Porch Lights (37 page)

“Why would he do that when he knew we were having steak?” Edith Bunker’s mother was my mother’s maternal grandmother’s sister.

“Well, Mom, I guess he preferred a hot dog. We’re going down to the forts now. Is Dad looking on the beach?”

“Oh, yes. And I’m here with Deb. Be careful. The wind is fierce.”

“I’m not coming home until I find Charlie. Call me if you hear a single thing, okay?”

“Of course!” Then she whispered to me, “I think the policemen are a little annoyed that you didn’t stay home like they said you should.”

“Really? Ask them what they would do and remind them that I’m an army nurse, okay?”

I hung up and continued staring out the windows, scanning every street, yard, and side street for anyone outdoors who might resemble Charlie. But of course no one was outside, even on the porches. We had an old family tradition, like many islanders, of sitting on our porch to watch storms, especially thunderstorms. But when the wind topped fifty miles an hour, we took down the hammocks, turned over the rockers, and went inside.

The wind was howling like thousands of demons breathing down our necks, and the flooded streets were already littered with debris. Palmetto fronds ripped from trees flew by us while the trees themselves bent this way and that, caught in the growing strength of Candace. Garbage cans rolled across the streets, crashing into curbs, their contents spilling everywhere. Lightweight porch furniture that had not been secured became airborne, flying into neighbors’ houses and trees. Blown-out porch screens flapped in the wind like laundry on a clothesline. And all the while Steve struggled to keep his SUV steady, the streetlights flickered. I just hoped and prayed we’d find Charlie before the island lost power.

“This is horrible,” I said. “It’s my worst nightmare come true.”

“We’re gonna find him, Jackie. I know we’re gonna find him.”

We pulled up outside of Fort Moultrie. Steve said, “You got Charlie’s clothes?”

“Yeah, right here,” I said and handed them over to him.

“Okay, let’s make a run for the front entrance. You ready?”

“Let’s go,” I said and opened my door. I had to push against it to get out because the force of the wind was right on us. The flashlight was tucked tight under my arm. Steve opened the back doors, and somehow by the grace of God, he got his dogs out. He began to run with them toward the entrance, and I was right behind them. When we got there we stopped, out of breath, and leaned against the wall, breathing hard.

“Okay,” Steve said and held Charlie’s clothes under their noses. “Now go get Charlie!”

I turned on the flashlight and aimed it down the tunnel. Stella and Stanley took off running like I’d never seen them go. I was amazed.

“I used to do a lot of bird hunting before my wife died. The dogs are trained to search and retrieve.”

“Even in a hurricane?”

“I had to pay extra for that, but yes.”

It was a stupid joke, but I knew he was trying to get me to calm down. We needed to think of where else Charlie might be if he wasn’t holed up in one of the many tiny rooms or niches in the fort. Minutes later the dogs were back. Charlie wasn’t here. My heart sank. Steve was disappointed too.

“What else was Charlie involved with this summer? I know he did an awful lot of skateboarding. And he played with those kids a lot.”

“Yeah, and he got all excited about the Revolutionary War battles that were fought over here.”

“Wasn’t he reading something by Poe?”

“Yeah. ‘The Gold-Bug.’ I thought it was too mature for him, but he really got into it. He made a map for a treasure hunt and actually had a hunt with those kids. He loved it. And I had to peel his Poe’s Tavern T-shirt off his back to wash it. He like lived in it.”

“Jackie, I’ve got it. Goldbug Island. He’s on Goldbug Island. Come on, we’ve got to hurry.”

“Oh, God! But there’s no shelter there except the clubhouse, and I’d bet my life that it’s locked up!”

“We can worry about that when we get there. Come on. Grab my hand.”

This time we were running right into the wind, and it was only because he held me so tight that I even stayed on my feet. Mom’s hat went flying to kingdom come, and the rain felt like needles on my face. Thank God we didn’t have far to go. When we got to the car, Steve got the dogs in the car first. Maybe because they had a lower center of gravity, they were able to better withstand the wind. I climbed in on his side and crawled over the console. It took a stevedore’s strength for him to pull the door closed.

“Okay, now,” he said. He threw Charlie’s clothes into my lap and started the engine.

We got as far as Dunleavy’s Pub and were just making the left when a patrol car appeared behind us.

“Sullivans Island’s finest appears to have an interest in us,” he said.

We continued on toward the Ben Sawyer Bridge and saw there was a roadblock. We slowed down and rolled to a stop. A police officer approached Steve’s side of the car and indicated by twirling his finger that he should roll down his window. He did, and the officer shined his large flashlight into the car.

“Can I see your driver’s license, sir?”

“Of course.” Steve pulled his wallet from his jacket, removed his license, and handed it to the officer.

The officer read Steve’s name and handed it back to him.

“I’m sorry but you’ll have to turn around, Dr. Plofker. Can’t go over the causeway. It’s flooded. Too dangerous.”

“Officer? My little boy is missing. We’re pretty sure he’s on Goldbug Island.”

“You that McMullen kid’s mother? I heard about that on our radio.”

“If we could just go over the bridge and down to the island. We’re not trying to go to Mount Pleasant or Charleston.”

“I’m sorry, ma’am. Too dangerous. My orders are no one crosses the bridge.”

“Officer, I’m an army nurse. I did six seven-month tours in Afghanistan. My husband just died. I can’t lose my son too. Please . . .”

“Jeez. That’s awful. Afghanistan, huh? I was with the 101st Airborne Special Troops Battalion.”

“The Screaming Eagles? They were on my post.”

He stood back and looked at me for a moment. “You realize you’ll be taking your life into your own hands out there?”

“Until three months ago, that’s what I did for a living,” I said.

“Just be careful,” he said.

“Thank you, Officer,” Steve said and raised his window. “I thought you only did three tours.”

“
Only?
Never use the word
only
when you’re talking about that hellhole. I needed to impress him. The Screaming Eagles have a reputation for eating their young. Raw.”

“Let’s go get Charlie.”

“He’s
got
to be there.”

We inched over the bridge and made the right turn onto the steep hill that would lead us down to the island. The weather was getting worse by the minute. Trees and limbs were down, and pools of water were everywhere. The island was going to be completely flooded as soon as the tide came in. Anything that wasn’t nailed down was going to float away and never be seen again.

Then we encountered our next problem: the gate to the island was locked. But even from there I could see that a large tree had come down on the clubhouse. What if Charlie was in there? What if he’d gotten hurt?

Steve stopped there and asked, “What do you want to do? Either I can crash the gate and buy them a new one when the storm passes, or we can make a run for it.”

It wasn’t like an iron gate at a prison but more like a simple metal bar, probably aluminum, that crossed the drive like a triangular-shaped cattle gate.

“You call it.”

“Okay, I’m going for it. I’m turning off your air bag, but back up your seat as far as you can just in case. And if mine pops out, slash it with this.”

He handed me his Swiss Army knife, and I backed up my seat as far as it would go.

“Ready?”

“Yes.”

He backed up the car about fifty feet and then slammed the gas pedal to the floor.

BAM!

We easily broke through the gate, and Steve’s air bag didn’t deploy. He ignored that detail and drove as close to the clubhouse as he could go, splashing through water and driving around fallen limbs.

“Give me Charlie’s shirt again. And you wait here.”

He opened his car door and let the dogs out. I would do no such thing. I got out of the SUV, and my first thought was that I was going to blow away. The wind had to be close to a hundred miles an hour. Maybe more. What would it be like by four
A.M.
, when the eye was supposed to pass over us? I could see him screaming at me, but the wind was so loud I couldn’t hear what he was saying. Stella and Stanley had already taken off running, and don’t you know they stopped where a huge branch from an uprooted live oak tree had crashed through a large plate-glass window of the clubhouse. I was hanging on to the handle of the door of the car, and Steve inched his way around to get me. I crouched down and began to make my way to him like a duck.

He pulled me up and put his arm around me; we dropped our heads down and struggled toward the window. The dogs were barking wildly. Steve pulled them back from the shattered glass and looked in.

“Go back!” he screamed to them, and they took off toward his Expedition.

Next, without a word, he pulled off his jacket, wrapped it around his hand, and broke away enough of the remaining glass to make a hole large enough for him to pass through. Then he climbed the branch and jumped inside. I was right behind him with my flashlight. We scanned the room, and there was Charlie, lying on the floor near the door. I thought my heart would jump out of my throat.

“Charlie!”
I screamed and began running to him.

Somehow Steve got there first and turned him over. He began giving him little slaps on his face to bring him around. A ceiling fan had fallen on him and knocked him out.

“Come on, Charlie, speak to me. Come on, boy. Your momma’s here, and she wants to talk to you.”

“Charlie? Sweetheart?”

“Careful, I think that wrist might be broken,” Steve said.

Charlie’s eyes fluttered and he groaned.

“Baby, open your eyes and talk to me,” I said.

“Momma,” he said in a whisper. “I’m so sorry.”

I helped him sit up, kissing him all over his head and wiping away blood. Steve took his own jacket and made a sling out of it. “Let’s put your arm in here, son,” he said. “Gently, gently.”

He called him “son” not in a territorial way but in an endearing way. I didn’t even bristle. At that point I was weeping with joy. Even Steve was crying. Charlie began to cry too. His forehead was cut, and he had numerous superficial cuts on his hands. Even if his wrist was broken, it would heal. Clearly it wasn’t a compound fracture. It would all heal.

“We need to get him to the ER,” Steve said.

I was sitting on the floor, leaning against the wall, with Charlie across my lap.

“Well, we can’t stay here, but we can’t go over the causeway,” I replied. “Can we take him in the morning when the storm’s over? I mean, you’re a doctor and I’m a nurse. Can we just take him home and patch him up until daylight? We can wake him up every hour, you know, to watch him for a possible concussion?”

“You’re absolutely right. We can absolutely do that. How’s that wrist, Charlie?”

“Hurts,” he said.

“How’s your head?”

“Hurts.”

“Okay, Charlie, we’re gonna have to get you out of here. If you can walk to the window, your momma can pass you through to me and we can get you home. You game?”

“Yeah,” he said.

“You know it was Stella and Stanley who found you?” Steve said.

“Really?”

“Yeah, but it was you, Steve, who figured out Charlie was here,” I said, and I knew I’d be grateful to him for the rest of my life.

We fought our way back to Steve’s SUV, where the dogs were lying patiently in the mud underneath his vehicle, waiting for him. He got them out and into the backseat and lifted Charlie up to my lap in the front seat. There was mud all over the car, and we were all soaking wet. This man was as good as gold. We went back over the Ben Sawyer Bridge, stopping to tell the police that we had Charlie, and they were happy that we did. They’d call off the search, they said.

“Mom?”

“Yes, sweetheart?”

“Am I in trouble?”

“No, sweetheart. No.”

I called home, and Mom answered the phone. “We found him!” I said.

“Oh! Praise God! Deb! Call Buster! Jackie and Steve found Charlie! Where are you?”

“We’re on our way home,” I said, and I meant it in every sense of the word.

Epilogue

Annie’s Parting Words

I
t might have been the end of October, but everyone was still talking about Hurricane Candace. People were complaining about how long their insurance companies were taking to pay and how many more jillions of bugs we had and how the beach still didn’t look right and on and on. Please. I had no complaints. I had my family under one roof, and that was
all
that mattered to me.

The Salty Dog had sailed right through our visit from Candace except for the paper lantern lights, my doormats that I had completely overlooked, that must have flown away like Frisbees, and beach sand that was so pervasive that it seemed like it was even in our hair. Buster and Steve had become quite the team and were so helpful during the cleanup, taking charge of the outside. They went to Lowe’s together and rented a power washer and blasted the salt and leaves and sand from the outside walls and porches of our houses, including Deb’s. The men reopened the shutters, Jackie, Deb, and I rehung the baskets and hammocks and set the rockers in a row, and we were as good as back in business. Charlie’s wrist, which had a Colles’ fracture, whatever that means, was in a splint that prevented neither running down the beach with Steve’s dogs nor some mild skateboarding. His explanation for running away was that he had been following his passion. After a lot of stern talking to, Charlie agreed that he would indulge in his passions only with his mother’s permission until he was twenty-one. In the days and weeks that followed the hurricane, I had worried that Jackie would blame me for lighting a fire in Charlie that had led him to believe he could go against the odds like the American patriots during the Revolution and somehow stay without her sanction. She didn’t blame me even once. She was so grateful that Charlie was all right, she couldn’t think of another thing.