The town seemed to be nearly deserted. Most everyone had been out on the beach for the festival and fireworks, so when the earthquake struck, and walls and roofs on the old weather-beaten buildings in town had crumbled and caved in, there had been few injuries. Several people had already returned to their businesses and homes to inspect the damage, though, and now as Rachel and Mrs. Manoa and the teenagers ran down Main Street yelling, “Run! Tsunami! Run!” they began to run with them.
“To the rainforest!” one man shouted. “It’s inland and higher. Climb a tree if you need to!”
They came to the SUV and pickup truck they had left parked near the little general store. “Mom, should we try to outrun it in the SUV?” Skeeter panted.
Leilani looked hopeful. She and Skeeter were helping her grandmother, nearly half-carrying her in their haste. Mrs. Manoa shook her head, though. “No, no! The road goes along the beach! It’s too dangerous! Keep running!”
They were nearly past the general store when Kristi heard a voice coming from within. “Help! Help me!’ she heard faintly.
“Mom! Someone is inside!” she cried.
Rachel shook her head. “It’s too late! Here comes the water!” She pointed behind her and Kristi saw a flood of water pouring into the street from the other end. “Keep running, Kristi!”
“Mom, I can’t!” Kristi ducked into the doorway.
“The rest of you, go! Go! I have to get Kristi!” Rachel shouted. She disappeared into the store, as well.
The water was nearly at their heels. Mrs. Manoa pointed breathlessly at a path leading into the rainforest and they veered toward it. Skeeter looked desperately over his shoulder at the little store his mother and sister had entered but he couldn’t abandon Mrs. Manoa. He lifted her off her feet and ran even faster.
The light inside the store was dim, for the electricity had gone out with the earthquake and now only a few emergency lights cast a ghostly glow. “Hello?” Kristi called.
“Help! Over here! The shelves fell on me!” It was the old woman who ran the store. Kristi couldn’t see her, but she knew the voice.
She was trying to pick her way over the mess that blocked every aisle. “I’m coming,” she called to the woman, but in her heart she knew the seconds were flying by. The water would be pouring in any second. Could she reach her in time and free her before the flood was upon them?
“Kristi! Kristi, where are you?” she heard her mother calling frantically.
“Here, Mom! It’s the shopkeeper! She’s trapped!” She had just reached the woman when the water began to pour through the doors. Within seconds it was up to Kristi’s knees. She was stunned at how rapidly it was rising. If she had not reached the old woman when she had, she would have surely drowned.
As it was, she had all she could do to hold the old woman’s head above water until her mother could reach them. Rachel tried to lift the shelf that had pinned the shopkeeper, but she couldn’t budge it. “Hurry, Kristi! Hurry!” she panted.
“Hold your breath!” Kristi told the old woman and let go of her for a second to help her mother push. The shelves moved an inch or two, but not enough. Kristi grabbed for the old woman and lifted her up once more. The shopkeeper gasped for air and then said, “Go! Go! It’s useless! Leave me and save yourselves!”
“No!” a voice said behind them. It was Dan. He grabbed hold of the shelves and he and his mother shoved as if their lives depended upon it, which they did, indeed. The shelves shifted and Kristi was able to pull the woman free.
Just in time. The water was to their waists now. “Upstairs!” the woman gasped. “There’s a storage room upstairs!” She pointed to a doorway only a few feet away. They managed to drag her and themselves to the stairway. The water followed them up the stairs.
For a few seconds they felt safe. They went to the tiny window that looked out over the main street below and stared in awe and dismay at the destruction below. The moon lit the scene and reflected off a swirling, madly rushing river that had been a street just a few minutes earlier. The vehicles that had stood just outside the store and down the street were tumbled in piles here and there, or gone altogether. The buildings across the way stood under twelve or fifteen feet of water. What could be seen of them above the water had mostly been damaged by the earthquake. Whatever was below the flood, they knew had to be utterly destroyed.
“Do you see the kids?” Rachel cried in terror. “Skeeter? The girls or Pete? Do you see Daddy at all?”
Dan shook his head. “I don’t see anyone, Mom. That’s a good thing, though. Maybe it means they all got to safety!”
Kristi couldn’t say a word. She could barely breathe, let alone speak, and she stared out the window in horror and disbelief. What had been a beautiful evening in paradise had turned into a nightmare beyond comprehension. “Oh, God!” her heart cried out. “Wherever they are, keep them safely in the palm of Your hand! Please, Lord! Let me see my father and brother and friends again!”
Dan began to pray out loud, “Lord, You know all about this and You control the earth and everything on it! Please, God, if it is Your will, save us and all our loved ones and bring us back together again. I pray for everyone here on Palekaiko. May this bring honor and glory to You and may people come to know you because of it.” His voice broke so that he could not even say amen. Rachel clutched him and Kristi to her, and she began to pray aloud.
The water on the second floor had risen to their knees and finally stopped, but now they began to hear creaking and loud snaps as the structure of the building began to give way. “I think we need to get up on the roof,” Dan said urgently. “If the store breaks loose we may get trapped inside. We’ll have a better chance of rescue up there. Is there a way up to the roof?” he asked the old woman.
“No, but I think I have an ax here somewhere among the hardware supplies. Perhaps you can chop through the roof.” She was able to go straight to the correct box in the storage room and produce a hefty ax.
Dan grabbed it and started hacking at the low ceiling above them. “Find some rope, too, if you have it, so that we can tie ourselves together, and if you can find anything that will float that we can hold onto, that would be good, too.” Kristi and Rachel began frantically going through the boxes with the old woman looking for anything that would help them in their dire situation.
It was only a few minutes before Dan had chopped his way through. By that time the building had begun to slant and the groaning and creaking became louder and louder. Kristi and the women had found rope and several small coolers. “I think these will float if they’ll stay latched,” Rachel said, “Yes! The lock is solid. Here Kristi, take one for you and one for Dan.” She handed another to the old lady and then added, “Tie it to you so you don’t lose it!”
“Mom, I’m going to get you out first—so you can help the others as they crawl through!” Dan explained quickly when she started to object. She did not hesitate then, but leaped for the hole and scrambled out as Dan and Kristi pushed her from below. The old woman insisted Kristi go next, and soon she was out on the roof with her mother. Dan had no problem lifting the tiny old shopkeeper as Rachel and Kristi helped pull her through. Finally Dan himself managed to crawl out on the roof. He lay there panting for a moment, trying to catch his breath after the exertion and stress of the last few minutes.
“Quick! Tie this rope around you,” Rachel reminded him. The building lurched just then and they all reached out to grab something, anything to keep them on the sloping roof. Dan grabbed for the edge of the hole, as his mother and Kristi held onto his leg. Kristi reached out and caught the old woman by the hand just as she started to slide away. The building settled again and they took that opportunity to quickly tie themselves and the little coolers together.
The water continued to rush below them for a while. They strained in the darkness to see something or someone, but the moon had disappeared behind the clouds and they could see very little in the dark of the night. They called out every few minutes, h
oping to hear rescuers, or at least other people out there who might be waiting for rescue, as well. They heard no one, which was more frightening to them than even the flood itself. Where was everyone?
Kristi knew it could not be even midnight yet. It would be a long, cold night on the roof if help did not come soon. “Where do you think they are?” she finally whispered. She shivered a little in the breeze.
“I think they all made it into the forest, Kristi, away from the water, and they are there waiting until it is safe to come back and look for us,” her mother said firmly. “And I wouldn’t want it any other way.”
“I am so sorry,” the old woman said. “If it hadn’t been for me, you’d all be safe, too.” She began to cry.
“We are safe, right here in the Lord’s hands! It’s just a question of hanging on until daylight when someone comes to rescue us.” She took the old woman’s hand and said, “By the way, my name is Rachel and these are my children Dan and Kristi. I’m the “shifty character” you didn’t quite trust the other day.”
The woman laughed sheepishly through her tears. “Yes, I am sorry about that! You are a naughty girl to tell your mother what I said, though, Kristi! My name is Nana Onakea. Thank you all for saving my life!”
“We can thank the Lord for saving us all! Mrs. Onakea, are there any blankets or jackets or something down there in that storage room? It’s getting very chilly up here and it may be a long night. You and Kristi are both shivering already. Maybe Dan and I can go back down there for a couple minutes and bring up something to keep us warm.”
The woman thought for a moment. “Yes, there is a box under the eaves across from the window full of beach towels. They wouldn’t be as warm as blankets, but they’ll help anyway.”
“I’ll go, Mom. There’s no point in both of us going down there and you can’t get back through the roof on your own,” Dan said. “What about flashlights and batteries, Mrs. Onakea? It would help perhaps if we could signal where we are.”
She shook her head. “There may be a box of batteries, but all the flashlights I had were on display in the store—under water now. Oh—wait a minute! There is one flashlight on top of a box near the stairway! I brought it up there to use when I was looking through some boxes a couple weeks ago. Let me think now…where are those batteries?” She paused for a moment and then said, “There are several small boxes near the box of beach towels. I think they’re in one of those boxes.”
“I’ll hand the stuff back up to you, Mom,” Dan said as he slid down through the opening.
“Hurry, Dan! I don’t want you down there if the building breaks loose of its foundation.”
‘Hey, I found some candy bars! Is it okay if I bring some up for us, Mrs. Onakea?” Dan called out.
“Of course! There are some bottles of water there, too.”
“Got ‘em! And here are the beach towels!” Dan handed the things he had found up through the hole above him. A minute later he had discovered the flashlight and batteries and was crawling back out onto the roof.
Kristi and the two ladies wasted no time in wrapping the large towels around them and covering their legs. Dan ignored the lure of warmth for the moment and scooted to the edge of the roof. He shone the light of the flashlight down toward the water.
The torrent had slowed down, and now the river through the middle of town moved sluggishly, carrying all sorts of debris and destruction with it. Uprooted trees, parts of buildings, furniture, vehicles and rubbish of every sort floated by or became hung up in jams up and down what had once been the same street where a parade had marched by only hours before.
“Look, Mom!” Dan called out. “I think the water’s going down already! If I shine the light on that building across the street you can see where the high-water mark was. It’s already gone down by three or four feet!” The beam of light played across the water and up the wall across from them. Dan was right. The line where the water had risen to its full height was several feet above the surface of the flood right now.
“Oh, thank you, Lord!” Rachel prayed fervently. “At this rate the water should be gone by morning, maybe.”
“Well, I’ll bet you anything Daddy won’t wait until morning to come looking for us!” Kristi said confidently. “Keep shining the flashlight around, Dan, and let’s keep yelling, too. That will help him find us in the darkness.”
Rachel didn’t speak her thoughts aloud. She didn’t dare give in to her fears, or let on to Kristi how scared she truly was. She just prayed that Steve could come looking for them, wherever he was, and that Skeeter and their friends were safely out of harm’s way, as well. “Lord, please bring us all back together again soon. Please, Lord…” she pleaded.
She joined Dan and Kristi in shouting for help from atop the roof. Mrs. Onakea did her best to help them, but her voice was weak and soon she did not speak at all. The night dragged on, only punctuated now and then by slight tremors in which the building shook and they clutched one another and whatever edge they could hang on to in order to cling to their precarious perch.
The moon came and went behind the clouds. Each time its light was at its fullest they peered with a sickening feeling of awe at the horrible mess that had been left behind in the pretty little tropical town. The water continued to recede, revealing the damage the earthquake and tsunami had inflicted upon Palekaiko.
As the moon began to drop in the sky, Kristi felt she couldn’t take any more. She lay down on the sloping roof and closed her eyes, too tired to worry about calling out for help any longer; too tired even to worry about falling off the roof. She was just sinking into sleep when suddenly a shout rang out from somewhere nearby, echoing across the water. Was it a dream, she wondered wearily—or had help come for them at last?
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CHAPTER TEN
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The Shelter of the Trees
The water came like a wall down the street, pushing anything and everything in its path as if it were twigs. Before they knew it, the flood was nearly upon them. They ran desperately, praying they could outrun it long enough to reach some sort of shelter, higher ground, trees to climb—anything. Skeeter felt like his lungs would burst. He had picked up Mrs. Manoa and now was running as fast as he could. She was a small woman, and probably didn’t weigh more than a hundred pounds, but still it was a hundred pounds more than he was used to carrying at top speed. He ignored her cries to put her down. There was no way she could outrun the water. This was the only way.
They reached the edge of the rainforest as the water lapped at their heels. The trees here were too small and too close to the flood to attempt to climb. Their only chance was to get further inland. Skeeter’s heart was breaking. His mom and Kristi were back there, caught in the flood. What had happened to his dad, he did not know. The last he had seen of him, he had run out onto the ocean floor to rescue a little child as the tsunami bore down upon him. Skeeter had no idea if he had made it into the trees, or if he had been swept back out to sea in the raging tidal wave.
He tried to look around him for Dan as he ran, but he could not see his brother anywhere. Pete had Anna and Robyn by their hands and was pulling them along. Leilani was at his own side, begging to help carry her grandmother. Skeeter could not waste the time or breath to argue with her. He just kept running.
The horrible realization came to him that Dan was not with them. Where was he? Had he fallen? Had Skeeter run for his own life with no thought of helping his brother when he needed help? He felt sick. He felt ready to give up the mad dash for safety; let the others try to go on without him, and turn back to look for his brother. Keep running, a voice within him said. Dan and the rest of your family are all safe within My hands.
I know, Lord, but where? Back there? Or are they with you already? Skeeter felt like he could not breathe; like a giant fist had punched him in the gut.
Keep running. Trust Me. Run!
At last they realized they had left the water behind. The ground had risen slightly, an
d they were far enough away from the beach now that the flood would come no further. There were others from the town with them, and they all cast themselves upon the ground, too spent at first to talk, or even cry, in their pain and shock.
Skeeter managed to turn to Pete at last and gasp out, “Dan?”
“He turned back at the last second…to help your mom and Kristi… He told me to stay…with you all and get…you to safety,” Pete panted as he lay there struggling for breath. “Skeeter…he’s okay. They’re all…okay… Trust the Lord.”
Skeeter nodded, but then he started to weep. He felt embarrassed and ashamed to be crying in front of the girls, but he couldn’t help himself. His whole family was gone in the midst of this catastrophe and he didn’t know if they were alive or dead.
Robyn crawled over to him and put her arm around his shoulder. Tears were running down her own face as she said, “It’s okay, Skeeter. They’re all okay. We have to believe that.” She rubbed his back as she spoke. “Just keep trusting the Lord.”
Pete scrambled over to him, as well. “Hey, Skeeter. You did a great job of leading us all out of the flood. You’re the one who got us all safely here. Dan and your folks are going to be so proud of you and the great job you did, when they hear about it! Thanks, buddy!”
Mrs. Manoa put her arms around the boy. “I owe you my life, Skeeter. I would never had made it, if it hadn’t been for you, and Leilani probably wouldn’t have, either, for she would never have left me.”
Leilani and Anna joined them in a group hug, all seeking to comfort and encourage the red-haired boy. Finally he wiped his face off with his sleeve and blew his nose on the shirttail of Uncle Paulo’s vintage shirt. “Nah,” he said, “it wasn’t me. It was God. But come one, everyone, we have to pray for them, and keep praying until we find them!”
Catastrophe at Castaway Cove (Kristi Cameron Book 8) Page 9
