The Locked Door

Restless, angry clouds threatened my walk home from school that day. I’d stayed late at school practicing my trumpet solo for the upcoming band competition, and now no umbrella was going to keep me dry. Unrelenting humidity cloaked my body and tiny drops of sweat gathered on my temples when I exited the school.

“I’ve got to get home and make sure my dog is okay,” I said to Tessa, my dependable friend, and fellow trumpeter.

“Hurry,” she said. “I just hear thunder.” She turned in the opposite direction, waved, and ran down the street.

It wouldn’t take me long to get home, but the storm clouds troubled me. They were piled up in the sky, like a swollen cow ready to give birth. When I was little, Granddad and Mama told me to pay more attention to the weather. I remembered how often Granddad’s weather advice was shared with me. 

“Your Granddaddy always used the sky and clouds to know what to expect,” MaMa said as she pulled my thin hair back into ponytails, forcing tears to leak from my eyes. “Granddaddy was rarely wrong. He’d glance at the sky and tell us the temperature and report that we’d have a gorgeous day or that fog would cover the creek bed. The day you were born, he declared it would snow. And by gosh, we got four inches just when you popped out, wailing like a coyote.”

We’d laugh, and I’d promise to watch the clouds, but I ignored them. I was too busy trying to tackle algebra problems, reading English sonnets, and spying on Raymond Vincent with his bright-toothy smile, and olive eyes that made my heart thump as fast as my dog Willa’s tail.

Granddad passed away two years ago, and I missed our nature walks together. His descriptions of the gentle deer and enormous snake he’d seen in the fields as a young boy always intrigued me. But his perception of changing weather was not passed on to my genes. 

Lightning crackled, and its power frightened me. A savage storm was coming, and I needed to get home and locate Willa. 

“Move inside if the sky darkens,” Granddad said one time while hunting watercress in the creek. He used to take me there to hunt minnows and crayfish and watch the otters slip down their zig-zag trails into the muddy waters. His words of advice lingered in my brain like his welcoming smell, dust and oil mixed with the scent of Old Spice™.

The wind picked up, and the giant oak trees quivered. I had two blocks to go. Our house perched near the outskirts of town with the creek snaking through the back. I could cut through Mr. Erlandson’s lawn to get home faster. But he chained his bulldog to his fence. If I got too close, I’d take home a dog bite along with my wet clothes. The dog meant an extra block for me.

My shoe caught a bulge in the sidewalk and I slipped, fell, and landed grass. I panicked. I couldn’t catch my breath. A quiet fell over the neighborhood, and a greenish tint blocked the sun. My heart stopped.

Twister! Run!

“The world is silenced and green skies appear when there’s a twister coming! You must never wait. Get to the tornado shelter as fast as you can. Take nothing with you. Do you understand?” Again, Granddad’s weather knowledge flashed in my brain like a bolt of lightning.

I jumped up and broke into a run, my trumpet banging against my knees, bruising them. No one would be home. The neighbors were at their jobs, and Mama was working at the downtown grill.

Clunky hailstones pelted me as I reached the backyard. I was a short distance from the house. A sudden pressure change popped my eardrums.

I pulled the backdoor open against the ferocious wind and hollered.

“Willa! Willa!” 

She was hidden under the kitchen table and ran to me with her tail tucked between her legs. I scooped her up and pushed the door outward. The monster storm swallowed us whole.  

I could barely see through the sideways rain and hail, but I managed one step at a time. Willa howled in confusion. The darkness blinded me as I searched for the shelter door. Reaching for it, I grabbed the slippery handle and pulled. 

Nothing happened. The door didn’t open. 

Muscles straining, I tried it again. Willa slipped and I tucked her back up under one arm and jerked the door for the third time. It refused to open. Branches careened past our heads and terrifying noises roared in the yard. The twister was here. 

Locked! The door was locked! Fear flooded me! I stooped over the door, sopping wet, and cried along with Willa.

“Please open. Please open.”

I smelled something faint, but there. An odor wafted up and filled my senses. Old Spice™. A feeling of safety drenched my body and I reached down and yanked the door handle one more time. 

It opened! I shoved Willa inside and tumbled down the stairs after her. The bulky door slammed shut as the angry winds bombarded it with debris.

Later, Mama found me there curled with Willa under a bench. She’d raced home, climbing over downed trees on the way. 

“I am so glad you made it,” Mama said, hugging me. “But Papa locked this place up last summer, worried the dirt walls would collapse. How’d you get it open?”

I didn’t know how to explain the door opening just in time. That it had been Granddad. I had smelled him close to me. It wasn’t a dream. I’d felt his presence and protection. She wouldn’t believe me, so I remained quiet.

I held Mama’s hand and together we climbed from the shelter to the havoc the twister had caused. The house remained, although a tree branch had shaved off part of the roof. Pieces of glass from the kitchen window shimmered on the grass. In the distance, dark clouds danced with the wind, and a thin red line of sunset was visible across the creek. 

“I’ll always watch the clouds, now Granddad,” I whispered.