Secrets of the Storm (The Rain Triptych)

by Brad Munson

  Thirty-three

  A few minutes earlier, Ty had grabbed one of the still-dry towels from the stack he’d taken out of the locker room and wiped the window clean – at least as clean as he could make it. The blurred shadow beyond the glass resolved itself into a human form. A man in a hood. A hood that was thrown back an instant later to reveal a familiar face.

  “Slumpy!” Ty shouted. “I mean – Steven! Steven!”

  He turned around, towel still in his hand. “Hey! HEY, IT’S STEVEN!”

  Barrymore and Trini burst in from the kitchen, looking harrowed. “Everything okay?” the huge man said. “What—”

  “Who’s ‘Slumpy’?” Lisa asked.

  The teachers stopped short at the sight of him. “One of our kids,” Barrymore said. “Kind of an asshole, really. Hangs with Amber Lazenby and her crew.”

  Lisa perked up. “Lazenby? Like Mayor Lazenby? And Miriam?”

  Now everyone was confused. Barrymore looked at the near-stranger and said, “You know the mayor?”

  Lisa half-shrugged. “Well … sort of. It’s a long story.”

  “They all are.”

  “He’s all right,” Ty said. “He helped me out down by the mall. I actually didn’t think he’d make it.”

  The door behind Tyler shifted slightly and a small wave of water surged in, but Slumpy immediately saw what he was doing and pushed it shut again. He put up his arms and waved an apology, mouthing ‘Sorry!’ through the glass.

  Barrymore gestured wildly to his left. “Fire escape!” he shouted. “Around the side! Up to my office!” He gestured some more, and Slumpy seemed to get the idea. He nodded emphatically and took off to his right.

  “I’ll go let him in,” Ty said. “Dave, you want to finish blocking up those holes?”

  Dave was already on his knees, enthusiastically mopping at the water that had leaked in. “On it!” he said. “Absolutely on it!” Barrymore and Trini exchanged looks, but said nothing.

  Ty looked at his daughter, still hunched on the grandstand and watching owlishly. “I’ll be right back, K,” he said. “You stay put.”

  “Yes, Daddy,” she said. Lisa saw him beam at the mere mention of his name.

  He took the stairs up two at a time. Just as he reached the top, they shuddered dangerously – just for a moments – and then he was on the landing.

  “What about lunch?” Lisa asked gently. The couple had emerged from the kitchen empty-handed. “These kids are getting pretty hungry.”

  Barrymore and Trini looked embarrassed. “Oh. Right,” Barrymore said. “We … we heard shouting, so we … we’ll go get that done.” They dashed back into the kitchen, almost arm in arm.

  A nine-year-old named Justin called out Lisa’s name and she went to answer him, shaking her head. These people, she thought, are totally insane.

  Thirty-four

  There was a window. It was a little window, and there was a board nailed over it, but it was a window. All Katie needed to do was get it open.

  She turned to Little Jennifer, who was huddled in a corner with her dress soaked through and grime smeared across her cheeks. Her hair looked like a dirty mop. “Look at you,” she said, trying to sound as mean as she ever had in her life. “I thought you were tough.”

  Little Jennifer sneered at her. “You shut up,” she said. “You just shut up.”

  The window was up high and very narrow, just a twelve-inch gap between the tin wall and the tin roof. But Katie couldn’t pull the board away without help, and Little Jennifer was just sitting there.

  “You want to get killed,” Katie said. “You’re all, ‘oh, I’m so fat and stupid and nobody likes me. Maybe I should just curl up and—‘”

  “SHUT UP!” Little Jennifer shrieked. She threw herself to her feet and lunged at Katie …

  … and went right past her. Katie watched in astonishment as Jennifer reached up, wrapped her fat fingers around the board, and pulled with all her might. The plank popped off like a big piece of Lego, and a puff of wet wind hit Katie in the face.

  There was plenty of space now. All she had to do was crawl up and out.

  “Give me a boost,” she said. She couldn’t climb the wall by herself.

  Little Jennifer set her jaw. “I’m not the one who’s gonna get killed,” she said. “You are.”

  Katie balled up her fists and screamed at her. She had lost all her patience. “Come on, you stupid bitch! GIVE ME A BOOST!”

  She had never used that word before in her life. She’d heard it a million times on TV, and her parents even used it when they were really mad, but this was her first time.

  Jennifer’s eyes got huge. Her cheeks turned a horrible shade of purple. “What did you call me?” she said, her phlegmy voice trembling with rage. “What did you call me?”

  “Why do you have to fight about everything? Please, PLEASE just give me a boost so we can get out of here and not die!”

  Jennifer stared at her. And trembled. And finally she just exploded.

  “GOD!” she said. It sounded more like a yelp than a curse. “GOD, I HATE you!” She lurched across the room and made a stirrup with her hands. “There! THERE!”

  Katie didn’t dare speak. She just put her sneakered foot in the laced fingers and jumped up. She was right: there was plenty of space. Her back didn’t even touch the broken roof as her belly scraped across the window sill. Rainwater slapped her in the face. She even smiled as her shoulders cleared the window—

  A huge bony mouth, as big as her head, jumped out of the storm and came right for her. Katie screamed and batted it away as hard as she could. The mouth veered off, just a couple of inches but far enough to miss her. It actually seemed startled.

  “Pull me back!” she shrieked. “PULL ME BACK!”

  It was like a snake made out of skeleton parts, half-swimming, half-gliding through the water.

  “What’s wrong?” Little Jennifer called. “You’re almost out! What—”

  It was circling around. It was coming for her again. Katie kicked her legs violently, both at once, trying to force the stupid girl behind her to do what she wanted. “PULL! ME! BAAAA—!!”

  Katie felt Little Jennifer’s pudgy fingers on her ankles as they gripped and pulled, and she flew back through the window so quickly and violently she scraped her belly on the bottom of the window sill. The creature’s huge gray mouth, a perfect circle made of teeth, whizzed past as she flew back, not two inches from her nose. An instant later Katie was back in the room, tumbling directly into Little Jennifer so hard they both fell in a heap on the floor of the janitor’s shed.

  “Get off me! GET OFF ME!”

  Katie rolled to the side and got up on her hands and knees. She was panting like a dog.

  “What is wrong with you?” Little Jennifer said, backing away and brushing at her shoulders and chest with prissy little movements of her fat fingers, as if Katie had cooties or something. That’s silly, Katie though, watching her. Just … silly.

  “We can’t get out,” Katie said, still panting. “There are … things … out there.”

  Little Jennifer stopped dusting herself off and looked triumphant. “Well, I coulda tole you that,” she said, as if she’d won some sort of argument. “So what do we do now?”

  Katie just looked at her. She honestly had no idea.

  Thirty-five

  The hundred and fifty men, women, and children trapped inside the Cafetorium ate a hearty meal of ham and cheese sandwiches and any damn soft drink they wanted while the water sloshed against the entrance doors, growing higher by the minute.

  “We better start thinking of a way out of here,” Ty said. He was sitting close to Kerianne – close enough to grab her if anything bad happened.

  “The sheriff could still get here,” Trini said, “Maybe it’s just taking some time to get organized.”

  “It’s past one in the afternoon, sweetie,” Barrymore said. “I don’t think he’s coming.”

  She batted him on the arm. “Don’t ca
ll me ‘sweetie,’” she said. “People will talk!”

  That actually made the grown-ups at the table laugh out loud. Most of the kids just looked confused.

  “Hey,” David Drucker said, “Ty. We know Kerianne’s mom pretty well, but they’ve never told us much about you.”

  Everyone looked away, trying not to be embarrassed. “David,” Trini said. “Maybe you should …”

  David looked at her, his eyes too bright and his blinks too fast. He was chomping on Doritos, bag after bag, like a rabid squirrel. “What?” he said. “What did I say?”

  He is so far gone, Lisa thought. She recognized the look from months – years – of dealing with a drug-addicted daughter and her crazy friends. I wonder how long he’s been off his meds?

  “No,” Ty said, waving it away and smiling. “It’s okay.” He finished his sandwich, chewing thoughtfully for a moment as he gazed out the doors at the rising water. The towels and tarps were holding the rain at bay, at least for the moment.

  “I did a lot of bad sh—.” He gave a sidelong glance at his daughter and stopped, then restarted. “… bad stuff for a long time. I was a bad guy, Dave. A really bad guy.” He toyed with the chips on his plate, thinking it through. “I started out okay. I was in the service for a while; came out of that in one piece – mostly – and came back to the States. That’s when I met K’s mom. Working security in a club in L.A.”

  Everyone found somewhere else to look. Everybody but Dave. “So what went wrong?” he asked, almost chirpy. “How’d you fuck up?”

  The older kids at the table tittered at the bad word. Trini said, “Jesus, David, come on,” which Lisa thought was only slightly better. She realized for the first time that Elli Monaghan, usually the first officer of the language police, was nowhere to be seen. Wonder where she’s gotten off to? Lisa asked herself.

  “You know what, Dave? In my case, it was simple. Wasn’t bad parents, wasn’t PTSD, wasn’t the cops or prison. It was drinking. Nothing but: I was a mean, stupid drunk.”

  He took a long swallow from his can of Dr. Pepper. Everyone watched him and said nothing at all. Steven, the boy everyone called “Slumpy,” was absolutely intent on him. Lisa wondered what the two of them had been through out there.

  Ty put the empty container down in front of him and toyed with it for a moment, still choosing his words carefully. After some thought, he turned his head to look at his daughter, who was listening very carefully. “I did some awful things to your Momma, K. I hit her. I scared her. I made her run away, and that was all my fault. That’s why I’m here.”

  He put his hand over hers. It was so big he engulfed her fingers completely, right up past the wrist. “I’ve been sober for almost three years now, and that’s pretty good. But the ninth step in the program says I should seek out the people I did wrong to when I was drinking. Try to make amends. That’s why I’m here. To ask forgiveness.”

  Kerianne Briggs smiled at him, full force and beautiful. “I forgive you, Daddy.”

  He smiled back at her, much smaller. “Well thank you for that, K,” he said. “But I really need to talk to your momma.”

  Before another word could be spoken, the door to the storage room on the mezzanine burst open with a jarring bang!, and everybody jumped. Lisa saw Elli Monaghan bustle onto the landing. She was dragging a canvas bag almost as big as she was. It was filled with something bulky, like bricks or books. “Got something here!” she called down. “Something that might help!”

  She wrestled it to the staircase and pulled, and this time the swaying of the metal stairs was obvious to everyone. Something had come loose during the tidal wave. Now it was getting worse.

  Elli didn’t seem to notice. Her face was flushed with the effort, but she was excited about what she’d found. Ty got to his feet, obviously glad to end the conversation, and went to help her. Together, they overturned the bag and dumped the contents at the feet of the group. It clattered loudly on the polished floor.

  The bag had been filled with black boxes, each about twice the size of paperback books. Each box had stubby little antennas protruding from one end, a screen for a meter, and a press-button embedded in its face.

  “Ah,” Barrymore said. “The tasers.”

  Dave Drucker was the first to snatch one up. “Ah!” he said, almost giggling. “God bless the Homeland Security School Defense Initiative, Grant Number H-6-Whatever.”

  Lisa brightened. “Electricity,” she said. “A … friend of mine … said electricity could scramble the brains of these … these things. Maybe drive them away.”

  “Really?” Dave said. His brow creased as he gave it some thought. “Really …” He mashed a thumb on the taser’s button, and its stubby antenna spat out sparks. The sound it made was a rhythmic and somehow nasty tick-tick-tick.

  Drucker grinned. “Really,” he said, and did it again.

  Everyone was so intent on the new weaponry that they didn’t see the shadow at the entrance this time. No one heard the door pull open until it was too late.

  The gushing water was like an explosion. Everyone in the room, adult and child alike, turned at the same moment to see the double doors pulled outward and the water roar in, so fast and hard that once it started it pushed the doors even wider, and the water, more than four feet deep, slammed inside.

  Tyler started to run towards the torrent, then stopped. “Dave! Dave, for fuck’s sake, you didn’t lock the door before you plugged the leaks?”

  Drucker was gaping at the widening crack between the doors and the torrent of water that was pouring in. “I didn’t – I – I didn’t—”

  It was too late. The figure that had opened the entrance without so much as a knock was thrown inside by the sheer force of the water itself. It tumbled end over end as the gap grew wider and stronger.

  Lisa was the first to see the creatures coming in with the water – a tangled mass of bone and shell and razor-sharp edges, scrabbling for purchase, diving through the bubbling current, searching, grabbing, clutching for something to kill.

  Or to drink dry.

  Thirty-six

  Lisa Corman started dragging children onto the grandstands the instant she saw what was happening. She caught a glimpse of Elli Monaghan scooping the tasers back into the bag and hauling them up out of harm’s way as well; the rest of the adults began scooping children up or pushing them along, ordering them to climb, climb.

  Only one of them didn’t move at all – not for the longest time. Dave Drucker just stood in the middle of the huge room, in the center of the basketball court, frozen in a moment of horrified realization as the water rushed forward. It swirled around his ankles. Then his calves. Then his knees –

  – until James Barrymore literally grabbed him by his collar and jerked him back, out of the rising water and onto the third row of bleachers, just above the rising water’s edge.

  Lisa didn’t take the time to marvel at Barrymore’s feat of strength, or even note the strangely horrified expression on his face. She simply shoved two small children down on the fifth level up and said, Stay, in such a commanding voice she even impressed herself. Then she jumped, high and far, back into the water to rescue three more.

  She caught sight of the dark, dripping figure who had opened the door, as the near-silhouette rolled to a halt at the far end of the bleachers on the far side of the room. From this distance, she could make out a hood and a pair of jeans, soaked through and black with water, as the figure struggled to climb the grandstand seats just like everyone else, desperate to escape what was waiting in the rising tide.

  Trini, she saw, was dragging children to safety. Elli had joined them now, pushing and carrying children with remarkable, panic-driven strength. Barrymore was lifting them up in armfuls, almost tossing them onto the bleachers … but Lisa saw something odd in his movements, too.

  He was backing away from the water. Even the first few inches of it, even if there were no creatures nearby, he backed away from the water as if it was acid.

>   “James!” Lisa shouted. “Are you all right?”

  Barrymore spun to her, and she was startled and a little afraid at how white he was, how wide-eyed. “What?” he said wildly. “Yeah! Fine! Yeah! I—”

  At that moment, one of the two doors completely broke from its hinges, finally shattered by the force of the raging water. It created a new wave, four feet high, that sped across the room and hit Barrymore square in the back, knocking him face-first into the churning water.

  Trini, just a few feet from Lisa, saw it happen as she helped her last child onto a safe seat. “Oh my God no,” she said under her breath. “James …”

  He was thrashing madly in the water, sending out rooster-tails and sprays of water in every direction. For one horrified moment, Lisa thought a creature had found him and was tearing him to pieces … then the huge man roared up out of the water all on his own, bellowing like a madman, and she saw that it was pure panic, pure fear, that had felled him.

  It took Barrymore a moment to focus on anything. Then he saw the bleacher seats, just a dozen yards away, and rushed for them, staggering madly, until he had his hands on the metal, grasping blindly, and he could pull himself up and out. The canvas bag of tasers was just a few feet from his trembling hands. There were children scattered on the bleachers all around him.

  “I’m okay,” he said, more to himself than anyone. “I’m good.”

  There was a sixth-grade girl wrapped in an oversized bright red hoodie, sitting just a few feet from him on the lowest possible seat. Lisa could see she was in shock. Her feet were actually in the water up past her ankles. Her head was bowed, her hands clasped in her lap. She looked cold and miserable.

  “Heather?” Barrymore said, trying to control his breathing, trying to recover. “Honey, you need to move up a few rows. It’s not safe—”

  Heather’s head came up and her huge, dark eyes looked straight into Barrymore’s.

  “It’s got me,” she said very quietly.