Landfall

by Dawn Lee McKenna

  Her focus changed to the gun that was already loaded, the one tucked into the front of his waistband. She needed that gun.

  She was taking slow, deep breaths, trying to slow her thoughts so that she could come up with something viable, when Sky got up out of her chair, wobbling a little unsteadily on cramped legs.

  “I need to pee,” she said boldly.

  The man straightened up and snarled at her. “No, you don’t. Sit back down.”

  “Sky!” Kyle croaked.

  “No! You wanna kill me, you ignorant redneck, then you go ahead and do it, but they’re not gonna find me with piss running down my leg,” Sky snapped. “Take me to the freaking bathroom.”

  Maggie’s heart pounded with hope as the man shot over to the table, but he pulled out the .22 and pointed it at Sky’s face. “Sit down now,” he said through his teeth. Maggie’s eyes zoomed in on the safety, expecting him to flick it off at any moment.

  Sky’s eyes blinked several times, but when she opened her mouth, all she said was, “No.”

  “Sky!” Kyle yelled again, and Coco started barking furiously from the bedroom.

  The man kipped the gun sideways and pulled his arm back a bit to strike Sky with it, and Maggie stopped thinking.

  She grabbed the loose rope in her right hand and whipped the remaining knot off of her left wrist as she got to her feet. She had been planning on slapping at the gun with it, but as she got up, she changed her angle. It was unplanned and awkward, and she was slower than she had been when she’d envisioned it in her mind.

  She slung it underhand, hitting him where his wrist met his hand. She was unsteady on her feet and her head spun a little, so she didn’t have the momentum she’d hoped she would, but it was enough to knock the gun from his hand. It clattered to the table, then skidded off the table and onto the wood floor, where it slid under the kitchen island.

  Sky sat down hard in surprise as the man whipped his head to follow the trajectory of his gun, then spun back to face Maggie. Maggie got one kick to the back of his thigh, but she had to use her left leg and wasn’t really positioned for good leverage. The kick was slightly weak and put her off balance, but it was hard enough and well placed enough to make him slump a bit.

  As he did, Maggie stepped forward and got him in the throat with the side of her left hand. It was a hit, but a weaker hit than she needed it to be. The pain registered on his face, but when she went for an upper cut with her right fist, he caught it.

  She twisted out of it before he could break her wrist, but his free hand popped straight at her and he slammed her broken nose with his palm. Pain exploded in every part of her face and head, and her vision swam. It gave him the precious few seconds he needed to wrap both hands around her throat.

  Maggie heard both Kyle and Sky screaming behind her as the man bent her backwards over the table. She thrust her arms between his and outward against his elbows in an attempt to break his hold, but she didn’t have the speed or power behind it that she needed.

  He actually lifted her by her neck, stronger than he’d appeared to be, and slammed her down on the table on her back. For a moment, Kyle’s face was visible above her, just inches away. She grabbed both of his thumbs and started trying to bend them backwards, to twist them enough to make him loosen his grip, but she couldn’t breathe and her vision was already darkening.

  Maggie kept pulling back on the man’s thumbs, trying to dislodge his hands from her throat just enough to get one breath of air, one breath to keep her conscious. The man lifted her neck just a few inches and slammed her head against the tabletop. She heard Kyle screaming, could see his frightened eyes just a few inches above her, as he sat there, staring down in horror.

  She felt her brain start to shut down, and she thought, Please don’t choke me to death six inches away from my son. Please don’t do this in front of my children.

  Above the sound of her children’s screaming and the man’s cursing, she heard the front door slam inward. It crashed against the wall with a clap as loud as thunder, and suddenly wind filled the room, and rain fell onto Maggie’s legs where they twisted and kicked between the man’s.

  Then, like something her air-starved brain had conjured, Boudreaux’s face appeared over the man’s shoulder. He was looking at her, and the pure, unadulterated, animalistic rage in his bright blue eyes was like something from someone else’s nightmare.

  Maggie didn’t even have time to reconcile what she was seeing with what she thought ought to be there. Boudreaux’s arm whipped around the man’s neck, and the man released Maggie’s throat. Two seconds later, they were both gone. Boudreaux pulled the man backwards, back out the front door, and the wind yanked the door shut again with a bang.

  It was as though some huge, tentacled creature had wrapped itself around a sailor and pulled him overboard into the sea, just like that. If she couldn’t still feel the rain on her legs, couldn’t see the water all over the floor in front of the door as she pushed herself up on one arm, Maggie would not have believed that it had actually happened the way her eyes told her that it had.

  Maggie laid on the table for two pounding heartbeats, then slid off and onto her feet, and scrambled over to Sky’s chair.

  “Mom, what just happened?” Sky asked, her voice near hysterical.

  “I don’t know,” Maggie managed to croak, squatting behind Sky’s chair and furiously working the ropes that bound her wrists.

  “What did he do?”

  “I don’t know, Sky!”

  The wind was whistling like a train outside, and it seemed impossible that it could be louder than it had already been. Maggie looked up toward the kitchen window as something small but hard hit it, and she caught Kyle’s eye. He was staring at the front door, his eyes wide.

  “I’m coming, Kyle,” Maggie said. He looked at her, but didn’t say anything.

  Sky wiggled her fingers. “Hurry, Mom!”

  “Hold still, baby, please,” Maggie said.

  She yanked the ropes free and jumped up as Sky pulled her arms around to the front. They were stiff from hours of being bound behind her, and she rolled them gingerly.

  “Sky, I need you to grab the Glock,” Maggie said, as she squatted behind Kyle and started working on the ropes. His thin wrists were bleeding, and the ropes had left welts on them that made Maggie want to scream.

  Sky ran over to the kitchen counter and picked up the Glock, where it lay with the Mossberg and her great-grandfather’s .38. “Do you want me to bring it to you?”

  “No, I need it for you,” she said. “Do you remember how to use it?”

  “Yeah, but…I guess. Why not the .38?”

  “This is not the time for a revolver, baby,” Maggie answered. “Just take it. I want you take it, and I want you to take Kyle, and I want you guys to go in my room, and you don’t come out unless I come get you.”

  “Mom, wait—”

  “You don’t come out unless I come get you, do you understand me?” Maggie yelled.

  “Yes.”

  A branch slammed into the window behind Sky, and she ducked instinctively, but the glass didn’t break. The branch fell away again as she straightened up and grabbed the extra rounds from the counter and shoved them into her pocket.

  Maggie finally pulled Kyle’s wrists free, and she rubbed them for just a second before she pulled him up from the chair. “Kyle, you go with Sky, and you guys stay in there. Do you hear me?”

  “Yeah,” he said, his voice a croak.

  “Go!” Maggie barked at Sky, and the kids ran down the hallway. As soon as she heard their steps, Coco started barking and scratching at the door again. Maggie watched Sky open the door, watched the kids go in and slam the door behind them, then she ran over to the kitchen counter.

  She glanced up at the front door several times, as she loaded the Mossberg, shoved a couple of extra rounds in her shorts pocket, and then ran over to the door. The floor was wet from when he had burst through, and she slipped and nearly went down befor
e catching herself.

  She put an ear to the door, but it was a ridiculous thing to do. On the other side was nothing but noise, and she could hear nothing beyond the pounding of the rain on the deck.

  She took a deep breath, slammed back the action on the shotgun, and flung open the door.

  Boudreaux was in the yard, a few feet from the bottom of the stairs. He was almost knee deep in water from the creek, and the water closest to him was colored a deep, dark red.

  He looked up at her, the wind buffeting him and pushing him, his hair whipping wildly.

  Maggie raised the shotgun and felt a catch in her throat as she looked into those eyes, so deeply blue even from this distance. She hadn’t wanted him to be the one, and she felt, ridiculously, the heaviness of disappointment in her chest.

  “I wish you hadn’t come here, Mr. Boudreaux.”

  He stared at the shotgun, then wiped his forearm across his eyes. “Your father called me,” he yelled to her above the rain and wind.

  It took a second for Maggie to process what he’d said. “What?”

  “He was worried about you,” he called back.

  “Why would he call you?” she demanded.

  Boudreaux seemed to hesitate for a moment. She could almost see him deciding on the best answer. “Because he knew I would come,” he yelled.

  Maggie raised the shotgun just a hair. “That doesn’t—” she started, but then she heard a whining, almost keening sound, like someone slashing a bow across the strings of a violin, and a section of sheet metal or aluminum, maybe a piece of someone’s storage shed, came whipping through the air.

  Boudreaux turned to look when she did, but it wasn’t soon enough to get out of its way. It banged into and across him at the midsection, then was flung into the water beside him, where it was quickly carried away in the fast-moving water.

  When Maggie looked back at Boudreaux, he had his mouth open as though he was about to say something, and then, all at once, his white button-down shirt was flooded with red, red that soaked the shirt from the inside, just above his waist, from one hip to the other, with remarkable speed.

  Boudreaux didn’t seem to notice it until he saw her face, then he looked down and placed a palm on his stomach.

  Maggie opened her mouth to yell a warning as a fresh surge from the creek cascaded into the yard, carrying with it clumps of debris. In an instant, the water was above Boudreaux’s knees, and just as he looked up at Maggie, part of an old railroad tie bumped into his leg and Boudreaux went to his knees.

  The water pushed him over to one side, then face first into the swirl, all in the span of just a few seconds. Maggie took one step toward the stairs, then froze as she saw Boudreaux get swept away toward the chicken yard, then disappear altogether beneath the water.

  She turned around and ran back into the house, skidding on the now much larger puddle in front of the door. She looked around for a moment, then spotted the man’s cell phone on the kitchen counter and ran over to it.

  She flipped open the phone, tapped his call log and looked at the number he’d dialed 17 times. She didn’t recognize it. She tapped it, and it was answered on the first ring.

  “I still got an hour of driving,” a woman’s raised voice said. “I’m going as fast as I can!”

  “Who is this?” Maggie asked evenly.

  There was a long pause before the woman’s rough voice came back across the line. “Who is this?” She sounded panicked.

  “Maggie Redmond,” Maggie answered.

  “You murdered our son, you whore!” the woman yelled. “You killed my Richard!”

  Maggie let out a slow breath. Ricky Alessi. This crazy woman had raised the meth dealer who’d tried to kill Maggie, and now she was raising poor Grace’s kids. She was about to ask where they were when the woman yelled at her.

  “Where’s Dewitt?”

  “Giving an account of himself to God,” Maggie said. “You want to be next, Mrs. Alessi? Keep coming. I’ll blow a hole in you big enough for me to crawl through.”

  “You evil little—” the woman’s scream was cut off and there was nothing. Maggie looked at the phone. It was dead. She allowed herself one second to be furious at herself for wasting the last few seconds of its battery life, then slammed the phone down on the counter.

  Maggie spun around and nearly trod upon Stoopid, who had come into the kitchen to give her an update on the weather, their situation, or his desire to be fed. “Move, Stoopid!” Maggie snapped, as she hopped over him, and he turned and flailed onto to the bottom rail of the kitchen island.

  Maggie ran back out onto the deck, shutting the door behind her to keep Stoopid from running outside.

  She scanned the front and left side yards for a few moments, constantly wiping the rain from her face, before she spotted a flash of white over by the garden.

  Boudreaux was hung up against one of the raised beds. He was partially on his side, one elbow up on the topmost railroad tie, but his face was in the water.

  Maggie half ran, half slid down the deck stairs and jumped into the water. It was up to the bottom of her backside, and she was amazed at how powerfully it pushed against her legs. They’d had flooding before, but not like this, not this deep and this fast-moving. Not in her memory.

  She had to alternate wading with the current and dragging her feet in order to remain standing, but she still came close to falling several times, as she stumbled against a rock or a hump in the dirt. At one point, something slammed against her calves, and she almost went down.

  She had to stop periodically, turn her body, and force her way diagonally toward the garden again, as the water sought to push her past it. She had a vision of herself, running against her will with the water, into the woods and on out to the river beyond them.

  She finally reached Boudreaux, and she tried to brace herself against the raised bed with one hip as she bent down and turned him over. His eyes were closed.

  “Boudreaux!” she yelled over the noise of the storm. It was the first time in her life that she hadn’t addressed him as ‘Mr.’

  “Get up!” she yelled at him, pulling on the shoulders of his shirt. His eyelids fluttered a moment, then he opened his eyes. He didn’t seem to see her at first.

  “Move! I need you to get up!”

  He finally focused on her, raised one arm up out of the water and pointed beyond her. “Get inside,” he said, and she read his lips more than she actually heard it.

  She leaned away from the raised bed, tried to plant her feet on the slick ground, and bent to slide her wrists under his arms. “Get the hell up!” she yelled again.

  He struggled to get his feet underneath him, as she struggled to pull him upward without losing her own footing. The water was tugging at her lower legs like a thousand insistent toddlers, and she knew that if one foot left the ground, they both would.

  Once she got Boudreaux to his feet, she was thrown for a moment by the sight of his midsection. His shirt, still mostly tucked in, had been rent almost from one side of his waist to the other. She wanted to spread the fabric open to the see the wound, but she was afraid she’d find it discouraging and that this would only distract her from getting him to the house. The amount of blood, and the fact that it was still seeping through the shirt and had soaked the top of his trousers, let her know all she really needed to know at this point: the help he needed was beyond her limited training.

  “Where’s your phone?” she yelled over the wind.

  He had one arm draped over her neck, and raised the hand of the other one to pat his empty shirt pocket, then shook his head at her.

  “Never mind. Let’s go,” she said.

  She’d thought moving with the water was difficult. She could see immediately that working against it was going to be much harder. The house was very slightly uphill from the chicken yard and garden area, which she supposed helped make the flow so fast. She also knew that the water was not only making its way downhill, but also back to its own source. Several h
undred yards through the woods in back, the river curved around and made its way to what would eventually, in five miles or so, be Scipio Creek, and then the bay.

  Maggie had always loved that she had water on both one side and the back of her land, but at the moment, the flood water on her property was essentially connecting the two, and this wasn’t a good thing. One way or another, everything was going to flow to the river, whether it wanted to or not.

  Maggie bent at the waist, leaned into the wind and took the first step back toward the house. It had occasionally seemed like a bit of a hike to the house from the garden or chicken yard, mainly when she was exhausted or Stoopid was throwing himself in her way in a fit of nerves or agitation. However, the hundred feet or so that she and Boudreaux now needed to traverse seemed like a great distance indeed.

  Apparently, everything was far away if you needed to get there dragging a half-dead man through thigh-high water that was moving in the other direction.

  The wind and the rain wanted to push them away from the house, as well, and Maggie almost appreciated the irony of her loving storms so much. She’d never had to fight one so hard. She’d always just prepared for them as much as she’d needed to, then hunkered down to wait them out and enjoy them as much as she could.

  She’d always felt somewhat guilty and secretive about her love of bad weather, especially after storms like Katrina, but she couldn’t help welcoming a good pounding rain, or the rumble of thunder overhead. Some part of her mind that wasn’t preoccupied with survival wondered now if she would lose that pleasure.

  Boudreaux spoke to her a few times as they fought their way toward the house, but his words were lost in the wind, and overwritten by her single-minded focus on moving forward. Every time Maggie looked up at the deck stairs, she felt like they should be closer than they were, but they were at least making progress.

  Maggie could feel her legs trembling from the strain, and this seemed incongruous with all of the hours that she had spent in her lifetime, running out into the ocean against the surf. She’d always loved bodysurfing, and she and her parents, and she and David, had spent countless days at Fort Walton Beach or Destin, running out into the surf, then riding it back in, from sunrise to sunset, almost without rest.