The Love Sucks Club (26 page)

“That’s my amazon,” Thomas laughs.

Susannah hefts the mag light, making an exaggerated flexing
gesture.
         

“I think we want to leave when the eye hits,” Karen says.

“You’ve got to be kidding,” Sam laughs. “Have you been listening
to the storm?”

“The road will be washed out, Karen. And I’d be surprised if there
weren’t trees down all up and down the road. You aren’t going anywhere.”

“Settle down, Karen. What’s wrong with you?” Rick is exasperated.

“What’s wrong with me? We haven’t spoken to each other in weeks.
We haven’t had sex in months. And now I’m cooped up in here with you and all of
your friends.”

“Well, technically we’re
your
friends, Karen,” Sam says.

She screeches and storms down the hall in the dark, slamming the
door of my spare room. Rick looks at us helplessly. Sam hands him a flashlight.

“I’d recommend going after her,” she says.

“I don’t know what good I can do. I’ve been trying to figure out
what’s going on for weeks.”

Mandy slides down in her chair, waving a beer bottle in Rick’s
direction. “Don’t bother, Ricky old boy. Women are crazy. You’ll never
understand them.”

“Pretty,” I whisper sidelong to Sam.

Breaking one of my own rules, I open the fridge, reaching for a
pound of bacon, a hunk of cheese, and some eggs.

“Oh yeah,” Sam yells. “Bacon and eggs, baby.”

Roxanne joins me in the kitchen. “Want hash browns, too?”

“Totally.”

Grabbing a cutting board and a knife, Roxanne starts dicing
potatoes. Sam chops an onion while I crack some eggs into a bowl. Thomas jumps
up, offering to fry the bacon. Before I can light the stove, I realize that the
sound has died down. Sam looks at me.

“The eye?”

“Yeah.
We
gotta
go.”

“I’ll take over here,” Roxanne says. She lights one of the burners
with a match. “Thank God for propane.”

“We’ll be back in a few. We have to take care of that shutter.”

“It will take a while for the potatoes,” she says, smiling. “I’ll
wait on the eggs until you get back.”

“Do you need help?” Jackie says, standing.

Sam doesn’t even look at her. “We can handle it.”

“We could use an extra set of hands,” I tell Sam.

“Not hers.”

Thomas steps forward. “I’ll help.”

The three of us head out into the rain. Looking up, I can see a
bit of sky through the clouds. Mesmerized for a minute by the swirling clouds,
I stop dead. Sam and Thomas stop too, and we all stand there staring at the
sky.

“Amazing, isn’t it?” Thomas says.

“Amazing and horrifying.”
Sam replies, turning to smile
at him.

“Come on.”

The yard is littered with branches and leaves. There are several
decorative shutters down, but the rest of the storm shutters look good. Sam and
Thomas go around
to look
at the broken shutter while I
run through the yard picking up debris and securing it in the shed. Sam jogs
back, grabbing a handful of nails.

“We’re just going to secure it for now,” she says. “We can fix it
after the storm.”

“Good idea.”

“And you should check out Roxanne’s car,” she calls as she trots
away.

Walking around to the other side of the other, I look around the
corner. All of the cars are covered with sticks, but Roxanne’s car is smashed
under a huge tree limb. It has flattened the roof, broken the windshield, and
caved in half of the hood. “Shit.”

Continuing around the house, I spy Sam and Thomas hammering the
shutter back together. They have it under control, so I continue patrolling.
There’s an awful lot of debris, but the wind is starting to pick up again and I
doubt I can get it all cleaned up before the other side of the storm kicks in.
Someone’s grill is in my yard. Dragging it along, I decide to shove it under
the deck. That should brace it enough to keep it from moving. Kicking it under
the deck, I look at the sky again. The little patch of visible sky is gone and
the wind is whipping through the trees again. The remaining leaves are starting
to drop from the trees. Thomas and Sam meet me at the corner.

“We’ve got it as secure as it’s going to get,” Thomas says.

“All right, let’s go.”

A gust of wind picks up as we run around the house. Stopping at
Roxanne’s car, we look at the damage together. Sam puts a hand on the branch.
“Should we try to pull it off?”

“Maybe, but where will we put it?”

She shrugs.
“Under the deck?”

“Okay.”

Thomas and I grab one end and Sam gets on the other. Lifting it
from the car, we heft it over to the side yard. As we drag it over the yard
toward the deck, the wind knocks us around, and Thomas almost falls.

“Auntie
Em
,” Sam screams, laughing
wildly.

We get the branch to the deck and shove it underneath next to the
grill. Lying down on the ground, I slam my foot against the branch wedging it
in as far as it will go. Sam hauls me to my feet and we run for the door.

“Come on, Thomas,” I yell, as the wind nearly knocks him off his
feet again. Sam reaches back to take his hand. Turning back toward the house,
she takes a tree branch to the face.

“Fuck,” she yells, grabbing her eye.

Yanking her by the elbow, I pull her around the house and into the
door. Thomas slams it shut behind us. Olivia comes tearing over to Sam. “What
happened, sweetie?”

“I’m fine. I think. I just got hit in the face.”

Olivia takes Sam out of my hands and walks her into the kitchen.
“Help me, Susannah.”

Roxanne looks up as the two other women coo over Sam’s head. “Is
she going to be okay?”

“She’ll be fine,” Susannah says, holding one of the lamps near the
wound.

“It’s okay,” Olivia concurs. “We just need to wash it out and pour
some hydrogen peroxide on it.”

“Don’t put hydrogen peroxide on it,” Roxanne laughs. “It will kill
the good cells.”

Smiling across the counter at her, I shake my head. She smiles
back at me as she turns back to the stove.

“Food smells good,” Sam says.

“Hold still,” Olivia tells her.

The wind is back at full force. I’m glad that we decided to move
that large branch, but I doubt it will make much of a difference. Hopefully the
cars will be all right.
Which reminds me, I should probably
tell Roxanne about her car.

“There’s been some damage outside,” I tell her.

“We can assess it all after the storm,” she says, leaning over the
counter to put a finger to my lips.

Susannah and Olivia get Sam’s wound cleaned and bandaged while
Roxanne finishes cooking breakfast. I wipe my hands down with a couple of wet
wipes before pouring some water over them from one of the jugs.

Roxanne dishes food out and everyone digs in. Mandy, barely able
to stand, manages to dump her entire plate on the floor after one bite.
Muffin
who had been shaking in the corner of the chair,
jumps down and starts
snarfing
up bacon as fast as he
can. Mandy, tries to shoo him out of the way, pushing the dog with one hand,
while trying to cram eggs and bacon back onto her plate with the other. Jackie,
continuing to shovel food in her own mouth, ignores her. I try to catch Sam’s
eye, but she’s busy feeding bites of potatoes to Olivia. Karen and Rick, still
sitting on opposite sides of the couch, eat in silence. Susannah and Thomas are
laughing together. Catching Susannah’s eye, I motion toward Mandy who is now on
the ground, holding the dog back with one hand. She shakes her head, laughing.
Finally taking pity on the woman, I reach down to pick up Muffin. Taking him
over to Olivia, I push him into her arms.

“He’s being a pain,” I say.

Now that he’s not actively trying to eat bacon, Muffin is
trembling like a baby again.

“Poor thing,” Olivia murmurs. “He’s not a pain, Dana. He’s just
scared.”

“Whatever.”

Roxanne starts to say something to me, but I can’t hear any sound.
A screeching boom shakes the whole house. Looking around wildly, I don’t see
any interior problems. The wind sounds horrible, though. It sounds as if a
bulldozer is being dragged across my roof. Everyone is one their feet, looking
nervous. Roxanne tells everyone to stack their dishes in a plastic bin, which
she then stashes under the sink.

“We can worry about washing them after the storm,” she yells in my
ear.

“Yeah, what kind of jackass decides to have bacon when there’s no hot
running water?” I grin.

The noise on top of the roof is getting louder. Sam reaches over
and tugs at my shirt. She’s pointing at a corner of the roof where water is
starting to shoot through.
Great.
If we lose the roof,
we’re fucked.

Roxanne has already thrown towels over everything that’s under the
spray of water, but it isn’t doing much good.

“Just get everyone into the bathroom,” I yell. I look around for
Frank, but Susannah already has him in her arms.

Trusting Roxanne to take care of everyone else, I grab Sam’s arm
and pull her over toward the roof. Olivia, clutching Muffin, runs toward the
bathroom.

“Do you think we should try to stabilize it?” I scream.

Jumping up on the counter, she reaches up toward the ceiling.
“Hand me some plastic,” she yells.

I grab several bags and heft myself up onto the counter next to
her. “You make it look so easy,” I yell.

Laughing, she shakes her head.
“Must be all of
those years of ballet lessons.”

She’s taller than I am, so I have to stand on my toes to hold the
bags. The roof is shimmying as wildly as the window. “I think we should take
cover,” I holler in her ear.

She shakes her head again. “Let’s get it taped up at least. We’ll
feel it if it starts to give.”

“It’s starting to give now,” I yell.

“Just hold the fucking bags.”

Both of us are soaking wet. The rain is gushing in around the
bags. Sam starts to plaster the bags and the ceiling with tape, but it isn’t
sticking very well to the wet plaster. The crack between the roof and the wall
widens and we’re blasted with a hard sheet of water. With water stinging my
eyes, I can’t see anything for a second. The force of the wind coming in
through the hole almost knocks me off the counter. A knot of anxiety starts to
form in my stomach and I reach for Sam, though she suddenly seems far away. I
can see the entire roof tearing away from the house and with it, I see Sam
being sucked into the storm. Paralyzed, I stand on the counter being pelted by
small rocks and driving rain. A leaf blows in on the wind and slashes against
my face. Dimly, I’m aware that my entire kitchen is getting wet, but I can’t
move to try to save anything. My vision darkens and then I’m looking at Sam,
lying dead in the yard, thrown to the ground by the force of the wind. My heart
stops and I drop to my knees on the counter. Swaying dangerously, I realize
that I’m about to pass out. Suddenly, Sam’s face is in my line of vision. She
yanks me off the counter into her arms and half-drags me down the hall to the
bathroom. Crowding into the small space with nine other people, we fall through
the door. Roxanne is sitting on the side of the tub next to Jackie and Mandy.
Karen is sitting on the closed toilet. Olivia is on the floor with both Muffin
and Frank curled up in her arms. Everyone else is standing. Sam lowers me to
the floor next to Olivia and squats in front of me, scared.

“Hey, buddy.” Sam tries to smile. “Hey. Dana. Hi.”

Blinking at her, I try to return the smile. “I thought I saw you
sucked out through the roof,” I whisper.

She leans forward, unable to hear me over the wind. “What did you
say?”

“I said I guess I’m not as healed as I thought I was,” I answer,
still whispering.

Grimly, she shakes her head. “I’m sorry, I still can’t hear you.”

“I said I think I’m fucked up,” I yell over the noise. Bursting
into tears, I put both of my hands over my face, shaking with the effort of not
losing it. Sam pats me awkwardly on the shoulder. I can feel everyone in the
room looking at me, even though I can’t see them. The wind noise is screaming
through the house and now, all I can see is a vision of Sam jumping off the
same cliff that took Fran. I can hear
Esmé
yelling
something, but I can’t make out what she’s saying. Shaking and crying, I press
my hands tight against my face, trying to stem the tide. Suddenly, Roxanne is
kneeling in front of me. She reaches around me and pulls me into her arms.
Collapsing against her, I press my face into her chest, letting go of
everything. Her hands feel warm on my body. I know she’s whispering things in
my ear, but I can’t tell what she’s saying. It doesn’t really matter. It has
the necessary effect. With my tears subsiding, I lean back against the wall and
open my eyes. Sam is looking terrified. I give her a wink and she relaxes a
bit. Roxanne turns around and sits between my legs, resting her back against my
chest. My arms move naturally against her waist. I can’t help noticing a look
from
Esmé
that I can’t quite decipher. I give her a
quick smile, but she doesn’t smile back.