The Departed: Chapter 1

It was storming when we awoke in our white linen beds. The clouds loomed like bloated monsters over the tall green hay field outside our bedroom window, rippling and swirling with a life of their own. Howls of wind rattled the white washed wooden siding and every so often a peel of raindrops would stampede the windows on the south wall of the bedroom, a preview of things to come. My parents were below running about the yard, mother in her night gown and father bare-chested in overalls, each tugging the tether of a frightened cow towards the shelter of the barn. 1

“It’s a tornado,” Thomas whispered in his bed across from me, his voice full of wonder.2

The cows were bawling. Margaret, the dairy cow that father taught me how to milk, wrenched free of mother’s grasp and bolted back into the pasture, heading for the far corner. Mother, slinging the wet weedy strands of brown hair back away from her eyes, dashed after her. Father rushed by with another cow in tow. They were fighting time.3

Loud clomping footsteps sounded from the hall as John, the hired man, ascended the stairs.4

“Relena, get your brothers down to the cellar,” the tall young man said hurriedly, his wheat blonde hair strewn haphazardly about the top of his head, his blue eyes wild. The boots that father purchased for him last week from the little store in the village were slicked crudely with mud. He panted as he stood in the doorway.5

I nodded and with that he dashed from the room with another reel of clomping announced his descent back down the stairs. 6

“Go wake up Charlie,” I told Thomas as he sprang from his bed and pulled on his trousers in front of the window.7

Charlie, the youngest, slept on a cot in the corner of mother and father’s room. Thomas, who was twelve, and myself, being sixteen, had a room to ourselves.8

I pulled my sun-faded lilac dress over my underclothes and slipped on my brown leather boots, leaving them unlaced. Thomas froze mid-pant leg, bracing himself against the window sill for balance.9

“Relena, Charlie is outside,” Thomas said suddenly, tearing his glance only momentarily away from the window to reveal his horrified expression, “he’s outside! He’s outside in the storm!”10

I pushed him away from the window and faintly glimpsed the small figure of Charlie adrift in a sea of hay. Each gust of wind sent rippling waves through the field, threatening to spill over the little five year old form. In one hand he held an orange, red, and yellow striped kite, the spool of string in his other hand. With each passing second, his little feet carried him further and further away from the tall square structure of the farm house. Further from safety.11

“Come on! We’ll get him!” I called as I ran to the hall and down the stairs, passing the many pictures of the stone-faced people on the walls, pictures of the people from the old country. I dodged the larger clumps of mud, left by John. Thomas pulled on a white button up shirt and followed closely behind me, chirping little worried groans as he ran his hand along the smooth pine banister that father stained last week. We reached the bottom of the stairs and hung a sharp left, turning towards the kitchen and the adjoining porch. The kitchen was alive with movement, any object of insignificant weight was being tossed and blown about the room, fueled by the angry force of the approaching tornado outside, allowed in by the open window. I flung open the screen door and took no heed as the wind caught it, first slamming it against the house then fiercely ripping it off its hinges and sending it soaring and spinning across the yard. It landed unceremoniously in mother’s garden, on top of the short patch of corn. Thomas ran into my back, lost his balance, and fell chest first to the ground. He heaved himself up, dripping with thick muddy water, and wiped his sleeve across his face.12

We ran around the edge of the house, our feet sliding in the soft muddy ground, our eyes repeatedly blinded by the sharp drones of rain drops. My curly red hair was quickly weighted down with moisture and reduced to mere wavy strands. We passed the barn, where in the distance mother and father were still rounding up the cattle, not knowing that it was the last opportunity they had to see their children. John, however, spotted us. In his hands he held a board, a hammer, and a nail, which he was using to cover the window in the chicken coop. He dropped them when he saw us enter the field.13

Thomas’s pants and my dress were immediately soaked up to our thighs. We were running full tilt, slowly gaining on Charlie who had such an immense head start. But thankfully, I saw, he had stopped and was unraveling the string of the spool. 14

Behind me, I heard Thomas scream. And shortly I, too, realized with great horror the event about to unfold. In front of Charlie, a funnel cloud was slowly dripping down from the sky. As it slid further, it grew longer and larger and rounder, gaining mass from neighboring clouds. 15

Charlie, faced with a tangle in his spool, noticed none of this. We ran faster, Thomas and I, John in hot pursuit. John was yelling, but the strong wind tore the words away and made them unrecognizable. We drew nearer and nearer to Charlie and were only 20 feet when he untangled the knot and released the kite into the air. The string pulled taught as the kite whipped in the wind, Charlie holding tightly. Charlie unraveled the spool more and more, the kite getting higher and higher. The fantastic form of the tornado drew ever closer, almost as if it was heading directly for Charlie. 16

“Charlie!” I screamed, even though I knew that he wouldn’t hear me.17

“The tornado…!” cried Thomas behind me before his voice was tore away.18

Charlie, looking proudly up at his kite, finally noticed the swirling monster of wind and dust in front of him. He stood frozen, hands still clasped about the spool as the string continued to unwind. With a snap, audible from our short distance away from him, the string ran out and pulled taught on the double knot tied around the spool. That was when Charlie, the spool raising his hands above his head, began to leave the ground. Thomas sped in front of me and leaped through the air, grabbing hold of Charlie’s little ankles, trying to pull him down. But the tornado spiraled closer and soon even Thomas was lifting into the air. I grabbed hold of him just as John caught up with us, my own feet lifting off the ground as John grabbed me about the waist, trying to anchor us all. The tornado approached and appeared to surround us, suddenly the field was gone, the house was gone, and all around us was white and gray. All I felt was my own grip on Thomas’s legs and John’s grip about my waist, praying that both would hold. The last image I remember seeing was the diamond shape of orange, yellow, and red, slowly drifting into white…19