She remembered that lunch she’d had with Adam a few weeks earlier when he talked about the Pollywog. How happy he’d looked. How she’d realized then that some of the joy had gone out of him in the last year or so.
She stubbed out her cigarette and leaned forward. “You two are solid, Maya,” she said. “All couples have their ups and downs.” She held her breath, waiting for Maya to tell her once again that she couldn’t understand since she’d never been married, but Maya only shrugged.
“I know,” she said. “But this just…this feels bad.”
Adam and Maya. Maya and Adam. Their personalities were entirely different—extroverted versus introverted, jocular versus serious—but together the two of them formed one whole, balanced human being. Rebecca couldn’t imagine Maya without Adam. She couldn’t imagine her own life without Adam in it as her brother-in-law.
“This is a phase,” she said. “You’ll get through it, honey. You can’t rush it. You can’t do anything about it. But—” she leaned forward again “—the thing you can do something about is work, and I think you’re working way too hard right now.” Work was a topic she could understand and she felt herself on safer ground. Maya was covering for one of her partners who was on vacation. Someone else could have covered for him—someone who hadn’t miscarried a couple of weeks ago.
“I need to stay busy,” Maya said. “You know how I am.”
She did know. Work had always been Maya’s way of coping. Even after their parents’ deaths, when their lives had been turned completely upside down, Maya threw herself into her schoolwork. Her teachers and the school counselor had been astounded. Maya had always been a good student, the type who didn’t have to study all that hard to do well, something Rebecca had envied since she’d had to cram to get the same grades. But after their parents’ deaths, Maya lost herself completely in her studies, graduating from high school in three years instead of four. Everyone talked about how amazing she was. No one paid much attention to the fact that Rebecca had sacrificed her own first year of college to play mother and father to her sister, or that she’d fought the system to keep Maya out of foster care or that she’d cooked and cleaned and done the laundry while Maya rose to the top of her class.
The thing that really changed about Maya after the murders, though, was her transformation from a happy-go-lucky kid into a girl afraid of her own shadow. Totally understandable. She’d been right in the line of fire. Who could go through something like that and remain unchanged?
Rebecca closed the book on the Chinese earthquake, giving up. She hadn’t absorbed a single word in the past fifteen minutes. Swallowing the last of her Americano, she got to her feet. She’d go for a run. Lose the negative memories.
She left the store and headed for her car, walking quickly as though she could leave the memories behind, but it wasn’t so easy. The whole time she and Maya had been talking the night before, Rebecca had been thinking about the shooting in the restaurant. She hated guns, hated treating gunshot victims, although she did it, wanting to save their lives with a desperation that went beyond the simple practice of medicine. Two decades had passed, yet she still saw her parents’ bloodied bodies in every shooting victim she treated.
The incident in the Brazilian restaurant had to remind Maya of that night. Rebecca had seen the panic in her eyes. She’d still been trembling later, when Rebecca hugged her good-night. They never talked about their parents’ murder. It was an agreed-upon, unspoken rule between them. Yet she knew that Maya had to blame her for that night.
Maybe even more than she blamed herself.
11
Maya
“HOLY SHIT, MAYA,” ADAM CALLED FROM THE SOFA IN THE family room. “Come look at this.”
I closed the dishwasher and walked into the family room. Outside the windows, the rain created a dark, undulating curtain so thick I couldn’t see the woods behind the house. It was eight o’clock, so I wasn’t sure how much of the darkness was encroaching nightfall and how much of it was the storm. Either way, it was the sort of weather that made me glad to be inside. Chauncey sat at the sliding glass door, looking discouraged.
Adam pointed toward the TV. “They’re in Wilmington,” he said. “They’re saying now it’s a category four.”
I sat down on the sofa next to him. On the screen, a newscaster dressed in a slicker and hood held on to a lamppost to keep from flying away. He was trying to shield his eyes against the wind and rain, shouting to be heard above the din. I squinted at the TV. “Is he…where is he?” I asked. Wilmington was less than three hours from us, and I loved the charm of the city on the Cape Fear River. “Is that the Riverwalk?”
“Right,” Adam said. “He’s near the Pilot House. Listen.”
“…not moving,” the reporter said. “Just sitting at the mouth of the Cape Fear. There’s no one out here on the downtown streets, but most people didn’t evacuate. Some were starting to, because the next storm, Erin, is expected to make a direct hit. And that’s a problem—” He slapped his hand on his hood to keep it on his head. “A big problem,” he said. “We’ve got people who were trying to leave and are now stuck on the roads because of flooding and downed trees. They tried to…you know…get out, but it’s just too late.” The reporter was getting blown all over the place. His knuckles were white where he clung to the pole. “You know the next named storm was Donald, but that one sort of just…fizzled, but the big…but Carmen…no one expected this. This…strength. And of course, no one expected her to make landfall here.” He fiddled with his earpiece. “Some people are trying to leave the area, like I said, but there’s already flooding on some of the major roads and many, if not most, of the minor roads. And I tell you…if this next storm, Erin, packs this kind of punch while people are here…unable to evacuate…” Something blew past his head and he ducked, then recovered. “If it packs this kind of punch,” he repeated, “we’re going to have a major catastrophe on our hands.”
Chauncey had moved to my side. He rested his big head on my knees and I massaged my fingertips into the short fur on his neck. “I hope there’s enough of a break between the storms that people can leave.” I glanced out the window, but now it truly was dark outside and I couldn’t see a thing. I’d been worried about the rain and wind in our own yard. I could still remember Hurricane Fran, which hit North Carolina shortly after I moved to the state. I was in medical school and sharing an apartment with Rebecca at the time, and I remembered trees lying helter-skelter everywhere. “How bad is it supposed to get here?” I asked Adam. “Did they say?”
He shook his head, putting his arm around my shoulders, and I felt relief well up inside me. Except for that moment in the hallway of the restaurant after the shooting, he’d shown me little affection since the miscarriage. I was trying not to read too much into it, trying not to be neurotic and insecure. I snuggled close to him. I wanted our intimacy back. I wanted to be able to talk to him. We used to talk so easily to one another. Now, though, the things that were on my mind didn’t feel safe to bring up, because they would make me sound small and pathetic and I knew he wanted me strong. Worse, I was angry with him for the way he was shutting me out. I’d rarely felt anger toward Adam before, and I didn’t know what to do with it. My hormones were still toying with me, and the things that were on my mind, the things I couldn’t get out of my mind were: my lost child, Adam’s ex-wife, laughing about having children after all, and the abortion I’d never told him about. Sometimes I thought to myself: just sit him down and say, Adam, please, I need to get all this out. Please just let me talk without telling me everything’s fine, not to worry. Please. But I didn’t. I was afraid, and I wasn’t even sure what it was that I feared.
The guy on the TV screen was growing repetitive, but he was still riveting to watch. “Dorothea was right,” I said.
“What do you mean?”
“This is why she told Rebecca not to go to Ecuador. She had a feeling about these storms. So I guess Rebecca will be going to Wilmington or where
ver the damage is the worst once they let up.”
“…didn’t really have a chance to board up along the coast,” the reporter was saying.
“I may go, too,” Adam said.
I lifted my head from his shoulder. “Really?”
He nodded. “If it turns out they need DIDA down there, this would be a good first assignment. You know…in our backyard. Better than Ecuador.”
“Definitely,” I said, but I didn’t want him to go. I didn’t want him to be in DIDA, period. But he was right. I would be far more comfortable having him in North Carolina than South America.
“…has the meteorologists scratching their heads, because this storm—this cat four hurricane—just wasn’t supposed to go down like this.”
The TV showed a satellite image. The hurricane was a stunner, huge and round with a perfect blue eye. It sat at the mouth of the Cape Fear and the projected path drove it straight up the river. A meteorologist with long, glossy red hair moved onto the screen and was about to open her mouth when the TV went dark, along with every light in our house.
“Knew that was going to happen.” Adam stood up. “I’ll get the flashlights.”
“I already did,” I said, getting to my own feet. As soon as the rain had started that afternoon, I’d taken them from the cupboard where we kept the emergency supplies. “The weather radio’s there, too,” I said, feeling my way toward the kitchen. “And the candles. They’re all on the island.”
I heard the ominous cracking sound of a limb being torn from a tree and stopped in the doorway of the kitchen, waiting for the thud I knew was coming, hoping the limb didn’t hit the house. I heard the snapping of other branches as the limb fell and held my breath until it finally hit the earth. The whole house shook, and Chauncey began barking furiously, running around my legs, his tail thwacking against my thighs. It was going to be a long, long night.
I heard the sound of chain saws even before I opened my eyes in the morning. Adam was already up, and I stood at our bedroom window to survey the yard below. It didn’t look bad. Tree limbs and branches littered the lawn, but they were small and I knew we could drag them back into the woods without much trouble. I hoped the front yard had suffered no more damage than the back. The odd thing was, the world outside was still gray. Almost dark, as though the storm was not quite finished with us.
Adam poked his head in the bedroom. “No coffee,” he said, wrinkling his nose.
“Oh.” I wrinkled mine back at him. “Power’s still out?”
He nodded. “The yard’s good, though. The Scotts have a big one down across their driveway. I’m going to take my chain saw over there.”
“Okay.” I smiled. As long as no one had suffered any major damage from the storm, I knew the men in the neighborhood would enjoy the chance to play with their saws that morning. “I’ll start picking up the yard,” I said.
I dressed and went downstairs, dialing Rebecca on my cell as I walked.
“Hey,” she answered. “Any damage at your house?”
“Power’s out, but we’re good,” I said. “How about there?” The trees around Dorothea’s house were far smaller than ours.
“Nothing,” she said. “Couple of shingles off the roof. Have you turned on the TV?”
“Can’t,” I said.
“Oh, that’s right. Well, Wrightsville Beach is practically under water. And wait till you see Wilmington. The river’s flooding a bunch of the buildings on Front Street.”
“Oh, you’re kidding. We saw on the news that people couldn’t evacuate in time. Are there injuries? Will you be going?” Would Adam be going?
“Tons of people stranded,” she said. “It’s hard to say what’s going on because nobody can get in or out. But Erin is right behind. They expect her to hit tomorrow morning.”
“Already? Hit where? I thought Erin wasn’t due until…” I tried to remember what the predictions had been for the second storm.
“They thought Tuesday, but it suddenly started moving,” Rebecca said. I heard the excitement in her voice. My sister loved a great disaster. “It’s not as big because it’s not spending enough time over the water to gain strength, but it’s still a four, and the area just can’t handle another drop of rain.”
“I hope…” I pictured images from Katrina. “I just hope all the people are safe.”
“Me, too,” Rebecca said. “Is Adam there? Dot’s probably going to want both of us to go down there after Erin, unless she turns out to be nothing.”
“He’s somewhere in the neighborhood with his chain saw.”
Rebecca laughed. “The air’s buzzing here, too,” she said. “Okay, have him call me when he gets in. How are you doing?”
“I’d kill for a cup of coffee, but that’s not much to complain about.”
“Hey, sis? You know what they’re calling these two hurricanes?”
“What?”
“The sister storms,” she said.
I thought about that. “Maybe they’ll be like us, then,” I said. “Carmen was the wild and crazy one, and Erin will be tame and mild.”
“Let’s hope you’re right,” Rebecca said.
12
Rebecca
ALTHOUGH THE DAY WAS CLEAR, REBECCA COULDN’T remember a more nauseating helicopter flight. She and Adam were strapped into the fold-down seats of a military helicopter, along with a disaster medical team from Asheville. On the floor between them were stacks of supplies and equipment, poorly anchored. They tilted and shifted from side to side, and Rebecca finally shut her eyes to stop the vertigo, disappointed with herself over her queasiness.
“Check it out!” Adam shouted over the sound of the rotor.
She loosened her seat belt so that she could turn toward the window behind their heads, and the sight made her gasp. Below them, the flooding Cape Fear River covered the earth nearly as far as she could see, and the sunlight reflecting off the still water was blinding. Treetops and the roofs of houses looked like litter strewn across the water’s surface. On one of the roofs, she saw two figures. A man and a child.
“Do you see that?” She pointed in the direction of the twosome on the roof. “We need to get them!”
She leaned across Adam to tug at the uniformed arm of the guy sitting next to him. She’d spoken to the man before takeoff, and he seemed to know quite a bit about the evacuation efforts. He was an older guy, gray haired with deep frown lines across his forehead, but clearly in fantastic shape. He looked as though he could lean out the door of the chopper and scoop people from their rooftops with his bare hands.
“There are people on a roof down there!” she shouted to him. “Can we get them?”
He shook his head. “We’re not equipped,” he said. “One of the rescue choppers’ll see them.”
There certainly were plenty of other helicopters. She watched them zip through the air, buzzing precariously close to one another. Some were huge and olive-drab, like the one she and Adam were in. Others were tiny and colorful, most likely donated to the cause by private companies. Rebecca could no longer see the roof where she’d spotted the man and child, and she hoped one of the choppers had already managed to pick them up.
She leaned toward Adam, her lips close to his ear. “The worst part of DIDA work is when you feel helpless,” she said, and he nodded.
It was rare that she felt helpless, though. She was a problem solver and the more chaotic the setting, the better she performed. Dot had once gone so far as to call her a magician. “The only woman I know who can manage two dozen patients at one time, make a jetload of supplies appear overnight and still find time to sleep with the best-looking dude on the site,” she’d said, annoying the hell out of Rebecca. Dot was one of the few people who knew how to yank her chain.
The gray-haired man abruptly unbuckled his seat belt and walked to the front of the helicopter, leaning into the cockpit to talk to the pilot. Rebecca watched him, wondering if he would mention the people she’d seen on the roof. He spoke with the pilot for severa
l minutes. Like the other DMAT team members flying with them, his battalion dress uniform was blue, while her DIDA uniform was dark gray. His multiple pockets, though, bulged just as hers did. In hers, she carried two water bottles, batteries, an MRE, a protein bar and her cell phone, which Dorothea told her she might as well leave behind. The cell towers near the Wilmington airport, where the evacuees were being taken, were down. Rebecca brought it along anyway, and she knew Adam had his as well.
The man returned to his seat. He leaned toward Adam and Rebecca. “I was wondering why we went past the airport,” he said.
“We did?” Rebecca had been so mesmerized by the helicopters that she hadn’t even noticed the airport.
“Right,” the guy said. “The pilot got word that someone on the ground was shooting at the choppers.”
“You’re kidding,” Adam said. He looked a little green.
“They think it was a rumor, so now we’re going down.”
Rebecca gave Adam a “whatever” shrug of her shoulders. She faced the swaying tower of supplies again, tightening her seat belt, and psyched herself up to face whatever they’d find on the ground.
She sensed Adam’s disorientation as they climbed out of the helicopter, and remembered feeling the same confusion the first time she’d landed in a disaster area. The tarmac was brutally hot, the sun so bright and the smell of jet fuel so strong that her head instantly began to pound. There was no time to waste, though, and they joined the DMAT team in unloading the supplies from the helicopter. Adam was quick to get a grip on his confusion. She saw the energy she’d always admired in him as he climbed back into the cabin and began handing boxes and crates down to the volunteers on the tarmac. He’s going to be good at this, she thought. She remembered her conversation with Maya at the Starbucks a few nights earlier. A little separation was probably the best thing for the two of them right now. Time apart would give them a new perspective on their problems.