Twenty Seven

As tired as they were, Cate and Sarah sat up talking until late in the night. Sophie woke up and sat crying behind the bathroom door, with Dinah sitting on the other side, nose pressed against the crack between the door and the floor.

They finally decided to try letting Sophie out of her exile, and after an initial mild confrontation--really just a tenative growl from Dinah and a half-hearted hiss from Sophie--the two cats seemed to settle into a truce of sorts. Dinah slept with Sarah in her usual spot--on top of the extra pillow--and Sophie stretched out along the back of the sofa where Cate had fallen asleep, mug of tea in hand.

Sarah had taken the mug from Cate's hand as it drooped toward the floor, and spread an afghan on top of her, then picked up Dinah and went off into her bedroom. She laid awake for a long time, thinking, and finally fell into a deep sleep with no dreams, or at least none that she remembered.

* * *

The storm let up sometime during the night, and by the time they woke up in the morning, the sun was brilliant in the morning sky and the air was heavy with heat and humidity. The shutters (and the roof) had held, but the lawn was littered with palm fronds and one of the huge palm trees at the edge of the beach across the street had fallen and was lying half in the street, half in Sarah's yard.

While Sarah was making tea in the kitchen, she picked up the phone to call the Grahams and be sure they were okay and see if there was any damage to the store, but the phone was dead. They hadn't lost power, though, which was a blessing. Jason wasn't scheduled to work until the afternoon, so she and Cate would do what they could to clean up the yard, then go in and check on the store. She wasn't worried about the store being closed--everyone else would be cleaning up after the storm, too, rather than shopping, and since she'd had the foresight to put a sign up on the door, no one would be worried if they did show up.

"What did you find out?" Cate was coming out of the bathroom, still dressed in Sarah's clothes, pulling her hair up in a ponytail on top of her head. Her own clothes, as well as Sarah's from the night before, were in the washing machine.

"Nothing. The phone's dead. We'd probably better go see if we can get the car unstuck, and see what else needs to taken care of right away around here, then get over to the store and take a look."

"Okay. Let's go." Cate finished with her hair and pulled on her sneakers, which had dried on top of the heat vent all night and were subsequently dry, but weirdly stiff. "Ick," she said as she tied them. "I should have washed these, too."

"Then they'd still be wet," Sarah reminded her.

"True, true."

Sarah had gone out while Cate was in the bathroom, and opened the shutters to get some light into the house. The yard wasn't actually too bad, apart from the big tree that had fallen. There were palm fronds everywhere, and several pieces of lumber which had been blown in from somewhere. They picked up debris and piled it at the side of the house to deal with later, then took a couple of pieces of the lumber and went across the street to deal with the car.

They circled it. "Doesn't look like it's damaged at all," Cate said. "Nope," Sarah agreed. Privately, she'd expected there to be a huge dent in the top from Yurkemi landing on it, and surely there would have been if he'd been human, but there was nothing. Maybe angels had a different physiology. Well, of course they do! she told herself, and then laughed.

"What?"

"Nothing. Let's see if we can get this baby unstuck."

It was surprisingly easy. They slid the pieces of lumber underneath the car's wheels, and with Cate pushing and Sarah driving, it only took a few minutes to move the car off the beach and onto the street. Getting it across the street and into Sarah's driveway proved to be impossible, though, because the palm tree was blocking the route.

It didn't matter anyway--they needed to get to the store. Sarah went back into the house to grab her bag, and found both Sophie and Dinah lying on the back of the couch in front of the window, watching the street. "You guys guarding the house?" she asked. She had been going to get Sophie's carrier to take her back to the store, but since the cats were getting along, and she didn't know what condition the store was in, she decided to leave her at the house and deal with it later.

"Just keep doing what you're doing," she said. "We'll be back in awhile."

They had just turned onto the street that led to the shopping district when their way was blocked by another tree. Farther down the block they could see city maintenance crews clearing away yet another downed palm tree, so they parked the car and walked the last block. The store was fine. The front window of the deli next door had been broken by some sort of flying debris, and the owners were there now patching the window with plywood. "Hey, guys," Cate called to them as they walked past. "Everything okay?"

"Yeah. Mostly. Just some broken glass and water--nothing major. We'll be open in a week!" That seemed optimistic, but she said, "Excellent!" and they went on past to the bookstore.

Cate's sign was still in the window, and she pulled it off as they entered the store, but as she was starting to throw it into the trash, she said, "Are we opening?"

"Sure, why not?"

"Just thought I'd better ask," she said, and threw the sign away.

The store was quiet; no one seemed to be interested in Christmas shopping, since they were mostly busy cleaning up their own yards and homes. There were quite a few houses that had been damaged, a lot of cars that had been crushed by falling trees, and more broken windows than could be counted. After sitting around the store for a couple of hours talking mostly to each other, Sarah decided they could be of better use elsewhere.

"Make a new sign, why don't you?" she asked Cate, and they stuck the new sign ("Closed for the day--come back tomorrow!" with the flying trees of yesterday now lying on the crayoned sand) on the door and too off walking to see if there was anything useful they could do. They didn't get far--they ended up helping the deli owner sweep out the broken glass from the store and mop up water, and he fed them lunch as a reward.

Over pastrami sandwiches and bottles of soda, they commisserated with him over the damage to the store, and gossiped about their neighbors. Bob, the deli owner, had heard that several yachts had sunk in the bay, but hadn't walked over yet to see since he'd been busy securing the store. He also said that some of the expensive homes near the marina had been damaged, one losing most of its roof, but "don't quote me on that," he said. The local high school had been turned into a shelter for the temporarily homeless, and Sarah thought that must be pretty funny--Sarasota high society mixing with the already-homeless folks that she was sure would turn up there, too, would undoubtedly be interesting. Maybe it would be worth volunteering just to see . . .

She decided she'd call later and see if the Red Cross needed help, which reminded her about the phone. She asked Bob, "Does your phone work?"

"Nope. It's been out since yesterday."

"Are the Grahams at home, do you know?" She'd forgotten to check on them.

"Nah. They were, but they took off early. Went over to the marina, I think, to see if anybody needed help."

That sounded like them. Wrapping gifts at the bookshop when they were shorthanded, and looking for a way to help those displaced by the storm the next day. "Okay, we'll go looking for them. Thanks for lunch!"

"No problem. Take care now." By now the street crew had cleared the street of trees, and they got back in the car and drove slowly toward the marina.

"Wow." A yacht. In the street, almost. They had arrived at the marina to find a group of people crowded around a yacht that had been beached. Well, maybe not a yacht--Sarah had never had much interest in boats and wasn't sure when a boat became a yacht, but this, if just a boat, was definitely a big boat. In the group, Sarah spotted Elizabeth and Donald, and they picked their way through the crowd to reach them. Elizabeth immediately hugged Sarah.

"Oh, I'm so glad you girls are all right!" she cried. "I wanted to call you, but the phones were out, and I thought we should come check on you, but Donald said he was sure you were all right."

"And I was right, wasn't I?" he said, but hugged Sarah, too. Even though the rain had stopped, they were both wearing yellow slickers over their shorts, and Donald's face was streaked with mud. Elizabeth reached over to scrub at his face with a handkerchief, and Sarah asked, "So what have you guys been up to?"

"Just sightseeing, mostly," Elizabeth said. "Donald helped pull a tree off a car, though, down the road that way." She pointed. "It's much worse on that side of town. Lots of signs and trees down, and a lot of roofs torn off. Did you hear they turned the high school into a shelter?" She grinned mischieviously. "I bet that's something."

Sarah laughed. "Yes, I heard. I considered volunteering just to get in and see."

After awhile they grew bored of watching the group of men standing around the boat (yacht?), and Sarah and Cate headed back toward the store. Elizabeth and Donald wanted to check on some friends of theirs across town, so they parted ways, promising to check in later.

"Sarah?" Cate asked, once they were in the car again.

"Yes?"

"Do you think I might go home?"

"Oh, Cate, I'm sorry!" Sarah laughed. "I totally forgot you had a home! I thought you might just live with me for awhile." She smiled over at her, then sobered. "Man. I hope your house is okay."

"Yeah."

"Well, let's go see."

* * *

It was, mostly. There was one broken window--a tree branch had speared it--but the roof was okay except for a few torn off shingles. Cate's pottery studio--really just an outbuilding that she had converted to hold a pottery wheel and kiln--had fared worse. The roof had been torn off, and one wall had collapsed, leaning sadly against the kiln. Pottery in various stages of completion lay broken on the ground, and the boards she had used as shelves were scattered all over the yard.

"Well, it was mostly bad pottery anyway," Cate said, surveying the damage. She picked up a small black pot that had survived unbroken. "Most of the good stuff was in the house or out on consignment--" She bent over and picked up another small pot, this one painted white and black. "A lot of the little stuff seems okay. Help me pick it up." They walked around the yard picking up pots; Kind of like an Easter egg hunt, Sarah thought. They managed to find six unbroken pieces among the shards of broken clay, and Cate placed them carefully on her kitchen table.

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© 2002 Willa G. Cline