One Breath Away

by Heather Gudenkauf

  “Nope, never been there.”

  “You’d remember my mom. She’s so pretty. She’s got brown hair. I know that doesn’t sound pretty the way I’m saying it, but it is pretty. It’s all shiny and soft. She’s got blue eyes and she’s skinny, but not too skinny.” P.J. leaned forward in his desk. “You would have known her about nine years ago, I guess.” The man decided to ignore P.J. and took another swig from his water bottle. “Were you in the marines? You look like you could have been a marine. My mom said my dad was a marine and had to go to the war. Were you ever in the war?”

  Mrs. Oliver was so enraptured in P.J.’s account that she didn’t immediately think to make the call.

  “Listen…Parker,” the man said almost kindly, glancing down at the nametag on P.J.’s desk.

  “My name is P.J.,” P.J. told him stiffly, risking a glance at Mrs. Oliver, who was busily fiddling around in her pocket. P.J. had asked her many times to please make him a new name tag that said P.J., rather than Parker.

  “Okay, P.J.,” the man amended. “I’ve never been to Revelation, Arizona. I’ve never met your mother.” A flash of understanding lit his eyes. “And I am most definitely not your father here to kidnap you away so we can live happily ever after. Have you ever taken a look in the mirror? We look nothing alike. I have blue eyes. You say your mother has blue eyes. Two blue eyes don’t make a brown eyes. Your eyes are brown. Get over it, Parker. If your dad hasn’t come looking for you by now, he isn’t ever going to. Now shut up and leave me alone.”

  A storm of emotions skittered across P.J.’s face and finally settled on anger. “Well, I’m glad you’re not my dad,” P.J. said in such a low voice the man had to strain to hear him. “My dad was a marine and he would never come into a school with a gun and scare people. You’re a jerk.”

  The man, to P.J.’s embarrassment, laughed. “I’ve been called much worse things, Parker, but I suppose you’re right. I am a jerk. Now shut up.”

  “My name is P.J.,” P.J. said dejectedly, and plopped back into his seat and buried his face in his arms on top of his desk.

  Mrs. Oliver, meanwhile, wanted to weep for P.J. The man could have been a bit gentler with the boy. She also realized what a sacrifice P.J. had made for her and his classmates. P.J. had never once in the weeks he had been enrolled at the school ever uttered anything about a father. He spoke of his mother, sister and grandparents. But never his father, though the other students asked P.J. about him. P.J. would only shrug his shoulders and quickly change the subject.

  Because P.J. had distracted the man for even just a few seconds, Mrs. Oliver was able to press the first name on her contact list and press Send. With any luck, Cal was listening to their conversation right now.

  Chapter 61:

  Will

  “Theodore.” Will lightly shook the older man’s shoulders and his eyes opened, unfocused and still heavy. “Theodore, Ray did this to you?” Will asked. Theodore nodded, his double chins quivered in agreement. “I’m calling for help.” He gingerly relieved Theodore of the blood-soaked towel and replaced it with a clean one that he pulled from the towel rack and pressed gently against Theodore’s head.

  Once again, Will pulled his phone from his coveralls and, without hesitation this time, dialed emergency. Busy. “Jesus,” Will muttered, disconnecting and trying again. Once again he was greeted by the monotone beep of a busy signal.

  Will looked around helplessly. Theodore Cragg had to weigh at least two hundred and fifty pounds. There was no way that Theodore was in any shape to walk to Will’s truck on his own accord, and it didn’t look like Will would be able to get the man there without help.

  Will debated on which of his sons to call in order to help get Theodore to the hospital over in Mason City. Todd lived in Broken Branch, but it wouldn’t be right to pull him away from the situation at the school and news of his wife’s safety. His next option was to call his eldest son, Joe. The drawback was that Joe lived thirty minutes away on a farm outside of Walton and Will wasn’t sure that Theodore could wait that long for medical care. Will finally settled on calling his friend Herb Lawson, who promised to work on getting help to the Cragg farm.

  The next call Will had to make was more difficult. He dialed Verna’s number. His wife’s best friend answered on the first ring. “Any news on anything?” she asked breathlessly.

  “Now listen, Verna,” Will said, trying to keep his voice from shaking. “You need to make sure that Darlene is in a safe place.”

  “Why?” Verna asked in confusion. “What’s going on?”

  “I’m here at Ray’s and Theodore’s got a nasty lump on his head. Said that Ray was the one who gave it to him. Ray’s nowhere to be found.”

  “Oh, Lord,” Verna said fearfully. “I’ve got to call Gene and Darlene. I told you that man is crazy.”

  “You do that and I’ll make sure that Theodore gets to the hospital. And, Verna, you take care of yourself, too. Marlys needs you, you hear?” Will swallowed back a flood of emotion. What more could this awful day bring?

  Chapter 62:

  Meg

  The road conditions have deteriorated rapidly and I can barely see the pavement in front of me. It’s approaching four o’clock and I have no idea of what’s going on back at the school. I suddenly am nervous about heading out to the Cragg farm without officially letting anyone know. I could end up stranded in a ditch and freeze to death. Cragg could be on a violent bender and shoot me when I show up at his house unexpectedly without backup. What if something big is happening at the school and I should be there assisting?

  I try Randall, the dispatcher, again and finally I hear his familiar voice, a little hoarse from all the talking he’s been doing the past few hours. “Hi, Randall, it’s Meg. Just checking in.”

  “Meg, where are you? You’ve been off the radar for a while,” Randall says a bit snippily. “Chief McKinney has been looking for you.”

  “I’ve been trying to call in,” I say defensively. “I haven’t been able to get through to you.”

  “I know,” Randall says, his tone softening. “It’s still crazy. Parents and kids in the building have been calling nonstop. The parents are asking me what is going on and wondering why the hell we can’t get their kids out of the school. I try to explain that we need to keep the phone lines clear and information will be shared as soon as it’s available, but it doesn’t matter.”

  “Is there any progress?” I ask. I’m about five miles away from the Cragg farm and my palms begin to sweat.

  “Chief McKinney tried to make contact with the intruder by phone and with the bullhorn, but the guy never responded. But from the 9-1-1 calls from within the school I’ve been able to get a sense of which classrooms appear to have had absolutely no contact with the intruder.”

  “Which classrooms are those?” I ask, my heart thumping loudly as I think of Maria’s schoolmates.

  “Surprisingly, no one in the high school wing has seen or heard a thing. So as of now it looks like nine grade levels have had no contact with the intruder of any sort. Plus, the 9-1-1 calls from the primary wing of the building, that’s kindergarten through second grades, indicate that there has been no sighting of a gunman.”

  “Okay, what about third through eighth grade?” I ask as I turn onto the gravel road that leads to the Cragg farm.

  “That’s the strange thing,” Randall says in a puzzled voice. “Initially, that’s where we were receiving the most 9-1-1 calls from. Then all of a sudden nothing. No calls were coming in from those classrooms and the students’ parents and the teachers’ spouses started calling in saying that they couldn’t reach—”

  “The gunman collected all the phones,” I interrupt. “Faith Garrity said that when she saw the man in the hall he dropped several phones. I bet you anything he avoided the high school wing so as not to be overpowered by the older st
udents, collected all the phones from the middle school kids and either didn’t bother to go to the younger grades because they most likely don’t have cell phones or because he was interrupted before he could get to them.”

  “That makes sense,” Randall says. “Listen, you better call the chief, he really wants to talk to you.”

  “Will do. And, Randall, I’m doing a welfare check at the Cragg farm right now, okay? So if you don’t hear from me in half an hour, send someone out here.”

  “What the hell, Meg? Why are you going way out there?”

  “I got some information that leads me to believe that I need to do a check on the Cragg farm. That’s all I know right now, okay?”

  “Okay, but you better call me in thirty minutes. Call my cell—at least I know you’ll be able to get through to me. And call the chief!” he shouts as I disconnect.

  Chapter 63:

  Mrs. Oliver

  Mrs. Oliver stood and went to P.J.’s side, the trill of the cell phone as it dialed Cal smothered by her hand and the denim of her jumper. P.J.’s tirade stopped as suddenly as it began. The man regarded her incredulously. “Sit back down. Now!”

  “I’m just checking to make sure P.J. is okay. You’ve upset him terribly.”

  “He’s fine,” the man scoffed, looking down at P.J., who still had his head down on his desk.

  “This is ridiculous,” Mrs. Oliver said loudly, chin down, trying to direct her voice toward the phone. “How dare you march into my classroom, with a gun no less, and terrify my students for no apparent reason. Thankfully no one is hurt. And then poor Lucy. Shameful the way you locked her in the closet.” Mrs. Oliver knew she was taking it a bit too far, but she couldn’t seem to stop herself. Now that she had an outside audience she wanted to make sure she provided as much information as she possibly could. “You said this was all going to be over soon. Why isn’t it?” Mrs. Oliver took a cautious step toward the man. She fiddled with the fabric of her dress, trying to casually pull the pocket open, hoping that the conversation was audible to Cal.

  “Go sit down,” the man repeated in a low, menacing tone.

  “I will once you tell me what is going on here, when you are going to let us go.”

  Suddenly the man reached out and grabbed the front of Mrs. Oliver’s jumper, sending the remaining rainbow-colored beads skittering across the tile. Mrs. Oliver squawked loudly, more in dismay at the thought of all of Charlotte’s hard work on her jumper ending up on the floor than in fear. “Sit down and shut the fuck up or I will shoot you and every one of these kids in the head!” the man sputtered, his nose nearly touching her own. And to prove his point, he pressed the barrel of the gun against her temple.

  From her pocket came Cal’s voice shouting, “Evelyn, Evelyn, are you all right?” For the first time, Mrs. Oliver realized that this might just be the very last time she would ever hear her husband’s voice.

  The man looked curiously downward toward the source of the voice, reached roughly into her pocket and pulled out the cell phone with Cal still shouting helplessly for his wife. “I love you, Cal,” she managed to say before the man pressed the end button. Mrs. Oliver squeezed her eyes shut as the man ground the barrel of the gun into her cheek and waited for the deafening blast.

  Chapter 64:

  Augie

  I decide not to take a chance by telling the primary teachers that the man with the gun is upstairs. Who knows if he is still in there or if there’s another crazy person running around the school. I would die if someone got hurt because I said it was safe for them to leave the school.

  I take a deep breath and begin my climb up the steps, and because I left my soggy shoes in the gym, the cold floor tiles prickle at my feet. I have no idea what I’m going to do when I get up there. It’s not like I can knock on the door and politely ask to be let in. I don’t particularly want to get shot.

  I’ve only taken a few steps upward when I hear a door open and a soft voice rasping out to me, “Hey, what are you doing?” I trip forward and bang my knee on the step in front of me. I twist my body so that I’m sitting and rub at my kneecap. It’s one of the second-grade teachers, peeping her head around the classroom door. I put a finger to my lips and glance over my shoulder to see if anyone above has heard us. “Is it safe?” she asks. She is young and hugely pregnant. She looks exhausted and is leaning on to the door frame like it’s the only thing holding her up. I shake my head no and she bites at her lip like she’s trying not to burst into tears. “Does he have a gun?” she asks. I nod. Her eyes grow wide with terror and she looks up and down the hallway. “Do you know where he is?” I point upward, still not saying a word. “Get down here, come in here with us,” the teacher says through clenched teeth. “Hurry, he might come this way.”

  I shake my head and push myself up from where I’m sitting. I don’t rush because I’m not afraid that she is going to come after me. I can easily outrun her and her basketball-size belly. “Come back,” she says more loudly than she means to because she claps a hand over her mouth and then whispers, “Please.” I shake my head no one more time, and turn my back on her. Slowly, quietly, I make my way back up the steps toward P.J.’s classroom, not quite knowing what I’m going to do once I get there.

  The last time I had to save P.J. was the night of the fire. I was in my room, texting my friend Taylor, making plans to go to a movie later that night, when the smell of garlic crept underneath my bedroom door making my stomach growl. Mom was making dinner and sautéing vegetables in olive oil on the stove and P.J. was at the kitchen table, working on his science project, painting Styrofoam balls to look like the different planets.

  “Hungry, Aug?” my mother asked as she dumped a bowl of chopped zucchini into the pan.

  “As usual,” P.J. said in a snotty voice.

  “What’s your problem?” I shot back. He ignored me, but I didn’t let it go. “Look who’s talking. At least my belly isn’t hanging over my pants.”

  “Shut up,” P.J. mumbled.

  “Hey,” our mother said. “Both of you, knock it off. Augie, will you get me a hot pad out of the drawer?”

  “Why don’t you ask lardo over there?” I asked. “He’s the one who could use the exercise.”

  “Ha, ha.” P.J. glared at me as he got up and opened the refrigerator, pulled out a gallon of milk and smacked it down on the counter next to where our mother was stirring the zucchini. “At least I don’t have a zit-covered face that causes people to vomit.”

  I think about what I did next every single day. It was only a Styrofoam ball; I knew it wouldn’t hurt him, even if it hit him in the face. “Shut up, loser,” I hollered as I threw the ball in his direction. I didn’t even throw it hard, just tossed it.

  “Aha!” P.J. raised his hands in victory as the ball missed him. Instead, it hit the open bottle of olive oil that my mother instinctively tried to catch before it fell to the ground. I could see the thick, yellow oil spill from the bottle and onto my mother’s hands, shirt, even onto her hair. P.J. was still laughing at me when my mother slipped on the oil that had dripped to the floor and tried to balance herself by grabbing onto the kitchen counter, knocking the pan of zucchini onto the ground and covering herself with more oil. It happened so quickly. Her sleeve barely touched the burner, but when it did, instant flames crawled up her arms like a scurrying bug. I can still see my mother’s face the second before the fire jumped to her hair; her mouth was frozen in surprise, a perfect round Cheerio, but it was her eyes I will never forget. The shock, the this can’t be happening to me look.

  The fire ignited everything that had been touched by the spilled olive oil, like a strange game of dominos, a stack of newspapers and magazines left on the counter, the corner of the curtains, the kitchen cabinets. By instinct, my mom went to the sink and began trying to put out the fire by running water over her hands, splashing it onto her face
, but my one year of Girl Scouts came back to me. Oil and water don’t mix. Flour. I grabbed the rooster-shaped canister that my mom found last year at the Phoenix swap meet, pried off the lid and threw the flour all over her. The white powder covered her face, putting out the flames that had eaten up the hair on the left side of her head and leaving her left ear a charred mess. I gagged at the smell of burned hair and skin, but tried to scatter the remaining flour from the rooster over her arm, which was still on fire.

  “Stop, drop and roll!” I heard P.J. yelling, and my mother must have, too, because she fell to her knees and writhed around on the floor until the fire was out. The curtains and the kitchen cupboards were still burning and a thick smoke filled the room and my lungs. My mother staggered to her feet and yelled for P.J., who had suddenly disappeared. I promised to find him and pushed her toward the front door.

  So here I am again, trying to find P.J. and pull him to safety. At least this time it’s not my fault.

  Chapter 65:

  Mrs. Oliver

  Mrs. Oliver was glad, at least, that she had the opportunity to tell Cal she loved him but was ashamed that her actions could be the reason that her students would never be able to utter those same words to their own families. She expected the blast to be louder and she expected pain. Instead, all she heard was a sharp rap and felt nothing. So getting shot was blissfully pain free, she thought to herself. Mrs. Oliver dared to open her eyes, and in the space beneath the gunman’s arm, she saw the classroom door being opened. The pressure against her cheek fell away and a voice pierced the silence.

  Chapter 66:

  Meg

  I pull up adjacent to the lane that leads to the Cragg home and put the cruiser into Park and kill the lights. I want to make sure I can easily drive away if I need to. I notice that the snow that covers the lane looks recently disturbed, making me believe that someone has driven through here in the past hour. A truck lightly frosted with snow is parked in the driveway, but this doesn’t mean much; most farmers have several vehicles for their use and Cragg could have left earlier in the day. The truck could also belong to Ray’s father, who, against everybody’s better judgment, still drives.