Page 66 of Eye of the Hurricane
I shift in my seat, checking my phone.
Four texts from my mom asking if I have everything I need. She also asks if my boyfriend will be sheltering with me. I want to ignore her messages altogether, but I don’t. As difficult as she can be, I don’t want her to worry all day and night. So I send a simple message letting her know I’m okay and safe.
If I’m being honest, I don’t even know if it’s true when I say it. I wonder if I made a mistake not evacuating. But then I remember the way traffic was at a standstill on the news. Iremember the meteorologists themselves saying those people may not make it out of here.
“You go inside, I’ll do the boards and the sandbags,” Ares says, turning the car off.
“I can help,” I tell him.
“I know. Let me do it anyway,” he says.
“You say that a lot.”
“I don’t want you to feel like I do these things because I think you can’t,” he explains. “Now go, let me work,” he says, standing from the car and shooing me toward the front door.
I wander all around the house looking for things I can do inside to prep for the storm. I take to the internet to find some advice on what I’ll need. I fill empty cups in the house with water. I also clear out a space in one of my closets in case of tornadoes in the outer bands.
It’s now 9:00 A.M and we’re only a handful of hours away from the first bands coming on shore. Once everything that can be done inside is done, I sit back down on the couch and turn on the weather channel.
Direct landfall has shifted another couple of miles closer south to us. Official landfall is expected at 1:30 A.M. but conditions will begin deteriorating this afternoon.
Ares knocks on the door. I call out to him, without getting up. “Come in!”
He walks in the door with a big duffel bag in hand. I think for a moment it’s some kind of tool bag, but then he sets his actual tool bag down on the ground next to it.
“What’s in the bag?” I ask, sitting up straight in my seat.
“You think I’m leaving you to sit out a category four hurricane by yourself?” He scoffs like I’m nuts.
“Just because I’m a woman—” He cuts me off.
“It’s not because you’re a woman, Kat. It’s becauseI care about you. I wouldn’t let Roman sit through one alone either. But Audra, Beck, and Sebastian are hunkering down together. Mom and Dad are together.”
His genuine kindness melts away some of my remaining defenses. It’s the kind of good guy thing that makes him impossible to stay away from. The kind that makes all of this a slippery slope.
“I asked for space,” I state firmly.
He chuckles for a single moment before gathering himself.
“Then I’ll give you space. But I’m doing it from your house.” His voice is firm and I hate to admit that it does something for me.
“Fine.”
“Fine.” I roll my eyes.
I decidedWe decided that the distance would be best practiced if I spent the night hanging out in my room and Ares spent the night hanging out in the living room.I thoughtWe thought it would be practical and maintainable, until thunder rattled the entire house and everything went dark and silent. It’s pitch black as the storm howls outside. All that can be heard inside is the sound of the bell on Bellatrix’s collar.
A few seconds after the outage, Ares is standing in my doorway with a phone flashlight in one hand and my cat in the other.
“Are you okay?” he asks.
“Yes. Lucky for you, I’m not scared of the dark,” I snap. So, stress doesn’t make me the kindest person. Sue me.
“Lucky for me? More like lucky for you. Part of your poor planning was not having a single flashlight in the house.” I see stress doesn’t make Ares the kindest person either. It’s kind of comforting, in a way. Seeing him be so… human.
“Shit,” I mumble to myself.
“Do you have candles?” he asks.
