  “Hey, honey, sorry I didn’t call earlier,” Norman said, his eyes watching for washouts and mud patches that could lock up his tires on the old gravel road as he navigated himself farther into the southern outskirts of town. “I was pretty busy with—”

  “Dad!” Lindsey said, cutting him off. “My phone is about to die and we have no power for me to charge it.”

  “Just plug it into the car.”

  The silence that followed put a smile on his face, mostly because it was becoming a rare thing to be able to suggest something to his daughter that she hadn’t already figured out for herself. Such moments were to be cherished.

  “Oh my God, I feel so stupid,” Lindsey said, the sound of the car starting echoing in the background.

  He considered making a joke about how he never would have thought about plugging a phone into the car outlet when he was her age, but then decided against it as his eyes caught sight of a vehicle in a field.

  Van?

  It was about fifty yards from the road, on its driver side, and while it did not appear to be mangled like some of the other vehicles he had seen, the fact that it had ended up so far from the road meant it had probably been bounced around pretty hard.

  “Honey, I need to check something out,” he said, trying to keep the horror of what he might discover from his voice.

  “What is it?” she asked.

  “Looks like a van.” He spotted a VW logo on the front. “Shit, it’s an old Volkswagen.”

  “Anyone we know?”

  “Not with one like this. It looks like it was driven straight out of the sixties.”

  “What do you mean, like tie-dyed and peace signs?”

  “No, just green, but the model. I haven’t seen one like this since college.” He shook his head. “I need to go check and make sure no one’s hurt. I’ll call you back in a bit.”

  “Okay,” Lindsey said.

  “And if you need anything, don’t hesitate to call Judy.”

  He heard a grimace on her end.

  Lindsey was not fond of Judy, and though Judy tried to pretend she enjoyed the company of Lindsey, Norman knew it was a front. The two hated each other, and there was nothing he could do to change it.

  “I think I’ll be fine,” Lindsey said.

  “Oh, I’m sure you will be,” Norman said, eyes still on the vehicle, looking for movement. He did not want to see another mangled body. “And the weather people are saying the worst of the storms are finished for our area, so all should be good from here on out.”

  “Yeah,” she said.

  “Anyway, I have to go. I’m not sure when I’ll be back in, but I’ll keep you posted on what’s going on.”

  “Okay.”

  “Love you.”

  “Love you too.”

  The call ended.

  Norman tucked the phone into the cubby by the cup holders and stepped from his cruiser, feet taking him toward the vehicle, eyes still on the lookout for movement or any other sign of life.

  Nothing.

  If anyone was still inside, they were probably dead.

  Bracing himself for such a discovery, he crouched down to peer through the broken windshield.

  No one was in the two front seats.

  Blood was present on the driver seat and window, which was cracked.

  He looked up at the passenger door and then beyond it to the side door.

  A bloody handprint was present.

  It looked like someone had climbed up through the door and then sat atop the vehicle for a moment, bloody hand on the surface, before jumping down.

  An impact point in the mud marked the landing point.

  But where had they gone?

  Tracks went around the van and headed off toward an old farmhouse in the distance, one that looked to have been spared by the tornado.

  He had no idea who—if anyone—lived there.

  No one was out and about, which was kind of odd given that the typical homeowner would want to check to see if there was any damage following a storm. And if an occupant from the van had gone there for help, it would seem like there would be some sort of commotion.

  Unless the person that had started toward the house didn’t make it.

  For all he knew, the homeowners could be inside, oblivious to an injured person that had collapsed while walking toward them for help.

  He started toward the house, his foot crunching upon something with his first step.

  Keys.

  He reached down and pulled them free from the mud.

  Surprise appeared.

  Two of the keys were typical and looked to belong to the van and the front door of a house or apartment. The third wasn’t typical, not unless the owner was a member of law enforcement, since it was a universal handcuff key.

  Now that she knew her phone wasn’t in danger of dying, Lindsey tried calling Oscar while sitting in the garage, vehicle running, phone plugged into the lighter.

  The call went straight to voicemail.

  She left a message asking if he was okay and begging him to call her as soon as he got the message.

  Following that, she went online to check his Facebook and Instagram pages, but nothing new had been added to either.

  Will Facebook do one of those “check in” things? she wondered.

  With terrorist attacks they did, and for hurricanes, but those incidents seemed to be large scale, whereas a tornado going through a small Illinois town wasn’t. Then again, the tornadoes were hitting all over the place throughout Missouri and Illinois, so maybe that would trigger some sort of regional check-in.

  If so, nothing had been started yet.

  Her phone buzzed.

  She looked at it.

  Gloria again.

  Liz lost her house, the text read.

  What? Lindsey asked back.

  Call me.

  Lindsey did.

  “Lindsey,” Gloria answered.

  “Yeah,” Lindsey said. “What do you mean she lost her house?”

  “It’s gone. Completely.”

  “Fuck, is she okay?”

  “Yeah, she’s fine. Shaken, but fine. They have a storm shelter out there. Like away from the house or something. They were in it.”

  “That’s good.”

  “Yeah, but she can’t find Gizmo.”

  “Oh no.”

  Gizmo was Liz’s cat, a large orange tom that roamed her family’s farm taking care of mice, birds, and snakes, the sight of him once coming in from the field with a dead corn snake in his mouth something that Lindsey would never forget. Though vicious while on the hunt, Gizmo also had a gentle side that saw him curling up in laps where he would purr for hours. He also apparently slept with Liz, often joining her during the first part of the night, then leaving to head out through the kitchen cat door to hunt, and then coming back during the wee morning hours.

  “She’s pretty upset,” Gloria said. “I told her he probably found a place to hide during the storm and is just spooked right now, but that didn’t seem to help her calm down. Anyway, she wants to know if we can come out and help her look for him.”

  “Right now?”

  “Yeah, she’s worried that if she doesn’t find him before it gets dark and if he comes back and finds the house gone, he will think they’ve abandoned him and he’ll leave.” Gloria sighed. “She’s a complete wreck right now.”

  “I don’t think driving around is a good idea,” Lindsey said. “My dad says ther
e are power lines down all over the place and debris everywhere. We might not even be able to get to her place, especially if that is where the tornado hit.”

  “Come on, Lindsey, we have to at least try.”

  Lindsey didn’t reply.

  “She would help us if it was the other way around,” Gloria added.

  “I know, you’re right. It’s just…I don’t know.”

  “Come on, what else are you going to do? Sit around in the dark for the rest of the day?”

  She has a point, Lindsey said to herself.

  Gloria also needed Lindsey to drive since she didn’t have a license yet.

  But what about Oscar?

  Something was wrong. He was either hurt or worse, and his phone was either off or had been destroyed.

  Whatever the situation was, sitting around her house in the dark wasn’t going to help him. Instead, she would simply focus on the conversation he’d had in the locker room that Dennis had overheard and what it all meant.

  “Lindsey?” Gloria asked.

  “Yeah, I’m here, was just thinking.”

  “Well?”

  “Okay, I’ll help.”

  “Great. I’ll be over in a second.”

  “Okay.”

  Gloria was one street over.

  Lindsey reached up and hit the garage clicker and then shifted to back up.

  The garage door did not open.

  Puzzled, she hit it again, only then realizing that with the power out, she would have to open it by hand.

  Idiot, an inner voice said as she stepped out.

  A cloud of exhaust enveloped her.

  Oh fuck!

  Lips squeezed shut, she hurried over to the door and tried lifting it, but it would not budge.

  How the…

  And then she remembered, her right hand quickly twisting the handle on the inner part of the door over to manual and then shoving it upward.

  Air rushed in as the exhaust rushed out, Gloria appearing at the end of the driveway as Lindsey hurried from the dark garage, taking a deep breath.

  “Whoa! You okay?” Gloria asked.

  “Fucking almost killed myself.”

  “What?”

  Lindsey explained about her phone being almost dead and charging it up while in the car.

  “And you sat in there the entire time?” Gloria said. “Smart move.”

  “I was talking to my dad,” Lindsey said. “And then you.”

  She didn’t say anything about Oscar, mostly because she didn’t want to think about the possibility of him being dead. Or dwell upon the fact that he had been bringing over a condom.

  Gloria waved her words away and said, “Do you think we should bring water or something?”

  “That’s not a bad idea.”

  They headed inside and into the kitchen.

  Cool air billowed out from the dark fridge, Lindsey quickly grabbing bottles of water and soda, which she handed over to Gloria, who put them on the counter.

  “Such a waste,” she said as the fridge door closed.

  “What?” Gloria asked.

  “All the stuff in the fridge. We went shopping last night, me and my dad since it was his day off, and now all of it is going to spoil.”

  “Maybe they’ll get the power back on in time.”

  “Maybe,” Lindsey said, though she knew they wouldn’t. Last time a storm had knocked out power, it had taken two days for it to come back on, and there hadn’t been any tornadoes with that one. This time around, entire areas of the town had been destroyed, as well as other towns all across the state. They would be lucky to have power on by the weekend. She looked at the water and soda. “Anything else you can think of?”

  “Have a cat whistle?”

  “Ha, I wish.” She hesitated and then, “Do you really think this is a good idea?”

  “Honestly, no,” Gloria said. “But…”

  “But…”

  “I think it will help Liz. Even if we don’t find him, which we probably won’t, it will keep her mind off the fact that she lost her house and make her feel like she is doing something productive and isn’t helpless.”

  “Yeah.”

  “And afterward we can all come back here and hang out or something while her parents go…shit, where does someone go after their house has been destroyed?”

  “A motel?” Lindsey suggested. “That one north of town?”

  “That’ll help what, twelve families?”

  “Isn’t there one north of here at the exit? The big exit with the McDonald’s.”

  “Yeah, there’s that.

  “And there’s one over in Smith’s Grove.”

  “Okay, I guess they’ll all go to those ones, if they can find transportation.” Gloria looked around. “You have a bag or something that we can put all this in?”

  “Yeah.” Lindsey opened up a cabinet and pulled out a brown paper bag that the groceries had come in and handed it over.

  Gloria filled the bag and then asked, “Should we bring any food? Snack items, things that might go bad.”

  Lindsey thought about it for a moment and then shook her head. “This stuff is fine. We won’t be out there very long.”

  “Yeah, you’re right.”

  “Let’s go.”

  It took Norman eight minutes to walk to the old farmhouse.

  No bodies were present during the journey.

  He was also surprised by the lack of debris, though figured that was likely due to how spaced out the homes were in the farm areas. Back in town, things were different, Judy having called him to advise that while his street had been spared, many of the neighborhoods around it hadn’t been, and debris was everywhere.

  “Aside from needing some new shingles, your place looks pretty much untouched,” Judy had said. She had then offered to go get Lindsey if he liked, but he had told her that wasn’t necessary and that he was going to call her in a second.

  That second had turned into ten minutes given that he had come upon a car with a body inside, one that looked like it had gone through a crusher in a junkyard.

  Cars and houses.

  Two hours earlier, they had all been fine. Now…

  He shook his head.

  It was amazing how quickly things could change.

  He spotted the doorbell and pressed it.

  No one answered.

  He pressed it again and then knocked several times.

  Still nothing.

  He stepped back and studied the house, wondering if it was one of the many that had been abandoned during the last several years. If so, it had done well thus far given that the front door and all the windows he could see were still intact.

  A noise echoed from beyond the house.

  It sounded like a crash or slamming of some kind.

  He walked along the front porch until he came to the side of the house. “Hello?”

  Nothing.

  Steps led down to the gravel of the driveway, which he followed to the rear of the house where a large round area for parking and turning around was present. Beyond it, the gravel continued and led to a barn.

  The door to it was halfway open and moving with the wind.

  Could it have been what slammed?

  At home, they had a back door with a screen that occasionally would come unlatched, and when the wind caught it and threw it into the frame, it sounded like the entire house was about to come down.

  The entire house almost did come down.

  If the tornado had continued eastward through the school and beyond…

  He shook the thought away and called out once again.

  All was still for several seconds, his feet about to turn himself around so that he could head back to the patrol vehicle and radio in to see if maybe the county itself had helped at the van but failed to mark it, when a young lady stepped through the partially opened door, a shovel in hand.

  She stopped when she saw him, startled.

  “Hi,” Norman said, eyes instantly spotting a look of
terror on the girl’s pale face, one that she was trying, but failing, to mask. “Everything okay?”

  “Y-yes,” she said and forced a smile, hand leaning the shovel against the barn wall. “It missed us.”

  “You were lucky,” he said and took a step closer. “Are your parents here?”

  “Yes,” she said, a hand smoothing her hair. “We’re all okay.”

  Something was off, but he couldn’t put his finger on it.

  “You know, there’s an overturned van in your field.” He took another step. “Did anyone come by asking for help?”

  “Help? N-no.” She shifted her eyes toward where the van would be, the house blocking the view, and then back at him, all while her body trembled. He then noticed something running down her leg where it emerged from her skirt.

  Jesus, she just pissed herself.

  “Are your parents in the barn?” he asked and started toward it.

  “Um…no, they—”

  “Mind if I take a look?” he asked.

  “Um…go ahead,” she said, hand motioning him toward the door.

  Norman gave her a nod and then started toward the door, the darkness within heavy despite the fact that the afternoon sun was out and once again shining upon the land.

  He stepped through the doorway.

  A muffled moan echoed.

  He squinted, his eyes taking a moment to adjust. Once they did, he saw a teenage girl on the floor, wrists behind her back, knees and ankles bound, mouth gagged.

  Shit!

  He spun just as something came at his head, the object catching him square in the face, the crack of his nose and a spurt of blood registering within his mind.

  Another shovel blow landed.

  Sparks flashed.

  He staggered several feet, his eyes momentarily clearing before everything went dark again.

  Three

  “No, Mom…no…I wasn’t being reckless. No. We got caught in a hailstorm and took shelter under a bridge and then a tornado hit the bridge. It wasn’t—” Ramsey went silent. “No, we’re going to have to stay here tonight. At the local high school. The police are setting up cots and stuff for everyone that lost their homes.” He listened some more. “Mom, I know, but it would take forever and the entire town is a mess with power lines down all over the place and it’s going to be dark soon.” More listening. “It will be better to wait until tomorrow.”