The North Face of the Heart - Dolores Redondo Page 0,2

been a mistake. He knew oppressive heat typically followed tornados, so he should have chosen something lighter. Everything around him had been destroyed except for the untouched little red barn by the steps to the underground shelter where the Jones family had taken refuge.

He picked up his briefcase and headed that way. The storm shelter’s heavy metal doors had been flung back. A stout chain still dangled from the interior handholds, evidence of the family’s hurry to escape their dark refuge. He descended the steps and paused for a moment to take in the scent of the basement, a rich mixture of mold and decay with a faint smell of urine. His heart accelerated. The shelter was deserted. Martin ascended the steps and went toward the farmhouse. Or, rather, what was left of it.

Albert woke up slowly. Even before he opened his eyes, he knew he couldn’t move. A tremendous weight lay across him. He heard faraway voices, surely the Jones family, and he tried to call out to them. The pressure on his chest was so great that after only three labored breaths, he passed out again.

He came to in a flood of dazzling light. He didn’t know how long he’d been unconscious. He told himself not to panic. If he became hysterical, he’d pass out again. Trying to assess his situation, he realized he was pinned. He saw a section of the coop’s roof on him, but he felt something else on top of that, something terribly heavy. The roof fragment wasn’t very wide. He worked his left hand around the edge and touched something lying across it, probably one of the heavy wood uprights. He panted. His forehead burned, scraped raw by flying fragments of wood, and his nose was full of blood and snot. The upright wouldn’t budge. He couldn’t move his left leg. It was broken—and he just knew it was shattered.

Albert wanted to cry but knew blubbering could kill him. He focused his whole being on controlling his emotions so as to fend off an asthma attack. With great effort, he breathed as deeply and as regularly as the heavy weight permitted. He imagined his mama’s voice—Very good, Albert, you’re doing very well—and the way she patiently talked him through his attacks.

The thought of Mama made him want to cry again. His eyes brimmed with tears, and he felt like a stupid little kid. Stop it, he told himself, and an involuntary shudder jerked his destroyed leg. He gasped in pain and lost the little control he’d established.

After a moment, he again focused on counting his breaths, doing his best not to think of his mama. Eventually he regained a semblance of calm. He twisted his head to the right, scraping his forehead as he tried to see through a gap in the heap of smashed wall panels.

Albert was a country boy. Even though he couldn’t see the sky from his position, the slant of light told him it was early afternoon. The tornado had swept away every trace of cloud.

Because Mr. Jones had cut the grass the day before, he had a clear view of the man walking across the field. It wasn’t Mr. Jones; this man was carrying a briefcase, and a badge on his chest flashed in the sun. Albert gulped air and tried to shout, but produced only a hoarse wheeze. The man turned in his direction and scanned the wreckage scattered across the farmyard. Albert was sure the man was going to help him, but just then, a hen that had been lying inert to his right revived with a squawk and scrambled through the gap into the yard. The man looked away and continued toward the farmhouse. Albert broke into tears. He didn’t care if he choked. He was going to die anyway.

The closer he got, the clearer their laments became, the same wails he’d heard dozens of times before. The actual words meant little. All survivors of catastrophe, every single one, sounded the same. That wet, strangled voice as if their throats had been cut, the miserable pleas when rescuers appeared. They wasted their dwindling energy rooting through the devastation for something familiar, anything at all to help assuage their survivor’s guilt.

A teenage girl was picking through the debris, collecting colored scarves. She waved them overhead like a gymnast, tracing trails of dust before wrapping them around her neck. She was the first to see him. She called to the family and pointed in his direction; her