Before the Storm (10 page)

My cheeks burned. How could I have thought that didn’t

matter to her? Did she say things to Keith behind my back? Had

Keith’s resentment built up until it spilled out on Andy at the

lock-in?

Sara had been at the UNC burn center with Keith since the

fire, so we’d had no good chance to talk. Our phone conversations were about Keith’s condition; he was still battling for

his life. Although the most serious burns were on his arms and

one side of his face, his lungs had suffered severe damage, and

he was being kept in a medicated coma because the pain would

otherwise be unbearable.

Neither of us brought up the fight between our sons. Maybe

she didn’t even know about it. She had one thing on her mind,

and that was getting Keith well. I’d offered to help her pay for

any care he needed that wouldn’t be covered by his father’s

military health insurance, but she said she’d be fine. Was it my

imagination that she’d sounded chilly in her response? Had I

insulted her? Maybe she simply resented the fact that Andy was

safe and whole while her son could die.

Everyone around me suddenly stood up. Even Andy. I’d been

so caught up in my thoughts that I didn’t realize we were supposed

to be singing a hymn, the words printed on the back of the

program. I stood up as well, but didn’t bother singing. Neither

did Andy or Maggie, and I wondered where
their
thoughts were.

Long ago, Sara helped me turn my life around. When I got

Andy out of foster care, he was a year old and I had no idea

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how to be a mother to the little stranger. After all, Jamie’d

been both mother and father to Maggie when she was that age.

It was Sara who helped me. Keith was nearly a year older than

Andy, and Sara was a goddess in my eyes, the mother I wanted

to emulate. Keith was adorable, and our boys were friends.

They stayed friends until Andy was about nine. That’s when

Keith started caring what other kids thought, and my strange

little son became an embarrassment to him. Andy never really

understood the sudden ostracism. In Andy’s eyes, everyone

was his friend, from the janitor at school to the stranger who

smiled at him on the beach. Over the past few years, though,

I was glad Keith and Andy had drifted apart. Keith got picked

up for drinking once, for truancy a couple of times, and last

summer, for possession of an ounce of marijuana. That was the

last sort of influence I needed over Andy. Andy longed to fit

in and, given his impulsiveness, I worried how far he’d go to

reach that goal.

We were sitting again and I felt ashamed that I’d paid so little

attention to the service. Reverend Bill swept his eyes over the

crowd as he vowed that “a new Drury Memorial will rise from

the ashes of the old,” embracing everyone with a look of tenderness, skipping over my children and me. Literally. I saw his

eyes light on the man sitting next to Maggie, then instantly slip

to the Carmichaels on the other side of Andy. We were the

heathens in the crowd, and Reverend Bill carried a grudge for

a good long time. I was willing to bet his eyes never lit on

Marcus either when he looked in the direction of the firefighters. Still, I felt for the man. Even though his congregation was

planning to build a new church, he’d lost this one. I knew

some families were talking about suing him for negligence.

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Others wondered if Reverend Bill himself might have set the

fire for the insurance money. I was no fan of the man, but that

was ridiculous.

My gaze drifted to Marcus. His face was slack and I could

suddenly see the first sign of age in his features. He was young.

Thirty-eight. Three years younger than me. For the first time,

I could begin to see how he’d look as he got older, something

I’d never have the joy of seeing in Jamie, who’d only been

thirty-six when he died.

Reverend Bill and Trish Delphy were changing places at the

podium. Trish licked her lips as she prepared to speak to the

crowd.

“Our community will be forever changed by this terrible

tragedy,” she said. “We mourn the loss of life and we pray for

those still recovering from their injuries. But I’d ask you to look

around you and see the strength in this room. We’re strong

and resilient, and while we’ll never forget what happened in

Surf City on Saturday, we’ll move forward together.

“And now,” she continued, “Dawn Reynolds has an announcement she’d like to make.”

Ben Trippett’s girlfriend looked uncomfortable as she took

her place behind the podium.

“Um,” she began, “I just wanted to let y’all know that I’m

coordinating the fund-raising to help the fire victims.” The

paper she held in her hand shivered and I admired her for

getting up in front of so many people when it obviously made

her nervous. “The Shriners have come through like always to

help out with medical expenses, but there’s still more we need

to do. A lot of the families have no insurance. I’m working with

Barry Gebhart, who y’all know is an accountant in Hampstead,

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and we set up a special fund called the Drury Memorial Family

Fund. I hope you’ll help out with a check you can give me or

Barry today, or you can drop by Jabeen’s Java anytime I’m

working. Barry and I are thinking of some fund-raising activities and we’d like your suggestions in that…um…about

that.” She looked down at the paper. “We’ll make sure the

money gets to the families who need it the most.”

She sat down again at the end of our row. I saw Ben, his head

still bandaged, smile at her.

Trish stood up once more at the podium.

“Thank you, Dawn,” she said.“We have a generous community with a generous spirit and I know we’ll do all in our

power to ease the suffering of the families hurt by the fire.

“Now I’d like to recognize the firefighters and EMS workers

who did such an amazing job under grueling circumstances.

Not only our Town of Surf City Fire Department, but those

firefighters from Topsail Beach, North Topsail Beach and the

Surf City Volunteer Fire Department as well.”

Applause filled the building, and as it ebbed, I saw Trish

drop her gaze to us.

“And I’d like to ask Andy Lockwood to stand, please.”

Beside me, I felt Andy start.

“Go ahead, sweetie,” I whispered. “Stand up.”

He stood up awkwardly.

Before the mayor could say another word, applause broke

out again, and people rose to their feet.

“Are they clapping for me?” Andy asked.

“Yes.” I bit my lip to hold back my tears.

“Why did they stand up?”

“To honor you and thank you.”

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“Because I’m a hero?”

I nodded.

He grinned, turning around to wave at the crowd behind

us. I heard some subdued laughter.

“Can I sit down now?” Andy asked finally.

“Yes.”

He lowered himself to his seat again, his cheeks pink. It took

another minute for the applause to die down.

“As most of you know,” Trish said, “Andy not only found a

safe way out of the church, but he risked his own life to go back

in and lead many of the other children to safety. Our loss is

devastating, but it would have been much worse without

Andy’s quick thinking and calm in the face of chaos.”

Andy sat up straighter than usual, his chest puffed out a bit,

and I knew he was surprised to find himself suddenly the

darling of Topsail Island.

MOM PUT HER VITAMINS IN A LINE by her plate. She ate

breakfast vitamins and dinner vitamins. Maggie and I only ate

breakfast ones. Maggie passed me the spinach bowl. Dumb.

She knows I don’t eat spinach. I tried to give it to Mom.

“Take some, Andy,” Mom said. “While your arm is healing,

you need good nutrition.”

“I have lots of nutrition.” I lifted my plate to show her my

chicken part and the cut-up sweet potato.

“Okay. Don’t spill.” She put her fingers on my plate to make

it go on the table again.

I ate a piece of sweet potato. They were my favorite. Mom

made sweet potato pie sometimes, but she never ate any. She

didn’t eat dessert because she didn’t want to ever be sick. She

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said too many sweet things could make you sick. Maggie and

I were allowed to eat dessert because we weren’t adults yet.

“Andy,” Mom said after she swallowed all her vitamins,

“your arm looks very good, but maybe you should skip the

swim meet tomorrow.”

“Why?”
I
had
to swim. “It doesn’t hurt!”

“We need to make sure it’s completely healed.”

“It
is
completely healed!”

“You’ve been through a lot, though. It might be good just

to take a rest.”

“I don’t
need
a rest!” My voice was too loud for indoors. I

couldn’t help it. She was pressing my start button.

“If your arm is all better, then you can.”

“It’s better enough!” I wanted to show her my arm, but I

punched it out too hard and hit my glass of milk. The glass flew

across the table and crashed to the floor. It broke in a million

pieces and milk was all over. Even in the spinach.

Mom and Maggie stared at me with their mouths open. I

saw a piece of chewed chicken in Maggie’s mouth. I knew I

did an inappropriate thing. My arm did.

“I’m sorry!” I stood up real fast. “I’ll clean it up!”

Maggie catched me with her hand.

“Sit down, Panda,” she said. “I’ll do it. You might cut

yourself.”

“I’ll get it.” Mom was already at the counter pulling off

paper towels.

“I’m sorry,” I said again.“My arm went faster than I thought.”

“It was an accident,” Mom said.

Maggie helped her pick up the pieces of glass. Mom put

paper towels all over the milk on the floor.

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“My arm did it because it’s so strong and healed,” I said.

Mom was scrunched on the f loor cleaning milk. Sometimes when I talk, she looks like she’s going to laugh but

doesn’t. This was one of those times.

I put my napkin on top of the spinach to clean off the milk.

“Andy,” Maggie said, while she got five or maybe six more

paper towels. “I know you’re upset that you might not be able

to swim, but you’ve
got
to think before you react.” She sounded

exactly like Mom.

“I
do,
” I said. That was sort of a lie. I
try
to think before I

act, but sometimes I forget.

Mom stood up. “We’ll check your arm again in the

morning.” She threw away the milky paper towels. “If it still

looks good and you feel up to it, you can swim.”

“I’ll feel up to it, Mom,” I said. I
had
to be there. I was the

secret weapon, Ben told me. I was the magic bullet.

The pool was the only place where my start button was a

very good thing.

I WAS SPACED-OUT AS I LINED UP MY TEAM of ten little

Pirates at the end of the indoor pool. Aidan Barber pranced

around like he had to pee and I hoped that wasn’t the case.

“Stop dancing, Aidan,” I called to him,“and find your mark.”

He obeyed, but then Lucy Posner actually sat down on the

edge of the pool and started picking at her toenails.

“Lucy! Stand up! The whistle’s going to blow any minute.”

Lucy looked surprised and jumped to her feet. I usually

loved these kids. I was good with them. Incredibly patient.

That’s what the parents always told me.
You’re so much more

patient with them than I am, Maggie,
they’d say. Now that I was

floating through this meet like I was in a weird dream, I had

no patience at all. I wanted it to be over.

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People talked about canceling the meet, since it was only a

week since the fire. It was like Mom had called me to say the

church was on fire minutes ago instead of days; I was still that

shaken up. I couldn’t sleep. I kept seeing flames and smoke

pouring out of the church and was afraid of what I’d dream if

I shut my eyes.

Since I coached the little kids’ team, I had some say about if

we should hold today’s meet between our team, the Pirates, and

the Jacksonville team, the Sounders. I voted for canceling. I told

Ben, who coached Andy’s team, that it was totally insensitive

to hold it, but mostly I didn’t think I could concentrate. Ben

wasn’t much in the mood for a meet either. He still had a

bandage over the gash on his forehead, and he was on pain meds

for his headache.

One of the girls who was in the burn center at UNC was

on Ben’s team, though, and her parents wanted us to have the

meet.
The kids need it,
her mother said.
They need the normalcy.

They persuaded Ben, and I didn’t have much choice but to go

along.

The whistle blew and my kids were off, paddling furiously

through the water in a way that usually made the people in the