The Disaster Days

by Rebecca Behrens

  Soccer and Marley

  Ur being ridiculous

  It’s not my fault you can’t play

  And it wasn’t mine either. The blame belonged to my lungs. My phone buzzed angrily.

  You need to check your jealousy

  LOL I’m not jealous!

  I’m

  I sent that accidentally, before I could think of what exactly I was feeling. Left out? How could I explain that to Neha without sounding needy or clingy?

  Marley is super nice

  You’d know if you would actually like talk to her

  That stung. It isn’t easy to jump into conversations full of inside jokes and game recaps.

  Whatever

  She’s not my friend

  I knew I sounded sulky. And I’d always been friendly with Marley, even if I didn’t know her well. I just had all these feelings, bubbling up inside, and I was too overloaded to control what I was typing.

  Three dots again from Neha. And then:

  Srsly Hannah?

  Right now I don’t even want to be ur friend anymore.

  She even used a period. As soon as I read it, Jupiter started to squeak. The timing was uncanny, like he was paying attention to our text drama and wanted to weigh in. I glanced over at his cage. He was whooping while he ran in circles, making small hops.

  Neha’s last text was slowly sinking in. I blinked to prevent tears. Somewhere deep inside I knew I wasn’t being very fair. But she wasn’t being fair to me either. I couldn’t think straight with all the squeaking. I turned to Zoe. “Is Jupiter okay?”

  I waved a hand until she came out of her tablet trance. “He’s never done that before, at least not when we aren’t by his cage with treats.”

  Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a commotion outside. Birds scattered out of the trees in the Matlocks’ backyard, cawing and soaring up high into the sky. The scene kept me distracted from the words on my screen for a few seconds longer. My phone buzzed again, reminding me I had gotten a message. An awful one.

  I replied in kind.

  I don’t want to be ur friend either.

  The jolt was so strange, and sudden, that at first, I thought only I had experienced it. Like it was some kind of physical symptom of how I felt about Neha’s texts—and my replies. People always describe bad news as a “punch to the gut” or being “shaken to their core.” It was like that. A jerk, a thud, a jolt—something had just shifted, or broken, in our best friendship, and I felt it inside and out. Neha and I had never said words like that to each other before. I didn’t even know we could. It was a tectonic moment in our friendship.

  “What was that?” Zoe’s eyes lifted again from her tablet, and they were wide with alarm. On the other side of the couch, Oscar sat up straight and pulled off his headphones.

  “I woke up a huge dragon, and I actually felt its roar!”

  The jolt wasn’t only mine. Even though my phone was practically burning in my palm, I focused on the room around me. I held my breath, looking and listening. Everything seemed fine…

  Then the shaking started.

  4

  One second, we were sitting down, quiet and still, wondering what we’d felt. The next, it was like the whole house had turned into a washing machine and we were inside. Sudden, violent, and loud, the noise of everything shaking and—within seconds—crashing around us. Along with our shrieks, once our disorientation shifted to fear.

  “What’s going on?” Is this an…earthquake? I didn’t know what else it could be. But I’d never, ever felt one before.

  The first crashes I could identify were from the pottery and vases that lined the mantel toppling off, one by one, like synchronized swimmers diving into a pool. As each piece hit the stonework at the edge of the fireplace, it shattered. The coffee table, which Zoe and Oscar had both rested their feet on seconds before, began to lurch across the floor. My love seat was starting to move too. I crouched on all fours on top of the cushions. I was afraid to stay on a moving piece of furniture but equally afraid to jump off. It’s like the house was suddenly on top of a cresting wave.

  Zoe pointed at something in the kitchen, yelling. It took me a second to realize she was shouting about the fridge. I turned and watched the huge stainless steel appliance shuffle out of its spot between the countertop and the cupboards. It advanced toward us in the living room, “walking” like Frankenstein’s monster.

  I heard creaking above me and brought my eyes up to see a metal pendant light fixture swinging. It looked heavy. And it could fall on us. I scrambled off the love seat. “Zoe! Oscar! Get under there!” I pointed to the heavy wooden dining table in between the living room and the kitchen. The table would be sturdy enough to protect us. It was at least better than staying on the couches while the house crashed down around us and giant pieces of metal swung sickeningly overhead.

  Zoe, shielding her head, darted to the table. Oscar and I followed. It felt like running on top of a surfboard. Underneath the table, we huddled together, too shocked to cry or yell or do anything but watch the living room fall apart. The shaking was making me feel sick, so I braced my hands on the floor. But that only made me feel the wavelike movement stronger.

  Zoe curled herself into a ball, hugging her knees. “Make it stop,” she begged. The rumbling was so loud, I could barely hear her, even though Zoe was right next to me.

  Oscar gasped and started to stand, almost knocking his head into the underside of the table. “Jupiter!” He pointed at the cage, below the windows way on the other side of the living room. It was sliding across the floor, and Jupiter cowered inside near his food dish.

  “I have to save him!” Zoe wailed, crawling out from under the table.

  “No, stop!” I shouted, sticking my arm in front of Zoe to block her from darting into the open room. “You have to stay here, where it’s safe.” Zoe howled as I held her back. I didn’t even know if underneath a table was where you were supposed to hide during an earthquake. If that was what was happening.

  For a moment, I covered my eyes because I couldn’t bear to watch poor, sweet Jupiter. But I could still hear his squeaks. That cage was a death trap, with everything falling around it. I took a deep breath. “Don’t move!” I shouted at Zoe and Oscar, before I army-crawled out from the safety of the table.

  Ducking my head, I hunched and ran in the direction of the cage, but the shaking and all the furniture moving around me forced me on a zigzag path. This is not smart, I thought. Really not smart. Mrs. Pinales, the babysitting course instructor, had said during the first aid part of the class that rule number one is to always make sure a situation is safe before you try to rescue someone else. Well, I’d rather be whacked by books flying off a shelf than leave a guinea pig to die.

  The floor shifted up and down, side to side. I struggled to move forward. Finally, I stumbled to my knees in front of Jupiter. There was no way I could drag the whole cage back to the table—it was too heavy and moving was already difficult enough. I unlatched the top and reached inside, scooping Jupiter into my arms. He was trembling so hard. His tiny paw-nails dug into my skin as I held him tight. My own fear didn’t even register. All I could focus on was getting us back to safety.

  Curling myself over his furry little body to protect him, I dodged and ran across the floor. Zoe and Oscar peeked out from under the table, tears streaming down Oscar’s face.

  “It’s okay. We’re both here,” I said as I reached them. I held Jupiter out for Oscar to grab, then dropped to my knees to scoot underneath. As soon as heavy wood was overhead, all the fear I’d put on pause during the rescue flooded me. What is happening? What should we do? Why isn’t someone here to tell us? I can’t handle this on my own. I felt my pocket for my phone, only to realize I didn’t have it. I’d left it somewhere out there, in the danger zone.

  “Good job,” Zoe said, wiping at her nose. I panted and closed m
y eyes, trying to slow down my racing heart. My breaths felt shallow. How long had the shaking and buckling been going on? Was it ever going to stop? I wanted it to, more than I’d ever wanted anything.

  We all startled at the loudest crash yet, followed by the sound of glass cracking and shattering. Something—maybe a vase, or one of Andrea’s paintings?—had flown through the big window behind Jupiter’s now-empty cage. Thick shards of glass rained down on it and the floor. Oscar whimpered and pulled Jupiter in for a hug, burying his face in the guinea pig’s fur. I wanted to cry, and I could feel tears welling in my eyes. But I had to keep cool, for Zoe and Oscar. I tried some of the yoga breathing Ms. Whalen had taught us in gym class. In for four counts, out for eight counts. Stay calm. Just stay calm.

  “What if you hadn’t…” Zoe started to say, but I shushed her. I didn’t want to think about what would’ve happened to Jupiter. And I didn’t want to think about what would’ve happened to me if I’d dashed to the window only a few seconds later, or lingered at Jupiter’s cage during the rescue.

  “What’s going on?” Oscar whispered.

  “I’m not sure. I think…it’s an earthquake?” As far as I knew, Pelling Island had never experienced one. But that’s the only thing this could be, right? My dad sometimes talked about the local building codes, how the new buildings he worked on had to have an earthquake-resistant design—which had always seemed silly to me, considering we lived in a place where quakes never happened. Where they hadn’t happened yet. We lived on top of the North American tectonic plate. The Juan de Fuca plate was sneakily slipping below it. I had learned all that in the geology unit. But I hadn’t understood that it meant this.

  Thoughts of my dad and my mom lingered in my head. I shut my eyes tight. I wish they were here. Or Andrea. Anyone old enough for a driver’s license, really. They would know what to do, how to stay safe. I wanted a grown-up to say to us, “Hey, it’s going to be okay.”

  I wasn’t sure how long we’d been hiding under the table. It felt like forever, but it must have been only minutes. Earthquakes didn’t last for hours, right? I mean, maybe the aftermath did, but not the actual quaking. Pretty much everything I knew about them I’d learned from movies and TV. I didn’t want to think about those shows, tense and shocking stories in which people died and everything was reduced to rubble. Something like that couldn’t be happening here. Not in Seattle. Not on sleepy, safe Pelling Island.

  “I don’t feel good,” Oscar said.

  I scanned him to make sure he wasn’t bleeding or bruised anywhere. I didn’t think he’d been hit by anything while we ran under the table, but I could have missed that during the chaos. Everything had happened so fast. It was like we were trapped in a bad dream.

  “You look fine. What hurts?”

  “My tummy.” He grimaced.

  I patted his shoulder. “It’s okay. You know, mine doesn’t feel good either.” It felt like I’d been riding the ferry on a really rough day. With the stomach flu.

  “Mine too,” Zoe said, leaning over to wrap Oscar and Jupiter in a hug.

  The shaking seemed to soften. I closed my eyes and held my breath, feeling and listening closely, hoping to detect a slackening. Yes, it’s slowing down. A few more seconds and the quake stopped, as suddenly as it had started. The noise continued, though—stuff falling over or off of surfaces. Pops and hisses and creaks and drips. Stray crashes and thuds. Then the toppling sounds faded, and it was quiet again. Eerily quiet, the only sounds our shallow breaths and galloping heartbeats in our ears.

  I didn’t trust the calm. Not one bit.

  “Can we get out of here?” Zoe’s eyes were shiny and wide. She crouched at the edge of the safe circle of shadow below the tabletop, like a scared rabbit ready to bolt. She pointed at the door that connected the living room to the screened porch.

  “No, we should stay put.” I was watching a bookshelf that teetered, having been wrenched away from the wall. Gravity needed a few more minutes to do its work, so we didn’t crawl out only to get crushed by a cabinet or something. Also, I wasn’t convinced the quake was truly over. People always talked about aftershocks. Did they happen right away? Or did they sneakily wait a few minutes until, dazed and relieved, you climbed out of your hiding spot and regained trust in the floor, stock-still beneath your feet?

  Maybe we would be better off waiting under the table until Andrea came home. I closed my eyes to ward off dizziness.

  Where was Andrea during this? The thought slid into my mind like a spear, sharp and sudden. And where were my parents? My dad might not have even felt it, hours away on the coast. But my mom was probably late leaving work, like always. Had she felt the earthquake in the library? I looked again at the slumping bookshelf across the living room. There were hundreds of shelves and cases loaded with heavy books in the big Central Library downtown. I wondered if they were secure, or if they could’ve toppled or started to walk like the Matlocks’ fridge.

  What if my mom had been shelving and was sitting right in the middle of an aisle full of books when the shaking started? I shuddered as I pictured hardcovers raining down.

  Or what if she’d been in the elevator, taking a book cart up- or downstairs? I doubted elevators were safe places during an earthquake. I imagined the car slamming into the sides of the shaft, the cables fraying like the scene in that action movie…

  I felt a rising in my throat, like I was going to be sick.

  No. None of that happened. I willed myself to stop thinking about my parents and Andrea. They were all fine. They had to be. As soon as I got my phone, I’d call them.

  “I have to pee,” Oscar announced, sniffling.

  “Me too,” Zoe added.

  “Can’t you hold it?” I longed to stay under the table. I didn’t trust anywhere else.

  “No!” Oscar said, shifting on his knees and wincing. Zoe nodded.

  “I’ll crawl out first, then hand me Jupiter.” I took another deep, calming yoga breath, then scooted into the open room. I looked up—the big pendant light was hanging at a weird angle, but we could avoid that part of the room because the love seat was no longer underneath it. I scanned the edges of the space, looking for anything big or heavy that might fall over. We’d need to stay clear of the bookcases. The walls still stood—most of the art had come crashing down, but the pieces left up looked light and stable. About half the windows were shattered. The door to the porch had come ajar. Dust swirled in the breeze that flowed in from outside.

  “Okay, you guys can come out now,” I said, bending down to take Jupiter from Oscar’s outstretched hands. The guinea pig was shuddering, so I hugged him close and gently petted his fur to soothe him. “Shh, it’s all over, Jups.” I really hoped I wasn’t lying.

  Zoe and Oscar slid from under the table and stood up next to me. They looked as dazed as I felt. Somehow, we’d all gotten a dusting of plaster or dirt or something on our heads. With my free hand, I brushed it off theirs and then wiped at my own. Nobody appeared injured, thank goodness.

  “Let’s head to the bathroom together. Zoe, take Jupiter?” I carefully passed him to her. “I’ll lead the way.” They followed me, single file, as I slowly crept into the kitchen. The fridge was smack in the middle of the tile floor. It had “walked” so far that it yanked its own plug out of the socket, which trailed behind the fridge like a tail. Zoe pointed to it and laughed.

  “That’s hilarious! I gotta take a picture.”

  “Later, once we’re back from the bathroom.” I needed to find my phone. But I also needed to pee, badly. Must be from all the adrenaline.

  The cupboard doors had flung open and spewed their contents all over the countertops and the floor, so we had to step through spilled boxes of cereal, around piles of lentils, and carefully over some shattered glass jars that once held what looked like pasta sauce and pitted olives. The floor was slick with sauce and oil and dusted with flour. Plus th
e trash can with Jupiter’s used shavings had toppled over, so that was part of the mix too. Yuck.

  “Be really careful, guys.” What a colossal mess. I felt glad that I’d get to go home and avoid the cleanup. Except my house might look the same inside. I swallowed hard. No, my house would be okay. My dad had renovated it, after all. I bet it could withstand anything.

  In the hallway right off the kitchen, evening light shined through the window in the bathroom. The door was wide open, and Oscar darted inside, slamming it.

  “Don’t slam anything!” I called after him. Like it was punctuating me, a framed photo fell off the mail table across from the door. While Oscar did his business, I glanced around the hallway. A lamp had also toppled off the table, and two chairs had been knocked over, legs sticking up in the air. Otherwise, the hallway area looked relatively unscathed. I walked to the bottom of the stairs and gasped.

  “What is it?” Zoe ran to my side and looked up. “Oh no.”

  Blocking the stairs was another big light fixture, like a chandelier but not fancy-looking with crystals or anything. Normally it hung dramatically from above the second floor landing. It had come crashing down from upstairs and landed smack in the middle of the staircase, covering the steps with glass and sharp bits of light bulb and twisted spikes of metal. Cords and frayed wires splayed out in all directions from the broken iron chain. The pieces of wood below the staircase’s handrail—they’re called balusters, I know that thanks to my dad, who let me use old design plans as coloring books when I was little—had been knocked out like teeth.

  “Well, that’s not safe.” I turned to Zoe. “No going upstairs.” She nodded in agreement.

  When Oscar came out of the bathroom, Zoe passed Jupiter to him before dashing in. Oscar mournfully assessed the hallway. “Our blue lamp,” he said, his bottom lip trembling. “I helped my mom glaze that one.”

  “It’s okay; lamps can be fixed,” I offered. But honestly, it looked beyond repair. I swallowed hard, thinking of the things I loved in my home, like the big colorful bowl we bought on a trip to Mexico and the shelves my dad had carved out of the old tree that fell down in our backyard. A painting of whales that my grandma had made when she decided to become an artist at seventy-one. I bet I could think of a memory attached to every single item in my house. It hurt to imagine them broken all over the floors.