This World We Live In

by Susan Beth Pfeffer

  "What about Alex?" I asked Jon. "Did you see him?"

  Jon shook his head. "It was just Julie and me," he said.

  "Come on, son," Dad said. "Matt, go into the house and get some blankets. We'll use them as a stretcher."

  Matt ran to our house, and moments later he came out with the blankets.

  "Laura, you, Miranda, and Syl keep working," Dad said. "Jon, show us where Julie is. We'll be back in a few minutes."

  "Be careful," Mom said.

  We watched them make their way down the road. "Mom," I said. "Should they move Julie? What if she has a spinal injury?"

  "It sounds like she does," Mom said. "But there are no doctors, no hospitals anymore. Not here. All we can do is make Julie comfortable."

  "No, Mom," I said. "No."

  "You have to be strong, Miranda," Mom said. "I'm going to work by the window, where your father was. You stay on the ground. Can you do that? Can you work on the rubble down here?"

  I nodded, but I could hardly hear what she was saying. Julie was badly hurt and Alex was still missing. Charlie was in the cellar, dead for all we knew. Lisa and Gabriel were

  231

  trapped, and we had no equipment, nothing but our hands and our will, to get them out.Syl had told me not to think. I did as she'd said.

  It took a few minutes before Syl spotted Jon. I stopped working and raced toward him. Dad and Matt had improvised a stretcher and were carefully carrying Julie.

  I didn't dare ask, but I looked straight at Matt, who shook his head almost imperceptibly.

  For a horrible instant I thought he meant Julie had died. But then I heard Dad say, "Hold on, sweetie. We're almost there."

  "Alex?" Julie asked.

  I'd gotten close enough so she could see and hear me. "He's not back yet," I said. "He'll be home soon."

  "I can't move," Julie said. "I tried to. I really tried, but I can't. And I feel strange, like my body isn't attached to me anymore. I've never felt like this, not ever."

  "It's okay," Dad said, bending over to stroke her forehead. "Your back is hurt, that's all. You'll be up and around in no time."

  She looked so small, so young. I kissed her on her cheek. "Alex will be so proud of you," I said. "You're being very brave."

  "He'll be mad," she said. "He gets mad at me when I do things he doesn't like."

  "He loves you more than anything," I said.

  "We'd better get her inside," Dad said. "Where's Laura?"

  "Working by the window," I said.

  "Get her and send her in," Dad said. "She can watch after Julie while the rest of us work."

  I walked rapidly toward Mom, and for the first time I

  232

  can ever remember, I cherished the sensation of movement. Hours ago I'd been trapped in the closet, and now I was outside and I could walk and run. Julie had lost that, most likely forever.Mom seemed reluctant to go indoors. I guess after all those months, she was cherishing the sensation of sky and air and freedom. Dad took her place at the cellar window, and he insisted Jon work by his side. Matt worked on the ground, and I went back to the top of the mound and resumed throwing things down.

  It got dark eventually, and Dad sent Jon to the house to get lanterns and flashlights. Hours later they broke through to the cellar window. It had blown out during the storm, but it was too small for Lisa to crawl through.

  Still, Dad was able to talk to her, and when she held Gabriel up, he could hold him. Jon was sent back to our house to get food for Lisa.

  Dad returned a while later to tell us what he knew.

  "Charlie was pushing against the cellar door," he said. "Trying to open it, but of course he couldn't. Lisa isn't sure what happened, because it was so dark, but she thinks he had a heart attack. She heard him make a funny noise, and then he fell down the cellar stairs. She went to him, but she couldn't find a pulse. He probably died instantly."

  I thought, Charlie's dead because of me. I told him to go to the cellar. He tried to open the door to rescue me.

  I knew that was crazy. If I caused Charlie's death, then I saved Lisa's and Gabriel's lives. If Charlie tried to get out for me, he was also trying for himself and for them. But I still felt the guilt, like the tornado was somehow my fault, and Julie was hurt because of me, and Alex missing.

  233

  "We're not telling Lisa about Julie or Alex," Dad said, much more softly. "I told Jon not to say anything. I told her Julie's back in the house and Alex has gone to look for help.""How long can we keep that up, Dad?" Matt asked.

  Dad grabbed him by the arm. "As long as we damn well have to," he said. "Now get back to work."

  And we did. I'd be working there still, except Dad decided we should work in shifts, and I was sent back to the house to eat and get some rest and stay with Julie. Mom left as soon as I got here.

  Julie's sleeping, but I can't. I'm too scared.

  I wish more than anything that it was last night.

  234

  ***

  Chapter 18 July 11

  The rest of my life, I'm going to be living a lie, so I'm writing now to tell what really happened.No, even that is a lie. It isn't what really happened. It's what I made happen. If I don't admit that here, now, then I'll be lying to myself just as I'll be lying to everyone else every day of my life.

  We spent all day working, trying to move the mountain of rubble that was blocking the cellar door and keeping Lisa and Gabriel trapped. We can get Gabriel out through the window, but only Lisa can feed him, so there's no point. She has food and water, and Mom cut up a couple of Matt's flannel shirts, for diapers. Sometimes when he cries, we hear him, and it makes us smile, at least for a moment, at least on the inside.

  We hardly talk. The only breaks we take are when we're coughing so hard we have to stop. A few sips of boiled water, and we get back to the job. It's better that we don't talk. There's nothing we could say that wouldn't make us sadder or more afraid.

  All the food Jon and Julie got is gone. All the food at Mrs. Nesbitt's is gone. We don't know for sure, but we can't

  235

  count on more food deliveries from town. We don't know if there is still a town.The electricity is out, but this time it will never return. Wires are down and there's nobody to repair them. There are two big tree limbs on the front of our house, and part of the roof has caved in. A handful of the windows shattered as well. It's funny. Matt used to worry about us losing the sunroom roof, but that made it through. It's the rest of the house that's collapsing around us.

  Dad had put Julie on the sunroom mattress. We took turns going in, checking up on her, making sure the fire was still burning, and eating enough to keep ourselves going, grabbing what sleep we could by Julie's side.

  We didn't talk about Julie except once. Mom said she'd taken a pin and stuck Julie's hands and feet with it. She told Julie to close her eyes and let her know when she felt something. Six times Julie hadn't felt anything. Three times she said she thought she felt the pin, but two out of those three times Mom hadn't pricked her.

  "I don't understand," Jon said. "What does that mean?"

  "It means Julie wants to believe she still has feeling," Syl said. "But believing it and having it are two different things."

  "But she'll get well," Jon said. "Won't she?"

  "No," Mom said. "She won't, Jon."

  "Is she going to die?" he cried.

  "Not so loud," Dad said. "We don't want Lisa to hear."

  "I don't care about Lisa!" Jon said. "What about Julie? Can't we do something?"

  "All we can do is make things as easy for her as possible," Mom said. "You're not a child anymore, Jon. You know what things are like."

  236

  None of us had stopped working while we talked about Julie. It was early evening, and the pile was down to four feet, so we stood ground level, stooping to pick up the debris. Our backs and arms were screaming in pain. But we kept flinging shingles and siding and pieces of mangled furniture as far from the cellar door as po
ssible."I don't want her to die," Jon said.

  "None of us want her to," Dad said. "But we don't want her to suffer, either. At least Charlie died fast. Sometimes I think that's the only thing we can hope for anymore."

  "No, Hal," Mom said. "We can still hope for our children, for their future. That's all that matters, their future."

  I thought about the future I'd imagined for myself two days before--Lisa, Gabriel, and Julie in a safe place; Dad and Alex and me near enough that we could see them sometimes, know they were being taken care of; having that future Mom wanted for all of us.

  It was more than twenty-four hours since I'd seen Alex. A part of me was starting to think he'd never existed, that I'd made up a boy I'd given my heart to because he wouldn't accept anything less from me.

  But I knew he was real because I missed him so much, and because his sister was lying helpless in the sunroom and we were talking about her death.

  Alex had thought about her death. He'd prepared for it. He'd accepted something I had never had to, that there might come a moment when death was preferable to life and that he bore the responsibility of recognizing that moment and acting on it out of love.

  He'd been so concerned about leaving Julie in Dad and Lisa's care because no matter how much they loved her, they weren't family. But when I'd agreed to marry Alex, I'd

  237

  become Julie's family. That's why Alex had told me to get his missal. He knew he was risking death, biking into the path of the tornado. But he trusted me with the only possessions of value he had, the passes and the pills.All of that came to me while I worked, every one of those thoughts, those realizations. And once they were in my mind, I thought them over and over again, like the nightmares I'd had, endlessly looping through my mind until I finally accepted the truth. Alex was gone. Julie was my responsibility, no one else's.

  I don't know what time it was when Mom told me to go home, to send Matt back, and to get some sleep. All I know is we were working by lamplight then, and the night was so clear you could make out the full moon through the ashen sky.

  I stumbled to our house, the darkness and my exhaustion making it almost impossible to walk a straight line. Matt was sleeping and I hated waking him, but we needed every hand we had. He didn't say anything when I shook him awake. All he did was nod and walk away.

  I lifted the blankets off Julie to see if she needed changing, but she was dry. I'd hoped she was asleep, but when I saw her eyes were open, I asked if she needed anything.

  "No," she said. "Matt gave me some food and water. But I wish Alex was here."

  I stroked her face. "Alex loves you," I said. "We love you, Julie. All of us love you."

  "I wish I could see Lisa and Gabriel," Julie said. "And Charlie. Charlie always makes me laugh."

  "You'll see him soon," I said. "I promise you that."

  Julie began to cough, and when she did, her body shook.

  I lifted her so she was in more of a sitting position and

  238

  had her rest against my chest until the coughing stopped. There were three pillows on the mattress already, but I asked if she'd like another. She said no."You're like the princess and the pea," I said, knowing what was coming but postponing it for another hour, another minute. I remember hoping that Alex would somehow fly in and Julie would be miraculously cured.

  But I'd been hoping for miracles for over a year now. Another hour, another minute, was never long enough.

  "What's the princess and the pea?" she asked.

  "It's a fairy tale," I said. "About how the only way you can tell a true princess is if you put a pea under forty mattresses. If she can feel it, then she's a true princess."

  "What a waste of a pea," Julie said.

  "When they wrote fairy tales, they didn't know," I said. "They had peas to spare in those days."

  Julie giggled.

  "Did your mother tell you fairy tales?" I asked. "When you were little?"

  "No," Julie said. "But she liked it when we told her about the saints. We learned about them in school and we'd tell her what we'd learned. Joan of Arc was my favorite. I wrote a report about her once."

  "I didn't know she was a saint," I said. "I guess I never thought about her being one."

  "She was," Julie said. "She's the patron saint of soldiers."

  "She's your brother Carlos's patron saint, then," I said.

  "Maybe," Julie said. "Maybe the Marines have a different one. Carlos says it's better to be a Marine than a soldier. He'd probably rather have his own patron saint."

  "You believe in all that," I said. "You and Alex. In spite of everything you still believe?"

  239

  It was dark in the sunroom, just the glow from the woodstove, but even so I could see the look of surprise on Julie's face. "Of course," she said. "I'll see Santa Maria, Madre de Dios, when I'm in heaven.""What's heaven like?" I asked. "Do you know?"

  "No one's hungry there," Julie said. "Or cold or lonely. You can see millions of stars at night, like that painting. And there are gardens. Big vegetable gardens filled with everything. Tomatoes, radishes. String beans. They're my favorites, the string bean plants."

  "No flowers?" I said.

  "You can have flowers if you want," Julie said. "It's heaven."

  She began coughing again, her face contorted, her body in spasms. I held her, comforted her, told her soon she'd be all right.

  We could both tell she'd soiled herself. "I'm sorry," she said. "I didn't mean to."

  "Don't worry about it," I said. "I'll get a washcloth and clean you and change your clothes."

  She began to cry. "Don't leave me," she said. "Please. I made Alex promise he'd never leave me to die alone."

  I think that's what she said. But she might have said Alex had promised he'd never leave her to be alone. I can't be sure.

  "I'll just be gone for a minute," I said. "Why don't you say a prayer while you're waiting? That's what Alex would want you to do."

  I left her praying in Spanish. I walked upstairs to my room, got some fresh clothes, then took a washcloth and towel from the bathroom.

  We're not supposed to stay upstairs any longer than we

  240

  have to. The roof could cave in anytime. But still I waited for a minute, a second, hoping for that miracle I knew would never happen.I stopped in the kitchen, wetted the washcloth, then poured Julie a glass of water. Maybe I thought about Alex. I'm not certain. All I remember is opening the envelope, taking out two of the pills, and shaking so hard the water spilled out of the glass.

  Julie was quiet when I returned. I pulled off her pants and underpants, cleaned and dried her as best I could, and put on the fresh clothes. Then I lifted her gently, raising her head and back from the pillows she'd been resting on.

  "I want you to take these," I said, showing her the pills. "They'll help you stop coughing."

  "I can't hold them," she said.

  "No, you can't," I said. "Wait a second. I'll put them on a spoon for you." I rested her tenderly on the bed again, went back to the kitchen, and put the pills on a spoon. Then with my left arm, I lifted her again, placing her head in the crook of my arm, and with my right hand I spoon-fed her the pills. When I was sure the spoon was empty, I put the glass of water to her lips and watched as she swallowed.

  "Say a prayer and go to sleep," I said. "Think about heaven, Julie, and your dreams will be sweet."

  I think she prayed. I think she said thank you. I think I heard her murmur, "brie," and "poppy." I know I kissed her on her forehead and told her she would never be hungry or scared or lonely again.

  I remembered a prayer Grandma had taught me. I knelt by Julie's side and put my fingers on her mouth so God would know the prayer was for her, not me.

  241

  Now I lay me down to sleep.I pray the Lord my soul to keep.

  If I should die before I wake,

  I pray the Lord my soul to take.

  When I couldn't deny to myself anymore that she was sle
eping, I eased one of the pillows from beneath Julie's head. I held it down for as long as I could, until I could be certain, for her sake, for Alex's, that she was in the healing embrace of her Holy Mother.

  I returned the pillow to its place and gently kissed her good-bye.

  She didn't wake up.

  She never woke up.

  July 12

  Syl woke me. "I'm sorry," she said. "There's water coming into the cellar. We have no time to waste.""Julie?" I said.

  "She passed while you were sleeping," Syl said. "Freshen up, Miranda, and I'll go tell the others."

  My diary was in my hands. I'd fallen asleep in the sunroom and never put it back in my closet.

  Syl had pulled one of the blankets over Julie's head. Two days ago Julie'd biked into town with my brother. Now she was just another of the dead.

  I went to my room, put the diary in its hiding place, then returned to what had been Mrs. Nesbitt's. We worked continuously, not even stopping to get food for Lisa.

  The water was waist high when Lisa and Gabriel crossed the cellar to wait for their rescue at the top of the

  242

  stairs. The moon had risen by the time Dad could pull the cellar door open. They raced out, away from the house, the rubble piled high on either side of them. One of the mounds collapsed inward, but they were already safe.Dad told her then about Julie, about Alex. I think Lisa had already guessed it, because she was the one comforting Dad as he stood there weeping.

  243

  ***

  Chapter 19 July 13

  The roof caved in on Mom's bedroom that night. We'd slept in the sunroom together so none of us were hurt.Matt had carried out Julie's body and rested it on Jon's mattress in the dining room, but it didn't matter. We felt her presence. Charlie's, too. I sensed Mrs. Nesbitt with us, and so many other people I've loved and lost.