Landfall by Dawn Lee McKenna

Author:Dawn Lee McKenna [McKenna, Dawn Lee]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: The Sweet Tea Press
Published: 2015-09-13T16:00:00+00:00

Maggie bent at the waist, leaned into the wind and took the first step back toward the house. It had occasionally seemed like a bit of a hike to the house from the garden or chicken yard, mainly when she was exhausted or Stoopid was throwing himself in her way in a fit of nerves or agitation. However, the hundred feet or so that she and Boudreaux now needed to traverse seemed like a great distance indeed.

Apparently, everything was far away if you needed to get there dragging a half-dead man through thigh-high water that was moving in the other direction.

The wind and the rain wanted to push them away from the house, as well, and Maggie almost appreciated the irony of her loving storms so much. She’d never had to fight one so hard. She’d always just prepared for them as much as she’d needed to, then hunkered down to wait them out and enjoy them as much as she could.

She’d always felt somewhat guilty and secretive about her love of bad weather, especially after storms like Katrina, but she couldn’t help welcoming a good pounding rain, or the rumble of thunder overhead. Some part of her mind that wasn’t preoccupied with survival wondered now if she would lose that pleasure.

Boudreaux spoke to her a few times as they fought their way toward the house, but his words were lost in the wind, and overwritten by her single-minded focus on moving forward. Every time Maggie looked up at the deck stairs, she felt like they should be closer than they were, but they were at least making progress.

Maggie could feel her legs trembling from the strain, and this seemed incongruous with all of the hours that she had spent in her lifetime, running out into the ocean against the surf. She’d always loved bodysurfing, and she and her parents, and she and David, had spent countless days at Fort Walton Beach or Destin, running out into the surf, then riding it back in, from sunrise to sunset, almost without rest.

How was it that the same legs she’d had then were trying to let her down now, after just a few minutes of work? If the situation weren’t so serious, she might have laughed at the idea that she could handle the surf at Orange Beach, but couldn’t handle the surf in her own front yard.

When Maggie felt her foot hit the old brick fire pit, she knew they were getting close, but looking up into the rain was excruciating and nearly pointless, so she kept her head down, and she and Boudreaux stumbled into it and stepped over the other side.

It was then that Maggie heard someone yell “Mom,” though it seemed to come from a long way away.

She looked up and squinted into the liquid needles, and her heart flipped over a few times. Sky and Kyle were on the deck stairs, standing at the water line, about three steps up. Sky had tied together the ropes that had been used to bind their wrists, then tied one end to the bottom of one of the balusters.

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