by Peg Kehret
Moose hung back, watching him.
“Stay,” Jonathan said. He let go of the leash, needing both hands free to push his way through the brush.
“Hurry!” Abby’s small voice sounded scared. He knew she didn’t like to be left alone.
“I am. I’m almost there.”
He reached the far side of the roots and looked ahead to see how far they were from the camper. A prickle of horror ran down the back of his neck and into his arms and legs.
The redwood tree had landed on their camper.
Bile rose in Jonathan’s throat. He swallowed fast, trying not to throw up. He stepped closer, staring at the wreckage.
The edge of one black tire stuck out from under the tree. The rest of the camper was flattened like an aluminum can in the recycling bin. Even with the camper underneath it, the tree was only a few inches off the ground.
Their supplies and equipment were smashed inside the camper. All the things he had counted on to help them while they waited to be rescued were gone. He and Abby had no food and no water. They had no beds, no extra clothing, no first aid kit.
Nothing.
Mentally, Jonathan walked through the camper, remembering the contents. Sleeping bags and pillows, my Yahtze game, long forks for roasting marshmallows, folding chairs to use around the campfire, Mom’s books, Dad’s wood carving tools, Abby’s doll, my radio, Moose’s basket.
My homework! Jonathan smiled. It would be the most unusual excuse ever for not turning in an assignment: “A huge redwood tree fell on top of my homework.”
How can I make jokes, Jonathan wondered, when I’ve just lost everything I need to survive this disaster? But he knew that if he didn’t joke about his homework, he would be hysterical with worry.
Moose plunged through the huckleberries and ran to the camper. With his nose to the ground, he sniffed all the way along the side of the tree. Whining, he turned and sniffed all the way back again, the leash dragging behind him.
“It’s gone, Moose,” Jonathan said. “Everything’s gone, even your dog food.”
Jonathan picked up the leash. He patted Moose’s head. What am I going to do now? he wondered.
Jonathan wanted to run. He wanted to vault over the fallen trees and run like the wind and leave this shuddering, destructive, unpredictable piece of Earth far behind him.
Just me and Moose, Jonathan thought, closing his eyes. We could run across the bridge, run off the island, run to safety. We’ll run to town, find Mom and Dad, and never again think about a camper smashed in an earthquake.
“Jonathan?” Abby’s shout drifted over the redwood’s roots.
Jonathan opened his eyes, knowing he could not run.
“I’m coming,” he yelled.
“Did you find the camper?”
“Yes!”
He stared at a small strip of yellow awning that was visible along the trunk of the tree. Mom always said the awnings made the camper look cheerful, “like a clump of buttercups, blooming outside our windows.”
Yes, he thought. Yes, I found the camper. But it isn’t going to do us any good.
Moose whined again.
Jonathan leaned against the tree trunk, wondering what to do. His head pounded, the scratches on his arms and legs stung, and every muscle in his body ached from the strain of lifting Abby over the fallen trees. He tried to figure out some kind of plan.
He knew he had to have a specific course of action in mind before he told Abby about the camper. Otherwise, she was sure to come unglued and, as tired as she was, she’d probably never stop crying. He felt like crying himself.
The thick redwood bark was cool against his back. He closed his eyes, pretending his parents were there to tell him what to do.
First things first, Dad always said. Decide what’s most important and then do that before you do anything else. Most important, Jonathan thought, was to get rescued but he didn’t know what he could do about that.
First things first. Food. Water. Shelter. Food wasn’t crucial yet, since they had just eaten and he still had the two smashed sandwiches that were meant to be his parents’ lunch.
Water was important. Abby was already asking for something to drink and his own mouth felt dry as dust. He thought of the gallon jugs of bottled water his dad had carefully packed in the camper.
“Probably more than we’ll need,” Dad had said, “but the worst thing that could happen would be to run out of water.”
Not the worst thing, Dad, Jonathan thought. The worst thing is to have an earthquake that smashes the entire camper, water jugs included. Jonathan licked his lips, tasting the salt of his perspiration.
He still had two juice packs, intended for his parents. I’ll save them as long as I can, he decided, in case we don’t get rescued right away.
There was plenty of water in the river but, even though it ran swiftly, it was probably too polluted to drink.
He wished he knew whether Mom and Dad had made it to town before the earthquake hit. If they did, Jonathan should wait by the camper, and help would get there soon, or at least as soon as possible.
But what if they didn’t make it? What if the road was blocked by fallen trees and Mom was still sitting in the car while Dad walked to town? Even worse, what if one of the trees had landed on the car? Jonathan shuddered. Maybe Mom and Dad needed help just as much as Jonathan and Abby did.
The longer he waited, the more thirsty and tired he and Abby would be. Before too long, they would be hungry, as well. He did not want to stay here and wait for help that might never come.
I need to follow the road, Jonathan decided. I’ll hike the route that Mom and Dad would have driven. If they made it off the island, I won’t find anything, and I can turn back when I reach the bridge, and wait with Abby for help to arrive.
If I do find them—well, if that happened, he would decide what to do then. He could always hike off the island by himself, if he had to. He could cross the bridge and walk to Beaverville, the closest town.
Either way, Abby would have to wait where she was. He could go ten times faster alone than he could go with Abby.
She won’t want to wait, Jonathan knew. She’ll cry herself into a snit if I leave her alone for long. He would have to leave Moose with her and hope that Moose would not take off after a squirrel or a chipmunk.
Maybe he could rig up some kind of shelter, so that Abby would have a special place to wait while he was gone. If he made a game of it, like playing house in the woods, she could lie down in the shelter and sleep while he walked to the bridge and back. He knew she was tired. She might sleep the whole time he was gone. With luck, Moose would stay with her and sleep, too.
His plan decided, Jonathan started back around the roots.
“We can’t use the camper,” he told Abby, trying to sound matter-of-fact. “This big tree smashed it.”
Abby’s bottom lip quivered but before she could cry, Jonathan hurried on. “Aren’t we lucky that we weren’t in it, when the earthquake came? And we’re lucky now, too, because you don’t have to walk any farther. We’re going to make a little house right here in the woods.” He glanced quickly around, and then pointed at the last tree they’d climbed over, a large maple. “That tree trunk is going to be one wall of our house.”
“The camper’s smashed?” Abby said.
Jonathan nodded.
“What about my Raggedy?”
She had left her favorite doll, the one she slept with every night, in the camper. “Raggedy is still in the camper,” he said, “but I can’t get her out because the tree is too heavy.”
“I want Raggedy!”
“My radio was in the camper, too. I can’t get my radio out, either.”
Abby nodded and was quiet, as if she didn’t mind losing her doll as long as Jonathan also lost something important.
“It’s going to be fun to build a little house in the woods,” Jonathan said, forcing himself to sound cheerful.
“How are we going to make a house? We don’t h
ave a hammer.”
“We don’t need a hammer. We’ll use small trees that fell during the earthquake. And we’ll make beds out of pine branches.”
Abby looked doubtful. “What about my chocolate cupcake?” she said. “You promised I could have a chocolate cupcake.”
“You can have it later.” Much later, Jonathan thought.
“I’ll have it for dinner,” Abby said.
Dinner, Jonathan knew, would be another squashed sandwich and a bag of cookie crumbs, but he didn’t say that.
“I’ll have chocolate cupcakes for breakfast tomorrow, too,” Abby declared.
Jonathan nodded. By then—oh, surely by then—his father or a rescue crew would come for them. “I’d better get started on our house,” he said.
“I want to help. I want to build the house, too.”
“You can be the boss. You sit right there and I’ll ask you questions.”
Jonathan looked around for trees that were big enough to use and small enough that he would be able to move them. He found three small alders and dragged them, one at a time, to where Abby sat.
“Which one shall we do first?” he asked, and Abby pointed.
After stripping off as many of the lower branches as he could, he laid the root end of the alder on top of the downed maple’s trunk. He did the same thing with the other two alders.
Next he gathered pine and cedar boughs. Some of these he put on the ground, as a bed for Abby and Moose. The rest he laid on top of the alders, forming a crude roof. He placed the alder branches that he had removed across the far end of the shelter, propping them up to form a back wall. The shelter was shaped like half a tent, with an opening at one end.
“There,” he said, stepping back to admire his work. “It’s a fine looking house, if I do say so myself.”
“It isn’t very big,” Abby said. “We won’t be able to stand up in it.”
“We don’t sleep standing up,” Jonathan said. “Crawl in and try it.”
Abby crawled under the roof and lay face down on the pine boughs. “It’s too prickly. The branches scratch my cheek.”
“Lie on your back. Smell the cedar?”
Moose sniffed the branches around Abby’s toes.
“It smells like Mommy’s blanket chest,” Abby said as she rolled on to her back.
Jonathan patted the branches beside Abby. “Here, Moose,” he said. “Lie down.”
Moose walked in a circle beside Abby and then flopped beside her. She put an arm on his side and Moose thumped his tail.
“Stay,” Jonathan said.
Abby sat up. “I’m thirsty,” she said. “I want a drink of water before I go to sleep.”
Jonathan hesitated. Maybe if she thought he was going after water, she would wait without so much fuss.
“All right,” he said. “I’ll go look for some water.”
Abby patted the dog. “You can use the red bucket, to carry the water in.”
Her words made him realize that she still did not comprehend that they had lost all of their equipment. “The bucket was in the camper,” he said. “I can’t get it.”
“I want to go along and look for water, too.”
“You can’t. It would take too long.” He saw her lip start to quiver again.
“It’s not fair,” she said.
“You’re right. It isn’t.” Jonathan squatted beside the shelter and looked at his sister. “I’m sorry, Abby,” he said, and he truly meant the words. “You’ll have to wait here for me. Moose will stay with you. You can be in charge of Moose.”
“I’m Moose’s boss?”
“That’s right.” He leaned in the opening of the shelter and put Moose’s leash, which had been dangling on the ground, in Abby’s hand. “Hold on tight,” he said, “and talk to Moose so he won’t be scared.”
“But I’m scared.”
“Pretend you aren’t. Pretend you’re brave and that will help Moose.”
“I’ll take care of you, Moose,” Abby said, “until Mommy and Daddy come back.”
“I’m going now,” Jonathan said. “Lie down and close your eyes. Smell the pine smell and think about what Santa might bring you this year.”
“Hurry?”
“As fast as I can.” Which won’t be very fast, Jonathan thought, given the condition of the trail. As he turned to go, Abby started to cry.
“I don’t want to stay alone. What if the earthquake comes back?”
The same thought had occurred to Jonathan. He knew more aftershocks were likely. Smaller earthquakes often followed a large one. Sometimes they weren’t so small. Another huge jolt could come any minute. But he couldn’t sit around doing nothing, waiting for disaster to strike.
“I wish I had Raggedy,” Abby said.
“I wish you did, too.” She looked so young, lying there. She was so helpless, without her walker. What if there was another earthquake before he returned? What would she do?
His worst fear kept popping into his mind. What if Mom and Dad didn’t make it off the island? Any hope of a rescue depended on his parents being where they could send help. But what if they hadn’t made it that far before the earthquake hit? What if they were also trapped on the island?
With a broken ankle, Mom wouldn’t be able to climb over fallen trees. She couldn’t hike across the bridge.
Stop it, he told himself. Quit being a pessimist. Maybe they did make it off the island in time. Maybe they’ve already alerted the police or the road department or whomever would need to authorize a crew to get us out of here. Maybe help was already on the way.
Maybe. Everything was maybe. He needed to know, and the only way to find out was to walk along the road from camp to the bridge and find out if his parents were trapped there or not.
“I’m going now,” he said, and left quickly, before Abby could protest again.
Jonathan went around the redwood, passed the crushed camper, and headed toward the bridge. The dirt road was visible in places but he had to climb over downed trees and push through tangles of fallen branches in order to follow it.
He tried to hurry but, even without Abby, his progress was slow. He wished he and Abby had walkie-talkies or some other way to communicate.
Periodically, he snapped a twig into a V shape and laid it down, pointing behind him. It would be easy to get lost, now that most of the road was covered. He had to make sure he could find Abby again.
An uneasy stillness hung over the island and the air seemed heavy and thick. Perspiration soaked Jonathan’s T-shirt and trickled down his forehead.
He wasn’t certain how far it was to the bridge. A mile, perhaps. Maybe a little more than that. A mile’s hike was nothing, under ordinary circumstances. But this road, in its present state, was far from ordinary.
The earth shuddered again, a small jolt this time, but enough to put Jonathan’s nerves on edge. He hoped Abby was asleep. She might not feel it, if she was asleep.
He pushed on, jogging whenever there was a clear space, which wasn’t often. His eyes searched the woods ahead, dreading what he might see. The farther he got without finding a smashed car, the more hopeful he was.
As he neared the approach to the bridge, the trees gave way to low shrubs. He could hear the river now and with fewer fallen branches, the road was visible again. Encouraged, Jonathan hurried on. Mom and Dad must have made it off the island.
He ran the last fifty yards, up the embankment to the start of the bridge. He had not found the car, so he knew Mom and Dad had made it off the island before the earthquake. Maybe Dad was already on his way back to Magpie Island.
When he reached the edge of the bridge itself, he stopped running and gasped.
The bridge went only partway across the river. The steel structure stretched across half the water and then ended abruptly. The other half of the bridge looked like a giant water slide. It lay at a steep angle from the opposite shore straight down into the water of the Tuscan.
The bridge had been snapped in two by the earthqu
ake.
Dad won’t be back.
The knowledge filled Jonathan with alarm. He stood at the edge of the embankment, looking at the broken bridge, and knew there was no way Dad’s car or any other vehicle would come to the island now. Not today. Not tomorrow. Not for many weeks, or maybe even months.
There was no way for Jonathan and Abby to walk off the island, either. They would have to wait for someone in a boat or a helicopter to rescue them.
Jonathan’s knees felt weak and he plopped onto the ground, as all hope for a fast rescue vanished.
Jonathan looked into the rushing water. Had Mom and Dad made it safely across the bridge before the earthquake tore it in two? If a car had been on the bridge when it broke, the car would have plunged into the river, would have sunk quickly to the bottom.
A person with a broken ankle would have a hard time climbing out of a car that was underwater. A person with a broken ankle would probably not be able to swim to shore. A person . . .
Stop it! Jonathan told himself.
He turned and started back to Abby. Fear formed a hollow place in his chest.
Until now, Jonathan had thought if no one came to rescue them, he would walk across the bridge and hike to Beaverville and bring help back for Abby. He would have been a hero. “Courageous boy walks twenty miles to save sister. Details at six.”
Well, forget the hero bit. That plan was no longer an option.
Jonathan felt far more helpless, knowing he had to wait for help to come to him, than he had felt when there was some action he could take.
Weighed down by this new disaster, Jonathan walked more slowly on the return trip. Twice, the V-shaped twigs served to direct him. Each time he came to one, he snapped it into several pieces. He had to be sure he didn’t start going in circles, following the same twig more than once.
Moose heard Jonathan coming and came to greet him. Jonathan knelt and hugged the dog, burying his face in the soft fur, inhaling the familiar doggie scent.
“Some boss,” he whispered. “She didn’t even hold on to your leash.”
Moose licked Jonathan’s arm.