Irving sat in the dimly lighted breakfast room, just off the kitchen, drinking a cup of coffee. Even though he couldn’t hear it clearly, he knew the wind’s velocity was increasing. The cover of the stove vent fan began to clatter. It always happened the same way. The vent cover started rattling, then the rain came. He normally found the noise unnerving. But now, it was soothing somehow.
The authorities issued an evacuation order a while back, but he remained. Fran stayed, too, but then, she had no choice. He’d waited three hurricane seasons for this very eventuality and nothing, no one would stand in the way of his plans. During the night, the cover’s banging increased in its frantic, irregular tempo. And the rain came. Came hard and stayed.
He’d waited three hurricane seasons for this very eventuality ….
At one point, Irving stood and walked to the living-room window. Oh yeah, this storm will be a doozy. The rain fell steadily, with a ruthless vigor, throughout the night and into the morning. Through the unrelenting deluge and the faint, early morning light, he realized the wind was already bending the palm trees like so many blades of grass. They danced in time with the tempest and the downpour.
A wooden Adirondack chair and various items of debris gamboled down the street. A faint smile crossed his lips. And the height of the storm was yet to come, he thought. We’re just to the east of the hurricane’s center, the more dangerous side of its path. So, we’re bound to take the worst it has to offer, because the storm’s forward motion strengthens the wind. Irving smiled again, broader this time. He’d learned a few things in his years living on the coast since he’d retired from his career as a statistician.
He returned to the kitchen, poured another cup of coffee, and sat at the breakfast table to resume his vigil. As the raindrops hit the vent cover like so many pebbles thrown by an angry sky, he thought back over what brought him and his anger to this point.
* * *
His and Fran’s marriage was a hurried, reckless undertaking at best. He’d just returned from the craziness of Vietnam and was trying to catch up with the time he’d lost while in the service. She was trying to overtake the lives her married peers were living without her. Soon after their nuptials they learned Fran was pregnant. But, by the time the child, a daughter, was born, Irving and Fran found themselves in a loveless union.
Divorce wasn’t the answer for either. Fran was willing to continue living the lie by keeping up the appearances of a normal family scene. Irving loved his daughter too much to risk losing her, even part of the time, in a custody battle. So they settled into trying to make the best of an awful circumstance. From this arrangement, Irving came to learn just how interchangeable the words “marriage” and “mirage” might be. The stalemate was barely tolerable as the years passed. What made it bearable for Irving was his very close bond with his daughter. Nonetheless, as time passed and the cloud over the marriage grew to a thunderhead, the girl grew more distant from the family unit, including Irving.
The stalemate was barely tolerable as the years passed.
Eventually, their daughter went off to college, married, and moved on, thrilled to be out from under the dour existence her home life had become. Irving often rebuked himself for letting the misery of the marriage keep him from being a better father. Maybe he should have tried harder while they were still together. He’d never been able to do so. Although it was a situation of his own making, he resented being stuck in the marriage. It affected every aspect of his life, including the relationship with the girl. Psychologically, he’d become a wretched creature.
About the time he’d “lost” his daughter, Irving had to face with the catastrophic illness which struck Fran, leaving her wheelchair bound and in need of constant care and attention. Now, he’d told himself, the marriage really kept him trapped. Despite his anger and resentment, he would not walk away and have others see him as a heartless fiend who left a loving, helpless woman at a calamitous time. The many years of such duty to a woman he detested made Irving’s bitterness grow exponentially. Now, that servitude was going to end.
* * *
Suddenly, the appearance of car headlights brought Irving back from his reminiscence. Since the authorities had long since ordered the evacuation, what was this? He hurried to a living-room window. As the beams raked the house, Irving stepped aside from the window and watched from the darkened room as a Belvedere Township Police Department vehicle passed along the street. The slow-moving patrol car created a wake from the chassis-deep water while dodging flotsam as it moved. The cops were out and about making certain, as best they could, the populace followed the evacuation order. Irving saw no cause for alarm.
… a Belvedere Township Police Department vehicle passed along the street.
Their neighbors left the area some time ago with Irving’s assurances he and Fran would be right behind them, joining the massive exodus of evacuees. He’d tucked their car was safely away in the detached garage behind the house, and no lights were on in the residence. The home looked abandoned. But there was no need to let some sharp-eyed, young officer spy him standing in the window at this late stage. The prowl car moved away, no doubt heading for the dry safety of the police garage before the brunt of the storm skidded across the panhandle.
He turned and moved back to the breakfast room table where the radio softly hummed a storm update from the National Hurricane Center. “The category three storm is coming ashore in the area of Staysail Beach,” the stern-voiced announcer warned. “The storm, which has gathered strength as it plowed across the Caribbean and carved a path of devastation, has left dozens of people dead in its wake. Local and state authorities are making every effort to eliminate, or at least minimize, that statistic here. Please….”
As the radio broadcast continued, Irving smiled to himself. Well, he thought, there will be at least one fatality here in the wake of this storm. At that moment, the house shuddered. He looked around. Irving hoped to hell it wasn’t the roof trying to pull away. They’d been paying premiums to the bloodsucking insurance company over the years, but he didn’t want to deal with them any more than necessary. The man expected the paperwork on Fran’s demise to be enough of a pain in the butt.
He poured another cup of coffee and moved toward the patio door. As he walked, the house seemed to moan against the weather’s rage. Behind him, the radio went silent. “Power’s gone,” Irving whispered. “We’re in for it now.” At the door, he peered over his cup at the backyard. One thing in particular caught Irving’s eye. Between the slats of the vertical blinds, he noticed that stupid mimosa tree Fran insisted he plant, bending helplessly against the merciless wind. It might not survive the tempest.
Two birds with one storm. He smiled. Fran called it her heavenly tree, but he referred to it as the tree from hell. That damned thing propagated everywhere. He’d long since foregone the backache involved in pulling the seedlings out of the ground and just mowed over them as fast as they appeared. And the “weed tree,” as he called it, left mounds of pink fuzz all over his vegetable garden. The sooner it’s gone, the better.
He momentarily studied the translucent corrugated fiberglass panels covering the patio. They vibrated slightly in the high wind. Just so they stayed in place until he needed them, he reflected, everything would be fine.
Before going back to the breakfast room, he walked down the hall to check on Fran. After getting his wife out of bed that morning, he’d dumped her in the wheelchair and left her in the bedroom. She slumped in the thing, still sleeping off the effects of the sedative he’d given her. If his calculations were correct, and they usually were, she’d be out when it happened. Everyone recognized Irving for his meticulous planning. This vignette would be no exception.
Satisfied, Irving walked back to the kitchen. The power failure had turned the coffee pot off. He poured another cup before the coffee cooled. As he stood there looking out the kitchen window, he picked up the telephone. Dead. Good. Again, his luck and timing held true.
He returned to the breakfast room and switched the radio from electric to battery power. The device hummed back to life, spewing forth information on the latest developments.
Sitting at the table, he contemplated what the next several days might bring. In seventy-two hours, people may know his name across the country, possibly around the globe. They’d admire Irving as an arthritic-prone hero, who, alone and with no means to get help, tried desperately to evacuate his invalid wife from the fury of a killer hurricane. In her terror, she fought his efforts to the point he’d sedated her in order to save her. When the world learned of his valiant labors against the wrath of the storm, people might well forgive and forget he’d started the evacuation too late because of his wife’s resistance.
In her terror, she fought his efforts to the point he’d sedated her in order to save her.
Irving considered the upcoming events. Unfortunately, I’ll be unsuccessful. Fran will die in the storm’s mighty rage. And wreckage, of my own making, will “confine” me until I get someone’s attention with calls for help and they rescue me. Then sympathy will wash over me like the storm surge now covering the area. The story should be good enough to get me, red-eyed and suffering the anguish of loss, a spot on Fox News or CNN or both. Irving thought he might sell his painful, yet gallant story to Reader’s Digest,or maybe for one of those sappy made-for-television movies. People eat that crap up, he thought, smiling.
The man sat for a while and listened to the hurricane’s fury. He had no difficulty hearing it now. Only periodic, unidentifiable crashes outside interrupted his solitude. Funny how his life’s despair could end in a storm pouring from the heavens. He’d often joke to his few close friends his and Fran’s marriage had been made in heaven–the same place that produced thunder and lightning. They never knew just how sincerely he meant those words.
Irving glanced at his watch. By his estimation, the time had arrived. He left the half-finished cup of coffee on the table. No sense making things look too orderly under the dire circumstances. Back in the bedroom, he scattered some of Fran’s clothing around to give the appearance of a man frantically trying to dress and move the dead weight of a heavy, invalid woman. He’d set the stage.
Fran still slumbered as Irving pushed the wheelchair down the hall to the family room overlooking the patio. He paused there as he braced himself for the ordeal to come. This would be a test of his strength and will, through which, he’d repeatedly told himself, he will prevail. Irving rubbed his knobby, achy hands together, not in relish, but in determination to carry his plan through. In his resolve, he refused even to look at Fran from this point on. She was a mere object which he could cast aside with no more thought than one used in disposing of a soiled tissue.
A powerful rush of air pushed past Irving as he opened the patio door. Later, he’d deal with the sources of the crashes sounding in the rooms behind him. Fearing excessive damage to his home, Irving pushed Fran through the open door and, just as quickly, closed it behind them.
The rain, driving horizontally against him, stung his face. Fran didn’t stir. The violent gusts transformed his every effort to move her into a nightmare of pain. Pushing slowly against the storm, Irving placed Fran’s wheelchair in the position he’d calculated to cause her the most injury when the patio cover “fell.” Since the first warning the hurricane might make landfall in their area, he’d worked meticulously in preparing the patio roof to crash and on locating the proper point of impact. His strength was ebbing, but his greatest challenge lie ahead. Nearly blinded by the driving downpour, he fought to get to the spot on the patio from which he could raise the cover slightly before letting it drop, crushing Fran. If, by chance, the structure didn’t finish her life, he’d simply use a piece of four-by-four lumber and complete the job himself before assuming his “trapped” position.
His strength was ebbing, but his greatest challenge lie ahead.
Irving summoned all his remaining strength and used a timber to lift the corner of the cover and push it away from its support. Just before he released it, movement came into his peripheral vision. To his horror, he realized the gale had blown Fran’s wheelchair from the spot in which he’d placed her. He’d forgotten to set the brake. As it rolled backward toward the house, Irving panicked. Against the strong, gusting wind and biting rain, he reached out for her with one hand. As he did, he lost control of the timber holding the roof above him. The timber fell away, and the patio cover dropped on him.
Although the crash stunned him and the rubble held him down, Irving initially felt no pain aside from a few minor scratches and soreness. It convinced him he’d come through the crash otherwise unscathed. This is only a momentary setback, he reasoned. He could see Fran, stupid, oblivious Fran still flopped safely in her wheelchair, now protected from the chief force of the elements by the fallen cover.
Suddenly, he coughed and tasted the metallic flavor of blood in his mouth. At that point, Irving became conscious of the strawberry-colored blood disgorging from his neck, covering his shirt and spreading across the patio. Apparently, the sharp edge of a corrugated panel had scraped across his neck and cut his jugular vein. Now, his reasoning turned to terror. Irving’s frantic efforts to lift the structure and free himself were in vain! He’d exhausted most of his strength positioning Fran and raising the patio roof.
Irving felt himself turn to liquid below the waist. His body shuddered involuntarily; his legs kicked senselessly. Gradually, he felt chilly despite the warmth of the day. As he continued to struggle, Irving grasped the hopelessness of his situation. As he lay there, he realized his predictions were only partly coming to fruition. The authorities would still see him as a sympathetic, yet unsuccessful hero, unable to evacuate his wife from the killer storm safely. And there would, indeed, be at least one more death here in the hurricane’s wake.
Blood and rain almost blinded Irving. His thrashing about diminished as he grew steadily weaker. Just before his eyes finally closed, he looked at Fran with vision blurred by blood and rain. Her eyes were open. Had the noise of the crash awakened her? The howling wind? The stinging rain? He focused on her face. Their eyes met. Fran returned his hard gaze. And smiled. ©