There She Blows

9:07AM. My phone began to vibrate to the beat of Macklemore heading downtown to pop some tags. I glanced over to see it jiving towards the edge of the desk, caller ID announcing Wanda on the other end.

“Wanda, you know this is Do-Not-Disturb-Me time,” I mumbled. 

The gyrations stopped as T-Mobile told her to leave a voicemail.

“Just send me a text message like you’re supposed to,” I thought and looked back to my laptop, not sure of how to get my momentum going again. Ah yes, Jackson was considering using the alley door of the convenience store to see if there were any diapers in storage he could snag. I tapped my fingers on the cheap laminate counter that served as my desktop and considered if Jackson was really capable of this covert deception – had he reached that degree of desperation yet? 

“Yes, I think so,” and I put my fingers back to the keyboard to begin again.

Vibration. 

“For crying out loud, Wanda! What do you want,” my brain screamed.

I grabbed the phone and answered with a slow and musical “Yes?”

“Turn on your tv.” That was all she said.

“What station,” I asked her. Unbelievable. She wants me to see some ridiculous morning show about some shit I don’t care about.

“Any of them.” 

It was a statement, flat. The hairs on my arms raised their red flags at the removal of any emotion in her voice. It was protective.

“Ok, give me a sec.” I had to extricate myself from my desk but the sense of urgency in my guts was escalating.

I rummaged in the creases of my hobbit sized recliner and found the remote controls for the tv, the sound system, the Amazon Fire TV box. 

“Why do we have so many damn remotes,” I mumbled, feeling this weird panic that I was going to miss something life-changing. The only thing I’d experienced like this before was when the planes struck the towers. Second thoughts – did I really want to see what was happening in the world? Should I just go back to bed?

Once the picture came clear and the Bose speakers came alive, I didn’t need to find a station. Wanda was right. Any station would do.

My eyes didn’t want to make sense of it. A split screen of a reporter on one side and the other filled with black smoke, red glowing magma, and a river of mud and trees as the lahar swept through my old hometown. 

Mount Rainier had erupted. 

While I gazed slack-jawed at the scene, a new screen split with the reporter as a live stream was coming through somehow. People were screaming, weeping. They’d made it up one of the volcanic evacuation routes into the hills to Copper Creek hut. They were high enough to reach a cell phone tower that was still operating as the ash cloud moved southeastward. The lushness of the Douglas fir trees starkly contrasted the desolate landscape below them; my town, Ashford, WA, was both burning and drowning. 

“Are you watching,” Wanda asked.

Startled, I’d forgotten Wanda entirely, I answered, “oh my God.” 

Wanda still lived in Ashford, but had been house sitting for her parents in Gig Harbor for the last week. She had planned on going home to her minimalist blue A-frame cabin that evening after they returned from their annual cruise. 

The screen changed, the reporter absent, and now it was a full view of the live stream. Suddenly, Wanda and I realized who was live-streaming. It was Jimmy Newsome with his German Shepherds pacing in circles around him. 

“It’s all gone,” he kept repeating, shock taking root in his mind. 

My stomach vaulted and now more than the hairs on my arms were at attention.

“I’ll call you back,” I said and hung up on Wanda. 

I moved swiftly back to my makeshift desk and started clicking the mouse frantically, searching the laptop for a file: Google drive, My drive, Writing folder, scrolling down, scrolling up, unable to make my brain spell correctly. Found it. 

ThereSheBlows.doc

Scrolling down, down, down, back up. There.

Jimmy Newsome stood atop the hill where Copper Creek Hut rested for weary skiers with its off-grid electricity, Berkey water filter, and a pit toilet. He kept repeating, “It’s all gone,” as his German Shepherds Molly and Max circled him in protective mode.

I couldn’t move. It was an eerie coincidence, nothing more. I unplugged my aging laptop and hoped the battery would last for at least an hour. Unlikely. On the television, there were people running up the road to the high mountain point on foot; some carrying nothing, some with backpacks, one cradling a cat to their heaving chest. 

“Who’s cat is this?” he yelled, eyes wild and lips trembling. “Who just left their goddamn cat to die?” 

It was Bobby Montagne, the solemnly gruff man we’d bought our house from. He held the cat like it was a child someone had abandoned. The little gray tabby clung to him, knowing Bobby had saved it from what literally looked like one of Dante’s circles of hell. 

I looked back to my laptop.

Bobby held the cat closely, protectively, and questioned the others, “Is this your cat? Did you leave it to die?”

“What. is. HAPPENING?”

Jimmy walked to the edge of the hill and did his best to zoom down to the town, trying to find his home in the neighborhood behind the post office. 

“It’s all gone,” he said again. The post office, made of cinder blocks, concrete, and rebar was still framed out, but the roof was gone, as were the windows and doors. Mud and water infiltrated the interior and continued to rush around the outside corners, washing away the earth and gravel surrounding it. What looked to be pieces of mail and cardboard boxes swam down what was once State Route 706 looking for a proper residence to call home. All the surrounding homes, made of wood and plaster, were gone. The image shook in time with Jimmy’s shoulders as he sobbed. 

What had I written next? Where was my house? It must be gone. What happens next? I looked back to my computer to see what was written. 

Surveying the town below, Jimmy could hardly find a landmark to help him center himself. When he finally found the post office, and where his home should have been, his grief overcame him. Ashford was his home and it was all gone. Everything he had worked for, sacrificed for, LIVED for was erased in a matter of minutes. His grief was tangible and the others near him gave space for this private man to grapple with what he saw, not knowing what he would do next; maybe if they had moved closer, offered comfort rather than empty space, things might have turned out differently. Or maybe not. 

Jimmy turned from the edge of the mountainside and walked 100 feet back to the hut. He pulled his dog leashes from his pocket and squatted, attaching the dogs to a porch post. The dogs licked his face while he gave them scratches behind their ears and said they were the bestest dogs. Jimmy looked to Bobby and gave a nod of his head from Bobby’s direction back to the dogs. Bobby understood and returned the gesture. Jimmy stood, turned, and ran to the edge of the mountainside, disappearing. Someone screamed, “Jimmy,” but he was already gone. 

Ashford was gone, and so was Jimmy.

No. Nope. This is not happening. Jimmy’s camera was still focused on the post office, the shaking subsided. He turned his phone around to himself, too close, only showing him from nose to forehead, his eyes like polished stones. 

“I’m going to secure my dogs now.”

My heart trying to beat out of my chest, the phone began to vibrate again. Still Wanda. My mind was fractured between watching what was happening on the screen, the phone wanting my attention, and knowing I needed to do something to stop whatever alternate universe was crashing into my reality. 

The laptop wasn’t going to last. I had to hurry. 

Google drive – My Drive – Writing folder – ThereSheBlows.doc

Right click, scroll, delete. 

Error. File is in use, please close file to proceed.

“Damnit!”

Close file, go back, right click, DELETE.

“Yes I’m sure I want to delete.” The television showed Jimmy scratching Molly and Max behind the ears simultaneously.

Click OK.

The television screen went black. My phone stopped vibrating. 

I carefully picked up the phone, wondering if it would disintegrate into dust in my hand, and scrolled through the call log. No calls today from Wanda, or anyone. No text messages or unheard voicemail messages. I sat down in my recliner and rocked myself to hide the shaky mental shutdown I was about to experience. And then I remembered Jackson and the convenience store. 

Jackson would not be robbing anyone today – not today, not ever. 

In Memory of Jimmy, I wish we could have saved you.